(urth) Hard SF
Daniel Petersen
danielottojackpetersen at gmail.com
Wed Nov 28 14:59:23 PST 2012
Ah, helpful. That's part of what I was wondering too - whether the story
itself suggested or allowed for the 'commingled atmosphere theory'. Sounds
like we need to discard it (imaginatively beautiful though it is).
-DOJP
On Wed, Nov 28, 2012 at 10:51 PM, David Stockhoff <dstockhoff at verizon.net>wrote:
> Well, the cited Jahlee reference has them burning up on reentry if they
> are dead. So the commingled atmosphere theory is not part of the story.
>
>
> On 11/28/2012 5:48 PM, Daniel Petersen wrote:
>
>> Yep, that's what I was worried about, but I have no scientific training
>> so I didn't know if there were some exquisitely rare scenarios where this
>> might be just barely plausible. (It's such a breathtakingly awe-inspiring
>> thought: worthy of a fantasy at least - if no one has written such a
>> thing, someone needs to!) But come to think of it: doesn't the passage
>> say rather explicitly that they fly through /space/? (Does anyone have a
>> page number reference for this?)
>>
>> -DOJP
>>
>> On Wed, Nov 28, 2012 at 4:21 PM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes <danldo at gmail.com<mailto:
>> danldo at gmail.com>> wrote:
>>
>> Not really -- they both seem to have about one G of surface
>> gravity, so getting close enough that their atmospheres
>> meaningfully touched would involve massive tidal effects up to and
>> including immense tsunami and disastrous earthquakes.
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Nov 28, 2012 at 8:04 AM, Daniel Petersen
>> <danielottojackpetersen at gmail.**com<danielottojackpetersen at gmail.com>
>> <mailto:danielottojackpetersen**@gmail.com<danielottojackpetersen at gmail.com>>>
>> wrote:
>>
>> That's a wonderful thought, Antonin! Is this feasible? (Both
>> generally and in the text?)
>>
>> -DOJP
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Nov 28, 2012 at 3:57 PM, Antonin Scriabin
>> <kierkegaurdian at gmail.com <mailto:kierkegaurdian at gmail.**com<kierkegaurdian at gmail.com>
>> >>
>> wrote:
>>
>> Do we have any idea just how close Blue and Green get
>> during conjunction? I seem to remember that from Blue,
>> Green is more of a spec than a moon, but perhaps they are
>> close enough, or have unusually expansive atmospheres,
>> such that during conjunction their atmospheres merge and
>> allow the Inhumi to fly from one to another. If they are
>> this close though, they would most definitely fall under
>> the sway of one another's gravitational field, which
>> doesn't seem to be the case.
>>
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Nov 28, 2012 at 10:51 AM, Lee Berman
>> <severiansola at hotmail.com
>> <mailto:severiansola at hotmail.**com <severiansola at hotmail.com>>>
>> wrote:
>>
>>
>> >David Stockhoff: We're not talking about hard SF here.
>>
>> Just for the sake of discussion, I'll disagree.
>> Perhaps Wolfe isn't diamond-hard
>> but I'd give him ruby- or sapphire- on the MOhs scale.
>> I think he makes a
>> sincere attempt in most of his work, as the quote
>> below illustrates.
>>
>> Where fantasy writers are content to give us shape
>> changers without explanation,
>> Wolfe provides us with a sponge cellular analogy for
>> Tzadkiel and flexible bones
>> and muscles, make-up and hypnotic abilities for Inhumi.
>>
>> If the Inhumi really fly through space I'd want more
>> than the skimpy evidence we
>> are provided (and less evidence for their lying nature).
>>
>> >Nick Gevers: Speaking as an engineer, how might the
>> godling be constructed so as to
>> >walk as a giant on land, where the undines [submarine
>> giantesses] cannot?
>>
>> >Gene Wolfe: There are a number of ways you could go.
>> First, get rid of the notion that
>> >the godling is going to be proportioned like a human
>> being. Changes in size always mean
>> >changes in build. (Dr. Crane touches on that.) A man
>> fifty feet tall, proportioned like
>> >you or me, would sink into the ground a lot -- had
>> you thought of that? Take a look at
>> >the really big dinosaurs. Bone density could be
>> increased, and the legs and pelvis made
>> >more massive, and so on
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>>
>> -- Daniel Otto Jack Petersen
>>
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>>
>>
>> -- Dan'l Danehy-Oakes
>>
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>> --
>> Daniel Otto Jack Petersen
>>
>>
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Daniel Otto Jack Petersen
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