Tales of time travel have been around for hundreds of years. Perhaps the best known work within the world of science fiction is The Time Machine by H.G. Wells. In addition to Wells' tale of an Edwardian scientist battling the Morlocks in the distant future, my personal favorites are :
1) Return from the Stars by Stanisław Lem published in 1961 and
featuring an astronaut returning to Earth more than one hundred years
into the future to find a utopian society based on a universal medical
procedure to alter human nature;
2) Connie Willis’ 1992 Doomsday Book
where a medieval historian travels back to the 14th century to live in a
rustic English village. Like nearly all other tales of time travel, the
novels by Wells, Lem and Willis revolve around travel to one point in
time, either forward or backward.
Dr. Futurity is a tale of time travel but Philip K. Dick being Philip K. Dick, the time travel for the novel’s hero, a doctor by the name of Jim Parsons living in the early 21st century, is a bit more complex, having the doctor propelled to the distant future of 2405 and then traveling via a compact time ship to 1579, back to the years when Sir Francis Drake explored the Pacific Coast of North America.
Published in 1960, Dr. Futurity is PKD’s seventh novel sandwiched between Time Out of Joint and Vulcan's Hammer. So as not to spoil for a reader, I’ll avoid saying too much about plot and jump immediately to a number of colorful highlights and then several philosophical issues the novel addresses.
Race - The men and women of this futuristic society are all of one race, coffee in color and facial features that appear to be a mixture of Native American, African and other racial groups under what we nowadays refer to as "people of color." Those Parsons encounters are put off by his white skin. In other words, the Caucasian race is a thing of the past. Back in the 50s and 60s it was quite common among the educated classes to think issues of race would eventually be solved by such a future "one and only one coffee-colored race."
Youth - Parsons is struck by the fact these men and women are all young - from the looks of it, ranging in age from 19 to 25. Where are all those individuals of middle age and old age? As the good doctor learns quickly, the population is all youth. As a man of 31, he is an outsider. Oh, PKD, you prescient author! You wrote Dr. Futurity several years before American in the swinging sixties came to place a high value on youth and youth culture. One of the catchphrases of the sixties free speech movement: "Don't trust anyone over 30."
Language - This future population speaks a language other than 21st century English but close enough that multilingual, linguistically facile Parsons can pick out their words and phrases without much difficulty. PKD thus handles the language issue with a touch of authenticity - we are reading plain English throughout the novel but there is a tacit understanding the words spoken are in a future amalgamated language.
Religion - Formal religion as we know it in our present day is a thing of the past. Nowhere does Parsons come across any signs or symbols of the major world religions. And not one of these young people appears to have a notion of an afterlife, either in another realm or in rebirth or reincarnation. Quite the contrary - there's a high premium placed on death and knowing you will be replaced by another, more perfectly evolved individual.
Healing versus Euthanasia - When Parsons saves a young lady's life he's arrested since, in this future world, healing people is a violation of the law. One big reason there are no older people - if you are sick and injured, you volunteer for euthanasia - if anything is worshiped here, it is death itself.
Tribes - The future world is split up into tribes. The main tribe in power is the Shupo tribe. Parson brushes against a number of tribes, most notably the Wolf tribe with a man and women he comes to know quite well, particularly the woman who holds particular rank and power. The Wolf tribe objects to death as supreme; rather, they value healing and the wisdom that comes with growing old. The Wolf tribe has mastered time travel and is responsible for bringing Dr. Parsons to this future world for the purpose of healing one of their leaders.
Soul Cube - A huge repository of zygotes that furnish the needed biology for future generations. A critical aspect of the social network since all males are sterile. Tribes compete for a place in this cube - the stronger the tribe, the more representative zygotes, all with the aim of keeping a stable 2.5 billion population and continually improving the human stock genetically.
Killing Drake - Members of the Wolf tribe see themselves as the descendants of Native Americans (since the novel is written in 1960, PKD terms this race of peoples "Indians.") The Wolf tribe wants to go back in time to kill Sir Francis Drake as a first step in nullifying European conquest of the New World.
Of course, what I've noted above cries out for much philosophic reflection. Firstly, we have the whole issue of race. Would one future coffee-colored race provide the answer? My own sense is tolerance and a deeply felt compassion for others is infinitely more important than a blending of skin color.
And then there's the values associated with healing and aging. Should an injured or sick man or women receive medical treatment? I would assume everyone reading this review would answer "yes," most especially if the reader was the person sick or injured. However, our current world, or at least many countries similar to the US, does have a dilemma in automatically opting to keep elderly people alive even to the point of sustaining a life of unending intense pain and suffering. Thus, I recall the Japanese aphorism: "Life without death isn't life, but self-preservation."
Additionally, the novel forces us to consider the dynamics of human evolution. Are we wise to construct a plan to "improve" human development from generation to generation? Should such development be valued over healing the sick and injured?
Turning to time travel, we have the paradox of entering the past to change the course of history. To take one example: if a time traveler traveled back to Germany and shot a twenty-one year old Hitler. Or, if that same time traveler went back and shot his own father before he was conceived. Would we have parallel histories? Again, a major paradox.
More specifically, would it be preferable to make major changes to human history? At first, eliminating European domination of the New World sounds appealing to the doctor but when he might be stranded on the Pacific Coast prior to European exploration, he reflects: "Sixteen years here, living on clams and deer, squatting around a fire, huddled in a tent made of animal hide, scratching at the soil for roots. This was the superlative culture that Corith (a leader of the Wolf tribe) wanted to preserve, in place of Elizabethan England."
Lastly, Philip K. Dick has us ponder our human condition and the very reasons we value life over death. Ultimately, although the novel is a bit rough around the edges, it is the highly engaging philosophic questions that really make Dr. Futurity worth the read.
American Science Fiction author Philip K. Dick, 1928-1982
Dr. Futurity is a tale of time travel but Philip K. Dick being Philip K. Dick, the time travel for the novel’s hero, a doctor by the name of Jim Parsons living in the early 21st century, is a bit more complex, having the doctor propelled to the distant future of 2405 and then traveling via a compact time ship to 1579, back to the years when Sir Francis Drake explored the Pacific Coast of North America.
Published in 1960, Dr. Futurity is PKD’s seventh novel sandwiched between Time Out of Joint and Vulcan's Hammer. So as not to spoil for a reader, I’ll avoid saying too much about plot and jump immediately to a number of colorful highlights and then several philosophical issues the novel addresses.
Race - The men and women of this futuristic society are all of one race, coffee in color and facial features that appear to be a mixture of Native American, African and other racial groups under what we nowadays refer to as "people of color." Those Parsons encounters are put off by his white skin. In other words, the Caucasian race is a thing of the past. Back in the 50s and 60s it was quite common among the educated classes to think issues of race would eventually be solved by such a future "one and only one coffee-colored race."
Youth - Parsons is struck by the fact these men and women are all young - from the looks of it, ranging in age from 19 to 25. Where are all those individuals of middle age and old age? As the good doctor learns quickly, the population is all youth. As a man of 31, he is an outsider. Oh, PKD, you prescient author! You wrote Dr. Futurity several years before American in the swinging sixties came to place a high value on youth and youth culture. One of the catchphrases of the sixties free speech movement: "Don't trust anyone over 30."
Language - This future population speaks a language other than 21st century English but close enough that multilingual, linguistically facile Parsons can pick out their words and phrases without much difficulty. PKD thus handles the language issue with a touch of authenticity - we are reading plain English throughout the novel but there is a tacit understanding the words spoken are in a future amalgamated language.
Religion - Formal religion as we know it in our present day is a thing of the past. Nowhere does Parsons come across any signs or symbols of the major world religions. And not one of these young people appears to have a notion of an afterlife, either in another realm or in rebirth or reincarnation. Quite the contrary - there's a high premium placed on death and knowing you will be replaced by another, more perfectly evolved individual.
Healing versus Euthanasia - When Parsons saves a young lady's life he's arrested since, in this future world, healing people is a violation of the law. One big reason there are no older people - if you are sick and injured, you volunteer for euthanasia - if anything is worshiped here, it is death itself.
Tribes - The future world is split up into tribes. The main tribe in power is the Shupo tribe. Parson brushes against a number of tribes, most notably the Wolf tribe with a man and women he comes to know quite well, particularly the woman who holds particular rank and power. The Wolf tribe objects to death as supreme; rather, they value healing and the wisdom that comes with growing old. The Wolf tribe has mastered time travel and is responsible for bringing Dr. Parsons to this future world for the purpose of healing one of their leaders.
Soul Cube - A huge repository of zygotes that furnish the needed biology for future generations. A critical aspect of the social network since all males are sterile. Tribes compete for a place in this cube - the stronger the tribe, the more representative zygotes, all with the aim of keeping a stable 2.5 billion population and continually improving the human stock genetically.
Killing Drake - Members of the Wolf tribe see themselves as the descendants of Native Americans (since the novel is written in 1960, PKD terms this race of peoples "Indians.") The Wolf tribe wants to go back in time to kill Sir Francis Drake as a first step in nullifying European conquest of the New World.
Of course, what I've noted above cries out for much philosophic reflection. Firstly, we have the whole issue of race. Would one future coffee-colored race provide the answer? My own sense is tolerance and a deeply felt compassion for others is infinitely more important than a blending of skin color.
And then there's the values associated with healing and aging. Should an injured or sick man or women receive medical treatment? I would assume everyone reading this review would answer "yes," most especially if the reader was the person sick or injured. However, our current world, or at least many countries similar to the US, does have a dilemma in automatically opting to keep elderly people alive even to the point of sustaining a life of unending intense pain and suffering. Thus, I recall the Japanese aphorism: "Life without death isn't life, but self-preservation."
Additionally, the novel forces us to consider the dynamics of human evolution. Are we wise to construct a plan to "improve" human development from generation to generation? Should such development be valued over healing the sick and injured?
Turning to time travel, we have the paradox of entering the past to change the course of history. To take one example: if a time traveler traveled back to Germany and shot a twenty-one year old Hitler. Or, if that same time traveler went back and shot his own father before he was conceived. Would we have parallel histories? Again, a major paradox.
More specifically, would it be preferable to make major changes to human history? At first, eliminating European domination of the New World sounds appealing to the doctor but when he might be stranded on the Pacific Coast prior to European exploration, he reflects: "Sixteen years here, living on clams and deer, squatting around a fire, huddled in a tent made of animal hide, scratching at the soil for roots. This was the superlative culture that Corith (a leader of the Wolf tribe) wanted to preserve, in place of Elizabethan England."
Lastly, Philip K. Dick has us ponder our human condition and the very reasons we value life over death. Ultimately, although the novel is a bit rough around the edges, it is the highly engaging philosophic questions that really make Dr. Futurity worth the read.
American Science Fiction author Philip K. Dick, 1928-1982
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