Questions tagged [the-algebraist]
For questions about "The Algebraist", a 2005 sci-fi novel by Iain M. Banks set in the far future, when a Seer from a gas giant searches for a long-lost secret.
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In "The Algebraist" how do the Dwellers build their ships?
As far as I know gas giants have no metals. How did the Dwellers get into space in the first place? Are they capable of being in the vacuum of space without ships? I don't remember Banks talking about ...
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How did Saluus use the portal if it was destroyed?
In the book, Banks mentions early on that the local wormhole (I believe he calls it Arteria) was destroyed 250 years ago, and the system (Ulubis) is awaiting the delivery of a new one, some 17 years ...
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In Iain M Banks' "The Algebraist", what was the alien artefact?
I've just finished the book The Algebraist by Iain M. Banks, and I enjoyed it very much, but I don't seem to fully understand the events around the alien artefact that was found by Fassin, Saluus, ...
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Source of this quote in "The Algebraist" by Iain M. Banks
There is a section in the book where the Archimandrite Luseferous is reading aloud to a captive preserved enemy head. The passage he reads is:
It is a given amongst those who care to study such ...
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Where does "The Algebraist" fit into the Culture timeline?
I have begun to reread Banks' work as my first readings more than a decade ago were haphazard and out of sequence.
Currently deep in The Algebraist and trying to fit the period into the Culture ...
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"The Algebraist": How did the Dwellers move their portals?
In The Algebraist, a key element of the plot revolves around portals, with the Algebraist itself being a list of co-ordinates to Dweller portals. Early in the story we hear about the destruction of a ...
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Iain M. Banks' "The Algebraist": Wormhole transport question
Note that this is a question based on what is described in the book, rather than a question based on current actual quantum and/or cosmological physics.
It wasn't quite clear to me from the ...
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