"Julian May - The Adversary" - читать интересную книгу автора (May Julian)

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The Adversary
Book 4 of the Saga of Pliocene Exile
by Julian May
Version 1.0


Synopsis

THE GALACTIC MILIEU AND THE
PLIOCENE EXILE

The Great Intervention of 2013 opened humanity's way to the
stars. By the year 2110, when the action of the first volume in
this saga began, Earthlings were fully accepted members of a
benevolent confederation of planet colonizers, the Coadunate
Galactic Milieu, who shared high technology and the capability
of performing advanced mental operations known as meta-
functions. Genes for the five principal metapsychic abilitiesтАФ
farsensing, coercion, creativity, psychokinesis, and redaction, or
healingтАФhad been part of human heredity from time immemo-
rial; but the mental powers were at first only rarely manifest,
remaining mostly latent until evolutionary pressure resulted in
increasing numbers of operant human metapsychics, being born
late in the twentieth century.

The five founding races of the Galactic Milieu had observed
the slow metapsychic development of humanity for tens of thous-
ands of years. But it was not until a small group of beleaguered
pioneer operants broadcast a desperate telepathic appeal that
the Milieu finally intervened in Earthly affairs. After some
debate, the galactic confederation decided to admit Earthlings
into the Milieu "in advance of their psychosocial maturation"
because of the vast mental potential of humanity, which might
eventually exceed that of any other race.

In the hectic years following the Great Intervention, the
mundane problems of humanity seemed all but solved. Poverty,
disease, and ignorance were wiped out. With the help of the
nonhumans, people from Earth colonized more than 700 new
planets that had already been surveyed and found suitable.

Earthlings also learned how to speed the development of
their metapsychic powers through special training and genetic

engineering. However, even though the number of humans with
operant metafunctions increased with each generation, in 2110
the majority of the population was still "normal"тАФthat is,
possessing metafunctions that were either meagre to the point