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orald
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Post by orald »

In short, nope.
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Post by A Thing of Eternity »

Oh good, I'm sure that will provide fodder for when KJA & BH run out of storylines to butcher.
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Post by SandChigger »

Ahem.
FH in CoD wrote: "The sandtrout," he [=Leto] repeated, "was introduced here from some other place. This was a wet planet then. They proliferated beyond the capability of existing ecosystems to deal with them. Sandtrout encysted the available free water, made this a desert planet...and they did it to survive. In a planet sufficiently dry, they could move to their sandworm phase."
You can't transplant grown worms, unless they're old and you've got sand containing sand plankton and a bath of spice and water to lure them into. ;)

Much easier to transplant sandtrout. (Not sure about the sand plankton then. ???)

No mention of where they originated (but whatever planet it was, they killed its biosphere) or who thought to bring them to within 300-some light years of Earth.

One of Leto's male ancestors witnessed or was involved in the transplanting of the sandtrout to Arrakis. It seems likely that the memory came to him through Chani, his Fremen side. (Maybe some early intermarriage between Fremen and older inhabitants?)

I personally believe it was some secret or forgotten group of pre-Jihad humans.

Or...autonomous robotic probes that discovered the worms on their native world and brought them back.

(There...that oughta cause some spheencter tweetching. 8) )
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Post by inhuien »

SandChigger wrote:(There...that oughta cause some spheencter tweetching. 8) )
Or Dick-ta-phones a clickin' :cry:
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Post by orald »

Nonsense! It was all Norma's doing(again)!

She planned it all along- with the sandworms she made Leto II and the GP, thus saving humanity from the threat of a bunch of robots! *oh wait, the GP failed, umm...*

She did it to create the BG and BT in their current forms, and also make Duncan die in the Harko-Atreides fued, thus entering his cells into the ghola "archives" of the BT, ensuring he'll be there in the end to, uh, do some lame stuff like not destroying all the machines.

I'm sick and tired of you guys ignoring her glorious part in history of the Duniverse! :x
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Post by Freakzilla »

SandChigger wrote:Ahem.
FH in CoD wrote: "The sandtrout," he [=Leto] repeated, "was introduced here from some other place. This was a wet planet then. They proliferated beyond the capability of existing ecosystems to deal with them. Sandtrout encysted the available free water, made this a desert planet...and they did it to survive. In a planet sufficiently dry, they could move to their sandworm phase."
You can't transplant grown worms, unless they're old and you've got sand containing sand plankton and a bath of spice and water to lure them into. ;)

Much easier to transplant sandtrout. (Not sure about the sand plankton then. ???)
I think the hybidization with Leto II eliminated the need for the sand plankton.
One of Leto's male ancestors witnessed or was involved in the transplanting of the sandtrout to Arrakis. It seems likely that the memory came to him through Chani, his Fremen side. (Maybe some early intermarriage between Fremen and older inhabitants?)
Why does it have to be a male ancestor? Leto was pre-born so he had male and female OM.
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Post by Tleilax Master B »

orald wrote:
Children of Dune wrote:The worm which had brought him here had come to the stamping of his foot and, rising up in front of him, had stopped like an obedient beast. He'd leaped atop it and, with only his membrane-amplified hands, had exposed the leading lip of the worm's rings to keep it on the surface. The worm had exhausted itself in the nightlong dash northward. Its silicon-sulfur internal "factory" had worked at capacity, exhaling lavish gusts of oxygen which a following wind had sent in enveloping eddies around Leto. At times the warm gusts had made him dizzy, filled his mind with strange perceptions.
I think you guys are reading too much into this. The silicon is the result of the sand and the massive heat caused by the friction of the worms movement. Remember, silica (SiO2) is most commonly found in nature as components of sand or quartz. You can create a chemical reaction with hydrogen, magnesium and sand that will generate pure silicon. I'm not sure that sulfur is a bi-product of this reaction, but I'm certain there are ways of producing sulfur gas through combustion.

IOW, this does not in any way imply the worms are silicon based. They are clearly carbon based, IMHO.
SandChigger wrote:Hmmm. I'm having a hard time seeing how it could be cellular (meaning formerly alive?) except for any dead cells injected into the water capsule by the surrounding sandtrout. Could you elaborate on what you're thinking, B?
I'm not entirely sure; I'm still trying to wrap my head around it. It just doesn't make any sense to me whatsoever, knowing what I do about biology, that a "womb" would be used for any other reason than it provides the ideal environment for repeated cell division. That's what nature has designed it for. Adding gametes, they combine, and meisosis/mitosis runs wild until you have a complete organism. If spice is being made in a womb, it would stand to reason that there is some type of cellular division taking place. UNLESS, as Orald has suggested, Spice is a byproduct of either cellular metabolism, or literally a chemical that can be produced from an organism (maybe splicing in that section of DNA that codes for those type of proteins) and that organism is being "grown" in the Tanks. The concept that spice is some type of fungisoid works well here, or that it is some type of gamete. But that its just a byproduct of a chemical reaction produced by sandtrout, water and CO2 is problematic IMHO. HOW is a womb reproducing that?
Last edited by Tleilax Master B on 14 Apr 2008 09:03, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Nekhrun »

orald wrote:Nonsense! It was all Norma's doing(again)!

She planned it all along- with the sandworms she made Leto II and the GP, thus saving humanity from the threat of a bunch of robots! *oh wait, the GP failed, umm...*

She did it to create the BG and BT in their current forms, and also make Duncan die in the Harko-Atreides fued, thus entering his cells into the ghola "archives" of the BT, ensuring he'll be there in the end to, uh, do some lame stuff like not destroying all the machines.

I'm sick and tired of you guys ignoring her glorious part in history of the Duniverse! :x
Now you're getting the hang of it!
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Post by orald »

Nekhrun wrote:Now you're getting the hang of it!
Does that mean I'll be allowed to attend your next date with Kevin? :P
*sharpens knife behind his back*
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Post by SandChigger »

(I'm getting pretty good at knowing when I can count on you to reply, too, Freak. ;) )
Freakzilla wrote:I think the hybidization with Leto II eliminated the need for the sand plankton.
What do the worms (and, probably, the sandtrout?) eat then? (I didn't mean they were necessary to the process as anything other than food. And, eventually, as a secondary source of new sandtrout?)
One of Leto's male ancestors witnessed or was involved in the transplanting of the sandtrout to Arrakis. It seems likely that the memory came to him through Chani, his Fremen side. (Maybe some early intermarriage between Fremen and older inhabitants?)
Why does it have to be a male ancestor? Leto was pre-born so he had male and female OM.
I was thinking that otherwise the knowledge would have eventually become available to the Fremen through their RMs and maybe become part of their traditions in some way. ("Like us, Shai-Hulud is a stranger to this world. He came as a lowly Little Maker, but now He rules Arrakis! We, too, will reign one day, when the Mahdi comes!" That sort of thing.) If it's locked in male OM, though, they can't get at it. Not conclusive, just my speculation. :)
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Post by orald »

SandChigger wrote:What do the worms (and, probably, the sandtrout?) eat then? (I didn't mean they were necessary to the process as anything other than food. And, eventually, as a secondary source of new sandtrout?)
FH in GEoD wrote:"For a long time after I put on the sandtrout skin, I felt stomach hunger," he said. "Occasionally, I would attempt food. My stomach mostly rejected it.
The cilia of the sandtrout spread almost everywhere in my human flesh. Eating became a bothersome thing. These days, I only ingest dry substances which sometimes contain a bit of the spice."
"You . . . eat melange?"
"Sometimes."
FH in GEoD wrote:Leto had a full day in which to relax and think, to play and pretend that he possessed no cares, to drink up the raw sustenance of the earth in a feeding frenzy which he could never indulge in at Onn or at the Citadel. In those places, he was required to confine himself to furtive burrowings through narrow passages where only prescient caution kept him from encountering waterpockets. Here, though, he could race through the sand and across it, feed and grow strong.
FH in GEoD wrote:Siona had stopped near the crest of a star dune. "Is it true that you eat the sand?" she asked as he came up to her.
"It's true."
It seems to me sandowrms eat sand. And a bit of spice, to spice things up a bit. :wink:
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Post by SandChigger »

Tleilax Master B wrote:
SandChigger wrote:Hmmm. I'm having a hard time seeing how it could be cellular (meaning formerly alive?) except for any dead cells injected into the water capsule by the surrounding sandtrout. Could you elaborate on what you're thinking, B?
I'm not entirely sure; I'm still trying to wrap my head around it. It just doesn't make any sense to me whatsoever, knowing what I do about biology, that a "womb" would be used for any other reason than it provides the ideal environment for repeated cell division. That's what nature has designed it for. Adding gametes, they combine, and meisosis/mitosis runs wild until you have a complete organism. If spice is being made in a womb, it would stand to reason that there is some type of cellular division taking place. UNLESS, as Orald has suggested, Spice is a byproduct of either cellular metabolism, or literally a chemical that can be produced from an organism (maybe splicing in that section of DNA that codes for those type of proteins) and that organism is being "grown" in the Tanks. The concept that spice is some type of fungisoid works well here, or that it is some type of gamete. But that its just a byproduct of a chemical reaction produced by sandtrout, water and CO2 is problematic IMHO. HOW is a womb reproducing that?
Sorry, I forgot to reply to this earlier.

Is there anything that says/suggests that the BT used sandtrout or small worms in their spice-production research?

If not, I would assume that they had engineered an organism or tissue that secreted/excreted the spice in some form. Their (YOUR) nickname is "Genetic Wonders R US!" after all, no? ;)

Um...a byproduct of the carbon-dioxide-producing fermentation under heat and pressure of sandtrout metabolites in solution + the temperature and pressure changes of the blow + heat from sunlight and evaporation in dry air. ;)

But you're the one with the biochem knowledge! :D
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Post by orald »

IDK, Chig, it's quite clearly stated they produce it from exlotol tanks, i.e human wombs.
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Post by SandChigger »

orald wrote:It seems to me sandowrms eat sand. And a bit of spice, to spice things up a bit. :wink:
That's what Leto ate.

I'm just really leery about what characteristics we assume are possessed by the worms created from the sandtrout that hybridized with Leto.

Previously they ate sandplankton—an organic substance—and no doubt swallowed and digested a certain amount of sand as well. For them suddenly to be able to subsist only on non-organic sand implies a major change in their biochemistry and metabolism. Is that warranted?
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Post by SandChigger »

orald wrote:IDK, Chig, it's quite clearly stated they produce it from exlotol tanks, i.e human wombs.
Right. Don't we currently produce insulin using vats of tailored microorganisms? I'm pretty sure I've read that things like this are actually being done now.

???
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Post by orald »

I've held the opinion they're like E-Colley(sp?) producing insulin, I've gave the same example myself. Frankly, I'm not sure anymore what to say. We need a clean-up here.

OK, let me straighten things up. There seem to be 2 opinions here:

1. Spice is only a compound. Like proteins, hormones etc.
2. Spice is cellular, i.e living cells/spores.

Both opinions agree whatever it is, it's organic(so I'm not sure why TMB keeps emphethizing that since I saw no one object).

I started out with op. 1, but TMB's quote of FH's saying it's "spermatic", together with the tanks being basically wombs might point out to it being cellular.
You could ask "why don't they use what we use today, giant tanks of bacteria-infested goo, with ideal growth conditions(that's how we do it in practice, right?)?"
But then we have to remember the BT follow the Butlerian Jihad, so that's why they use organisms even as their tanks(and they can get much better control that way anyway, nature being used to adjustations like in pregnancy).

Op. 1 would have it that the "tanks" secrete spice(I like to think of it as "pissing spice" :D ), whereas op. 2 would have it that they grow a cluster of cells("baby") and then extract the spice from it.
I'm still inclined to say they secrete it, since raising a "spice baby" sounds just bad, but if it's "spermatic" and all...Oh, blast FH for not specifying what "spermatic" means! It could still mean a compound, like the growth hormone makes people, well, grow. Maybe we're stuck in the notion that "spermatic" means sperm(cells) and not just "having the effect of sperm".
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Post by SandChigger »

Herbert never really used the word "spermatic". It was McNelly and Herbert agreed:
FH: Well, you were going to do something.
 
WM: Oh, I was going to trace Shai-Hulud for you. Well, I can’t quite do ... it completely without referring to the text and I’m afraid that most of it is given in the text, but I think that the question of the sand trout and the---

H: That’s right.

M: Is one of the vectors from the sand trout to the dry leathery to the sand trout---no---dry leathery thing---sand trout---to little maker--to---a-- [SC: McNelly's wrong here: sandtrout = little maker]

H: To the big---to the worm---to the big one.

M: To the---yes---well---but it—-- it goes through---does little maker just go directly into tho worm, or is there another---

H: No, that’s---it goes directly into the worm.

M: Goes directly into the worm.

H: It’s a matter of growth process.

M: All right. To the---to Shai hulud itself, and then Shai hulud spice, I think, becomes the eggs. [SC: Shai-hulud spice? Eggs? What's he on about?]

H: Well, the spice, as I conceived it

M: Spermatic material--— [SC: It seems he's interrupting and injecting his own POV, no?]

H: The spice as I conceived it was necessary for the development from, let’s say, the pupil [=pupal] stage.

M: Yes.

H: For him to go beyond the pupil [=pupal] stage, they had to have to be in the presence of the spice. That’s the way I conceived it.

M: I see.

H: That’s why it’s so--

M: I think the spice itself is almost as being spermatic material.

H: That’s right. That’s exactly right.


M: And then there’s spice growing into the-——well, ultimately the little maker.
 
FH: U-huh. [SC: Spice growing into the little maker? Hesitant agreement from Herbert?]
 
WM: As I saw it.
 
BH: Is that something like royal honey, royal nectar.
 
FH: No, the way I saw it is slightly different but…the spice in the presence of a…of a dead…worm.

WM: Oh yes. Killed by the water of life. Then this becomes…and you’re off in the spice below [=blow?].
 
FH: That’s right. This becomes the…the seed of the new life cycle.
 
WM: Ok. Yes. It’s almost orgasmic in that sense.
 
FH: That’s right. Yes.
 
WM: Probably deliberately so.
 
FH: Yes. I built these things in there deliberately, all the way through it.
As I've mentioned just recently, I think we really need to hear the original recording at this point to determine the exact nuances of the interactions.

It seems to me that McNelly was basically where we are: trying to figure out the worm's life cycle and the spice cycle and running his version past FH for comment.

Ultimately, this is all very interesting and throws a different light on the subject. But as a transcript of a casual interview/conversation (over wine and snacks, IIRC?), for me it falls under the category of apocrypha.
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Post by Fantômas »

SandChigger wrote: and you've got sand containing sand plankton and a bath of spice and water to lure them into. ;)

Much easier to transplant sandtrout. (Not sure about the sand plankton then. ???)
when you say "bath of spice and water",

is it the pre-spice patch of encapsulated water?
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Post by Tleilax Master B »

orald wrote:I've held the opinion they're like E-Colley(sp?) producing insulin, I've gave the same example myself. Frankly, I'm not sure anymore what to say. We need a clean-up here.

OK, let me straighten things up. There seem to be 2 opinions here:

1. Spice is only a compound. Like proteins, hormones etc.
2. Spice is cellular, i.e living cells/spores.

Both opinions agree whatever it is, it's organic (so I'm not sure why TMB keeps emphethizing that since I saw no one object).
I keep emphasizing it because it clearly eliminates the possibility of tanks producing "artificial" spice. And others have argued in the past that it was not necesary for it to be organic.


I started out with op. 1, but TMB's quote of FH's saying it's "spermatic", together with the tanks being basically wombs might point out to it being cellular.
You could ask "why don't they use what we use today, giant tanks of bacteria-infested goo, with ideal growth conditions(that's how we do it in practice, right?)?"
But then we have to remember the BT follow the Butlerian Jihad, so that's why they use organisms even as their tanks(and they can get much better control that way anyway, nature being used to adjustations like in pregnancy).
Correct. Spice would literally result from direct cellular division. You put a few "cells" of spice in there, and soon it multiplies into a lot of spice.
Op. 1 would have it that the "tanks" secrete spice(I like to think of it as "pissing spice" :D ), whereas op. 2 would have it that they grow a cluster of cells("baby") and then extract the spice from it.
Correct. You would either grow an organism that "excretes" spice. Or, the tank itself is the organism that excretes spice. My problem with this argument is that the womb, which is the key component in all other products made by the tanks (FDs, gholas, etc.), is completely unnecessary here for the first of those two options. It would still play a role if its an organism or set of cells being grown in the womb that are the source of the extracted spice.

Interesting discussion. I will say that in general, I completely agree with Sandchigger's take on the interview. Its very easy to read too much into it.
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Post by inhuien »

Here's my tuppence on the spermier side of Spice. Now I'm no Biology Graduate so a lot of the techy babble above went over my head but I don't think Mr. F Herbert was suggesting that Spice is like sperm in such that it has little tails and swims about more that it act as a fertilizing/propagation agent. If that's what was said then I should reread this thread.

Your right SandChigger FH's flow is interrupted my McNeilly's own POV, The most telling evidence of that is where FH repeats "as I conceived it"

H: Well, the spice, as I conceived it
M: Spermatic material--— [SC: It seems he's interrupting and injecting his own POV, no?]
H: The spice as I conceived it was necessary for the development from, let’s say, the pupil [=pupal] stage.
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Post by SandChigger »

(I forgot to indicate that those "[=pupal]" bits were added by me. McNelly or whoever did the transcript misspelled it "pupil".)

Something that flitted through my mind yesterday but I didn't get into a post...'cause I'm a little fuzzy (all over, actually :D ) on the details.

When a woman becomes pregnant normally (in the REAL world, I mean), the fertilized egg divides and forms a hollow sphere inside which the fetus develops, right? Does the outer sphere/tissue become the placenta, or does that develop in some other way?

Anyway, I was thinking that the tank spice tissue/organism/thingy could have been engineered to behave in a similar way: it creates a layer of tissue all around the inside of the tank-womb, essentially converting it into a new spice-excreting organ.

If the BT needed to use a spice tank to create something else, they'd just cause that layer of tissue to slough off and be expelled and then they'd have a fresh new womb to play with.

Just an idea, FWIW. :)
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Post by Omphalos »

Sandchigger wrote:When a woman becomes pregnant normally (in the REAL world, I mean), the fertilized egg divides and forms a hollow sphere inside which the fetus develops, right? Does the outer sphere/tissue become the placenta, or does that develop in some other way?
The fertilized egg splits and divides, turning into an embryo, then that embryo becomes the fetus. The fertilized egg doesn't become the egg sack, and it does not give a space for the fetus to grow from something else. The fertilized egg is it. It develops into everything else.

The placenta is a temporary organ that develops out of fertilized egg, not from the mother.
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Post by orald »

Omphalos wrote:The placenta is a temporary organ that develops out of fertilized egg, not from the mother.
I don't really remember much from biology class about pregnancy, but isn't the placenta something that does develope from the mother?
A part of the womb or the ovaries(sp?)?
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Post by Omphalos »

orald wrote:
Omphalos wrote:The placenta is a temporary organ that develops out of fertilized egg, not from the mother.
I don't really remember much from biology class about pregnancy, but isn't the placenta something that does develope from the mother?
A part of the womb or the ovaries(sp?)?
No. It really is a temporary organ that is a part of the fetus' sack, and not something that the mother makes on her own. Its ejected after delivery with the other temporary structures in the ovary.
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Post by orald »

Probably got confused with the unused eggs and tissue(that one does become something in case it's fertilzed, no?) women bleed in their periods.
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