← Evidence Archive
Alien motives and human assumptions
Better Questions, No Answers
The archive will not tell you what the Servators want, because the novel does not know either, and pretending otherwise would be the one dishonest page here.
UnknownSmarter science fiction does not make aliens more human. It questions whether human motives apply to them at all.
What we actually know
Every motive on record in CROWN's files is an inference drawn from human precedent by human analysts. None of it is testimony. The object has never described itself.
Where the extrapolation begins
A resolved motive would be comforting and would close the interesting question. An unresolved one keeps the reader doing what the scientists in the book are doing: measuring carefully and refusing to fill the gap with a familiar story.
What the novel invents
This is the deliberate hole at the centre of the series. Monsters and saviours are both easier to write, and both would be lies.
Questions to think about
- — Why is an unresolved motive harder to sit with than a hostile one?
- — Which of the archive's questions could actually be answered by observation?
- — What would you need to see before you believed you understood them?
Where to read next
- — Critical writing on the invasion narrative in twentieth-century SF
- — Lem, Solaris — contact without shared categories
Continue in the archive