{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/1733", "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it. Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.", "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'" }, "archive": "urth", "thread": { "id": 1733, "subject": "those high fliers", "messages": 2, "voices": 2, "first": "1999-08-05T17:12:57+00:00", "last": "1999-08-11T08:51:31+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Andre-Driussi", "address": "mantis at sirius.com" }, "date": "1999-08-05T17:12:57+00:00", "subject": "(urth) those high fliers", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Eep!\n\nI hope my joke didn't misfire so completely that umbrage occured. I'm too\nfond of that phrase, \"Everything you know is wrong,\" but not in the\nput-down way, rather in the way of the snake-oil salesman pitch.\n\nAnywho, since Wolfe was so anti-antigravity in 5HC, I personally find\nmyself less concerned with the motive force of the fliers (as I wrote\nbefore, I first or second thought of magnetic monopoles, especially in\nlight of \"magnetic sails\" [which are like solar sails but they respond to\nmagnetic forces rather than photons; and might be used for planetary\nliftoff if the flipping over part can be controlled], and then picked up\n\"legitimate\" antigravity notions from Forward, which in turn makes me\nlaugh) than I am concerned with _the anchor ropes that tether the fliers to\nthe ground_.\n\nBut every reader finds some different angle or detail to worry about, this\nis a given.\n\n . . . like, if Urth receives barely enough solar insolation to maintain\nhabitability, then how does Verthandi manage to survive with even _less_\ninsolation? With a Barsoomian brand atmosphere plant, naturally.\n\n=mantis=" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Mitchell A. Bailey", "address": "mab at lindau.net" }, "date": "1999-08-11T08:51:31+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) those high fliers", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Michael Andre-Driussi wrote:\n\nEep!\n\nI hope my joke didn't misfire so completely that umbrage occured. I'm too\nfond of that phrase, \"Everything you know is wrong,\" but not in the\nput-down way, rather in the way of the snake-oil salesman pitch." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Mantis, if that was the worst thing anyone ever said to, or about, me,\nI'd be a happy man indeed!" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Anywho, since Wolfe was so anti-antigravity in 5HC, I personally find\nmyself less concerned with the motive force of the fliers (as I wrote\nbefore, I first or second thought of magnetic monopoles, ..." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "..but wouldn't monopoles tend to accelerate away from the \"like\"\nplanetary pole toward the \"unlike\" pole? If the Autarch's flier was full\nof \"south\" monopoles, wouldn't it be forever straining to dash northward\nacross Ascia into the dark icy seas said to lie in the uttermost north\nof Ascia? And how do we reconcile that with the Autarch's statement that\nhis flier contained \"the antimaterial equivalent of iron\"?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "and then picked up \"legitimate\" antigravity notions from Forward, ..." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Yeah, now THAT was interesting. Would \"negative matter\" be expected to\nannhilate with positive matter, a concern the Autarch had? Remember, he\nsaid \"antimaterial\", not \"negative\". And would negative iron have\nreversed magnetic properties such that it would be repelled by magnets?\nI have been trying to find out more about this \"negative matter\", with\nlimited success. I've heard of a concept of \"negative energy\"; could\nnegative matter be its equivalent? -E = -mc**2? \n(That sound you heard from the Saltus mine is Einstein spinning in his\ngrave!)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " . . . like, if Urth receives barely enough solar insolation to maintain\nhabitability, then how does Verthandi manage to survive with even _less_\ninsolation? With a Barsoomian brand atmosphere plant, naturally." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Dunno. Are we sure Verthandi even DOES survive? It appears Verthandi,\nSkuld, and even Lune are pretty much totally out of contact with Urth by\nSev's time. There's no insystem space flight other than that provided by\nthe Hierodules for their own purposes. You would think that if the\nCommonwealth still had access to even Edwardian radio technology they\ncould still at least communicate, but I don't see much indication that\nsuch a thing takes place. Then again, what would they talk about?\n\nI guess any surviving Verthandians and Lunatics must be huddled in their\nlifesystems eking out a living with farms under pressurized domes and\ndecrepit old tokamaks supplementing the fading solar power grid. On the\nother hand, Skuld is probably pretty balmy now. Major industry:\npostcards that say \"Hello from sunny Skuld. I'm here and you're not.\nPththpbb!\"\n\n(The Barsoomian air plants, located in the pyramids of Elysium, were\nrestarted and depleted, you may recall, when AHHHnold cranked them up in\nthe climax of _Total Recall_)" } ] } ] }