Foundation

Even though I’m only on page 26 and it isn’t Friday night yet, enough things have happened that I feel that I need to make a post (plus, I’m bored right now). My current book is the first in Isaac Asimov’s original Foundation Trilogy (the name is Foundation).

Our main character is the mathematician Gaal, who has come to the seat of the Galactic Empire (mind, this was copyrighted 26 years before A New Hope was released), Trantor, home to 40 billion people, to work with his new employer, Hari Seldon. When he arrives, we learn that a population or 40 billion people takes a toll on the planet. The only green area left is 100 square miles around the emperor’s palace. The rest is covered in steel buildings tunneling a full mile down into the surface, but only a few hundred feet above. Due to this, seeing the sky requires either a space shuttle tour or a trip up one of the observation decks.

We also find that Dr. Seldon is well known for predicting the fall of the empire through psychohistory (I’m surprised my word program recognizes that one), complex mathematics that takes into account the likelihood of each occurrence. He has determined that, due to the increasing reliance of Trantor on other planet’s for it’s food and such items, increased power struggling, declining exploration of planets, the known rate of assassination in the upper echelons of society, and the like, that there is a 92.5% chance of the empire collapsing within the next 500 years. This, of course, has made him hated by the government. He has even predicted a 1.7% chance of his own execution.

Gaal is quickly apprehended by the government, who takes him into questioning. He gives them no useful information, and demands a lawful trial. At the trial, it is truly Dr. Seldon who is being questioned. Currently, they have forced him to admit to having a 100,000 person force (including women and children; not even the men have any arms training) despite admitting that it is far to low a number to influence human history in such a large way as to prevent the fall of the empire (where nearly a quintillion people live in roughly the year 12,000 Galactic Era; the A.D. year is not given). What they want to know, is why?

That is where I left off.
Yet again, I’m enjoying this book so far. It is significantly different that the last series I read that was set in the future (Otherland). That was only about 100 years in the future and focused on VR immersion rather than space travel (which is accomplished through a jump through hyper-space). The difference in opinion on how far we will have progressed in the future is quite interesting. In Otherland, people have neural interfaces, and can literally enter the Net as an avatar. In Foundation, we see Dr. Seldon using a simple calculator, the only difference from a calculator of today being that the numbers glow (which we could do now). In Foundation, there is widespread space travel, while in Otherland, there is only mention of an attempt to colonize Mars. It seems to me that the author of Otherland (Tad Williams) believes that humans will progress much faster than Asimov did. I guess that goes to show how much progress we’ve made in the last 60 years alone.