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What gets me are the psychic powers -- Sci-Fi's weird obsession with mumbo-jumbo parapsychology such as ESP which ran I think roughly from 1955 to 1980. In the

What gets me are the psychic powers -- Sci-Fi's weird obsession with mumbo-jumbo parapsychology such as ESP which ran I think roughly from 1955 to 1980. In the Foundation series it manifests as the mental powers of the Second Foundationers (their ability to directly seize control of other people's minds, above and beyond their mathematical skill and knowledge of 'psychohistory').

fractallyte 8y ago
This was due to John W Campbell, editor of Analog Science Fiction (which he renamed from Astounding SF), the premier hard SF magazine of the time (and now too?). Campbell was one of the most influential figures in science fiction history who cultivated a 'stable' of authors; Asimov was his most famous protégé. Campbell's interest in psi was inflamed further by SF luminaries H Ron Hubbard and A E Van Vogt, who started the Dianetic movement a while before Scientology became a 'thing'. (Since Scientology turned into such a cult, it must be pointed out that Van Vogt had nothing to do with its development). But I'm counter-intrigued: why are so many people in this discussion (and in the article's comments) so vehemently opposed to psi? It's been comprehensively debunked, but Campbell had a neat (and plausible) explanation for that, which no one ever addresses. And many of the most striking anecdotes of psi phenomena have never been adequately explained. This is reminiscent of a consensus reality (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consensus_reality https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consensus_reality), which SF readers in particular should be less susceptible to...
- musha68k 8y ago
  What was Campbell’s explanation if I may ask? Being a big fan of Aldous Huxley I was pretty astonished but none the less entertained by his apparent believe in the supernatural which might have been due to him having lost most of his eyesight when he was in his teens. In case you are interested, there is a lecture where he talks about this stuff over at the psychedelic salon: https://psychedelicsalon.com/podcast-578-1-enemies-of-freedom-2-life-after-death/ https://psychedelicsalon.com/podcast-578-1-enemies-of-freedo... https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Aldous_Huxley https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Aldous_Huxley https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Bates_eye_method#Aldous_Huxley https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Bates_eye_method#Aldous_Huxley
  - fractallyte 8y ago
    Campbell said that psi powers (which are natural, and inherent in everyone), can be nullified by another party's strongly opposed belief in their non-existence. Thus in any demonstration, there's usually someone in the audience who is more than a 'non-believer': strongly opposed to psi, who has the effect of damping or negating the demonstrator. The other thing that's rarely mentioned is that most psi phenomena manifest themselves in moments of extreme peril or emotion, which (by their very nature) cannot be replicated in a laboratory situation. Campbell also pointed out that, throughout human history, psi has been misunderstood, and ultimately maligned by religion, that most contagious of memes. So it's a subconsciously suppressed ability, and its suppression (and repression) is the cause of many human ills... He believed that psi is an emergent phenomenon (like consciousness and intelligence), and - foreshadowing Penrose's "The Emperor's New Mind" - that the explanation for psionic phenomena lay in quantum physics and information theory. I've highlighted those last few words, because current information theory does not adequately cover phenomena such as complexity, synergetics and emergence. For a taster of what a new extended information physics should look like, check out Tom Stonier's "Information And The Internal Structure Of The Universe".
    - mrob 8y ago
      If you remove the requirement for "strongly opposed belief", this explanation neatly dodges the standard objection to psi that if something so obviously evolutionarily adaptive is possible, why doesn't everyone have it? In this explanation everybody does have psychic power, it's just that some are aimed purely at shutting down other powers. In a zero sum competition, preventing your opponent from gaining an advantage is the same as gaining an advantage for yourself. Does anybody know of any fiction where humanity is split into a stable equilibrium of psi and anti-psi?
      - TheCoelacanth 8y ago
        That sounds like something Phillip Dick would write. Closest that I can think of off the top of my head is Ubik, where the protagonist runs an anti-psychic agency that companies hire for security purposes.
smhost 8y ago
the ESP that you're talking about might have been a response to broadcast (color) television, which has always been about controlling public psychology and behavior. the classic text on propaganda was written in 1928, it would be a bit strange if anxiety about secular religion (i.e. politics) didn't ramp up during the decades that followed. with arguably the biggest scandal of this year being Cambridge Analytica/Emerdata, seizing control of other people's minds was correct in its precociousness. more broadly, sci-fi inherits from religion (really religious fantasy), which has always been about control of group behavior and group think, power and identity, the relationship between creator and creation, etc. "we shape our tools and thereafter our tools shape us" was said by mcluhan, but it may as well have been said by victor frankenstein or any other critic of science and industry.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
handojin 8y ago
Need magic but audience is a crew of logical positivists - let's call it psi, apply some handwaving, and slip it in under the radar. Sounds awful but it's exactly the same as every other "advanced technology" in the genre really. Books with psi by forgotten writers that are interesting (to me): Stapleton's 'Odd John' and May's 'Intervention'.
- trukterious 8y ago
  >Need magic Yet 'every sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic'. This presumably applies to fictional tech also.
on_and_off 8y ago
For this reason hard science novels are among my favorite. The uplift cycle by David Brin is amazing. The comment about Asimov misses reminds of another brin novel, Earth, that is known for envisioning several events and technology that appeared after its publication.
- pavlov 8y ago
  Brin’s Uplift universe is full of mystic psi powers that operate at interplanetary distances. It’s not a great example of hard scifi.
  - on_and_off 8y ago
    Full is an overstatement but true, there are some phenomenons that escape our knowledge of physics at the moment. They are not big parts of the plot though, except for faster than light travel, which is necessary to write about a galatic civilization. Uplift for example is a hard sci concept that is too rarely evoked.

fractallyte 8y ago

This was due to John W Campbell, editor of Analog Science Fiction (which he renamed from Astounding SF), the premier hard SF magazine of the time (and now too?). Campbell was one of the most influential figures in science fiction history who cultivated a 'stable' of authors; Asimov was his most famous protégé. Campbell's interest in psi was inflamed further by SF luminaries H Ron Hubbard and A E Van Vogt, who started the Dianetic movement a while before Scientology became a 'thing'. (Since Scientology turned into such a cult, it must be pointed out that Van Vogt had nothing to do with its development). But I'm counter-intrigued: why are so many people in this discussion (and in the article's comments) so vehemently opposed to psi? It's been comprehensively debunked, but Campbell had a neat (and plausible) explanation for that, which no one ever addresses. And many of the most striking anecdotes of psi phenomena have never been adequately explained. This is reminiscent of a consensus reality (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consensus_reality https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consensus_reality), which SF readers in particular should be less susceptible to...

musha68k 8y ago
What was Campbell’s explanation if I may ask? Being a big fan of Aldous Huxley I was pretty astonished but none the less entertained by his apparent believe in the supernatural which might have been due to him having lost most of his eyesight when he was in his teens. In case you are interested, there is a lecture where he talks about this stuff over at the psychedelic salon: https://psychedelicsalon.com/podcast-578-1-enemies-of-freedom-2-life-after-death/ https://psychedelicsalon.com/podcast-578-1-enemies-of-freedo... https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Aldous_Huxley https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Aldous_Huxley https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Bates_eye_method#Aldous_Huxley https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Bates_eye_method#Aldous_Huxley
- fractallyte 8y ago
  Campbell said that psi powers (which are natural, and inherent in everyone), can be nullified by another party's strongly opposed belief in their non-existence. Thus in any demonstration, there's usually someone in the audience who is more than a 'non-believer': strongly opposed to psi, who has the effect of damping or negating the demonstrator. The other thing that's rarely mentioned is that most psi phenomena manifest themselves in moments of extreme peril or emotion, which (by their very nature) cannot be replicated in a laboratory situation. Campbell also pointed out that, throughout human history, psi has been misunderstood, and ultimately maligned by religion, that most contagious of memes. So it's a subconsciously suppressed ability, and its suppression (and repression) is the cause of many human ills... He believed that psi is an emergent phenomenon (like consciousness and intelligence), and - foreshadowing Penrose's "The Emperor's New Mind" - that the explanation for psionic phenomena lay in quantum physics and information theory. I've highlighted those last few words, because current information theory does not adequately cover phenomena such as complexity, synergetics and emergence. For a taster of what a new extended information physics should look like, check out Tom Stonier's "Information And The Internal Structure Of The Universe".
  - mrob 8y ago
    If you remove the requirement for "strongly opposed belief", this explanation neatly dodges the standard objection to psi that if something so obviously evolutionarily adaptive is possible, why doesn't everyone have it? In this explanation everybody does have psychic power, it's just that some are aimed purely at shutting down other powers. In a zero sum competition, preventing your opponent from gaining an advantage is the same as gaining an advantage for yourself. Does anybody know of any fiction where humanity is split into a stable equilibrium of psi and anti-psi?
    - TheCoelacanth 8y ago
      That sounds like something Phillip Dick would write. Closest that I can think of off the top of my head is Ubik, where the protagonist runs an anti-psychic agency that companies hire for security purposes.

smhost 8y ago

the ESP that you're talking about might have been a response to broadcast (color) television, which has always been about controlling public psychology and behavior. the classic text on propaganda was written in 1928, it would be a bit strange if anxiety about secular religion (i.e. politics) didn't ramp up during the decades that followed. with arguably the biggest scandal of this year being Cambridge Analytica/Emerdata, seizing control of other people's minds was correct in its precociousness. more broadly, sci-fi inherits from religion (really religious fantasy), which has always been about control of group behavior and group think, power and identity, the relationship between creator and creation, etc. "we shape our tools and thereafter our tools shape us" was said by mcluhan, but it may as well have been said by victor frankenstein or any other critic of science and industry.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

handojin 8y ago

Need magic but audience is a crew of logical positivists - let's call it psi, apply some handwaving, and slip it in under the radar. Sounds awful but it's exactly the same as every other "advanced technology" in the genre really. Books with psi by forgotten writers that are interesting (to me): Stapleton's 'Odd John' and May's 'Intervention'.

trukterious 8y ago
>Need magic Yet 'every sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic'. This presumably applies to fictional tech also.

on_and_off 8y ago

For this reason hard science novels are among my favorite. The uplift cycle by David Brin is amazing. The comment about Asimov misses reminds of another brin novel, Earth, that is known for envisioning several events and technology that appeared after its publication.

pavlov 8y ago
Brin’s Uplift universe is full of mystic psi powers that operate at interplanetary distances. It’s not a great example of hard scifi.
- on_and_off 8y ago
  Full is an overstatement but true, there are some phenomenons that escape our knowledge of physics at the moment. They are not big parts of the plot though, except for faster than light travel, which is necessary to write about a galatic civilization. Uplift for example is a hard sci concept that is too rarely evoked.