Every time I see an Islamist wearing glasses, or talking on a TV or, for that matter, using a car, I’m reminded of a very entertaining book by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle: Footfall.
In it a civilization of under-evolved, elephantine creatures overrun a much more advanced civilization by force, and inherit their advanced technology. They proceed to use it to clumsily conquer every planet they find.
It’s not spoiling the ending to say that things don’t go as expected for them on Earth. And the book has one of my favorite descriptions ever. A space ship is lifting off, a large one. It is lifted by a series of atomic bombs going off under it. (This was a real idea called Project Orion.) The authors describe the launch as experienced by the passengers:
“God was knocking on the door. And He wanted in real bad.”
Anyway, I often think of those space barbarians when I see cretins from a culture totally incapable of producing anything like eye glasses or the internet using the technology of its enemies. Here’s hoping things don’t get quite as bad as they did in Niven and Pournelle’s book before we win.
As we shall. Some day.
UPDATE:
Dan Simmons thinks they’ll get that bad. And worse. (Caution: language)
UPDATED UPDATE
Speaking of terrifying technology in the hands of savages, how did I miss the bomb?
i stumbled across this entry when googling for the line about god wanting in – i read the book a long time ago, and i only read the hebrew translation.
when i think about the extreemist islamists (like the iranian president and his atom bomb) your comparison is genious!
i just think that some facts should not be forgotten – some of the first scientists in the history of optics science were actually arabs (and muslims). look in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lens_(optics) , at the “history” part, and u’ll see many arab names.
muslims bring a lot of suffering to the world nowadays, but the arab culture was once the most advanced one technologically, and they still have some aspects in their culture that are amazing and fascinating. everyone should be judged according to what they did or intent to do, never according to what they look like.
i am jewish and a zionist who lives in israel. we jsut finished this morning a month of war in which many of my friends fought, and i had to hide in bomb shelters more than once during this month. and still i see that there are other kinds of muslims, ones who seek more than death to all those who are not muslims.
Comment by Amnon — 14 August, 2006 @ 12:01
[…] The Arab/Muslim world used to be quite different. Anciently, they built great cities and invented a lot of things. After all, no less than Thomas Jefferson studied their ancients. Clearly it is no longer capable of technological progress. But let’s give credit where credit is due, right? Everybody knows the Arabs gave us the zero. Right? […]
Pingback by Buttle’s World » Blog Archive » Much Ado about Nothing — 15 August, 2006 @ 12:37
[…] phone cards and sheep. Footfall indeed. And I cheered at this bit of good news: We killed the barbarian who led the savage attack […]
Pingback by AQI Sitrep « Buttle’s World — 3 October, 2007 @ 17:13