Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site brl-tgr.ARPA
Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!harvard!seismo!brl-tgr!wmartin
From: wmartin@brl-tgr.ARPA (Will Martin )
Newsgroups: net.tv,net.sf-lovers
Subject: Re: AMAZING STORIES 11/3: The Mission
Message-ID: <2958@brl-tgr.ARPA>
Date: Thu, 7-Nov-85 11:32:18 EST
Article-I.D.: brl-tgr.2958
Posted: Thu Nov  7 11:32:18 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 8-Nov-85 21:27:32 EST
References: <1384@mtgzz.UUCP>
Organization: USAMC ALMSA, St. Louis, MO
Lines: 26
Xref: linus net.tv:3304 net.sf-lovers:9905

> So he coddles them, tells them, "There, there, whatever you do, there
> will be some way to fix it up.  Just wish hard enough and everything bad
> will go away."
> Feh!
> 					Evelyn C. Leeper

I think I liked this episode a lot more than a lot of you, and now I
think I know why. I think that, deep down inside, I really DO believe
that you can change external reality by "wishing hard enough"; actually
by mental force. It is just that we do not yet know how to do it, or do
it repeatably or consistently. Maybe we need to evolve more, or be given
the secret by aliens, or achieve higher planes, or something...

Remember that I was the one who attacked an earlier Amazing Stories for
unscientific portrayal of meteorite impacts, and not for the totally
unscientific "animal magnetism" that the story hinged upon. This episode
illustrates what I described as the proper technique of fantasy (in this
sort of story); a totally realistic and accurate environment and detail,
with ONE (or one unified set of) fantastic element(s). That element can
be totally off-the-wall, unscientific, inexplicable, nonsensical, etc.
It is the insertion of that element in the otherwise totally realistic
environment that makes the fantasy, and having only to suspend disbelief
for that (not for everything else, too!) lets you appreciate the
contrast and leads you to think "what-if"s later on.

Will