From: dvandom@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (David VanDomelen)
Subject: LSH and cheesy science
Organization: The Ohio State University
Date: Sun, 8 Nov 1992 04:44:13 GMT

If T&M have done anything for LSH, it's that they replaced the old cheesy 
science with *new* cheesy science.  But to paraphrase Suenteus Po, making 
mistakes is natural, but repeating mistakes is the sign of a dim spirit.  By 
and large, T&M haven't been making many of the Silver Age foobars, but have 
made their own:  clone tech (more on that in a sec), orbital mechanics, batball
bats, etc....
     I'll have to admit that when I first read the "Lar brings a White Dwarf" 
issue I went "Yow!  I thought Lar had brains!"  Later when I had learned about 
things like Riemann curvature tensors and tidal effects of curvature gradients,
I went "YOW!  Shattered Earth Syndrome!"  But that was a pre-Retcon science 
goof.  T&M have been pretty good about things like "real objects" (i.e. things 
that cannot be picked up by a single point or they break) and so forth.  And 
they don't fall into the trap of just powering up the good guys to finish a 
plot off (well, the superfusion stuff that ended the Khund War was kinda like 
this, but at least it made sense).  Their only real problem with tech is that 
they come up with some piece of science for a particular plot then forget about
it when it might solve a later problem.  Consider the superfast warp drives 
based on 28th Cent tech.  Presuming the whole UP fleet upgraded then, there 
should have had no problem in getting enough ships there in time to evac the 
planet.  But then, all of fiction is full of plot devices discarded after one 
use.
     Okay, a point on clones, which I think I thought up but forgot before my 
next net connection the other day.  Someone made the argument that Controllers 
had such highly advanced tech and couldn't make clones that could reproduce 
safely.  So howcum the Dominators, a much younger race, could?
     Simple.
     Maltusian technology is at its root inorganic.  Sure they have things like
houseplants (if you believe anything in Ganthet's Tale), but they act down upon
life from machines.  On the other hand, Dominators have an organic technology, 
and things like genetics are the basis of their science.  Controllers have tech
almost at the level of Mighty Magic (tm), but since it is apart from life, and 
acts down upon it, there will be errors, if only tiny ones.  Think about the 
transporters on Star Trek TNG as a good example.  They can do wonderful things,
but the same tech applied to making a copy of things is imprecise. Sure, it can
make flawless foodstuffs that are edible, and perhaps even make reasonable 
replacement limbs.  But it cannot replicate a person.  The "single-bit" errors 
in the genetic code render a 'clone' unviable.  The Controllers are advanced 
enough that the errors in replicating lifeforms aren't enough to prevent it 
from living, but they cannot reproduce properly.  Germ Plasm (reproductive 
cells) are alot more sensitive to ANY errors than normal cells.  That's why a 
little radiation may not affect you too much but will make your kids have 
Leukemia or worse.  However, since the Dominators understand genetics like we 
understand electromagntism, they are able to do away with the errors in germ 
plasm.  Just don't ask them to create brilliant robots.
     Dave Van Domelen, spewing science and all the attendant prefixed forms of 
science (pseudo-, quasi-, etc)
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