Analog SFF, May 2007 Read online

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  Analog SFF, May 2007

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  Science Fiction

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  ANALOG SCIENCE FICTION AND FACT

  Vol. CXXVII No. 5, May 2007

  Cover design by Victoria Green

  Cover Art by Donato Giancola

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  SERIAL

  QUEEN OF CANDESCE, Part III of IV, Karl Schroeder

  Novella

  DAMNED IF YOU DO..., Lee Goodloe

  Novelette

  BAMBI STEAKS, Richard A. Lovett

  Short Stories

  THE ASTRONAUT, Brian Plante

  A HIGHER LEVEL OF MISUNDERSTANDING, Carl Frederick

  Science Fact

  I COULDN'T READ YOU, E.T., Henry Honken

  Reader's Departments

  THE EDITOR'S PAGE

  IN TIMES TO COME

  THE ALTERNATE VIEW, John G. Cramer

  THE REFERENCE LIBRARY, Tom Easton

  BRASS TACKS

  UPCOMING EVENTS, Anthony Lewis

  Stanley Schmidt Editor

  Trevor Quachri Associate Editor

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  Click a Link for Easy Navigation

  CONTENTS

  EDITORIAL: METASCIENCE AND MAIL FRAUD by Stanley Schmidt

  DAMNED IF YOU DO... by LEE GOODLOE

  SCIENCE FACT: I COULDN'T READ YOU, E. T. by HENRY HONKEN

  THE ASTRONAUT by BRIAN PLANTE

  BAMBI STEAKS by RICHARD A. LOVETT

  THE ALTERNATE VIEW: THE UNIVERSE AS WATERMELON by JOHN G. CRAMER

  A HIGHER LEVEL OF MISUNDERSTANDING by CARL FREDERICK

  QUEEN OF CANDESCE: PART III OF IV by KARL SCHROEDER

  IN TIMES TO COME

  THE REFERENCE LIBRARY by TOM EASTON

  BRASS TACKS

  UPCOMING EVENTS by ANTHONY LEWIS

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  EDITORIAL: METASCIENCE AND MAIL FRAUD

  by Stanley Schmidt

  In my last column here I mentioned my recent stint as a volunteer in a field study of invasive plants—a scientific study with botany and ecology as its subjects, with data being collected by volunteers who were not professional botanists or ecologists. A secondary goal of the study was to evaluate the effectiveness of that method of collecting information. The first goal is science, the study of the natural world; the second is “metascience,” the study of science itself and how it is done.

  There was a third purpose, too: to try to increase understanding of what science is and what it does among people who came to the study without much knowledge of such things. Some people volunteered not because of their own scientific backgrounds, but simply because they thought it sounded like a good way to make a useful contribution to the protection of something they loved while doing something they enjoyed. The organizers of the study hoped that by getting involved in doing some science, some nonscientists might develop a better feel for what it is and why it's worthwhile. And they, in turn, might spread some of their newfound understanding and enthusiasm to still others.

  That, too, is a kind of metascience. Why is it important? Because a great many of the decisions all of us increasingly have to make—as voters and as consumers, for instance—depend on having at least a basic understanding of scientific philosophy, principles, and in some cases specific details. If you're voting on such matters as energy policies and conservation, you can't expect to be able to make reasonable choices unless you have some understanding of how those things work.

  Furthermore, in many cases we're going to need better understanding than we yet have of these subjects. That means we need more research. And that means we need more researchers and more funding for research. We need policy makers (and at some level that includes voters and corporate stockholders) who see the value of supporting research—even the basic kind that does not yet have obvious practical applications. We need young people who are interested enough in science and technology to pursue careers in those fields. That means we need parents and educators who understand the workings and importance of those endeavors well enough to inspire interest in them among those they're raising and teaching.

  They're not likely to do that unless they have such understanding and enthusiasm themselves.

  And there are plenty of obstacles to peoples’ getting a realistic idea of what science and the people who do it are like. The vast majority of portrayals of scientists and engineers in movies, television, and other popular media are grossly unrealistic stereotypes and caricatures. (We could use a lot more things like the Kristi Lang stories of Michael Shara and Jack McDevitt, which admirably convey all the fun and boredom and frustration and occasional excitement of real science.)

  I've had at least one humanities teacher who said in front of her classes that she didn't like science because it was “so cut-and-dried.” That made me cringe; whenever I hear anyone say anything like that, it tells me quite clearly that either they've never tried to do any science, or if they did, they didn't understand what was going on.

  And then there are the highly visible things arriving in our mailboxes all too often, masquerading as science and quite possibly turning off potential scientists and science supporters who take them at face value. This problem has been around a long time; we published a “Brass Tacks” letter about it eighteen years ago, and I've noticed no diminution of the practice since. In fact, I think we may still be seeing some of the same old offenders, with little or no change in all that time.

  I refer to the solicitations that all of us get that come in envelopes with portentous statements on the outside like, “You have been selected to participate in an important national survey.... “But when you open the envelope, what you find inside is a list of ten or so questions, all or most of them blatantly loaded and leading, like, “Do you think we need legislation to curtail the raping and pillaging of the environment by industrialists run amok?” The list culminates in one like, “Would you pledge as little as $50 to help stop these abuses? If so, please make your check payable to...”

  In other words, the “important national survey” is nothing of the kind. It's a bald-faced solicitation for money, shamelessly couched in blatantly manipulative terms that superficially look like an actual survey, but are actually calculated to shame the reader into professing agreement with the sender and coughing up a contribution. The teaser on the envelope is, purely and simply, a lie.

  Since these things come in the mail, and use deliberate misrepresentation in an effort to get money from people, it's awfully tempting to call them “mail fraud.” I hasten to add that I suspect at least most of them don't meet the strict legal definition of that term, so I'm not actually accusing anybody of literal criminality. I'll even grant that you might say that my inclusion of that phrase in my title is itself a somewhat similar bit of trickery to get people's attention. But I respectfully submit that it's at least less egregious than the practice I'm describing.

  These phony “surveys” are the sort of thing we've come to expect in campaign mailings from politicians, most of whom we'll vote against if we can find a less unpalatable alternati
ve. But many of these things come from scientific, humanitarian, and environmental organizations that actually promote admirable goals that many of us would find well worth supporting.

  What's going on here? Why are these high-minded organizations using such underhanded tactics, and why have they continued to do it for so long?

  Well, presumably because they work, or at least those who evaluate such things for the organizations in question have managed to convince them that they work. Personally, I'm not so sure. Maybe they do persuade some people to send money; but I'm quite sure they also persuade others not to send money who probably would if they were approached with a modicum of respect for their intelligence. When that happens, it's surely counterproductive for the organization trying to gain support, and I'm not at all sure that that effect isn't larger than the other.

  But the practice of misrepresenting “research” may be counterproductive in another sense, too, subtler but in the long run perhaps more important. I can easily imagine some people—young ones deciding what to do with their lives, for example—looking at these “surveys” and actually believing that they are examples of how science is done.

  And deciding, with disgust, that they want no part of it.

  In other words, these things contribute to giving the public an even more distorted idea of what research is—and it's plenty distorted already. We need to give people a clearer idea of what science is, how it's done, and why it matters.

  So why are reputable organizations like , , and (you can fill in the blanks from your own experience), which could be doing that, instead using tactics that repel the very people they want and need to attract? An obvious part of the answer is that the people who set the core policies for such organizations seldom write the promotional and fundraising materials they use. They hire others to do it for them, people or other organizations that specialize in such things.

  But one might think, or at least hope, that those who do set the organization's main goals and directions would pay closer attention to what's being said in their names, and try to exert some control over it where such is clearly needed.

  After all, there's more at stake than next year's budget.

  Copyright © 2007 Stanley Schmidt

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  DAMNED IF YOU DO...

  by LEE GOODLOE

  Illustration by

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  Some sleeping dogs have friends...

  Chad Gutierrez latched the heels down on his skis. The first couple of runs had been everything he'd hoped for: untracked powder, just enough trees to make it interesting (and to stabilize the slope), and stunning views of the high country.

  He now wanted to try a different area, so he'd had Charlie Jones, the chopper pilot, drop him off farther down the ridge.

  He stood in snow, among which krummholz and the occasional gnarled bristlecone pine poked out, and looked down a steep open slope. Chad regarded it with trepidation: it looked both steeper and less stable than it had from the helicopter, exactly the sort of place where avalanches were likely. There was no avalanche control in the backcountry, as the boilerplate for the heli-skiing operation reminded customers.

  Well. He'd try to sneak down the right side, avoiding the middle of the slope. He went through the last checkout of his equipment: avalanche radiobeacon (which doubled as the locator for his pick-up point) turned on; helmet cam on and running; backup video also on and running ... all set. Then Chad checked the fastening on his helmet strap one last time, flexed his legs experimentally, and dropped onto the slope.

  And immediately knew he was in trouble, as the snow under him began to slide with his weight. Chad promptly turned left, trying to get away from the avalanche he'd triggered, but the snow continued to fail as soon as his weight came on it. He ended up frantically skiing diagonally across the slope to stay ahead of the avalanche that formed as soon as he touched the snow. He felt a moment of relief as he reached the ridgecrest that defined the left edge of the slope—and then felt himself fall as the cornice he'd unknowingly topped collapsed under him, dropping him on the other side of the ridge. Chad in a panic threw himself forward, leaning out over his skis, trying to get beyond the collapse to the slope below—and hoping desperately there was snow on that slope.

  There was. He hit hard, but managed to stay on his skis, feeling the edges dig in as he turned his impromptu jump into a traverse across the steep slope where he'd landed. Finally he angled his skis uphill to stop.

  His heart was thundering and his breath gasping. Muchcloser call than I like, Chad thought. Avalanche was every backcountry snow buff's nightmare—either swept away to be dashed to pieces, or else entombed in unyielding snow to suffocate. And there's no way Charlie would get back in time for a rescue before he perished miserably. Chad laughed nervously in reaction. If he'd had Charlie taking a video from the chopper he could've sold that sequence as an extreme-skiing movie.Now his knees were trembling to the point he had trouble keeping his balance. Get hold of yourself, he admonished himself. If I fall again here I am done for! He wished he could sit down for a minute, but there was no way—not standing sideways on skis on a steep snow slope. Chad forced himself to take deep breaths, trying to will calmness. Maybe it was working....

  He was now committed to descending this canyon. He looked below: craggy, with cliffs directly below him, it was a lot rockier overall than where he'd intended to go. South-facing slope ... it's more melted out. But as he looked, he saw a possible route off to the left. It was serious double-diamond stuff, a narrow and extremely steep slot between rocky crags. Not a lot of margin, there. He would have to drop straight through the slot, then quickly go into a turn to kill speed as the slope opened out below, trying to beware of rocks all the while. You could break your neck like this....

  Not the right attitude. Concentrate! You can do this. He skied over to the left, lined up, and started down, kicking himself off with a sharp turn to the right.

  The acceleration was ferocious. Chad tried to ignore his rapidly increasing speed, concentrating on keeping his skis lined up on the meager strip of snow ahead of him. It seemed to take forever to widen out into a slope. At that point Chad gingerly began a turn to the right, leaning forward slightly onto the tip of his left ski. It was working—he felt himself start to slow—but then something grabbed that ski. The sudden deceleration spun him around and he felt himself go over backwards, sliding, tumbling, rolling down the slope. He felt one ski pop off as the breakaway binding functioned just as it was supposed to; then he felt the other one pop off, too. Chad threw his body around frantically, trying to get his feet pointed downhill, trying to face the slope so he could dig his toes in, thinking of the sharp talus he'd seen below. He had to stop.Somehow he still held one ski pole. He grabbed it behind its basket with his other hand and pushed the tip down into the snow, like an old stick plow. It left a deep groove in the snow behind as his momentum dra
gged it along, but it slowed him down.

  Finally, he stopped. Shaken, Chad lay in the snow for a minute, mentally checking for injuries before he tried to move. He was cold, too—his parka had scraped up snow like a bulldozer as he'd slid, but no doubt had helped him slow down as it did so. He blinked experimentally—things seemed preternaturally vivid for a minute, the way they do if you've had your eyes closed and open them up suddenly—but he didn't seem to have any more serious visual effects. Probably no concussion, then.

  At length Chad stood up gingerly. He unzipped the parka and shook out the snow, and looked back up the slope. Thank God there'd been a soft powder layer that he could dig into. He never could have stopped on glaze.

  He could also see his skis and missing pole—above him. Way above him. At least the ski brakes had worked—the skis hadn't sailed off to the bottom of the canyon—but now he had to climb back up to retrieve them. Chad sighed and started trudging back up, kicking out steps in the snow with the clumsy ski boots, using the one pole for a walking stick. Once back on his skis, standing sideways, Chad considered his route.

  It looked easier from here, which was good, especially after that fall. More gentle slopes, well covered with snow and spattered with a few piñons, beckoned off to his right. He could traverse that way and eventually drop into the canyon. At which point he'd have to go all the way down out the canyon mouth, so Charlie'd have room to set down the chopper. Hopefully he could ski at least part of the way out.

  First traversing laterally, Chad then turned, feeling the edges bite the snow after the initial acceleration. He dodged a rock, nearly hidden by the snow; then turned back to the right, making graceful sweeping curves down the mountain. He passed a tree, ready for the soft shaded snow underneath that can grab a ski when you least expect it. He fell into a reverie, the sheer kinesthetics of motion—and maybe something else too—pushing away all thought.