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[[File:hariseldon01_7764.gif|frame|[[Gambit Roulette|Taking the long view.]]]]
The
▲The "Foundation Trilogy" is a classic collection of science fiction stories by the author [[Isaac Asimov]]: ''Foundation'', ''Foundation and Empire'' and ''Second Foundation''. Famous mathematician Hari Seldon creates the science of "psychohistory", which can be used to predict the broad sweep of humanity's future. Said future is not looking good: the Galactic Empire in which Seldon lives is in terminal decline, with nothing to follow but barbarism for the next thirty thousand years. In order to accelerate a return to civilization, Seldon and his followers establish two Foundations to preserve human knowledge, at "opposite ends" of the galaxy. In order to keep its actions predictable, the first of these colonies originally has no idea of Seldon's real plan, but is banished from the imperial capital Trantor to the planet Terminus on the remote edge of the galaxy, there officially assigned to compose an encyclopedia of all human knowledge. The Second Foundation remains nearly forgotten, cloaked in secrecy.
As the decades pass and their power grows, the leaders of "the" Foundation time and again find themselves facing a major crisis, usually having to do with their relationships with the semi-barbarous star systems which surround them, the political rubble left behind by the Empire's ongoing collapse. Seldon's "Plan" dictates that each crisis will force events down one inevitable path, which will invariably cause a drastic change in both the Foundation itself and its relationship with the nations surrounding it. During these Crises, the long-dead Seldon always steps in with a [[Dead Man Writing|recorded message]] telling the current generation of Foundationers what they need to hear (or a summary of the recent past), as he has predicted it decades previously. All goes well, at least as far the Foundation is concerned, until a very singular individual nicknamed "The Mule" suddenly appears on the galactic scene...
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