A Collection of Unmitigated Pedantry
A look at history and popular culture
This is the second part (I, II) of our somewhat silly look about the plausibility of warfare in Frank Herbert's Dune. Last week, we looked at the system of warfare that is dominant in the setting when the first book opens: warfare among the Great Houses. While I noted some worldbuilding issues I see - … Continue reading Collections: Warfare in Dune, Part II: The Fremen Jihad
This week, time for something a bit silly: we're going to think about the plausibility of the warfare in Frank Herbert's Dune! In particular, I want to approach the question in two parts (I, II) : first asking if the model of warfare among the Great Houses we're introduced to in the first book of … Continue reading Collections: Warfare in Dune, Part I: Fighting Faufreluches
This week we're covering the winning topic from the latest ACOUP Senate poll, which is a look at some of the odd designs and mechanics for futuristic science fiction body armor, particularly rigid 'hardsuits.' Naturally, this post isn't going to cover every variety of armor that appears in science fiction, so I want to be … Continue reading Collections: The Problem with Sci-Fi Body Armor
Since I finally got out to see Dune (2021), I wanted to take a chance to share some of my reflections on it and this week was a good time because I had nowhere near enough time otherwise to get the next Fortifications post ready. So first I want to give my own reaction to … Continue reading Miscellanea: Reflections on the Sands of Dune (2021)
This is Part IV of our four-and-three-quarters part series (I, II, IIIa, IIIb, interlude) on the Fremen Mirage. We began by sketching out the basic outline of this pop theory of history: that a lack of wealth and sophistication leads to moral purity, which in turn leads to military prowess, which consequently produces a cycle … Continue reading Collections: The Fremen Mirage, Part IV: Desert Power
This week we're breaking out of the main series of posts on the Fremen Mirage (I, II, IIIa, IIIb) to answer a brewing discussion that has been running in the comments: does Dune exist within the literary trope of the Fremen Mirage as we've described it? Now, I should clear about exactly what we're doing … Continue reading Collections: The Fremen Mirage, Interlude: Ways of the Fremen
This week's post is the first in a four part series (II, IIIa, IIIb, interlude, IV) looking at what I'm going to term the Fremen Mirage (a play on Le Mirage Spartiate, which we've already discussed in some detail), a term I'm creating to encompass a set of related pop-history theories which are flourish, evergreen … Continue reading Collections: The Fremen Mirage, Part I: War at the Dawn of Civilization