Ask Prof
Created | Updated Jul 11, 2003
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Overseer...
Welcome back, my friends, to these humble pages. Into our fifth edition
now, and going strong, what? Before I move on though I must inform you that
there may not be a column next week, as I'll be too busy over in San Beta
with the yearly obligatory meetings. Indeed, as this goes to press, I am
readying to depart. As I come back on the Wednesday however I may have time
to prepare a little something for you, though it won't be as extensive as
past issues. Services should be resumed after that though.
This week, I'm going to change the column's format a bit. I've recently
received an e-mail from Ming (who else?) regarding my vessel, the Space
Station Big C, and as there are so many questions I thought I might as well
make it the introductory section. Normal letters will follow afterwards
though, never fear.
Subject: The Space Station Big C
I have a few questions about your Space Station:
Is there a crew or is it completely computerised?
Have you (or just the Space Station) ever been attacked?
What do you do for food?
Can you travel through time? Forwards, backwards, sideways, and
diagonally?
What is the décor of Space Station Big C like? *grin* Holographic?
Have there ever been any pests infesting the Space Station?
Do you have long journeys, or simply teleport everywhere?
How much energy does the Space Station use?
What does it use for fuel?
Consider yourself very lucky, Ming, to feature in the introductory
section of Ask Prof! Still, excellent questions deserve an excellent spot,
don't you think?
The Space Station Big C is my personal vessel, my home. Before I came to
h2g2 I lived in Governmental House on the planet of San Beta. Now that I
spend most of my time here, I live on the Station. As the Space Station is
home to many people (refugees, hitch hikers and what not) I could not leave
it without a crew while I lived on G-Planet. The crew is, admittedly,
minimal, being solely comprised of two emergency control staff (Sergeants
Kühenschlepper and Osielle), a chief of hangars and maintenance bays (Jane
Phillips), and myself. When the Space Station Big C was open to the public,
all those many months ago, there were also a number of volunteer staff
taking care of the commuter facilities, the Secondary Labs and such things,
but they've gone now. The most advanced artificially intelligent computer in
the Known Universe also resides on the Station, and is simply called, ahem,
Computer. It deals with the day to day running of the vessel, hardly a task
for its superior processing power (which, incidentally, runs on technology
not found in this dimensional plane).
The Station has been attacked a number of times, mostly by my archenemies
mentioned in last week's column, the Morphs. It is only ever attacked in
attempts to gain control over my technology, thought it is this same
technology that always hinders them. The defences and weapons on the Station
are second to none, though were a little crude in the beginning. Many years
ago, before I had installed most things now on the Station, it did sustain
quite heavy damage from a Morph attack, but was luckily not boarded and
taken over. I do however know of one Dimensional Equivalent of mine whose
Space Station was shot out of space over a planet, and crashed, and I
believe it's still there. I can only thank goodness that the technology on
it was destroyed!
What do we do for food? Well, as long as we have enough matter in stock
(and using my fairly new spatial vortex technology I can have infinite
storerooms full of it) we can prepare any type of meal we choose! Most of
the food on the Space Station is derived from matter being converted into
the elements needed and assembled according to the consumer's wishes, but a
lot of it is cooked up specially in the Great Hall of the vessel, where
there are a vast number of restaurants and cafés that I frequently visit.
Additionally, we have a lot of food imported directly from the producing
planets, such as San Betian Seawater and Osian Sub-Ice Cream, which is of
course sold in the Sweet Shop on h2g2, I remember.
Time travel is one of my specialities! I do it a lot myself, but the
Space Station Big C hasn't changed its time state yet, even though I could
send it through time with ease. You see, I don't think the residents of the
Station would like to leave their current state. My modes of time travel are
varied, in which I can go forwards, backwards, both with or without
affecting the timeline, I can expand and contract time, and even twist it
round if I so wish. A very easy dimension to manipulate, if you know
how.
The décor of the Space Station is not holographic! The corridors and open
areas are splendidly laid out in chrome and gold, with shimmering blue
floors and long lamps let into the sides of the walls for continued
lighting. Most of the doors slide sideways into the walls when you activate
them, and are also made with a chrome finish. Many public areas have great
fountains and other water displays, and benches to cater for most races'
behinds. If you're lucky you might even stumble across a spectacular display
of light, which does indeed use light diffusion (holographics). It is up to
the residents to decide how to decorate their own quarters though.
Pests infesting the Space Station? Goodness no! The entire vessel is
perfectly hygienic and bug free. If, however, by pest you mean annoyances,
then yes, we have had some. My brother was one of them. Ever jealous of my
technology, he comes traipsing into the Space Station one day in his puny
little space hopper (a vehicle, not a toy!) and sets about vandalising the
public facilities! The security systems weren't very advanced at that time,
and it took me hours to catch him!
Teleportation is one of those things modern scientists seem to take for
granted. It is a vicious, horrible rumour that says one can teleport from
anywhere to anywhere else. This is simply not true. Teleportation works on
the principal of the Alpha Wavelength1, a type of subspace wave not at all
related to the electromagnetic spectrum. All matter and energy of the
teleporting subject is fragmented, and pushed into the Alpha Wavelength.
Once there, predefined co-ordinates tell the subject's entity structure when
to emerge out of the Wavelength and into normal space. This Wavelength is
infinitely fast, and so the journey time is instantaneous. However, the
Alpha Wavelength can only transport things so far before the entity
structure dissipates and vanishes forever. That's why I can't teleport all
the way to, say, Mercury from here because I'd simply be destroyed. Long
journeys are a necessity, it taking a few hours to get from this galaxy to
the outskirts of San Beta through the fastest wormhole technology.
The Space Station Big C uses about 1.63 mJ (millijoules) throughout its
system every Earth day. However, before you think I've come up with some way
to power enormous machines with so little energy, let me tell you that these
millijoules are on the seventh power scale, taking the normal Earth scale to
be the first power scale. More powerful that you could possibly imagine,
therefore. It uses Gelectrons for 'fuel': entities taking the form of
electrons the next dimensional plane up. Their discharge in this plane is
virtually limitless, so my Station never incurs power failures or
interruptions.
Anyway, enough about my technology! I remember that I wished to talk to
you about my findings in the research I've been doing into toasters, but I
have no time now. I believe it would be a suitable topic next week. By the
way, if you don't quite understand the title of this week's issue, have a
look at this page to
clear it up.
Letters
Letters, excellent! Another three this week, answered for
your enjoyment. In fact, one of the letters isn't even a question, but is a
reply to the request I made last week for more
information. Read on!
Subject: Evil and Lizards
Dear Professor,
I thought I'd give you a break from questions this week and attempt to
answer you on the matter of evil and lizards.
As far as I have been able to work out, the relationship between evil and
lizards is not really direct. As lizards are physically cold-blooded and
many scaly and hard, people naturally come to associate them with the mental
cold-bloodedness and hardness of those who are evil. The people who are evil
do of course notice this, though whether it is consciously or subconsciously
is debatable. This then leads to a furthering of lizard-like characteristics
in them, as they want to be recognised as evil by people in general.
It can also be noted that people who do not consider themselves evil, but
may be evil in one way or another, do not show many lizard-like
characteristics, as they do not recognise that they are evil and so do not
play up to the general evil appearance. The only lizard-like characteristics
they will show are their mental characteristics, so they are difficult to
spot, as these characteristics may not be shown very often at all.
I hope this helps and that my ideas give you a hand in sorting out the
matter once and for all.
¦M¦
PS- Sherlock Holmes's archenemy is Professor Moriarty!
Pah! You say you will not question me this week, and yet what is this I
have written above? Ah well...
This is indeed interesting news, Ming, and I thank you greatly for it! So
it appears that knowingly evil people develop lizard-like features in order
to show off, as it were, and those who don't know they are evil but
evidently are, do not. Yes, I can understand the psychology behind that.
However, it doesn't explain what I believe to be a sort of spiritual
connection between lizards and evil. The Krylma Leader for example didn't
intentionally make himself look like a lizard, but had to use lizard DNA in
order to survive, I believe. And the Morphs were created with lizard-like
faces, although maybe they choose to remain in their natural state most of
the time because they look like lizards. No doubt the mystery will one day
be solved.
Moriarty, of course! The evildoer's name temporarily escaped my mind.
Thank you for your letter!
Subject: Additional Planets
My dear Prof,
I have awaited your column with bated breath since you began it a scant
month ago. I have searched my knowledge base for a question worthy of both
your impressive intelligence and publication in this esteemed paper. The
only question that I have been able to come up with is this:
Do you feel that there is a tenth planet within the solar system in which I
reside? Or, rather, if you discount Pluto as simply a satellite, is there a
ninth planet? And, more importantly perhaps, is the tenth planet actually
the Space Station Big C?
Thank you ever so much for your answers to this and other dilemmas. I found
your response on the penguins especially useful.
Respectfully yours,
G7
Greetings, Gw7en, it's good to hear from you! A good question this,
indeed worthy of my intelligence and no doubt publication in the Post!
First off, the supposed tenth planet is not in fact the Space Station Big
C. My vessel only ever orbits the Earth - in geosynchronous orbit over h2g2
Island I should note - when in this solar system. No, the tenth planet is
indeed a planet. It does exist. Sometimes.
Very well, perhaps I should explain that last statement. The planet
designated Sol:A10 and named Horelus by the Milky Way government is trapped
within an oscillating existence pattern. As it goes around our sun, Sol, it
quite literally fades in and out of existence in this Universe. I did a
little research on the matter when I arrived at h2g2 for the first time, as
I happened to get here just before Horelus disappeared again. It turns out
that this Universe is closely connected to another one exactly like ours.
The other Universe seems to have exactly what we have, except for this tenth
planet. Therefore, the logical conclusion I came up with was that Horelus is
being 'shared' by this dimension and the other. Quite fascinating,
really.
Thank you for the question!
Name: John D. MillerSubject: Pyramid Idiot Dating
Dear Professor Christopher,
My question is this: How did the builder of the Great Pyramid know the year
of the Crucifixion?
Firstly, I'm sorry I had to cut your e-mail down. It was way too
long to feature in this already extensive issue. However, the whole e-mail
can be found here folks, and ought to be read if
you're to understand this answer at all.
The answer to your question is simple, John. I told him.
Well, you know, I've always been good friends with the Martians, 'always'
being just the right word. You see, in the early trial runs of my time
machine I ran into a few problems, and ended up being catapulted far, far
back in time to where the Martians still lived on Mars and had their eyes on
Earth. I wasn't captured as such, but was persuaded to help them in their
little projects. After realising that the Earth wasn't a very good planet
for them, they thought they'd play a little joke on us Earthlings in order
to pay us back, as it were.
'Master Tonks,' they say to me, 'Master Tonks, we'd like you to give us a
special date from the future, one which'll have the humans dumbfounded as to
the connection.' And so I obliged by telling them the date of the
Crucifixion. You can blame all the years of research and hard toil on me!
Ha-hah!
Another issue nicely rounded off then. And quite a long one too: three
letters and a very long introduction by myself. Puts issue three to shame, what? Again, I'm sorry that next
week's issue won't be as big. You never know; it might not even appear next
week, I'm that busy. Still, I'll get back to you in two weeks, tops! I'll
expect you all to send in twice as many letters as usual! Toodles!
Yours with bulging suitcase,
- Professor Christopher Tonks
Minister for Science & Technology for the Alabaster House
GalaGroup Overseer to San Beta
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Wavelength is Copyright © Christopher Tonks 2001. But that's me, so the
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