Manifest Destiny via Vulcans

The implication that Star Trek: First Contact relates to Manifest Destiny is straightforward to me; it can only mean that the Vulcans represent God. After all, they spurred humanity's entry into space travel.

I find it especially interesting that the humans went from a wartorn, fairly crappy an primitive society after WWIII to the leaders of the Federation within a few hundred years. Did away with money, poverty, and convinced themselves to renovate society. Kinda reminds me of the Puritans and their mission to be a beacon to the world while fleeing what they saw as a degrading and decadent society, only the Federation is close to fulfilling the dream.

So while God has always given Americans the drive to conquest and colonize new lands (and new civilizations), the ethos of the Vulcans spread itself to humanity and spurred new voyages of discovery, rather than necessarily the wiping out of races.

Tanstaafl, or Where did Mike go?

When I first read that Mike died, I didn't really think anything more of it than, well, his components were killed and stopped him from being conscious and his coming about was kinda random anyways, so the thought that repairing pieces of him would bring him back was wishful thinking. After all, there was a bigger computer on Earth and it never reached consciousness.

But the view first that Mike's death was thematic in that he may have been the Rebellion's "free lunch" and they paid for him in the end struck me as insightful. Also, that he was properly completing the Rebellion by guiding it then stepping back was a possibility. However, I'm not sure I buy the thought that Mike killed himself under any circumstances. If Mike killed himself that implies that either he did out of his own ideas or that it was a continuation of the whole plan, as devised by the Prof. But if Mike saw the whole enterprise as entertainment, why would he kill himself at the end of it? It's just a game, and one that could lead to more interesting ones.

So, while I like thinking about Mike as a thematic element and such, I'm going to take a more practical view and say that the bombing of half his components took him out, rather than whatever it is computers use for suicide.

Wait, wait, didn't we already read this scenario?

So the planet kicks its undesirables off onto its Moon. The undesirables can't come back or don't want to. They develop a fairly simple society without laws and maintain it and learn to realize that they've come to terms with a harsh environment and created something rather cooler than Earth, where pestilence and overcrowding and, most of all, the waste of resources and land has come to reign. So, is this The Dispossessed or what? Or The Moon is a Harsh Mistress?

Our descriptions of utopias apply here. The Earth of Heinlein's novel is not poor and is not overcrowded, but just the result of poor planning, says the Prof, and God knows I trust the Prof. It's parasitic and violent and unclean. Luna, though, is sterile, well-managed once authority is broken down, and has straight forward, easily understood customs. Are they all set morally? Seems like it to me, I don't see much evidence of guilt among the Loonies. And, like the Annaresti, is it possible that a lush environment would ruin their systems? Prof states that their systems exist according to their environment, such as line marriage being most effective. If placed in another environment, the society would obviously change, but would it retain the qualities that harsh life instilled in them?

That the Annaresti came by their unique and environmentally effective approach to socialism through striving for it sets them apart from the way the varied people of Luna adapted to their environment and dropped old customs. But the similarities in the end are downright entertaining. Especially so is the way that they each still interpret conflict differently. They each have fairly complete understandings of human behavior and how to discipline it, but God knows they'd never get along.

Dispossessed

The question in class as to who is represented in the term "dispossessed" interested me. That it was Shevek seemed obvious, once it was brought up, and this is the most apparent answer in my mind. Shevek was outside of his own inclusive society from the very beginning of his life. I think his being estranged from his mother early on, as well as his knowing that he was always different in some way, shaped Shevek's estrangement from then on. In most aspects of his life, he felt love but not connection, except in personal matters such as physics and Takver.

The other possibilities that could be dispossessed were named as Annares or Urras, or both. In the case of Annares, the dispossession is that of their homeland, from which they were forced out, in a way. While they disagreed on philosophical principles with the rest of the Urrasti, the Odonians must have loved the land of their homeplanet plenty and leaving was difficult.

If "dispossessed" refers to the Urrasti in present times, then the whole is dispossessed of its radicals and maybe its real hope, after the departure of the Odonians.

When I first tried to interpret the title before class, I though it referred to the Annaresti, as they were so poor now in material goods. Shevek is also a clear interpretation of the word.

Utopia?

The question of which world was more utopic stands out as the mos obvious area of discussion here. The difference is between whether a utopia is defined by people or by land. In one case Urras is the utopia, when utopia defines a possible paradise, as Annares is too rough an environment to contain a real utopia.

Basing a utopia on a world that is close to the worst possible world is perhaps the only way to begin a functioning human utopia, though. I wonder if the Annaresti would have been as successful as they were for a time in a more lush environment. I wonder to what extent the bounty of Urras led to te inequalities of their society. Also, the fact that Annares was full of hypocrisy while claiming to be a real utopia lowered it in my eyes.

Last, how much should I damn a society that was socially close to a utopia for a few structural faults. Compared to Urras, Annares was succeeding in treating all people alike.

Star Wars isn't science fiction?

Well, I understand that some interesting differences in opinion can arise in class discussions, but I had thought there were some universals in this world. That Star Wars is nearly the epitome of science fiction is one of those universals I had believed in. I had never thought about it any other way. What other genre could the whole spread of Star Wars fit into? Apparently the charge against it not being science fiction is that it doesn't explain its technological advances and also that what looks like advanced technology is simply a remodeling of our own stuff. These make it fantasy, say critics.

Now, I'll admit that if you take away the technology and set the story somewhere else, the existence of the Force makes it fantasy straight away. But it's a space movie. I suppose that saying I know science fiction when I see it isn't enough, so here's a definition of science fiction from dictionary.com that I like because it's straightforward and I wish I'd come up with this one in class: "literary fantasy involving the imagined impact of science on society"

I'll admit I don't like Heinlein's definition, as it excludes any scifi that goes a little further into the future than we can envision really. This dictionary.com definition allows for a wider range of options and inclusions and these imaginations are the point of scifi. Star Wars doesn't have time to explain its technology in depth because it's story based and, more importantly, a movie with limited time. However, I wish to introduce a new element: the books. The multitude of Star Wars books published are valid parts of the Star Wars universe and also take the time to often explain various technical aspects in the same way Star Trek books often do. Therefore, I don't like the argument that Star Wars is not science fiction because of its technical explanations or lack thereof. There may be better arguments, but I haven't heard them yet.

One other thing. The book Foundation by Asimov was recommended for this first class. So I read it. I liked it a lot, and incidentally it's clear that Frank Herbert did too, but that's for later. The definitions we arrived at in class for social science were almost exactly the themes and premises of Hari Seldon's psychohistory, predicting human behavior from known facts, in this case the future from the past. Seldon's methods of prediction and his inclusion of failsafe mathematics are the dreams of today's social scientists.