Worlds in Chaos by James P. Hogan Read Free Book Online Page B

adorning the wall. A model of a tyrannosaurus had appeared on top of the refrigerator. “Oh, what’s this?” Keene murmured. He remembered what Vicki had said at the office the previous evening. “Is Robin going through his dinosaur phase? I guess he’s at just about the right age.” Robin returned immediately from wherever, registering interest.
    Vicki nodded with a sigh. “His room is practically papered with prints that he’s downloaded. It’s like one of those science-fiction-movie theme parks. I think he must have checked out every book on them in the local library.”
    “I hope that won’t mean more additions to the private zoo, CR,” Keene said, looking at Robin. Keene had dubbed him Christopher Robin, after the character from the British children’s books.
    Robin appeared to mull over the possibility, then shook his head. “Too much cleaning up after. And they’d probably bother the neighbors.”
    “What’s this I hear about them not being real?” Keene asked. “Has everyone been imagining things all these years?”
    “Oh, did Mom tell you about that?”
    “Right.”
    “Theoretically they ought to be impossible,” Robin agreed. “They couldn’t exist.” Keene waited, then showed an open palm invitingly. Robin went on, “Well, you’re an engineer, Lan. It follows from the basic scaling laws. The weight of an animal or anything increases as the cube of its size, right?”
    Keene nodded. “Okay.”
    Robin shrugged. “But strength depends on the cross-section of muscles, which only increases as the square. So as animals get bigger, their strength-to-weight ratio decreases. All this stuff you read about insects carrying x times their own body weight around isn’t really any big deal. At their size you’d be able to walk around holding a piano over your head with one hand.”
    Keene glanced at Vicki with raised eyebrows. “Robin’s been doing his homework.” Keene was familiar with the principle but had never had reason to dwell on its implications regarding dinosaurs.
    “That’s Robin,” Vicki said.
    Keene looked back at Robin. “Go on,” he said.
    “As you get bigger, it works the other way. Do you know who the strongest humans in the world are?”
    “Hmm. . . . Oh, how about an Olympic power lifter?” Keene guessed.
    “Right on. Now, take one, say, doing dead-lift or a squat. The most you’d be talking about would be what—around thirteen hundred pounds including body weight?”
    Keene shrugged. “If you say so. It sounds as if you’ve checked it out.”
    “Oh, he has,” Vicki threw in.
    “Now scale him up to brontosaurus size, and his maximum lifting capability works out at under fifty thousand pounds,” Robin said. “But the brontosaurus weighed in at seventy thousand; the supersaur even more than that, and the ultrasaur at—would you believe this—three hundred sixty thousand pounds!”
    “My God.” Keene sat back in his chair, staring hard as the implication finally hit him. “Are you sure they were as heavy as that?”
    Robin nodded. “I got those estimates from a guy called Young, who’s Curator of Vertebrate Paleontology at the museum in Toronto. And I checked it with somebody else at the Smithsonian, too.” It sounded as if Robin had been picking up tips from Vicki. His expression remained serious. “But the point is, the strongest man in the world wouldn’t have been able to stand under his own weight, let alone move—and that’s when you’re talking about practically being made of muscle. These other things were all digestive system. So how did they do it? See what I mean—they couldn’t exist.”
    Keene looked across at Vicki quizzically. It was a challenge for any engineer. Vicki tossed out her free hand and shook her head. “Maybe they had better muscles,” Keene offered as a starter, looking back at Robin.
    Robin was clearly prepared for it. “No, that doesn’t work. The maximum force that a muscle can produce is set by the size of the