Stars End S3E06

“The Podcast Was Alone in the Galaxy for Thousands of Years – Millions of Years”

Did you know that sleep podcasts are a thing? Podcasts that people listen to go to sleep.

You can imagine it, can’t you? Someone like Sam Waterston, Tony Shalhoub, or Jane Lynch probably reading poetry in a quiet, soothing voice. Like, what? I don’t know. Something in the public domain probably. Wordsworth?

Calm is all nature as a resting wheel.
The kine are couched upon the dewy grass;
The horse alone, seen dimly as I pass,
Is cropping audibly his later meal…

I’m sleepy already. Most poets will do, but not Emily Dickinson. Everyone who’s anyone knows that all of her poems can be sung to the tune of the Yellow Rose of Texas. Try it, it’s fun!

Because I could not stop for Death-
He kindly stopped for me-
The Carriage held but just Ourselves-
And Immortality.

We’re not one of those. If you’re reading along with us, this time we’re talking about “Heatsink” and “Billibotton” from Prelude to Foundation.

We’ve left the depilated pates of Mycogen behind, but the strangeness remains. Hari and Dors arrive in Dahl, where all the men luxuriate in their impressive black mustaches and sweaty people provide half of Trantor’s power while in various states of undress. Also, Dors buys TWO knives (“I’ve got two hands,” she explains) and she and Hari fight off a bunch of street toughs. Plus we meet Hari’s future adoptive son Raych and hear the first arcane and enigmatic legends of a planet called “Earth.”

Plus, a bonus: Foundation shines at the Visual Effects Society Awards!

Join us! No one could fall asleep to this one!

Stars End S3E05

“We Have Something Far Better than Religion We Have a Podcast”

Introducing this episode puts me in mind of Tom Lehrer’s Alma, which was inspired by, as he puts it, “the juiciest, spiciest, raciest obituary it has ever been my pleasure to read.” The amount of prime humor that one mathematician can fit into a three-and-a-half-minute sound clip is impressive.

Hari Seldon, our protagonal mathematician, isn’t nearly so funny. In fact, he seems to take himself quite seriously. But he does get to participate in the juiciest, spiciest, raciest scene in the entire Asimov canon. And that includes the non-fiction.

That scene is also startlingly strange. We’ll talk about it. Then we’ll move on to other grandiose notions like the nature of religion, governmental ethics, and Pascal’s Wager. Also, there is a robot!

Join us as we follow Hari and Dors through the remainder of their sojourn in Mycogen. You’ll be glad you did!

Stars End S3E04

“The Podcast as a Whole in its Full Complexity Cannot Be Represented By any Simulation Smaller Than Itself”

After our break, we’re back to reading Prelude to Foundation and things are starting to get weird. Dors and Hari finally journey to Mycogen as we embark on a Voyage to the Space Amish, with apologies to A. E. Van Vogt.

This one has it all! Dors and Chetter deconstructing Hari’s trip to Upperside ad nauseam! Bad bald caps (Boy, does Issac like the word “pate!”)! Rigidly defined gender roles! Lots of complaining! Dors and Hari don’t understand their room! More complaining! And Hari drags some poor guy out of bed in the middle of the night to make him a sandwich. Let’s just say he’s not the ideal guest. Also with some more apologies, this time to Rod Serling, there’s an iPad… and IT’S A COOKBOOK!

Also a new Apple TV+ Minute! Buckle up! This one will be fun!

Stars End S3E03

I think I need to listen to “Flowers in the Dirt” again. That’s the 1989 Paul McCartney album where Sir Paul collaborated with Elvis Costello. I was hoping that Elvis might bring some of the sharper edges that John Lennon brought to the Lennon-McCartney songwriting duo. No such luck as I recall but maybe 32 years farther on I’ll hear something new.

What brought that up? Well with Hari on the mend from his excursion to Upperside we’ve decided to take a quick break from Prelude to Foundation before we begin our excursion to Mycogen.

We’re joined this time by Paul Levinson; Fordham University Professor, author, singer-songwriter, podcaster, and all-around renaissance human. Lots of that springs from his philosophy, “If I enjoy something, I try to do it,” he says. We chat about robots, the Foundation, robots, Asimov, robots, artificial intelligence, robots, and lots of other things. Also robots.

Want to know more about Paul? Check out his blog, Paul Levinson’s Infinite Regress, his podcast Light On Light Through, or his Twitter feed, @PaulLev. You can take it from there.

Oh, and that “Flowers in the Dirt” thing? That was mentioned in Paul’s new short story, “It’s Real Life,” an alternate history story involving the Beatles. You can read that for free here.

But first, our latest Episode: “Your Podcast is Obscure but I Think I Understand.” Let’s go!

Stars End S3E02

“The History of Podcasts is Full of Simple Questions That Had Only the Most Complicated of Answers or None At All”

https://starsendpodcast.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/b58de-prelude-to-foundation-asimov-cover-bantamedition.jpg

Our second conversation about Prelude to Foundation, in which we discuss “Library,” “Upperside,” and “Rescue.”

It was 1-degree Fahrenheit when we recorded this episode. That’s -17 Celcius to the rest of the world. I personally prepared for this episode by running around outside dressed as though I still lived in Florida or on Helicon, maybe. Then I rearranged all my bookshelves and wondered if I could create a model that would predict the future of the Marvel Universe.

In these chapters, Hari gets settled in at Streeling University and begins working on Psychohistory in earnest. We also meet Dors Venabili who knows her way around a history library and is a quick study at Tennis. And Hari goes for a stroll to get some fresh air; that’s easier said than done on Trantor.

Also Trees! And our first M*A*S*H reference! Don’t miss it!

Stars End S3E01

“The More Complex a Podcast the More Likely It is to Become Chaotic”

In the criminal justice system, the podcast is represented by two separate, but equally important kinds of seasons. The odd-numbered seasons, which directly discuss Asimov’s Foundation and the even-numbered seasons that talk about the Apple TV+ series.

So now we start the interregnum between seasons 1 and 2 of Apple TV’s Foundation. That’s our cue to start Stars End season 3. That’s as many seasons as Gilligan’s Island or the original Star Trek but far fewer than Law & Order. We’re shooting for the latter.

We have a plan and if you follow our plan and listen to our podcast it will seem like far less than 30,000 years until we start to get new episodes of the teevee show.

In this episode, we start discussing Prelude to Foundation in which we meet Eto Demerzel and begin Hari Seldon’s long journey to create Psychohistory. If you’re reading along this time we talk about the first three sections, “Mathematician,” “Flight,” and “University.” But whether you’re reading along or not, let’s go! This will be fun!

Episode 11

As the Manimal threshold fades into the rear-view mirror, we reach our next milestone, with number 11, we now have as many episodes as Cop Rock! You know, it takes most shows years to get around to a musical episode, but those guys? Musical episode right out of the gate! Never fear, though; Stars End: The Musical is toward the end of our Thousand Year Plan.

Right now, please join us for Episode 11 – A Podcast Has No End.

And podcasts don’t, but books and trilogies do. We’re at the end of Second Foundation, and we talk about the very last story, “Search by the Foundation,” known as “…And Now You Don’t” when it was published in Astounding. We’ll meet Bayta Darell’s granddaughter, Arkady, and see a reveal of where the Second Foundation might be, followed by the reveal that there is no Second Foundation, followed by another reveal that the Second Foundation might be somewhere else, and then… well, you get the idea. Plus, we discuss the latest trailer and squeeze in one more round of Asimov Trivia before we start Season 2, coming soon to one of them WWWs near you!

Please join us!

https://open.spotify.com/episode/3tQHOkowngydUG5gSfK92O?si=1I-NPGC-SiyFwkS501yIiQ&dl_branch=1

Episode 10

The start of the Apple TV+ series is now less than a month away and we’re approaching the end of our discussion of Asimov’s original trilogy!

Join us for episode ten “Finished Podcasts Are For Decadent Minds.” That’s 10! Our first-round number! And it’s not 10 base-two or 10 base-eight but 10 base-ten! That makes it the tenest ten!

We’ve finally jumped into Second Foundation! We’ll be talking about the first story, “Search by the Mule,” known as “Now You See It” when it appeared in Astounding Science Fiction. See the final fate of Han Pritcher! Learn the ultimate destiny of the Mule! Marvel at the awesome presence of the Second Foundation! Swoon at the other stuff! A podcast 80 years in the making!

Sadly, True Believers, no one claimed the No-Prize from Episode 9; the Hitchhiker’s Guide Reference comes from Chapter 25 when two philosophers, Vroomfondel and Majikthise are confronting Deep Thought about how the ultimate answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything. That could put philosophers out of business you know! Anyhow, at some point, Vroomfondel shouts “We demand rigidly defined areas of doubt and uncertainty!” which I maintain is one of the finest sentences ever written in the language of Shakespeare. And of which I borrowed a bit in episode 9’s description. Always steal from the best and then provide a citation.

But never fear! That was an obscure one! In this Episode’s Asimov Trivia, you’ll have another chance at the glory of a prize that isn’t actually anything! We’ve added an extra question for you folks at home and to make things more interesting we’ll allow multiple winners! No-Prizes will be awarded not only to the correct answer but to any answer with an interesting explanation. Always show your work!

Please join us!

Episode 9

With the Threll of the Las Vegas 55-Year Mission winding down and the excitement of the Apple TV+ Foundation series winding up, now is a perfect time to check out our Stars End Podcast! Whether you’re looking for a new decades-old franchise to enjoy, you want to catch up on some of your favorite old SF before enjoying the new teevee series, or if you’re just looking for something entertaining to listen to at the airport, Stars End can fill that need! We’re not even off-brand yet!

Please join us for Episode 9 – “A Podcast is Best and Most Effective When It Does Not Evaporate In Empty Phrases” as we wrap up Foundation and Empire with the resolution to Episode 8’s cliffhanger and learn the sooper-secret identity of the Mule. Will the Foundation persevere? Will the Mule conquer the Galaxy? What’s up with Bayta? And where the heck is the Second Foundation anyway? All will be revealed as long as it falls outside our rigidly defined areas of doubt and uncertainty. Thus we merely foreshadow Second Foundation which may or may not be about the location of Seldon’s Second Foundation.

Also “Asimov Trivia” and a new game: find the Douglas Adams reference in this very episode description! The first person to identify the reference and comments on it here or to @StarsEndPodcast on Twitter will receive what Stan Lee used to call a “No-Prize.” That’s not really anything, but we’ll mention your name here or something.

Join us! Please rate and review!

Foundational Readings: The Mule

If you’re keeping up with the Stars End Podcast, Episode 8 has been out for about a week, and Episode 9’s release is imminent. In these two episodes, we discuss the entirety of “The Mule” as we know it from Foundation and Empire. If you’re reading along, of course, it’s pretty easy to find a copy of the book including on Archive.org.

If you want to read this story as it first appeared in Astounding Science Fiction, it appears in the November and December issues from 1945. Not-at-all coincidentally it’s broken up just as we did it on the podcast. The first installment covers the Foundation and Trader Worlds first learning about the Mule and then considering how to respond. It corresponds to Chapters 11 (Bride and Groom) through 18 (The Fall of the Foundation) and ends, as you might guess from the title, with quite a dramatic moment. The December installment covers the remainder of the story and completes the tale with a search for the Second Foundation. Asimov’s writing had gotten better here as evidenced by two nice touches; Mayor Indbur III on Terminus and Emperor Dagobert IX on Neotrantor are excellent personifications of their respective dominions.

As we’ve been seeing, Asimov changes very little from Astounding to the novels. As was the case with “The General” The obligatory Encyclopedia Galactica entry that serves as a prologue is absent, replaced in the first part, by this teaser, probably written by John W. Campbell.

First of two parts of Asimov’s first serial of the Foundation — and of the one factor that even Hari Sheldon could not predict — could not defend the Foundation against. The defenses were based on human psychology; The Mule was a mutant!

Unlike for “The General,” unfortunately, the layouts have largely reverted to rectangles and a lot of the images are tiny. We can hope they do a bit better in part two.

Once again there are some nice illustrations in both parts by Paul Orban. Unfortunately, the scans of these issues aren’t as clean as the previous installments have been so the image quality is uneven.

You can find the entire issue here: Astounding Science Fiction, November 1945 while the interior artwork can be found below.

Part 2 starts off with this teaser.

Second of two parts. Across the ruined, dying Galactic Empire , fleeing from a conquered Foundation, three frightened people and the hunted jester of the new conqueror, the Mule, sought the Second Foundation — the only hope, but it must be warned

That’s followed by a summary of part 1, which you can find here: Astounding Science Fiction, December 1945 if you’d like to read it. Paul Orban’s illustrations are below. They’re larger and more textured than the illustrations from Part 1.