Astounding Science Fiction, August 1955 (British Edition)

About this issue

This British edition contains a novelette, three short stories, and a serial conclusion. Mark Clifton's novelette "Sense from Thought Divide" concerns a Pentagon liaison officer delivering a supposed telekinetic "poltergeist" to a personnel director in a research organization. The Swami, claimed to have psychokinetic abilities, proves fraudulent, unable to move even a simple ash tray. Clifton's narrative explores the question of authenticity: what defines a charlatan versus a genuine practitioner. Additional fiction includes R.C. Noll's "A Fine Fix," Eric Frank Russell's "Diabolic," and Lee Correy's "The Test Stand." The issue concludes H. Beam Piper's serial "Time Crime." John W. Campbell Jr. editorializes on technical unemployment, arguing that machines will replace technicians in predictable, fully-specified tasks, with meaningful work remaining only in design engineering, research, and creative endeavors not yet fully defined.