The latest movie review I've posted is A Bug's Life. In the process I dealt with issues of scale, which do come up in semi-serious sci fi and fantasy. Here's a short list of things I've pondered at one time or another:
1. Would human machinery work on a miniature scale? I see this coming up especially with guns and combustion engines, which depended on thermo-chemical reactions.
2. Can human-level intelligence exist in a species much less than half our size?
3. How does aging and learning work in a creature with a shorter lifespan and possibly accelerated metabolism?

Anyone recall ever seeing these things really dealt with, or are they just usually ignored? Anyway, here's the review link.
https://trendytroodon.blogspot.com/2021/11/animation-defenestration-one-that.html
David N. Brown
Mesa, Arizona

On 2021 Nov 09, David Brown wrote
(in article<53853aa4-8106-454c-b895-3d4c6f124ffcn@googlegroups.com>):

> The latest movie review I've posted is A Bug's Life. In the process I dealt
> with issues of scale, which do come up in semi-serious sci fi and fantasy.
> Here's a short list of things I've pondered at one time or another:
> 1. Would human machinery work on a miniature scale? I see this coming up
> especially with guns and combustion engines, which depended on
> thermo-chemical reactions.
> 2. Can human-level intelligence exist in a species much less than half our
> size?

Crows and other corvids, and assorted parrots, are pretty smart. Tool-making
has been observed in certain crows and ravens. In particular certain crows
make hooks. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/12/171207141719.htm
>
> 3. How does aging and learning work in a creature with a shorter lifespan and
> possibly accelerated metabolism?
>
> Anyone recall ever seeing these things really dealt with, or are they just
> usually ignored? Anyway, here's the review link.
> https://trendytroodon.blogspot.com/2021/11/animation-defenestration-one-that.h
> tml
> David N. Brown
> Mesa, Arizona

On 11/9/2021 6:12 PM, Wolffan wrote:
> On 2021 Nov 09, David Brown wrote
> (in article<53853aa4-8106-454c-b895-3d4c6f124ffcn@googlegroups.com>):
>
>> The latest movie review I've posted is A Bug's Life. In the process I dealt
>> with issues of scale, which do come up in semi-serious sci fi and fantasy.
>> Here's a short list of things I've pondered at one time or another:
>> 1. Would human machinery work on a miniature scale? I see this coming up
>> especially with guns and combustion engines, which depended on
>> thermo-chemical reactions.
>> 2. Can human-level intelligence exist in a species much less than half our
>> size?
>
> Crows and other corvids, and assorted parrots, are pretty smart. Tool-making
> has been observed in certain crows and ravens. In particular certain crows
> make hooks. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/12/171207141719.htm

There is also the not so small issue of _defining_ "intelligence"....

--
I've done good in this world. Now I'm tired and just want to be a cranky
dirty old man.

David Brown wrote:
> The latest movie review I've posted is A Bug's Life. In the process I dealt with issues of scale, which do come up in semi-serious sci fi and fantasy. Here's a short list of things I've pondered at one time or another:
> 1. Would human machinery work on a miniature scale? I see this coming up especially with guns and combustion engines, which depended on thermo-chemical reactions.

My first thought was 1/200th scale folks buying something like this:
https://estesrockets.com/product/002160-saturn-v-1200th-scale-ready-to-fly/
and starting a space program. Well, no.
One thing that doesn't scale down is the height you have to reach for orbit.
Another is the 9.8 m/s/s you'd be fighting.

It's been a while since I took a statics or dynamics course, but I think the smaller the machinery they have, the toll friction takes on the work it can do becomes a higher percent of its output.

As James Blish points out, if you go small enough, Surface Tension becomes a major worry.

--
-Jack

On Wed, 10 Nov 2021 08:11:40 -0800 (PST), Jack Bohn
<jack.bohn64@gmail.com> wrote:

>David Brown wrote:
>> The latest movie review I've posted is A Bug's Life. In the process I dealt with issues of scale, which do come up in semi-serious sci fi and fantasy. Here's a short list of things I've pondered at one time or another:
>> 1. Would human machinery work on a miniature scale? I see this coming up especially with guns and combustion engines, which depended on thermo-chemical reactions.
>
>My first thought was 1/200th scale folks buying something like this:
>https://estesrockets.com/product/002160-saturn-v-1200th-scale-ready-to-fly/
>and starting a space program. Well, no.
>One thing that doesn't scale down is the height you have to reach for orbit.
>Another is the 9.8 m/s/s you'd be fighting.
>
>It's been a while since I took a statics or dynamics course, but I think the smaller the machinery they have, the toll friction takes on the work it can do becomes a higher percent of its output.
>
>As James Blish points out, if you go small enough, Surface Tension becomes a major worry.

IIRC, /Antz/ deals with surface tension.
--
"I begin to envy Petronius."
"I have envied him long since."

On Wednesday, November 10, 2021 at 11:11:43 AM UTC-5, jack....@gmail.com wrote:
> David Brown wrote:
> > The latest movie review I've posted is A Bug's Life. In the process I dealt with issues of scale, which do come up in semi-serious sci fi and fantasy. Here's a short list of things I've pondered at one time or another:
> > 1. Would human machinery work on a miniature scale? I see this coming up especially with guns and combustion engines, which depended on thermo-chemical reactions.
> My first thought was 1/200th scale folks buying something like this:
> https://estesrockets.com/product/002160-saturn-v-1200th-scale-ready-to-fly/
> and starting a space program. Well, no.
> One thing that doesn't scale down is the height you have to reach for orbit.
> Another is the 9.8 m/s/s you'd be fighting.
>
> It's been a while since I took a statics or dynamics course, but I think the smaller the machinery they have, the toll friction takes on the work it can do becomes a higher percent of its output.
>
> As James Blish points out, if you go small enough, Surface Tension becomes a major worry.

IIRC, Blish didn't account for the low Reynolds number at the scale he was using:
https://www2.gwu.edu/~phy21bio/Reading/Purcell_life_at_low_reynolds_number.pdf
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQsNQcpkmRk

Moving around gets very strange.

pt

On Wednesday, November 10, 2021 at 9:11:43 AM UTC-7, jack....@gmail.com wrote:
> David Brown wrote:
> > The latest movie review I've posted is A Bug's Life. In the process I dealt with issues of scale, which do come up in semi-serious sci fi and fantasy. Here's a short list of things I've pondered at one time or another:
> > 1. Would human machinery work on a miniature scale? I see this coming up especially with guns and combustion engines, which depended on thermo-chemical reactions.
> My first thought was 1/200th scale folks buying something like this:
> https://estesrockets.com/product/002160-saturn-v-1200th-scale-ready-to-fly/
> and starting a space program. Well, no.
> One thing that doesn't scale down is the height you have to reach for orbit.
> Another is the 9.8 m/s/s you'd be fighting.
>
> It's been a while since I took a statics or dynamics course, but I think the smaller the machinery they have, the toll friction takes on the work it can do becomes a higher percent of its output.
>
> As James Blish points out, if you go small enough, Surface Tension becomes a major worry.
>
> --
> -Jack
I'd already considered Surface Tension as the closest thing to a "hard" sci fi treatment of miniature humanoids. Still pretty iffy on the science. I remembered the same series, published as The Seedling Stars, has another story where the human-descended colonists are more like cat or monkey-sized on a planet full of dinosaur-analogue creatures, a lot easier to reconcile with conventional biology. Also, for surface tension itself, there are benefits as well as drawbacks, partly shown in A Bug's Life. At a small enough scale, you could carry your water with a net instead of a bucket.

On Wednesday, November 10, 2021 at 10:37:51 AM UTC-7, Paul S Person wrote:
> On Wed, 10 Nov 2021 08:11:40 -0800 (PST), Jack Bohn
> <jack....@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >David Brown wrote:
> >> The latest movie review I've posted is A Bug's Life. In the process I dealt with issues of scale, which do come up in semi-serious sci fi and fantasy. Here's a short list of things I've pondered at one time or another:
> >> 1. Would human machinery work on a miniature scale? I see this coming up especially with guns and combustion engines, which depended on thermo-chemical reactions.
> >
> >My first thought was 1/200th scale folks buying something like this:
> >https://estesrockets.com/product/002160-saturn-v-1200th-scale-ready-to-fly/
> >and starting a space program. Well, no.
> >One thing that doesn't scale down is the height you have to reach for orbit.
> >Another is the 9.8 m/s/s you'd be fighting.
> >
> >It's been a while since I took a statics or dynamics course, but I think the smaller the machinery they have, the toll friction takes on the work it can do becomes a higher percent of its output.
> >
> >As James Blish points out, if you go small enough, Surface Tension becomes a major worry.
> IIRC, /Antz/ deals with surface tension.
> --
> "I begin to envy Petronius."
> "I have envied him long since."
Commented above, A Bug's Life definitely handles surface tension well. I remember seeing AntZ myself, way back when it was in the theaters. It was a good movie, but from what I remember, a bit thick on conspiracy-theory "politics". It tried hard to be trendy where Bug's Life tried to retell classic source material, and it definitely showed in their legacies.

A novel of 1977 where the /secret/ is that humans are
much smaller than normal, so I'll use ROT13 scrambling
to disguise this URL.

uggcf://jjj.tbbqernqf.pbz/ra/obbx/fubj/33230815-znanybar

https://rot13.com - A is N, B is O, C is P, and N is A, O is B, ...

An aptly named hero suffers under "a ruthless police state"
which suppresses evidence of exactly how they solved
overpopulation without just shooting a lot of people (mostly).

I don't remember if people have faster and shorter lives,
but each human generation is /increasingly/ small and
I think they have increasing birth problems /and/ an
increased rate of congenital mental impairment and
generally a sense that this can't go on, which is explained
to the hero at the end with an invitation to join the secret
scientific world masters and work on solving these problems.

On Wednesday, November 10, 2021 at 12:11:40 AM UTC, David Brown wrote:
> The latest movie review I've posted is A Bug's Life. In the process I dealt with issues of scale, which do come up in semi-serious sci fi and fantasy. Here's a short list of things I've pondered at one time or another:
> 1. Would human machinery work on a miniature scale? I see this coming up especially with guns and combustion engines, which depended on thermo-chemical reactions.
> 2. Can human-level intelligence exist in a species much less than half our size?
> 3. How does aging and learning work in a creature with a shorter lifespan and possibly accelerated metabolism?
>
> Anyone recall ever seeing these things really dealt with, or are they just usually ignored? Anyway, here's the review link.
> https://trendytroodon.blogspot.com/2021/11/animation-defenestration-one-that.html
> David N. Brown
> Mesa, Arizona

"Bug Park", by James P. Hogan, addresses some of the nanotechnology issues. A 1998 post here https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.sf.written/c/0QCwcUtQodc/m/JFav0oF-zJoJ has details.

Des

On Tuesday, November 9, 2021 at 6:11:40 PM UTC-6, David Brown wrote:
> The latest movie review I've posted is A Bug's Life. In the process I dealt with issues of scale, which do come up in semi-serious sci fi and fantasy. Here's a short list of things I've pondered at one time or another:
> 1. Would human machinery work on a miniature scale? I see this coming up especially with guns and combustion engines, which depended on thermo-chemical reactions.
> 2. Can human-level intelligence exist in a species much less than half our size?
> 3. How does aging and learning work in a creature with a shorter lifespan and possibly accelerated metabolism?
>
> Anyone recall ever seeing these things really dealt with, or are they just usually ignored? Anyway, here's the review link.
> https://trendytroodon.blogspot.com/2021/11/animation-defenestration-one-that.html

One scale effect is the fact that most living tissues are translucent to some extent, and when they are
thin enough the light transmission becomes very noticeable. From Wikipedia (John Lasseter was the director):

Lasseter thought it would be useful to look at a view of the world from an insect's perspective. Two technicians obliged by creating
a miniature video camera on Lego wheels, which they dubbed as the "Bugcam".[10][18] Fastened to the end of a stick, the Bugcam
could roll through grass and other terrain and send back an insect's-eye outlook. Lasseter was intrigued by the way grass, leaves,
and flower petals formed a translucent canopy, as if the insects were living under a stained-glass ceiling.

Peter Wezeman
anti-social Darwinist