Problematic element in chronology

António Marques · 28 May 2011, 09:08 · from 2011-May.txt.gz

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From: entonio at gmail.com (=?UTF-8?B?QW50w7NuaW8gTWFycXVlcw==?=)
Date: Sat, 28 May 2011 10:08:12 +0100
Subject: (urth) Problematic element in chronology
In-Reply-To: <87E792FA008E4A679A9EFA68176C4976@jill>
References: <87E792FA008E4A679A9EFA68176C4976@jill>
Message-ID: <4DE0BB7C.2060406 at gmail.com>

Gerry Quinn wrote:
> On Blue, SilkHorn explains to prospective astral travellers that they
> can, if they peer for some time, see a dim red star - this is of course
> Sol, etiolated by the black hole inside it.

But we only have the narrator's word for it, and the narrator isnt 
omniscient.

> On the whole, I put this down to Wolfe not fretting too much about the
> details (...)

I don't think it's that.

I think GW fretts paranoidly about the details when the details matter.

When the details are unimportant I think he nontheless handles them with 
some care.

When, as in this case, the details depend on knowledge no one has within 
the story, he's free and willing to improvise.

When the details depend on knowledge no one has period, he's almost 
obliged to improvise. One of the things that makes 'hard' sf so 
ridiculous is its datedness. As-of-time-of-writing scientific consensus 
dates a work even more than cassette tapes do. Constraining a story by 
scientific boundaries is not different from constraining it by 
technological ones.

Of course, it's one thing not to be limited by science, and another to 
contradict it too much (cf. a story I've read recently which places 
Sanskrit 11k years in the past). Unless it's got a good reason behind 
it, it comes across as just uninformed.

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