@RUTGERS.ARPA:BARBANCON@YALE.ARPA (02/26/85)
From: Monique Barbancon <Barbancon@YALE.ARPA>
How about G.R.R Martin's "A song for Lya" ?
It's a short story about two humans telepaths meeting an
alien group mind entity. Definitely worth reading...@RUTGERS.ARPA:levin@bbncct (02/27/85)
From: Joel B. Levin <levin@BBNCCT.ARPA> I remember a story (but not its author or title) about a 'micro'-group mind--a few individuals linked together, as opposed to a species-wide or planet-wide group mind--in some collection I know I own but which is buried in one of several boxes. I am missing two digest issues (63 and 64), but otherwise I have not seen it mentioned. The narrator is the personnel director of a large Hughes-like Defense contractor. He has an interest in psi abilities (without possessing any himself) which gets him in trouble with his boss, and he is always being pestered by a Col. Flagg type security officer. This story is not the first in the line: I read another a long time ago, and this story has references to events probably contained in earlier stories. A group of five college grads come to see him; they are individuals but are linked together and think of themselves as "George". The narrator thinks they are using a gimmick to attract his attention (finishing each others' sentences seamlessly), but he hires them into different departments of his company. The company gets in trouble with DOD because "George" expedites interdepartmental interactions and jobs start getting done (gasp!) on time, and DOD wants to know why. I would be interested to know the extent of this series and if it exists in a single collection. /JBL
srt@ucla-cs.UUCP (03/01/85)
I vaguely recall a story in which a group mind is formed when a retarded farm hand meets up with a mongoloid child, a child with telekinetic abilities and a pair of telepathic (naked) twins. I may have some of the details wrong, but surely someone remembers the details. I think the story is considered a "classic" - I certainly consider it so. -- Scott Turner
fish@ihlpg.UUCP (Bob Fishell) (03/05/85)
*** AC T YOUR AGE *** I have read a book called "Mindbridge," By Hoe Haldeman. It involved a melding of minds via a telepathic alien that physically resembled a wet sponge. It was also one of the worst SF novels I've ever read in my life. /_\_ Bob Fishell ihnp4!ihlpg!fish
@RUTGERS.ARPA:Slocum.CSCDA@HI-MULTICS.ARPA (03/07/85)
From: Slocum@HI-MULTICS.ARPA > I vaguely recall a story in which a group mind is formed when a > retarded farm hand meets up with a mongoloid child, a child with > telekinetic abilities and a pair of telepathic (naked) twins. This is More than Human by Theo. Sturgeon, which I mentioned in regards to group minds. - Brett Slocum
bobd@zaphod.UUCP (Bob Dalgleish) (03/08/85)
> I vaguely recall a story in which a group mind is formed when a retarded > farm hand meets up with a mongoloid child, a child with telekinetic > abilities and a pair of telepathic (naked) twins. I may have some of the > details wrong, but surely someone remembers the details. I think the > story is considered a "classic" - I certainly consider it so. > > -- Scott Turner *** REFINE THIS MESSY PLACE WITH YOUR LOSSAGE *** How classic was it? - Theodore Sturgeon almost made a career of this concept. You're right, it does sound familiar: I vaguely recall one novel and some short stories from the man with this theme. I have no pointers, since I don't keep my SF collection in anything remotely resembling Dewey Decimal notation, but start with his collections. _More_Than_Human_ is the first anthology I would look at - it should have pointers to others. Also, try the gigantic anthology by Anthony Boucher (the name is on the tip of my tongue, it's ... it's ..., oh, you know the one I mean, it comes in two volumes and was offered by the Science Fiction Book Club as their loss leader). -- [The opinions expressed here are only loosely based on the facts] Bob Dalgleish ...!alberta!sask!zaphod!bobd ihnp4! (My company has disclaimed any knowledge of me and whatever I might say)
ellen@reed.UUCP (Ellen Eades) (03/12/85)
Leonard Wibberley wrote a really great kids' sf book called Encounter Near Venus which has a group mind made up of critters called "lumens" which are little lights which live in the Seesuch, which is the ocean of Nede, which is a satellite of Venus. It's a very improbable and entertaining book, especially if you are into things like baby gorgons and multicolored Popsicle-flavored crystal cliffs and centaurs with Liverpool accents. Fun stuff. -- Ellen
donn@utah-gr.UUCP (Donn Seeley) (03/12/85)
Bob Dalgleish wonders what was the name of the gigantic anthology edited by Anthony Boucher some time ago. I believe it is called THE TREASURY OF SCIENCE FICTION and while I don't have a copy of my own to verify this, I remember it vividly from having read it in the school library in junior high (in Hong Kong, of all places). It had some wonderful things collected in it -- whole novels, not just stories. Pieces like BRAIN WAVE by Poul Anderson (where it is discovered that stupidity is an artifact of some strange cosmic radiation, which vanishes and leaves everyone normal); THE [WIDGET], THE [WADGET], AND BOFF by Theodore Sturgeon (a very funny and very sentimental story, classic Sturgeon); RE-BIRTH by John Wyndham (his best novel, in my opinion -- published in England as THE CHRYSALIDS); 'Mimsy Were the Borogoves' by 'Lewis Padgett' (another classic); 'Gomez' by Cyril Kornbluth; and (I think) A. E. Van Vogt's THE WEAPON SHOPS OF ISHER. (Well, how many of these did I get right?) These two volumes were primarily responsible for my getting lured into science fiction... If you're unfamiliar with these classics, you really are deprived. The book Scott Turner is asking about is surely Sturgeon's MORE THAN HUMAN. A superlative book -- Sturgeon's best novel, I think. While typing the preceding paragraph I was trying to remember the names of all three novellas in it and for some reason could come up with only two: 'And Baby Is Three' (almost certainly the story you remember) and 'Morality'. These present a much more interesting portrait of 'homo superior' than is found in a book debated over here recently, EMERGENCE by David R. Palmer. To say that MORE THAN HUMAN is Sturgeon's best novel is a bit discriminatory against his other novels such as THE DREAMING JEWELS, VENUS PLUS X, [WIDGET] and others, which are mostly excellent as well. One of my favorite Sturgeon novels is very hard to find and is (I think) amazingly good in spite of its obscurity; it's called SOME OF YOUR BLOOD and makes the recent rash of vampire novels which rationalize the existence of such creatures look rather silly. Now I'll have to go home and dig these books out, Donn Seeley University of Utah CS Dept donn@utah-cs.arpa 40 46' 6"N 111 50' 34"W (801) 581-5668 decvax!utah-cs!donn