Review: Starship Troopers (1959) by Robert Heinlein

I enjoyed your review. I tend to lean fantasy genre, but it may be time for me to read Starship Troopers.

Decent review, avoids falling into the "Wow! Fascist!" trap that seems easy.

Like almost all reviews of Starship Troopers, it misses the fact that the Terran Federation has a "mathematical logic" of ethics. Mr Dubois is given the lines:

We have such a theory now; we can solve any moral problem, on any level. Self-interest, love of family, duty to country, responsibility toward the human race - we are even developing an exact ethic for extra-human relations.

This same thing comes up when Rico is in OCS. A professor asks for a proof of an ethical assertion made by another officer candidate.

Because of this, the Terran Federation can be assured they're doing the right thing flogging someone, or summarily hanging them, or being sexist, or atom bombing the Skinnies or whatever. They've got mathematical certainty.

Unfortunately, our universe's mathematics doesn't work that way. Axioms and rules of deduction are a choice, and to some extent, mathematics can be invented, rather than being fixed and platonic and discovered.

The other thing this review misses is that Heinlein wrote Starship Troopers in 3 weeks. It's probably a mistake to soberly consider what Heinlein "meant" by something, or seriously considering that what he wrote was what he believed because he didn't have time to consider that kind of consistency, or possess that kind of underpinnings. This shows through in other ways, like: what kind of power did an armored suit have? Battery? Atomic? Those suits used a lot of power for sure.

I do think you should read and enjoy Starship Troopers, the book. It's well worth your time and energy.