In regards to Hans Rancke-Madsen's statement about Imperial nobles using
psionics... he couldn't be more right. It's the worst kept secret in
Traveller that the Emporer has his own psionic secret service (called "IRIS",
I forget what the acronym actually stands for). The whole point to IRIS
is to provide extra security for the Emperor by psionically scanning all
his visitors, retinue, cohorts, etc. This way, the Emperor should never
be subject to any assassinations... Of course, we know that this is bunk,
since Strephon was clearly shot by Dulinor on the Imperial Palace's closed
circuit TV during prime time. What happened??
For reasons unknown to the privvy public, Strephon had IRIS removed from
his court about two months (or so) before Dulinor made his attack. Thus,
"The Unseen Who Also Serve" were not anywhere nearby to detect Dulinor's
threat.
Now, as to his point about nobles keeping psionic adepts around for greater
protection... that's anybody's guess. But, there are a few points to keep
in mind. 1) Sure, harboring a psionic is a class-two felony, even for nobles,
but how many nobles do *you* know of who follow all those tedious imperial
laws? 2) The sheer number of nobles, and hence of plots thereof, guarantees
that some of them will be employing psionics. 3) Psionically gifted nobles
exist in and of themselves (just look at how many are playing in campaigns!)
As for the Solomani, official word says that the Solomani hate them just as
much as the Imperials... Of course, we've seen how well the Imperials follow
their own supposed "psionophobias".
Richard Anderson
Univ. of Costa Rica
[email removed]
P.S. In the Hinterworlds, there's even an independent state of humans called
the Anubian Trade Confederation who openly and unrepentantly use psionics for
commercial advantage. (And they directly border on the fringe of Margaret's
domain.) This might give us some idea as to how far the psychohistory exper-
iment went. RHA