To Be Taught, If Fortunate

[L Y N N]

Must get a copy of this asap! I love Chambers' writing!

[Marc *Dark Reader with a Thousand Young! Iä!*]

I read it early, sorry not sorry, it was necessary due to library availability. Chambers continues to show that her sci-fi is all about humanity and what it means, where the species can go. I really liked the idea of what is essentially crowd-funded/crowd-sourced NASA. I ran across a similar idea in Occupy Space recently.

Overall a lovely, thoughtful and emotional story.

[Jennifer]

I just got it from my library, and I'll be starting today!

[Jennifer]

While reading, I came across this: "They'd been sold on a vision of discovery and progress accessible to everyone...Instead, they found that dream inextricably, cripplingly anchored to the very founts of nationalistic myopia and materialistic greed that said dream was antithetical to." (Page 19).

Except that, as a scientist, I feel like I should point out that scientific study is and probably always has been intertwined with nationalism and/or materialistic greed. For an interesting overview of how this relates to astrophysics, I'd recommend Accessory to War: The Unspoken Alliance Between Astrophysics and the Military. Even the development of logarithms had its start with merchants in ancient Babylonia wanting to more accurately calculate interest payments. And as the infrastructure required for scientific research (and training new scientists) becomes larger, more expensive, and more resource-intensive, the more likely it is that only governmental and large corporate entities will be able to fund it to any significant extent. I'd argue that the fact the government has stepped up to the plate - in the form of funding public research universities and providing grant money to labs - is overall a good thing, even if its motives are not completely "pure."

Science doesn't happen in a vacuum unaffected by any outside interests, and I'm not so sure that there's anything inherently wrong with that, either.

[Ilona]

Hi all, I would like to join this buddy read! I am planning to start the book today :)

[Jennifer]

So I just finished, and I can't say I'm entirely satisfied with the ending. (view spoiler)[I don't see how continuing to explore by going to Tivael - and possibly making contact with a technological civilization - would really conflict with the parameters of the team's mission, at least in spirit. No, they weren't originally sent to explore anything beyond the initial four planets, but they weren't sent to "hibernate" in space for an extended period of time, either. Nor do I see how a return to Earth would conflict with the parameters of their mission, at least after they finish on Votum. After all, they were sent to study the initial four planets, and, unless I'm missing something, would have returned to Earth with the data from their exploration mission, as planned. And this was the data that they were originally sent to collect and bring back. I'd say pick one and stick with it. (hide spoiler)]

As for the final question, sometimes I find myself wondering about that too. (view spoiler)[I think one of the confounding factors here is that space exploration has an element of romance to it that other fields do not, and people tend to get caught up in the romance and start going on about intellectual curiosity without really thinking things through.

For example, we know far more about the topographies of the moon, Venus, and Mars than we do about the topography of Earth, because the vast majority of the ocean floors have never been mapped. The excuse given for this is that triple-beam sonar projects are too expensive. Really? As opposed to the space program?

And human activity has resulted in some species going extinct while the scientific papers describing those same species are awaiting publication.

When things like this are going on, I've got to ask how much of space exploration is really based on human intellectual curiosity. And I've got to ask how and why we became so interested in investing way more into outer space than into the planet we live on. (hide spoiler)]

[Jennifer]

Anyone else here? Or did I scare everyone else off?

[Marc *Dark Reader with a Thousand Young! Iä!*]

Is this still the same month we read this? It feels like so long ago.

[Jennifer]

Marc wrote: "Is this still the same month we read this? It feels like so long ago."

Well, it said at the top that the challenge length would be one month, and specified October as that month. Seeing as it's October 24th, I thought I'd check back here.

[Ilona]

I am still here! :) Just forgot to post after reading the novella. It was short enough for me to read in one day, and I really enjoyed it. I hardly read sci-fi, but am glad to make an exception for Becky Chambers books. I just love how she writes her characters.

[Marc *Dark Reader with a Thousand Young! Iä!*]

Ah, I actually read this in September, which per my calculations was approximately 3 months ago. This explains it. Boy, stasis really messes with the passage of time.

[L Y N N]

Bah! Although I have the book I just started it last night, November 3. So...I missed October!

[Jennifer]

Lynn wrote: "Bah! Although I have the book I just started it last night, November 3. So...I missed October!"

I don't see any reason we can't talk about it this month too :)

[Denise]

I finished this book recently and love it, but there's a part that I really don't get, and I hope someone can clarify. I realize it's been a bit of time since this thread was active, but I hope someone can help me.

(view spoiler)[ It's the part near the end, with the ambidextrous molecules and chirality. I read it a few times, and I don't understand it. Why is it an exciting discovery that the molecules on that last planet are ambidextrous, and why does it strongly suggest that life on Earth happened because of ingredients from elsewhere? And doesn't that just mean that we were hit by a comet? (hide spoiler)]

[Jennifer]

Denise Cameron wrote: "I finished this book recently and love it, but there's a part that I really don't get, and I hope someone can clarify. I realize it's been a bit of time since this thread was active, but I hope som..."

I'd guess it was considered an exciting discovery because (view spoiler)[it suggests that, say, the presence of L-amino acids is not absolutely necessary for life to develop. Instead, life could develop that used either D-amino acids or a mix of L- and D-amino acids. Which would increase the likelihood of life developing by a great deal. L-amino acids are the default for life on Earth, as are D-sugars. The question would then become whether there's something intrinsically important about these configurations or not. In reality, we simply don't know. But we would starve to death if we were fed D-amino acids and L-sugars, because our enzymes aren't equipped to break down molecules in those configurations. Not sure if this is actually what the author had in mind or not, but then my degree is in biochemistry, not reading authors' minds ;) (hide spoiler)]

[Denise]

Jennifer wrote: "Denise Cameron wrote: "I finished this book recently and love it, but there's a part that I really don't get, and I hope someone can clarify. I realize it's been a bit of time since this thread was..."

Thanks for the reply! You know, maybe it's the sort of thing (view spoiler)[ where you need to really be into the science to get it, and that's why she had that part where she was like "do you care? do you not? is it exciting?" (hide spoiler)]

[Jennifer]

Denise Cameron wrote: "Jennifer wrote: "Denise Cameron wrote: "I finished this book recently and love it, but there's a part that I really don't get, and I hope someone can clarify. I realize it's been a bit of time sinc..."

I think that part is (view spoiler)[supposed to be more of a paean to intellectual curiosity. If that's the case, the question could be lengthened to "do you care enough for us to stay out here and study it more, just so humanity can learn more?"

Since intellectual curiosity seemed to be an important theme in this book, I discussed my take on it as it relates to space travel in the second paragraph of my review (message 7). (hide spoiler)]

I'm glad someone else came to this thread. I'd been hoping for an interesting discussion :)

[Denise]

Jennifer, I read what you wrote in post 7, (view spoiler)[ that's really interesting and I hadn't thought about that before. I guess it's because there's a romance to space travel, and presidents want to be in power when their country, say, goes to the moon or does something new. It's really sad for our planet though. I wish we could put in more effort, but instead our weather is getting worse and animals/plants/insects are dying. (hide spoiler)]

[Scott]

This book sounds pretty interesting something like what I would like to write myself if I was an author which I'm not.