{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/639",
    "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": 639,
    "subject": "the mantis-Borski 5th Head star search",
    "messages": 1,
    "voices": 1,
    "first": "1998-05-19T23:31:18+00:00",
    "last": "1998-05-19T23:31:18+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0011-0074@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Robert Borski",
        "address": "rborski at coredcs.com"
      },
      "date": "1998-05-19T23:31:18+00:00",
      "subject": "(urth) Re: the mantis-Borski 5th Head star search",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "In trying to nail down which star might shine down on the twin worlds of\nSainte Anne and Sainte Croix in 5HofC, mantis wondered recently:"
        },
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "Assuming a 30 hour day and given the 402 day year, we have a local\nyear 1.37577 times as long as a Terran year.  (Any recollection of a\nsimilar ratio given anywhere in the text?  Another possible clue.)"
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "There's at least one citation in \"V.R.T.\" that supports numbers similar to\nthe ones you propose. Dr. Marsh asks VRT how old he is and he replies,\n\"Sixteen.\" Marsh then says, \"You seem older than that--would say seventeen\n_at least_.\" (Italics mine) Meaning V. could easily be as old as someone in\nhis early (Terran) twenties--I'm sure we all have at least one baby-faced\nfriend in the same age bracket who could pass for much younger (hell, I was\ncarded for alcohol purchases even in my 30s). In other words I have no\ntrouble with these figures and they may be valid."
        },
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "Re: \"Shadow Child\" with \"two bright star eyes,\" in truth my notes are\npretty bad, lacking even page numbers, but I managed to find this one\nbecause it is close to the beginning of \"`A Story"
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "I checked \"A Story\" in my Scribners edition and it is the same as your Ace,\nwith Shadow Child holding over Shadow Children. The reference I cited,\nhowever, was from \"V.R.T.\" -- 20 pages into the narrative--and it reverses\nthis, giving us S. Children. I wonder if this is deliberate or an\neditorial/auctorial miscue? It appears likely each reference has a\ndifferent provenance. \"A Story\" appears to have been written by VRT while\nhe was in prison, so perhaps (given VRT's abo/Annese Origins) may be more\nauthoritative than Dr. Marsh's field notes, which cite Shadow Children.\nThen again, either one or the other could be typos.\n\nIn my initial response I failed to mention that Number Five makes several\nreferences to specific hours (wanting to be waked by ten, but not rising\ntill one). Canonical hours are also apparently utilized, especially on\nSainte Anne. Unfortunately, unlike 1984, there is no telling line like \"It\nwas a bright cold day in April and the clocks were striking thirteen.\"\n\nI share your frustration as well in determining valid reference texts for a\nwork as old as FIFTH HEAD, though in my case I'm speaking more re genetics\nthan astronomy. After all, Dolly the sheep currently lives. (Two heads\ndown, three to go!)\n\nOne last teaser then, slightly off-topic for this thread:\n\nAfter 25 years, I finally figured out what the initials \"V.R.T\" stand for\n(the V and T are readily derived from text, but the R has eluded me until\nrecently). Was it alga or someone else who earlier wondered about this or\nmight be otherwise interested? (I'll also save the supposition about\nDavid's mother for later.) \n\nRobert Borski"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}