Thoughts on the Foundation Trilogy

Spoiler Alert

You don’t need to have read the book to read this article.

For the past two weeks, I’ve been trying to write an article about superconductors. I just can’t bring myself to finish it for some reason. So today, we will discuss the Foundation Trilogy by Isaac Asimov. This article will not be particularly structured but more so a pouring of spontaneous thoughts.

Setup of the series:

The First Galactic Empire is on the verge of collapse, and what follows will be 30,000 years of darkness and chaos before the rise of the Second Galactic Empire. The prominent mathematician Hari Seldon predicted this downfall and came up with an ingenious plan to shorten the Dark Age to just 1,000 years through the use of psychohistory—a statistical model governed by probability that predicts the behavior of large populations. To initiate his plan, Seldon sends a group of scientists and mathematicians to the periphery of the Galactic Empire, establishing the Foundation on the planet Terminus. He also secretly establishes a second group, the Second Foundation, at "the other end of the Galaxy," consisting of psychologists to guide the plan in ways beyond the first Foundation's knowledge.

The largest theme in this book is the question of free will. What is the role of individuals when an almost perfect statistical model already predicts the outcome of a society? Seldon’s Plan accurately predicted the first five wars of the Foundation, it seems that individual actions can be completely disregarded since it doesn’t matter in the broader perspective. This reminds me of the bell curve, specifically the Galton Board— the office gadget you see on every professor’s desk.

In short, the metal balls form the bell curves because there are more paths to the center than to the sides. A lot of social phenomena such as height, IQ, SAT score, and reading ability, can be shown with binomial distribution as such. Humans are surprisingly predictable when evaluated as a group. It is then not hard to imagine that it’s possible to predict the future by combining sociology and statistics. It’s a brilliant idea.

I once talked to Martin B Short, a math professor at Georgia Tech researching mathematical models that predict and analyze human behavior, about how his research reminded me of psychohistory. He agreed. Humans are intrinsically irrational, yet somehow, can be modeled by some purely rational operators.

Seldon’s Plan was operating smoothly until the birth of the Mule, a biological mutant that Seldon’s Plan couldn’t possibly have predicted. The Mule could manipulate people’s emotions. Without any resistance, he “Converted” all of the Foundationers to be his loyal servants. The existence of the Mule questions if psychohistory works. If just one individual can change the trajectory of the future, this one person adds a forever unknown variable to the equation. And that is the limitation of psychohistory.

I doubt Isaac Asimov, as a scientist or writer, believed in the Seldon’s Plan. The world, the galaxy, is too chaotic (in a mathematical sense) to be modeled precisely. Seldon was able to predict the first few hundred years, sure, but nothing beyond that. The ending of the Second Foundation (3rd book in the series) ultimately suggests that what was thought of as Arcadia or Dr. Darrell’s genius was just a perfectly calculated course of events. But not the calculations done by Seldon, but by the Second Foundationers. Seldon’s Plan was just an illusion, providing false confidence to the Foundationer, almost like the placebo effect. That’s what determinism yields: false prophets predicting the future. Did the prophecy come true or did the people make the prophecy come true?

My overall impression of the series: it discusses the clash between the predictability of human beings as a collective and the incalculable nature of each human being. In the end, are we predictable or are we not?

One last thought:

The most important contribution to a successful startup isn’t the business plan, the idea, or the qualities of the founder; it’s the timing. For instance, a few years before YouTube was founded, there were a few video streaming companies. These companies failed not because the idea failed, they failed because the World Wide Web at that time was not mature enough to handle video sharing. YouTube was founded right after the video quality problem was solved. A good idea and great timing resulted in the best startup. Yet not any single person could have changed that. It was the work of the society as a collective.

Thank you for reading my post this week! Feedback and suggestions are highly appreciated! I’m not sure what I’ll cover next week yet. Looking forward to greeting you again!

Enjoy the rest of your week:)