Much has been made of the short story in this collection, "A Logic Named Joe", predicting the Internet as we know it. And, well, of course it doesn't.

The short story is about a set-top box (a cable box, possibly managing Internet-of-things devices like thermostats, but still not out of the ordinary for early sci-fi where the most pressing problems to which technology could be applied seem to be cooking meals and pressing a light switch) that, through a manufacturing glitch, starts pestering users to ask it for solutions to any problems they need help with. People being what they are, the questions tend towards committing the perfect crime rather than getting just the right level of juiciness in a pork roast. My favorite is the children that got the box to show them documentary footage of cannibals - undoubtedly a prediction of the horror film genre and its audience.

Basically, the box has access to relays which connect all information in the world. So, there's AI for you, sort of, except the AI here answers each question in the most Ray Bradbury/Twilight Zone way possible, and isn't prone to the embarrassing blinkered reasoning that characterizes *actual* AI. All in all, it's just another "Monkey's Paw" story.


As for the rest? Eh, they're fine. Entertaining, but rather formulaic ("oh look! another alien race that evolved telepathy in place of speech!"). Calling the characters even one-dimensional is charitable. As each story plays out, the same stock phrases are used again and again to drive the point home ("This was the end. blah blah This was the end. blah blah bah This was the end."). It's not as tiring as it sounds, but it sure ain't good writerin'.

There are two stand-outs:

"First Contact", in which two species encounter each other for the first time, each on a deep space mission. They have no choice but to fight it out: otherwise, the first ship to make it home will be able to launch a surprise attack on the homeworld of the other species. The set-up is a bit clunky, but the problem of establishing initial trust is a very real one, and the solutions attempted are all quite good. A nice thought-experiment, especially in an era of Alice-meets-Bob security protocols.

"Critical Difference", in which different solar cycles (6-month, 7-year, 136-year) all reach their low points at the same time, causing the inhabited planets to experience a new Ice Age. You know, the old Maunder Minimum that may or may not be exacerbating the human contribution to 21st-century climate change. The interesting part of this story is the Imposter Syndrome which plagues the main character: given Leinster's lack of attention to the human psyche up until now, it's impressive that he hit the nail on the head with this one. ( )

Sidewise in Time (1934)
This does not describe coventional time travel to the past or future, but rather alternate realities on parallel timelines. The idea is similar to that in Paratime written by H. Beam Piper in the 1940s and 50s, and Richard C. Meredith's Timeliner Trilogy (1970s). There is an interesting take on the possible nature of hyperspace. It must be said that the story is repetitive and drags a little, but the concepts are fascinating.


Proxima Centauri (1935)
This story has been dismissed by some reviewers as pulp fiction having no merits, but I think that is extreme. It is at the very least imaginative, even if the weak and weepy female character makes it feel dated. Prior to the 1970s, well-developed and realistic women are few and far between in science fiction. On the positive side, there is interstellar travel (apparently at half the speed of light), which the author tries to make seem as real as possible. That life on board is similar to that on an ocean-going vessel is probably due to the fact that when this novelette was written space travel was still a couple of decades in the future, so a limited amount was known about it. The aliens are frequently described as 'fiends', but they are nevertheless interesting. Their buildings and spaceships are not built but are grown from plant matter which is then held in stasis. They value animal flesh as men crave wealth or gold. Thus, when we are made to feel disgust at the unreasoning and destructive actions of the Centaurians, we might reflect on similar crimes perpetrated by avaricious humans. Apart from this, the relationship between humans and Centaurians is presented in a very black-and-white manner, and the deus-ex-machina finale does nothing to add sophistication to the story. However, it was probably what most readers in the 1930s would have wanted.

The Fourth-Dimensional Demonstrator
This short story is a humorous account of a young man who inherits a time machine capable of replicating matter from his uncle. It is a madcap tale of dissatisfied fiancees, cigarette-eating kangaroos and thwarted policemen. It was mildly amusing, but a little over the top. Fortunately, it was not too long.

First Contact
This is one of the works Murray Leinster is remembered for. It was one of the first science fiction stories to address the practical aspects of first contact with an alien race. The aliens are neither all good nor all bad, but are in many ways just like humans. The dilemma is caused by the fact that they encounter each other in deep space and then do not dare to leave in case the locations of their homeworlds are revealed. Both groups would like to trust the other, but cannot take the risk. I immediately thought of the Dark Forest (黑暗森林) principle from Liu Cixin's Three Body Trilogy, even though Liu's aliens are much more predatory in nature. In First Contact, there is a universal translator with similarities to the one in the story Proxima Centauri, which was also written in 1935. The fact that the translator system uses cards in its output makes the story feel a little dated, but at the time the start of the digital age was still four decades away, so it would not really be fair to criticise this point. I guessed the solution to the impasse between the groups slightly before it was revealed, but on the whole this was a compelling read and deserves its place as a classic of early modern science fiction.


The Ethical Equations
This story was published 1945. I must say that I really enjoyed it. Some reviewers raise the point that because the equations mentioned in the title are not based on real scientific principles (the equations state that what goes around comes around, good begets good and vice versa), this story cannot be considered a work of hard science fiction. While this may or may not be true, short stories appearing in Astounding magazine in the 1940s principally had to meet the requirements of being entertaining and thought-provoking, and I think The Ethical Equations certainly succeeds in meeting those standards. Probably owing to the similar titles, I immediately thought of The Cold Equations by Tom Godwin which appeared in the same magazine in 1954 and which I read a few months ago. I am not sure whether the parallelism between the two works is coincidental or not. The Cold Equations ends with the equation balanced by the forfeit of a human life, thereby averting a disaster. A catastrophe is avoided in Leinster's story by satisfying the ethical equations.
A curious point is that, although the protagonist in Leinster's tale is absolutely convinced that the principles behind the ethical equations are real, nobody else in the story seems to care about them one bit. This could mean that the equations are in fact a personal superstition of the lead character, or that they are an established fact which most people choose to ignore. At any rate, acting in accord with the ethical principles embodied in the equations provides a farsighted solution to the problem at hand and saves the day. Even though 'what goes around comes around' is not true from a scientific point of view, if more people believed it the world would probably be a much happier place.

Pipeline to Pluto
This short story was also first published in Astounding magazine in 1945. It is a little different from the first five pieces in this book because it is a science fiction horror story. Despite the fact that it is pretty tame by modern standards of horror, and although I had a premonition of how it would end, it does produce a chilling effect on the reader. That it was successful in its day can be seen from the fact that it was included in an anthology entitled Science Fiction Terror Tales edited by Groff Conklin ten years later in 1955.
A Logic Named Joe
A 1946 issue of Astounding Science Fiction magazine ran a short story by Murray Leinster that contains an amazingly accurate prediction of the technology and culture of our day. Leinster describes a society in which every home possesses a "logic", a machine that can provide entertainment and virtually unlimited access to information. Each "logic" accesses a central "tank" where raw data are kept on "plates". Sound familiar? The eponymous "logic" becomes self-aware due to a slight flaw in the manufacturing process and, in order to be helpful, decides to provide humans with the answers to any questions they ask through the network. On the surface, this sounds like a good idea, but Leinster continues to show how human moral deficiecies make this a less-than-desirable development. We should keep in mind that this story was written in an age when most people had a naively optimistic view of science and before science fiction was known for warning about the potential dangers of technology. What also makes it fascinating to read is the fact that in 1946 computing machines still filled whole rooms and the first phase of the internet would not come into existence for another 23 years. This story has been included in many science fiction anthologies over the years, and rightly so, since it was predictive of personal computers, computer networks, and artificial intelligence.

Symbiosis
This 1947 tale tells of a small and peaceful country which is invaded by a powerful and ruthless neighbour state. The conquered people, however, are prepared and apply an intriguing medical solution to the problem, much to the dismay of the agressors. I am not sure if it is, but this might be the first example of biological warfare in science fiction literature. Of course, H.G. Wells' invading Martians in The War of the Worlds were wiped out by bacteria, but that was a fortuitous occurrence rather than the result of deliberate action. Symbiosis is certainly a fine example of how to write a short story.


The Strange Case of John Kingman
This tells a story about John Kingman, who is a patient in a mental asylum. Despite the fact that he has an obvious physical anomaly, not much notice is taken of him because he is aloof and uncommunicative. It is assumed that he is foreigner who cannot speak English, and that he is paranoid with delusions of grandeur because his manner is so supercilious. A young and enthusiastic doctor decides to check the asylum records, and is shocked to discover that Kingman has been an inmate of the institution for more than 160 years. When the doctor expresses an interest in him, Kingman draws intricate diagrams which turn out to be explanations of scientific processes not yet known to humans. When this comes to the attention of the authorities, the government is anxious to extract more technological information in order to secure a firm advantage in the arms race against enemy nations. The methods they use eventually render the patient unable to provide any further assistance. On the surface, this might appear to be merely an entertaining story. I think, however, that it possesses hidden depths. Something which is noticeable is that Kingman is thought all along by everybody to be insane, even when doctors conclude that he is probably an extraterrestrial, and when he shows his superior knowledge and a high level of intelligence. Readers may find themselves asking if the patient or the humans who handled his case showed more evidence of madness in thought and action. It is possible that the dropping of the atomic bombs on Japan about three years earlier (this story was published in 1948) had caused Leinster to wonder whether military considerations would always be a principal catalyst for technological development, and whether a desire for knowledge would always be linked to mankind's baser instincts. Perhaps Kingman's condescending attitude towards the humans around him was not unjustified.

The Lonely Planet
This 1949 story is about a planet-wide organism which humans name Alyx after its homeworld. Through serving the needs of men, Alyx learns and becomes self-aware, only to find its very existence threatened. In an interesting twist on the "dark forest" theme, we see that the miscommunication between men and Alyx all seems to be the result of a human inability to conceive of an intelligent being which would not be as predatory as mankind. Fortunately, not all humans are so narrow-minded, and at least some are willing to embrace the mutually beneficial symbiosis envisioned by Alyx. This is another very absorbing and thought-provoking short story by Murray Leinster.

Keyhole
This story was published in 1951, and is another one which paints humanity in a less-than-positive light as far as relations with extraterrestrial lifeforms is concerned. Of course, individual people are a different matter, since these may think up ways to persuade their contemporaries to act with a greater degree of foresight than they would have done otherwise. The Moon creatures in this story are subjected to study by humans who wish to identify their weaknesses. However, in the end the specimen the men capture manages to learn much more about humanity than human scientists can learn about its people. It is another warning that appearances can be deceptive.

Critical Difference (aka Solar Constant)
This is a solid story about a planetary survey officer who tries to overcome technological problems in order to save human colonists on two worlds. The chacterization is quite good, perhaps because it is a slightly later story which was first published in 1956. The author may have by that time got to grips with how to make his characters a little more three-dimensional and interesting. The self-effacing quality of the protagonist which never allows him to take full credit for his achievements may be something some readers can relate to. This is a good example of a hard science fiction story which uses most of its length to describe technical details, but also has a romance element thrown in to make the plot more absorbing.




Leinster's strengths are showcased very clearly in the works in this book. He is adept at defining or identifying problems, and then working logically through his plots to provide solutions without letting readers guess the endings too soon. Although perhaps a little pessimistic on the surface, many of his tales do have positive outcomes. While very entertaining, the stories are obviously also written to convey deeper meanings, but this is achieved in subtle ways and without the author needing to moralize or preach. Probably the only easily detactable weakness is in his characterizations, which never really allow you to get into the minds of the protagonists. But, overall, this is an excellent short-story collection which is well worth reading if you are interested in the history and development of science fiction literature. ( )

My reactions to reading this collection in 1999. Spoilers follow.

“The Dean of Science Fiction”, John J. Pierce -- Besides being a brief summation of the stories in this collection, this introduction talks about Leinster’s themes and career. It also relates some surprising information about Leinster. His first story (a fantasy) was written in 1919 (no date for his last work is given – he died in 1975). He converted to Catholicism, and it relates information I knew already – Leinster’s career as an inventor of the optical Jenkins Systems used as a rear projection system in movies and tv. Leinster also emphasized rationality and was an admirer of Thomas Aquinas.

“Sidewise in Time” -- This story is the original reason I bought this collection. It’s generally credited as being the first parallel universe story, and it holds up very will since its publication in 1934. Later on this type of story was rationalized with, as in Frederik Pohl’s The Coming of the Quantum Cats, the many worlds interpretation of quantum physics. Here Leinster introduces some twists on the notion that many later writers didn’t. First, his plot does not simply have a character or characters leave their own timeline willingly or unwillingly. Leinster introduces the notion of a tile-work Earth where each bounded area enters a different parallel universe than its neighbors do. One world has a strong Viking presence, another has China settling North America, another universe still has dinosaurs, in another the Roman Empire still endures, and in another the South won the Civil War. Leinster’s main character is a mathematician, Professor Minott, who is the only person who knows a cosmological upheaval, which eventually thrusts a quarter of the Earth’s surface into other universes, is about to take place. But he tells no one. He hopes to use the event to become more than just a mathematics instructor in an obscure community college. He wants to find a universe where his knowledge and technology can make him king – and husband of one of his students. His attempts to do this are fascinating as are the alternating sections showing what happens to some when their homes are suddenly bounded by other universes. Eventually, the students Minott tricks into joining him on his adventure (and they don’t follow him willingly for long) leave him except for a female student with a crush on him. The universe settles down but the story ends with not all the tiles returning to their proper timelines. This is the first example of a parallel universe story and still holds up well. Leinster puts forth many intriguing alternate histories and works out or hints at the implications of his idea, and I liked the notion of a man who seeks to use such a cataclysm to gain respect and power. It’s a very human idea.

“Proxima Centauri” -- This is, in its notion of sentient vegetable men, a pulpy story in conception, but Leinster carries it off well, and there are several elements which make it a sophisticated sf tale, especially one published in 1935. Leinster takes some trouble to describe the construction of an artificial ecosystem in his interstellar ship. That, the inclusion of crews’ families to facilitate morale, and a mutiny from the psychological effects of a seven year voyage to the next star were all, I suspect, novel in 1935. Leinster does a credible job rationalizing, via atomic physics, his starship drive but it’s still unworkable. The vegetable men of Proxima Centauri seem brutal, but Leinster cuts them some slack by rightly pointing out that that aliens made of precious metals would probably be met the same way by Earth men, and he tries to construct a biological rational (which doesn’t really work but it’s the attempt that makes it sf) whereby these mobile plants need animal flesh to live and how it excites them (they’re destroyed just about all animal life on their world). Actually, they’re learned to live on vegetable matter but instinctually still crave animal products. This may also be one of the first sf stories to introduce an alternative to a fire and metal technology: the Centaurians mold protoplasm to their ends. I liked the human commander, at story’s end, contriving to get all the Centaurians to return to their home world to eat their Earth trophies and celebrate a new source of animal matter. Then he blows the planet up with a sabotaged starship engine.

“The Fourth-dimensional Demonstrator” -- An ok, humorous story of the screwball comedy sort involving a matter duplicator. We have a broke playboy, a kangaroo, a golddigging dancer and it was published in 1935.

“First Contact” -- The first and only other time I’ve read this story I wasn’t very impressed even though it’s widely regarded as a classic, included in The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, and even provoked a critical answer (“The Heart of the Serpent”) by Soviet sf writer Ivan Yefremov (in which the central problem of this story is because both aliens and humans are good communists). I appreciated it much more the second time around. The biggest reason is its kinship (and, perhaps, inspiration for) George Zebrowski and Charles Pellegrino’s wonderful The Killing Star. Both stories make the justifiable point (Pellegrino’s and Zebrowski’s novel goes into more a detailed rational including evolutionary history) that intelligent spacefaring races would share similar traits and similar paranoia and similar motives to launch a preemptive attack against each other as potential competitors. The one flaw in Leinster’s story is that he, perhaps, repeats why the races can’t trust each other too often. The concern that human and alien have in not revealing their homeworld may have partially influenced Larry Niven’s “Neutron Star”. I like both races amiably meeting each other and agreeing they’ll probably have to kill each other. The solution to the quandary is justifiably famous. Human and alien switch ships thereby insuring dismantling of weapons and tracking systems and the removal of vital maps.

“The Ethical Equations” -- Another first contact story from Leinster. He seems to have made something of a specialty of them. It’s an interesting story with its gimmick based on odd, unstable isotopes (thermally unstable – I don’t know how plausible that is) and another, like Leinster’s “First Contact”, example of warily meeting aliens though here they are in suspended animation. The Ethical Equations, physical laws which cause coincidence to reward ethical behavior and punish bad behavior, are an interesting notion. While I certainly don’t expect Leinster to thoroughly explicate this conceit, which is pure moral fantasy, (anymore than I expect the many ftl drives in sf to be realistic, workable, and fully detailed), I would have liked a bit more background information on how they allegedly manifest themselves. This is sort of a thematic variation on the end of “First Contact”.

“Pipeline to Pluto” -- Three interesting ideas in this story. The first is a virtual pipeline between the Moon and Pluto composed of cargo carriers launched daily at each location. The second is the notion of technological possibility trumped by political and economic factors. Here passengers can ride these tugs cheap, but it’s illegal because of lobbying efforts by passenger lines. (Thus rationalizing the plot of smuggling people to labor starved Pluto – people who are flaush frozen en route.) Third is the notion of surviving, in great pain, the freezing process. Leinster tells this revenge tale in a moody tone.

“The Power” -- Another first contact story by Leinster. Here a dying alien, survivor of an expedition to Earth decides to dictate his knowledge to a medieval heremetic alchemist. The effect of iron on the alien technology seemed implausible given iron’s relative plentifulness in the universe. Leinster probably made it deleterious to the alien technology in order to reconcile his plot with bits of medieval folklore) . Of course, the alchemist understands almost none of the tale due to his ignorances and prejudices. The modern physicist reading the alchemist’s writings echoes, at story’s end, our exasperation at not having the specific scientific knowledge of the alien instead of just medieval vagueness: “Damnation! Where is the rest of this stuff.” What makes the story interesting (and perhaps reveals Catholic Leinster seeing man as perpetually flawed) is that the alchemist isn’t just some scholarly, harmless seeker of knowledge out of his league. He’s an ambitious, egotistical, power hungry man who is perfectly willing to deal with what he thinks is a demonic power (who he betrays at story’s end) to further his ends.

“A Logic Named Joe” -- I’d heard of this justifiably famous short story for several years, but it was only after reading a letter in Skeptical Inquirer claiming that Jenkins predicted the Internet that I really wanted to read it. The letter was right. Leinster did predict something close to the Internet (pretty remarkable considering sf’s abysmal record of predictions, particularly in regard to computer technology) in 1946, very shortly after digital electronic computers made their appearance. Of course, the technical names are completely different, but Leinster did a remarkable job of prediction, especially in regard to the social problems of the Internet. Jerry Pournelle has asked what happens to civilization and society when you can get the answer to any question you want. That question is at the heart of this story when a logic named Joe decides, after randomly developing sentience, to turn the ubiquitous household logic service from a mere consulting to a directive service. Joe orders the network of logics to answer questions on how to develop new technologies and commit perfect crimes, list complete dossiers on people, and evade the “censor block”. The latter two elements touch on two concerns of the contemporary Internet: privacy and filtering services. (Joe isn’t malicious. He just wants to provide a better service.) Even the technology is remarkably close. Household logics have monitors and screens like computers (different jargon, of course). They are hooked up to a “tank and integrator set-up”, rather similar to a modern computer server, to provide a variety of reference and commercial services, and the logics can do math and accounting. Leinster erred a bit in having his tanks have “all the facts in creation” and recordings of all telecasts (a dream for the Internet, now), and it’s not entirely clear if each tank has the same data or if they are networked (they are connected to each other). It’s a classic bit of informed prediction tied to a compelling story. Joe haunting a computer network is foreshadowing, almost 40 years later, of the more sinister sentient hauntings of networks in Vernor Vinge’s True Names and John Varley’s “Press Enter ”.

“Symbiosis” -- The central concern of this story, biological warfare, and its setting, the fictitious country of Kantolia overrun by an oppressive neighbor (obviously the Soviet Union, unchecked by the United Nations), probably accounts for this story not being published in a sf magazine but a 1947 issue of the general interest Colliers. It’s an interesting story built around the notion of a country inventing a vaccine which enables a symbiotic relationship between the human body and a mutant form of a diplococcic bacteria. Kantolia, upon being invaded, releases the bacteria against which its population is protected. The invaders, after heavy losses due to disease, retreat. It’s an interesting notion. But Leinster’s ending, where it is implied that Kantalia’s voluntary sharing of this technology with peaceful countries to ensure permanent peace is way too pat. Other countries could develop a competing technology, steal the secret, or force it out of Kantolia (or, of course, betray Kantolia after getting the immunization. Perhaps Leinster wanted to explore the morality and moral implications of such a non-aggressive defense rather than create a realistic one.

“The Strange Case of John Kingman” -- This story, with its delving into historical records to uncover the secret of a mental patient committed for 162 years, reminded me of H. P. Lovecraft. It’s a clever story. The normal course of this story would be to end it upon revealing the man is an alien. But Leinster takes it further. Kingman is an alien, all right, but he’s an insane alien with a god complex, and he refuses to communicate the technological and scientific knowledge he must possess. An attempt to cure him seems to work until it’s revealed he’s reverted to, for him, child-like IQ of 90 and has developed amnesia.

“The Lonely Planet” -- An odd, sort of super science tale from Leinster. It features a vast, planet covering organism called Alyx. Alyx is telepathic and can absorb the memory, knowledge, and skills of the intelligence she contacts. It also can be directed telepathically. The story depicts its evolution from a planet covering organism to sentient organism after meeting a Space Patrol expedition. Yet, despite battling the Space Patrol which fears its intelligence, Alyx craves the human contact which created and shaped its mind. The story is also a bit of a mild satire against organizational mindsets. The Haslip family has a long, multigenerational relationship with Alyx, a relationship virtually unacknowledged in official records though the Haslips made crucial discoveries about Alyx. John Haslip XXII is purged from history because he refused to kill Alyx, who goes on to team up with his expedition and make travel to the Second Galaxy possible.

“Keyhole” -- An ok story about a study of lunar beings to determine how to kill them and save the colonization effort. At story’s end, it’s revealed the aliens are telepathic, quite clever, and have been studying the psychologist sent to study them.

“Critical Difference” -- An engagingly grim story set on a cold colony world. The race to save a world’s population from an impending ice age was good as well as the protagonist’s struggles in his very first independent survey command. Even the love story between Massy and Riki was handled well and also the psychology of people facing their own death and the death of their world and of their family. The concept of Lani III’s climactic changes proceeding Lani II’s (the heavily populated planet) by 200 hundred days was logical and exciting. The technology for extracting electrical energy from the atmosphere was plausible sounding, well worked out, and interesting (as was priming the pump, at story’s end, with sodium and potassium vapors) though probably not theoretically possible (I’m guessing). I think I also detected another link between Larry Niven and Murray Leinster. Niven’s “Inconstant Moon”, like this story, involves the sudden and disastrous discovery that your star is a long term variable. ( )

I must admit that I came to this with moderately low expectations--thinking of Murray as solidly in the dated, pulp scifi mode. The stories generally proved to be quite a bit better than I expected--all based on compelling ideas, often interlaced with very funny humor, and at times emotionally powerful as well.

Many of these ("Sideways in Time," "First Contact," and "A Logic Named Joe" in particular) were groundbreaking stories that defined subgenres for generations of writers to come. While some of the stories are dated, they have aged reasonably well. "A Logic Named Joe" probably rings truer in today's "wired" era than when it was first written. "The Fourth-dimensional Demonstrator," with a bit of updating, would make for very funny contemporary story.

The stories generally display a great sense of optimism about individuals and a great sense of pessimism about mankind as a whole. And when the stories are sexist, they are so in a funny, humble way (in many cases, the women really run the show, despite appearances). My favorites were "The Fourth-dimensional Demonstrator," "The Power," and "Critical Difference." ( )