Path: ...!feeds.phibee-telecom.net!3.eu.feeder.erje.net!feeder.erje.net!eternal-september.org!feeder3.eternal-september.org!news.eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail From: Don Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written Subject: Re: It is not just Physics that Should be Hard in Hard SF Date: Mon, 7 Oct 2024 15:43:22 -0000 (UTC) Organization: A noiseless patient Spider Lines: 103 Message-ID: <20241007a@crcomp.net> References: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8stipulation Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Injection-Date: Mon, 07 Oct 2024 17:43:22 +0200 (CEST) Injection-Info: dont-email.me; posting-host="c73855960f13c4bc14e2ee1116442478"; logging-data="1869703"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@eternal-september.org"; posting-account="U2FsdGVkX1/EjGJ1GsEu4590zgn0RGVd" Cancel-Lock: sha1:qdbCguiNb9KaDi/lF3XHC5ZaF9g= Bytes: 5521 Ahasuerus wrote: > Robert Woodward wrote: >> I think authors mess up biology quite often in Science Fiction/Fantasy. >> For example, IMHO, genetic engineering will be much more difficult than >> some authors assume because an individual's DNA isn't the blueprint but >> the assembly instructions. >> >> Also, I have seen stories where advanced bio-technic civilizations use >> bacteria (or multicellular organisms) to wreck havoc on our type of >> technology. Essentially, they are speeding up rust and other forms of >> degradation by one or more orders of magnitude. This, unfortunately, >> requires one of more orders of magnitude more power at the cellular >> level (probably greater amounts of stored energy as well). >> > The other day a PharmD wrote > (https://www.reddit.com/r/printSF/comments/1fj0aon/books_that_feature_speculative_but_accurate/): > > science fiction ... is very sophisticated when it comes to > engineering, astronomy and physics, but when it comes to > biochemistry, medicine and pharmacology, I've yet to encounter > any fiction that gets it right. > > My response was: > > Are you, by chance, familiar with Knoll's Law of Media Accuracy > (https://effectiviology.com/knolls-law/): > > everything you read in the newspapers is absolutely true, except for > the rare story of which you happen to have firsthand knowledge > > or the similar Gell-Mann amnesia effect > (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Gell-Mann_Amnesia_effect)? Robin Cook's mentioned at the reddit link. My followup pertains to Cook. Edgar Allan Poe (EAP) invented the detective genre. EAP's sleuth took the form of Monsieur C. Auguste Dupin, who triumphed through thoughtfulness. Dupin believed the game of chess suitable for developing mental prowess. EAP nemesis Arthur Conan Doyle followed in Poe's footsteps. Doyle projected his own drug use into Holmes to twist Poe's clear thinking detective into mysticism. The Poe-Doyle nexus will be covered by me in the future. Agatha Christie restored Poe's idealized detective. Her character, Hercule Poirot, also brings back the Francophilia found in Poe's Dupin. Levinson and Link's Lieutenant Columbo closely follows formula. Is the show's Peugeot 403 another nod to Poe's Dupin? Robin Cook's _Critical_ (Cook, 2007) contains a Lieutenant strikingly similar to Columbo. Cook's hard-science biology is about as good as it gets these days. See what you think about this sample: Laurie sat down and explained the situation, which elicited from Agnes a mini-lecture on MRSA, including everything Besserman had to say and then some. She explained in detail how staphylococcus was such a pluripotent microbe, and perhaps the most adaptive and successful human pathogen. "When you think about it from the bacteria's point of view," Agnes said, "it is truly a superbug, capable of killing someone in a frightfully short time while the same strain is able to merely colonize an individual, usually just within the nares. This is a convenient location for the bacteria, because every time the carrier puts his or her finger in their nose, their fingers are contaminated from where it can be spread to the next person." "Is there an estimate as to how many people are so colonized?" "Absolutely. At any given time, a third of the world's population carries staph; that's about two billion people." "Good Lord," Laurie said. "Are there many strains of MRSA besides the hospital-acquired and the community-acquired?" "Very many," Agnes said. "And they are evolving all the time in people's noses and elsewhere, like moist skin surfaces, where they exchange genetic material." "How are the strains differentiated in the laboratory?" "Many ways," Agnes said. "Antibiotic resistance is one." "But that's not particularly sensitive, considering everything you've said." "That's correct. The more sensitive methods are all genetics-based: the simplest and most commonly employed being pulse-field gel electrophoresis, and the most complete being full genotyping. In between, there are a number of other sequence typing techniques all based on PCR." Danke, -- Don.......My cat's )\._.,--....,'``. https://crcomp.net/reviews.php telltale tall tail /, _.. \ _\ (`._ ,. Walk humbly with thy God. tells tall tales.. `._.-(,_..'--(,_..'`-.;.' Make 1984 fiction again.