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that that's an explanation in a sense as to why psychohistory became a congenial notion with which you could deal whether the fact that this notion of early determinism fits in with the notion of psychohistory. |
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A.: Well, I'm trying to think now, you see, I was only 21 when I started writing the Foundation stories and then I had the general notion in my head, and I didn't change that general notion. Now at the time I was 21 I had not had time to notice, I think, that I had developed habits that dated back to an early age. Now I'm old enough to see that there isn't a reason in the world why I have to eat fast. But, no, I don't think that's why I'll have to go back to what I said before. When I was 21, I was doing graduate school, I had taken physical chemistry physical chemistry was important to me, because I had to pass it with a B in order to stay in school. More than any other course I ever took, that one sort of hovered over me with its fangs and claws extended, so that I worked harder on that course than any other course I'd ever taken. And one of the things that particularly impressed me was the careful working out of the laws of gases. Partly because, I suppose, it was so difficult for me to understand, but I got it firmly fixed in my head that you arrive at certainty through uncertainty. That even though every atom or molecule thinks it has a free will, it doesn't, because on the whole it doesn't, and mind you, this was also at a time when I'd been living through the Hitler era in the 1930s, where no matter what anyone did, Hitler kept winning victories, and the only way that I could possibly find life bearable at the time was to convince myself that no matter what he did, he was doomed to defeat in the end. That he couldn't win. |
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Gunn: Psychohistory is against it. |
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A.: That's right. And as a matter of fact, we started with the Foundation bound to win, no matter what the forces arrayed against it. I suppose that that was my literary response to my own feelings, which have no basis, I suppose, except that it made me feel better. To the inevitable victory of the anti-Nazi causes, although they seemed to be steadily losing. And, you know, the first two stories of The Foundation Trilogy were written in 1941, which was just about Hitler's peak. They were published in 1942. I think that might be the way it worked out. |
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Gunn: In the last portion of Second Foundation there is a kind of ambivalent attitude toward the Second Foundation, that the psychologists are going to establish eventually a new kind of society in which mental science is going to be more important than physical science and in essence are going to be the new rulers. And that seems to me to be not a great idea! (Laughter) |
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A.: What my thoughts were as I was writing it you see, whenever I |
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