In an otherwise terrestroid planetary ecology, a single ubiquitous bacterium enters the human bloodstream where it excretes acetylcholine which is lethal to the nervous system. Scientists on the mother planet, New Djawa, developed an antitoxin that enabled the colonization of Unan Besar but also empowered the tyrannical Biocontrol.
Like the basic plot idea of many another sf story by Poul Anderson, this one could have generated an ideal Star Trek script but, fortunately, it instead became an installment in Anderson's much better and greater Technic History. Dominic Flandry solves the problem, which is just one of many.
6 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I admit it took me a LONG time to pay proper attention to that critical detail about acetylcholine and now it affects the human nervous system. I do recall Flandry commenting that even 300 years or more before, the technology used on Unan Besar for manufacturing the antitoxin was antiquated and obsolete even then. The much more advanced medico/chemical technology available in the Empire could produce the antitoxin far more cheaply, efficiently, and safely.
But even the cumbersome methods used on Unan Besar could still produce antitoxin which would cost only a few coppers per pill, not the ten silvers everyone had to pay every thirty Unan Besaran days. And enough of the antitoxin could have been produced and kept in reserve for emergencies. Biocontrol used its control of antitoxin production to become a dictatorial single tax oligarchy.
Ad astra! Sean
Kaor, Paul!
I've also been wondering about the currency used on Unan Besar, and whether it was a decimal system. If so, did 100 coppers make one silver? And ten silvers one gold? And was there a smaller silver coin valued at 50 coppers called a "half silver"?
Just geeking out like a fanboy! (Smiles)
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Very fannish.
I will switch off soon but am thinking of a post on interstellar polytheism in Anderson and Blish for tomoz.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Well, we see more than we usually do about coins and currency in THE PLAGUE OF MASTERS. Even a bit about Imperial currency. And was a one copper coin about the size of a UK two pence?
And we do see mention of various planets in the Technic stories, human and non-human, having polytheistic religions. And others which had monotheistic faiths. Not familiar enough with how Blish handled such things to comment.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Not much about this in Blish but his Okies swear by "gods of all stars!"
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I'm reminded of how late Victorian and Edwardian Englishmen mighty exclaim "By Jove"! So they wouldn't take in vain the name of God or Christ.
Ad astra! Sean
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