The Science of Discworld Revised Edition

mammal or lizard was even now winding up its elastic ready to propel itself towards the crown of the world. Soon, without a doubt, some creature would suddenly develop an unnecessarily large brain and be forced to do things with it. And it’d look around and probably declare how marvellous it was that the universe had been built to bring forward the inevitable development of creature-kind.
    Boy, was it in for a shock …
    ‘Okay, you can come out,’ he said. ‘They’ve lost interest.’
    The Librarian was hiding behind a chair. The orangutan took university discipline seriously, even though he was capable of clapping someone on both ears and forcing his brain down his nose.
    ‘They’re busy trying to catch the Bursar right now,’ said Rincewind. ‘Anyway, I’m sure it couldn’t have been the apes. No offence, but they didn’t look the right sort to me.’
    ‘Ook!’
    ‘It was probably something out of the sea somewhere. I’m sure we didn’t see most of what was going on.’
    Rincewind huffed on the surface of the globe, and polished it with his sleeve. ‘What’s recursion?’ he said.
    The Librarian gave a very expansive shrug.
    ‘It looks okay to me,’ said Rincewind. ‘I wondered if it was some sort of disease …’
    He slapped the Librarian on the back, raising a cloud of dust. ‘Come on, let’s go and help them hunt …’
    The door shut. Their footsteps died away.
    The world spun in its little universe, about a foot across on the outside, infinitely large on the inside.
    Behind it, stars floated away in the blackness. Here and there they congregated in great swirling masses, spinning about some unimaginable drain. Sometimes these drifted together, passing through one another like ghosts and parting in a trailing veil of stars.
    Young stars grew in luminous cradles. Dead stars rolled in the glowing shrouds of their death.
    Infinity unfolded. Walls of glittering swept past, revealing fresh fields of stars …
    … where, sailing through the endless night, made of hot gas and dust but recognizable nevertheless, was a turtle.
    As above, so below.

INDEX
    The page references in this index correspond to the printed edition from which this ebook was created. To find a specific word or phrase from the index, please use the search feature of your ebook reader.
    A
    Abbott, Dallas 308
    abduction by aliens 326–9
    Aborigines 322
    abortion, drawing the line in 59–60
    absences 182–6
    acceleration, rapid 367
    acid rain 307
    adaptability of life 300
    aerial boat 367
    Africa 146–8, 230, 323, 334, 366
    Agassiz, Louis 226
    Ahlquist, Jon 335
    air
    as ancient element 71
    as Earth’s atmosphere 156–60, 184
    as mixture of gases 72–3
    Alaska 312
    alchemy 72, 76
    Alexander the Great 367
    Alexandria 88–9
    algae 195, 198, 231
    algorithms 349
    ALH84001 meteorite 132
    alien life 126–7, 129, 132
    on Europa 133–5
    on other planets 373
    aliens, abduction by 326–9
    allosaur 285
    Alroy, John 312
    Alvarez, Luis 305–6
    Alvarez, Walter 305–6
    Amazon river 161
    amber, insects trapped in 310
    America(s) 139, 147–8, 312, 321, 366–7
    American Indian tribes 161, 312
    amino acids 217
    Amirante Basin 253
    ammonia 118, 123, 157, 162
    ammonites 286, 305, 309
    amoebas 44, 134, 198
    Amor 257
    Anasazi Indians 312
    Anaximenes 71
    Anderson, John 93
    Andes 158
    angular momentum 119, 122, 174
    animals 102, 158, 209–13, 229, 316, 322
    minds of 350–1
    ankylosaur 288
    Antarctic 146, 159, 321, 323
    Ant Country 106, 110, 339, 349
    anteaters 322
    anthropic principle 260–1
    anthropology 347
    anti-Black Hole 95–6
    antigravity 42, 94–6
    anus, invention of 231
    apatosaur 288, 303
    Apatosaurus
(orig.
Brontosaurus
) 303*
    apes 323–38, 340
    humans as ‘aquatic’ 336–8
    Apollo (type of asteroid) 257
    Apollo missions 172, 174, 366–7
    Apollo-11 172
    Apollo-13 172
    ‘aquatic apes’, humans as 336–8
    Archaeopteryx
291
    Archer, Mike 321
    architecture 160
    of the brain 347
    archosaur 288
    Arctic 159, 366
    argon 157
    armadillos 322
    Armstrong, Neil 172
    Around the Moon
(Verne) 367
    arthropods 198, 200
    artificial intelligence 348–9
    Artsutanov, Y.N. 370
    asteroids 39, 117, 132, 257, 259, 301, 306, 364
    astrophysics 80, 83
    Atlantic Ocean 147
    Asia 148, 307, 320
    Aten 257
    atmosphere 132, 156–9, 162–4, 171–2, 229, 365
    of Moon 171–2
    atomic bomb 22
    atomic clocks 92
    atomic number 77, 81–2
    atomic physics 77
    atomic reactors 80
    atomic weight 74, 76, 78
    atoms 26, 44, 74–8, 81–2
    Democritus’