#the mote in god's eye

[chernobog13]

This is the Matt Jefferies-designed ship that AMT used to expand their initial Star Trek line of models in the mid-1960s.

The Leif Ericson didn't sell very well, and the entire Star Trek line was soon discontinued. However, the model did find fans in renowned science fiction authors Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle. They liked it so much they used it as the basis for the INSS MacArthur in their magnum opus The Mote in God's Eye.

[alphamecha-mkii]

The Mote in God's Eye Cover Art by Fred Gambino

[grayrazor]

A lot of bad "humans are space orcs"/"humanity fuck yeah!" web fanfiction intentionally or unintentionally imitates Niven, but the guy himself was pretty good at avoiding the worst cliches. Every "enemy" species is less inferior to humanity and more a sidegrade with different strengths and weaknesses.

Slavers and Kzin are stronger and faster than humans, but kinda stupid. Fithp are good strategists, but are unprepared for the concept of “revenge.” Moties and Pak are super smart, but can never accomplish anything as a civilization because they’re so warlike.

[art-of-illlustration]

The Mote in God's Eye, 1977

[that-dinopunk-guy]

I bought more paperbacks.

(Also I got the Peter F. Hamilton books entirely based on enjoying Pandora's Star like twenty years ago and completely managed to not realize there's another book between The Dreaming Void and The Evolutionary Void.)

[thelastofthebookworms]

You'll find the other polls in my 'sf polls' tag / my pinned post.

[paulsspaceshippictures]

The Mote in God’s Eye - re-rendered using Master Bit’s Pluto texture maps as a stand in for Cue Ball, which works better I think.

[a-queer-little-wombat]

Hand one: Hell yes. Please.

Hand two: in the era of going to the sanatorium for 4-5 months, sanatoria were out of reach for the vast majority of people. Most people worked 6+ days of the week, and only the affluent went to a sanatorium for any length of time. We just don't have a lot of books written about the average person.

Hand gripping: these days the income inequity in the US (and the UK, I suspect) is *even larger*, so now the merely affluent can't do it either. The 1% rich folks, tho? Totally can go to a resort/retreat/private island any time they want for as long as they want.

My deepest darkest fantasy is that I collapse on the street and I am rushed to the hospital. They perform a bunch of tests and find out I am severely deficient in some kind of vitamin. Then I start taking the vitamin and I become the happiest cleverest person alive because all my problems were caused by this one deficiency

[paulgadzikowski]

[Image description: Preview panel for the comic strip at the link below. Several Motie Masters from The Mote In God’s Eye and The Gripping Hand look on as a Mediator makes an entry on a pocket computer and speaks to Governor Renner. The Doctor, half human on his mother’s side incarnation, is there. The Mediator is saying, “Governor Renner, on behalf of the new United Mote System Confederacy, I accept full membership in the Empire of Humanity and Motie.” Unfortunately there are not image descriptions at the main Hero Of Three Faces site. End description.] 

The Hero of Three Faces is fanfiction crossovers, but it’s comic strips with stick figures, but they’re triangles. Preview panel only. Click here for full cartoon. Or see the on-site navigation tutorial. Or see this blog’s FAQ, or my archive tumblog’s FAQ. Cartoons may contain unmarked spoilers. Cartoons linked from Tumblr 10:00 (Central US time) daily are the previous day’s new update and the posts are pinned to the top of this blog. Cartoons linked from Tumblr 22:00 daily are from the archive and the posts are pinned only during annual summer hiatus of new updates.

Thanks for reading.

[billlaotian]

[loveerran]

What Matters Most

when we are obsessed about people working on specific standards for personal purity, i think we sound a lot like we’re teaching folks to be the man in the parable who had only one talent and buried it.

turning outward and helping others? ministering to and welcoming and serving all of God’s children? that sounds a lot like the person in the parable who had five talents and gained another five on top of that.

would Jesus ask the church today if we were focusing too much on the small things? the wrong things?

“Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.” Matthew 25:40

[fair-dinkum-mechanic]

?

[grayrazor]

Non-Star Trek books that are kind of Star Trek-like (quality not guaranteed)

Spaceship finds a weird object/alien civilization:

Rendezvous With Rama

The Mote in God’s Eye

The Invincible

Blindsight

Utopian interplanetary society:

3001: The Final Odyssey

The Culture Series

The Hainish Cycle

Contact

Napoleonic Navy in Space:

Lensman

Legend of the Galactic Heroes

Honor Harrington

John Grimes

[longwayhome-laststop]

"YOU WILL NOT SUCCEED," THEY TOLD HIM. "NO ONE CAN."

TO WHICH THE THIEF REPLIED, "I HAVE A YEAR NOW THAT I DIDN'T HAVE BEFORE, AND A LOT OF THINGS CAN HAPPEN IN A YEAR. THE KING MIGHT DIE, THE HORSE MIGHT DIE, I MIGHT DIE... AND WHO KNOWS? MAYBE THE HORSE WILL SING."

[DAY 31]

Given how difficult it's been to find a librarian, I'm hard-pressed to believe that anyone on this planet is literate.

Luckily, I don't actually need the book I'm looking for, although it would be a massive boon to have. Mostly I just needed something to do that's not farming. Plants grow quickly in the outpost, I think that golden flower has something to do with it, so I'm not exactly strapped for food.

I am strapped for air, though—not an entirely unanticipated challenge, but I'm going through respirators much faster than I'd like. Safe places with altitudes low enough to breath comfortably are few and far between... another point deducted from the overworld, another point granted to the strange lush ruins I've made a home in.

The Freydis is still out of range; I've made my own company in the creatures that live up here, though I still don't know their proper names. Cod and Salmon remain, though Salmon now carries the feather of a very large, bright bird I've tamed. (They still have not eaten the fish I gave them.) The small bird does not have a name yet, nor does the large one. I have Bert and Ernie now, who are... clams... I think. They climb the walls and ceilings of the ruins and hide when I get close.

I should probably domesticate animals I can farm, but an underground outpost isn't very conductive toward that. The only creature of any real use at the moment is the large bird, who let me saddle her and takes directions well enough that I'm not afraid to fly with her. I still hate how vast the sky is here, but I have to admit it's a convenient way to travel. There's also no way I would have otherwise found the massive floating island I sit on now—let alone been able to get up to it.

There aren't any librarians up here either, at least not that I've seen, but I don't mind exploring. At least so long as my respirator holds. The whole reason I'm this far outside of the designated area if because I need to find a librarian that has some idea how to make this thing last longer.

Lack of contact from the Freydis has me a bit wired, too. Sent a message yesterday and it bounced. Trying not to think about it. May be that they've already started surveying at the other pole, they'll circle around soon enough.

[remma-demma]

My new online math class is set up sooooooooooo badly. It’s on a fucking forum, it’s all nested links to the textbook and we’re skipping things and going back and doing other things and the only actual instruction is coming from a collection of five different calculus men on YouTube.

It's an accelerated course so I fucking guess we have to have gone onto week three stuff even though it's only week 2 but he didn't TELL us that.

The videos don't even cover everything. I'm coming across an assignment and am literally like WHERE IS THAT INFORMATION EVEN. WHEN DID WE LEARN THIS. (it's hidden behind three links but i won't tell you which ones tee hee) fuck off.

hell.

[team-frightfur]

🌸

A+. This pic tastes like jasmine tea (because to me nostalgia tastes like jasmine). I guess it also looks like its been dipped in tea to make it sepia or something. Prolly smells like my childhood too. Hngh. Where's that bitchass duck?

flowers