With magic, you can turn a frog into a prince. With science, you can turn a frog into a Ph.D and you still have the frog you started with. –Terry Pratchett The Science of Discworld
Quote of the Day 18 July 2005
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This page contains a single entry by Mike Dunford published on July 18, 2005 11:50 PM.
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Speaking about Pratchett (and don’t forget Cohen and Stewart, who co-author this series with him), anyone read the third Science of Discworld book, “Darwin’s Watch”? It’s quite good.
Eh, I wasn’t as impressed; the wizards were too organized in the novel section, and I knew all the science already. It does impress me that Pratchett is so avidly pro-science, however; I was also heartened a few years ago to read that when asked to list his favorite 10 books of all time, Douglas Adams including Darwin’s “Origin of Species.”
:s/including/included
There’s a third one? I’m of to the bookstore right now. BTW has anyone here read the lost continent with the god of evolution.
God of evolution: “…Organic wheels are very difficult you know, diversify and fill all niches that’s the ticket” Ponder Stibbons: “but is lying on your side in a bog with all four wheels spinning an important niche?”
I remember a comment from The Art of Discworld, where he says that he doesn’t use a lot of magic in Discworld because magic itself isn’t all that amazing; a wizard snapping his fingers to make light is nowhere near as interesting as a bunch of apes discovering how to take the universe apart and put it back as a light bulb.
The God of Evolution appears in The Last Continent. And he absolutely loves beetles…
Actually, the God of Evolution makes a comeback in Darwin’s Watch, and the wizards actually arrange a meeting between him and Darwin so Darwin could see how would evolution look if a god took care of it… (as opposed to how it really looks)
Marek:
I really need to buy this book. And the others. But I don’t think the first two are published in the United States, sadly.
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