Nornagest comments on Holden's Objection 1: Friendliness is dangerous - Less Wrong

11 Post author: PhilGoetz 18 May 2012 12:48AM

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Comment author: Nornagest 20 May 2012 06:28:50AM 1 point [-]

Well, I'm not exactly a Heinlein scholar, but I'd say it shows up mainly in his late-period work, post Stranger in a Strange Land. Time Enough for Love and its sequels definitely qualify, but some of the stuff he's most famous for -- The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, Have Space Suit, Will Travel, et cetera -- don't seem to. Unfortunately, Heinlein's reputation is based mainly on that later stuff.

Comment author: TimS 20 May 2012 09:00:02PM 0 points [-]

The revolution in "Moon is a Harsh Mistress" cannot succeed without the aid of the supercomputer. That makes any moral philosophy implicit in that revolution questionable to the extent one asserts that the moral philosophy is true of humanity now.

To a lesser extend, "Starship Troopers" asserts that military service is a reliable way of screening for the kinds of moral qualities (like mental discipline) that make one trustworthy enough to be a high government official (or even to vote, if I recall correctly). In reality, those moral qualities are very thin on the ground in the real world, being much less common than suggested by the book. If the appropriate moral qualities were really that frequent, the sanity line would already be much high than it is.

Comment author: CronoDAS 20 May 2012 10:14:00PM 1 point [-]

It might be relevant to note that Heinlein served in the U.S. Navy before he was discharged due to medical reasons.

Comment author: JoshuaZ 20 May 2012 10:20:05PM 0 points [-]

Most men in his generation did military service of some form.

Comment author: Bugmaster 20 May 2012 09:12:49PM 0 points [-]

I read Starship Troopers as a critique of fascism, not its endorsement, but I could be wrong...

Comment author: TimS 20 May 2012 10:04:53PM *  1 point [-]

I wouldn't say the Starship Troopers government was fascist, but Heinlein clearly thinks they are doing things pretty well. The fact that the creation process of that government avoided fascism with no difficulty (it isn't considered worth mentioning in the history) is precisely the lack of realism that I am criticizing.

Comment author: Bugmaster 21 May 2012 10:33:22PM 0 points [-]

Hmm, I could be confusing the book with the movie. I'll need to re-read it again.