From: m.driussi@genie.com
Subject: (urth) Science Seance
Date: Tue, 19 May 98 21:42:00 GMT

Robert Borski,

Okay, so far here's what I've got:

Assuming a 30 hour day and given the 402 day year, we have a local
year 1.37577 times as long as a Terran year.  (Any recollection of a
similar ratio given anywhere in the text?  Another possible clue.)

1.37577 = square root of (D^3/M); where D = orbit in AU and M = solar
mass in Sols.

Plugging in values for M.  An M-type star (M = .35), a K-type star (M
= .71).

If M = .35, then D = 0.87 AU
If M = .71, then D = 1.10 AU

The first figure is far outside the lifezone/ecosphere of an M-type
star.  The second figure is bad news for a K-star, too.

Tangential angel <g>: which astron text is Wolfe using, if any?  I
mean, our noodling here is in the name of Art Appreciation, and we
usually trip into the abyss of frenzy of interpretation at one point
or another (Inspiration Point, I'd call it), but honest to Darwin,
when you start comparing astron reference books you get a scary sense
of how mixed up, jumbled, and impossible everything is.  I got three
or more books at hand and they often have very different reality maps
of supposedly the same realty <g>.  I HAVE CORROBERATION FOR THIS:
saw a recent episode of "Nova" talking about detecting extrasolar
planets.  Team California had been working for ten years, couldn't
find a thing.  Team Europe, tinkering around after hours, found the
first one.  How and why?  Well, the Europeans were using a text that
said that particular star fit parameters that they (and everybody else)
was looking for; the Californians were using a text in which the info
on that particular star was incorrect, so they never bothered to
observe that star.

Brrzzt!

"Scientist, fetch thy Ouija Board!"

Anywho, I'm going to guess that if Wolfe is using a text here, it
would be PLANETS FOR MAN by Dole and Asimov.  I will try to use it as
the primary text in this investigation--no sense clouding things up
with astronomy texts written within the last thirty years.

M-type stars are pretty much out of the question.  Entirely out of
the question, according to Dole.  K-type stars, well, it depends, but
they are more iffy than G-type stars.

(By definition (I think), all Wolf stars are M-type stars, fwiw.)

The bright eyes of The Shadow Child =might=, just might mean that we
are talking about a triple star system, with a distant enough binary
being the "eyes" for the lonely third star.

=mantis=

*More Wolfe info & archive of this list at http://www.urth.net/urth/