vs The Expanse: we are headed for some bleak imperialist nonsense but humanity's salvation will come from... Nevermind, we're fucked.
Thing is, the Asimov Foundation universe could actually fit in the "past" of the Dune universe.
This idea is oddly fascinating. Now we just need a good sci-fi writer to produce the "missing link".
Maybe the robots in Asimov's universe lead to the creation of Erasmus and eventually the Butlerian Jihad.
In the non-canon book Psychohistorical Crisis, the Dune universe is part of the past of the Foundation universe. The Fremon are known as the "Frightful People" to historians.
I'll let you all guess which one was published in the 50s and which one was published in the 60s.
Both of these are terrible takes on the books.
Spice is not a solution in dune in fact the whole 4th book and the end of the third are centered around forcing humanity to wean itself off spice so that it may evolve.
The central concept is that humanity must not depend on machine or drugs or complicated eugenics and must instead look inwards and improve itself by facing hardship.
In foundation (at least the start) the complicated maths is essentially there to prove that all establishments fail and survival requires constant change. Very differently from dune foundation sees technological superiority as key to this and importantly the ability for society to change in order to support the technological progress.
Even if you don't agree with the above neither book aims to "fight imperialist bullshit" if anything they both quite staunchly support the idea of a benevolent dictator controlling all.
Or is Dune about the folly of different types of dictatorship; sadistic, benevolent, religious or machiavellian? Taking only the first book (because that's as far as I've read) every leader is thwarted or confined by the consequences or weakness of their own style of leadership.
I read an interview where frank said that his intention was for Dune to be a cautionary tale about the dangers of charismatic leaders (which is to say, the "classic" hero archetype). Which - for the first book - tracks pretty well. The free are basically just used as cannon fodder for Paul to win back his power (and a lot more), then when he wins, he sets them loose on the universe because he can't control them.
The trouble I have with that though is that he goes on to contradict that point in later books, but I won't get into that because I don't want to spoil anything for you
It's honestly crazy how many people can read Dune and completely misunderstand the themes of the book.
Though to be fair, it sometimes feels like Frank himself didn't fully understand what themes he was going for. Books 1-3 were staunchly "Beware of heroes, charismatic leaders will lead you to evil and despair", then in GEoD, we find that literally the only hope for humanity was millenia of oppression by a totalitarian government.
But either of those two takes is still wildly better than "spice saves the universe" lol
I think Dune has very many themes, but the biggest one is the dangers of religion (which is not really portrayed in the movie I think)
The 2022 movie covers the first half of the first book and that theme only really comes into its own in books 2 and 3.
I mean, I feel like manipulating a whole culture's established religious beliefs to place yourself at the highest seat of power and war a holy war in your name is a pretty poignant display of "religion bad, m'kay"
Yeah but if you don't know about the books it doesn't necessarily look like manipulation. That's only made overt when you read the latter books
OP could at least make the effort to plug the dude's post.
https://mastodon.social/@flargh/110821695878847573
@flargh@mastodon.social
better do both just in case
edit: guys maths is HARD
I'm sure there are drugs that make math easy. We just need to find them.
From the Wikipedia page for Paul Erdős:
After his mother's death in 1971 he started taking antidepressants and amphetamines, despite the concern of his friends, one of whom (Ron Graham) bet him $500 that he could not stop taking them for a month. Erdős won the bet, but complained that it impacted his performance: "You've showed me I'm not an addict. But I didn't get any work done. I'd get up in the morning and stare at a blank piece of paper. I'd have no ideas, just like an ordinary person. You've set mathematics back a month."[66] After he won the bet, he promptly resumed his use of Ritalin and Benzedrine.[67]
Melange, I'm sure. Seeing how it enables you to fold space, I'm assuming it also helps with the math involved.
MATH AND DRUGS ARE THE KEYS TO EVERYTHING
Source: myself, a computer science major
Don’t the Dune universe have Mentats?
So, maths and drugs
Iain M. Banks: we're living in an AI-regulated Utopia, but the AI that we totally trust might be doing some light imperialism on the side.
Pratchett / Baxter: we're headed for some bleak imperialist nonsense, and another one, and another one, and another one, and oops, a blank...
Edit: added the Long Earth one.
Maybe sometimes there are special circumstances?
Arthur C. Clarke: We're headed for some bleak imperialist nonsense, but humanity's salvation will come from encountering benevolent alien intelligence we haven't discovered yet.
Ray Bradbury: We're headed for some bleak imperialist nonsense, but humanity's salvation will come from rediscovering the beauty of books and humanity's inherent capacity for empathy in a world we're rapidly forgetting.
Robert A. Heinlein: We're headed for some bleak imperialist nonsense, but humanity's salvation will come from pioneering individualism, libertarianism, and multi-planetary colonies we haven't established yet.
William Gibson: We're headed for some bleak imperialist nonsense, but humanity's salvation will come from navigating and subverting the interplay of high technology and low life in a cybernetic reality we're only beginning to understand.
Ursula K. Le Guin: We're headed for some bleak imperialist nonsense, but humanity's salvation will come from understanding and integrating a spectrum of social, psychological, and cultural perspectives we haven't fully considered yet.
Neal Stephenson: We're headed for some bleak imperialist nonsense, but humanity's salvation will come from unprecedented technological and social innovation, often resulting from deep historical and philosophical introspection, in a future we're yet to engineer.
Octavia Butler: We're headed for some bleak imperialist nonsense, but humanity's salvation will come from embracing and adapting to change through the lens of bio-diversity and sociocultural evolution we haven't fully embraced yet.
vs Hyperion:
Dan Simmons: We’re headed for some bleak imperialism nonsense but humanity’s salvation will come from serving AIs we haven’t discovered yet.
Don't we eventually find out the AIs are oppressing the humans and siphoning off their life-force/brain-power through the use of the portal system and that humanity's actual salvation comes from deeply believing in the power of love to the point of developing the ability to teleport to beloved places and people?
Asimov: weird mutants capable of overthrowing the universe should be put down with prejudice.
Frank Herbert: weird mutants capable of overthrowing the universe should be made emperor.
Neither of the stories present salvation, merely survival.
Warhammer 40k: ~~we're headed for some bleak imperial nonsense but~~ BY THE GOD EMPEROR SUCH HERESY IS INTOLERABLE.
Bringing Warhammer 40k mythos into this isn't fair. That is like bringing a gun to a kid's thumb war.
Image Transcription: Mastodon Post
Peter Cohen, @flargh@mastodon.s...
"Foundation" vs "Dune"
Isaac Asimov: we're headed for some bleak imperialist nonsense but humanity's salvation will come from using math we haven't discovered yet
Frank Herbert: we're headed for some bleak imperialist nonsense but humanity's salvation will come from tripping on drugs we haven't discovered yet
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In Dune, the imperialist "nonsense" was the path to salvation. Genocide by machines was what we were saved from.
I started reading Foundation (the first one) just yesterday. So far I love it!
Not totally true, like Asimov's math wanted to reinstate the Imperium, so is kinda the other way arround.
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