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Foundation and Earth
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Foundation and Earth is a science fiction novel by Isaac Asimov, the fifth novel of the Foundation series and chronologically the last in the series. It was published in 1986, four years after the first sequel to the Foundation trilogy and its direct predecessor Foundation's Edge.
ral centuries after the events of Second Foundation, two citizens of the Foundation seek to find Earth, the legendary planet where humans are said to have originated.
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Foundation and Earth is a science fiction novel by Isaac Asimov, the fifth novel of the Foundation series and chronologically the last in the series. It was published in 1986, four years after the first sequel to the Foundation trilogy and its direct predecessor Foundation's Edge.
Plot introduction
Several centuries after the events of Second Foundation, two citizens of the Foundation seek to find Earth, the legendary planet where humans are said to have originated. Interestingly, even less is known about Earth than was the case in Foundation, when scholars still seem to know the location of 'Sol'.
The story follows on from Foundation's Edge, but can be read as a complete work in itself. (It does, however, give away most of the mysteries that Foundation's Edge is built around.)
Plot summary
Part I: Gaia
Councilman Golan Trevize, historian Janov Pelorat, and Blissenobiarella of the planet Gaia (all of whom were introduced in Foundation's Edge) set out on a journey to find humanity's ancestral planet — Earth. The purpose of the journey is to settle Trevize's doubt with his decision at the end of Foundation's Edge to embrace the all-encompassing supermind of Galaxia.
Part II: Comporellon
First, they journey to Comporellon, which claims to be the oldest currently-inhabited planet in the galaxy. Although many other planets make that claim, Comporellon has a very long history with which to back it up. Upon arrival, they are imprisoned, but negotiate their way out. While there, they find the coordinates of three other Spacer planets. Since the Spacers were the first colonists from Earth back in the ancient days of space travel, it is surmised that their planets would be fairly close to Earth.
Part III: Aurora
The first Spacer planet they visit is Aurora, where Trevize is nearly killed by a pack of wild dogs, presumed to be the descendants of household pets long since reverted to wolf-like savagery. They escape when Bliss manipulates the dogs' emotions to psychologically compel a retreat.
Part IV: Solaria
Next, they go to Solaria, where they find what the Solarians — who have survived the Spacer-Settler conflicts by clever retreat detailed in Asimov's novel Robots and Empire — have evolved into self-reproducing hermaphrodites, who have remained generally intolerant of human physical presence or contact. They have also modified themselves to have a natural ability to mentally channel ("transduce") great amounts of energy, and utilize this as their sole source of power. The Solarians intentionally avoid ever having to interact with each other, except by holographic apparatus ("viewing"), and reproduce only when necessary to replace someone who has died. Bliss, Pelorat, and Trevize are nearly killed by a Solarian named Sarton Bander. Bliss, however, deflects the transducer brain-lobes at the moment Bander tries to use them to kill. Bliss intends to knock out Bander, but has not had sufficient time to learn the full workings of the transducer and accidentally kills him instead. While escaping, they find what they assume to be Bander's immature child, Fallom, in a state of panic because its robotic nursemaid, like all other robots on the estate, has stopped functioning. The child Fallom cannot inherit the Bander estate, as would normally be the Solarian custom, because it is too immature to be able to use its transducer lobes. There being no other place for the child on Solaria, the decision of the robots who immediately arrive to investigate the loss of power is that Fallom is to be killed. Upon learning this, Bliss insists that they take Fallom with them.
Part V: Melpomenia
They next go to Melpomenia, the third and final Spacer coordinate they have. They find that the atmosphere has become depressurized to a few thousandths of normal atmospheric pressure. Wearing space suits, they enter a library, and find a statue with the coordinates of all of the Spacer worlds. While departing Melpomenia, they notice a carbon-dioxide-feeding moss has begun feeding off insignificant leakages in their space suits. Barely recognizing this before stepping on their fully pressurized ship — which would have likely been disastrous — they set their blasters to minimum power to fry it off, and then set the ship to heavy UV-illumination before stepping onboard. This disinfection procedure kills any trace of the moss, preventing it from spreading to other worlds.
As well as giving them another 47 Spacer worlds that they could visit, they now have a vital clue to where Earth may be found. Since the Spacer worlds were settled from Earth, they form a rough sphere with Earth at the centre. Two stars seem to match. One is a binary star, and also on the charts as an inhabited world, though with a question mark where its status should be indicated. The other is uncharted and much more likely to be Earth's star, especially since legends do not mention Earth being part of a binary system. They decide however to go first to the binary system, because it may give them clues about what to expect on Earth itself.
Part VI: Alpha
They next journey to the enigmatic charted system, which turns out to be Alpha Centauri. They find a remnant of the inhabitants of Earth, who many millennia ago were resettled there. There is a reference back to the events of Asimov's novel Pebble in the Sky: we learn that the restoration of Earth's soil was indeed attempted but was abandoned. Later, with Earth becoming uninhabitable, there was a grand project to terraform 'Alpha'. This too was not completed; the only dry land is an island 250 kilometers long and 65 kilometers wide. It is left open whether or not the entire population of the dying Earth was sent to Alpha.
The natives, who call their home New Earth, are quite friendly, and Bliss, Trevize, Pelorat, and Fallom decide to enjoy some rest and relaxation. It turns out that the natives secretly intend to kill them, so as to prevent them from ever informing the rest of the galaxy of "New Earth" (the natives are paranoid of being taken by another "Empire" of any kind). They are warned by a native woman, who becomes sympathetic upon hearing Fallom playing the flute with its transducer brain-lobes, and make their escape in the middle of the night.
Now certain that Alpha Centauri is not Earth but is near Earth, they head towards the uncharted system. They do notice and are puzzled by the very strong similarities between this star and the larger sun of the Alpha Centauri system. Asimov here is drawing attention to an astronomical curio: the nearest star system to Sol contains a star that has the same spectral type, G2 V, though Alpha Centauri A is a little larger and brighter.
Part VII: Earth
Entering the solar system of the uncharted star, they notice that it fits legends about Earth's solar system. The sixth planet has very prominent rings, much more so than any known gas giant. Also the third planet, the one fit for life, possesses an abnormally large moon for any planet other than a gas giant. Obviously this is Earth and its solar system.
On the approach to Earth, they detect that it is highly radioactive, and not capable of supporting life. The ship is drawn to the moon by an external force. They land, and find R. Daneel Olivaw, who explains that he has been paternalistically manipulating humanity for many millennia, and indeed, since Elijah Baley's time, which was long before the Galactic Empire or Foundation. He caused the settlement of Alpha Centauri, the creation of Gaia, and the creation of psychohistory (detailed in Prelude to Foundation and Forward the Foundation). He also manipulated Trevize into making his decision at the end of Foundation's Edge (although he did not manipulate the decision itself).
Trevize confirms that decision, as the numerous narrow escapes have convinced him that the creation of Galaxia is the correct choice. Also, Daneel's positronic brain is deteriorating. He explains that he is unable to design a new brain, as it would require extreme miniaturization, to the point where the brain would deteriorate immediately. Thus, he tells his visitors that he wishes to merge Fallom's brain with his own, as Fallom's life span is the exceptionally long one of a Spacer. This will buy him time to oversee Galaxia's creation.
Daneel continues to explain that since the dawn of civilization, man has been divided. This was the reason for his causing the creation of Psychohistory and Gaia. Another reason this was important was because of the likelihood of advanced life beyond the galaxy eventually attacking humanity. This danger is part of the conclusion to Asimov's book The End of Eternity, in which "Project Eternity" (which manipulated human history to maintain human comfort) had to be destroyed to undo that same extraterrestrial disaster -— extraterrestrials giving humanity no hope of expansion, at which point the birth rate fell, and humanity became extinct. The book ending tells us:
- "In all human history, no other intelligence has impinged on us, to our knowledge. This need only continue a few more centuries, perhaps a little more than one-ten-thousandth of the time civilization has already existed, and we will be safe. After all," and here Trevize felt a sudden twinge of trouble, which he forced himself to disregard, "it is not as though we had the enemy already here among us."
- And he did not look down to meet the brooding eyes of Fallom — hermaphroditic, transductive, different — as they rested, unfathomably, on him.
The Unwritten Sequel
Foundation and Earth takes place only some 500 years into the 1,000-year Seldon Plan. The ending hints greatly at the next part of the story. As detailed by his wife in It's Been a Good Life, Asimov intended to write a sequel, but his attempts were fruitless. He did not know what to do next. This is why he wrote the prequels (Prelude to Foundation and Forward the Foundation) instead.
Trevize mentions that no human ship has ever penetrated the Magellanic Clouds, nor the Andromeda Galaxy or galaxies beyond that. Intelligent aliens have been mentioned in the short story Blind Alley (who end up fleeing to the Magellanic Clouds). No reason is given why humans have not visited other galaxies, which would seem to be within range of the hyperspace drive.
The book states several times that the Seldon Plan does not take into account alien influences. Combined with the ending (see above), one could surmise that for the sequel, he planned to introduce aliens (almost certainly from another galaxy) who would upset and possibly destroy the Seldon Plan. It is also possible that Fallom, combined with Daneel's vast knowledge and influence, but uninhibited by the Three Laws of Robotics, would have turned out to be the enemy of humanity (as the last two paragraphs seem to suggest). However, all his fictional citations from the Encyclopedia Galactica are dated after the formation of the Second Galactic Empire. This meant that there could never be irreparable damage to the plan, since, eventually, it must return to its precalculated path. These citations also seem to give hints to a possible future timeline. Bliss tells Trevize that there are no written records kept by Gaia. So the very existence of the Encyclopedia Galactica seems to indicate that Galaxia hasn't yet come into existence by that point.
Further notes
Although hinted at in Foundation's Edge, this book was the first book of the series that merged it with Asimov's Robot series. The radioactive-Earth theme was begun in Pebble in the Sky, which is set thousands of years earlier. R. Daneel Olivaw's role in the events of that novel would later be described in the prequels.
This book serves as a kind of epilogue to the Robot series. Asimov describes what has become of the Spacer worlds of Solaria and Aurora, described extensively in The Naked Sun and the Robots of Dawn, respectively. The author also reveals what has happened to Earth, as described in Robots and Empire.
The book Nemesis, predating the Foundation and Robot series, hints at the motives and origins of Gaia. Humans had a very early contact with the sentient moon Erythro, a very abstract alien intelligence.
In Foundation's Triumph, the last book in the Second Foundation Trilogy authorized by Asimov's estate, another possible future for the Galaxy is discussed. In a conversation between Hari Seldon and Daneel Olivaw, Seldon discusses the possibility that the Foundation will in fact incorporate Gaia into the Second Galactic Empire. He then bets that in a thousand years, well after Galaxia should have been established and removed the need for formal education, there will be editions of the Encyclopedia Galactica published. The fact that two versions of the Encyclopedia are published after this deadline seems to lend credence to the view that Seldon won the bet.
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