Friday, 29 November 2019

One Very Easy Quiz Question Followed By Speculations

SM Stirling, Shadows Of Annihilation, Advance Reading Copy, FIFTEEN.

Which "...Jewish physicist from Switzerland..." had "...daring new theories...," including "...that gravity was things like planets and stars making a downward dimple in space. Rather like a cannonball on a sheet of rubber, and everything rolling down the slope it made toward it." (p. 335)

And will his theories be applied in timeline (B) in the same way that they were in (A)? How many years or decades of (B) are we going to be shown?

We have seen great scientists in alternative timelines before, e.g.:

Instead of Einstein originating relativity theory and Planck originating quantum theory, they cooperated to originate rheatics. Moseley applied rheatics to degaussing the effects of cold iron, thus releasing the goetic forces from their electromagnetic inhibition.
-copied from here.

1 comment:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

Every reasonably educated person should know the answer to that easy question: EINSTEIN! And I see no reason to doubt that both German and the US in the Black Chamber timeline will develop nuclear weapons.

I've also thought of Anderson's story "Details," in which interfering aliens unintentionally hastened the developing of nuclear weapons.

Ad astra! Sean