How much handwaving would you tolerate?

[La Volpe]

I've been mulling an idea over for some time now, but I have a problem in terms of plausibility. There is no reasonable explanation as to how the physics would work.

Here is a simpler example of what I'm talking about:
Let's say there's a story with train-sized insects ruling the world and humans fighting them for freedom, etc. Now, that is not plausible in the normal realm of physics. The reason being the square-cube law; i.e. the insects would collapse under their own weight. If insects were that big, they wouldn't have exoskeletons. And they would have thicker legs. And they would walk differently, and have lungs, etc. etc.

So the question I'm asking is this: Would I need to come up with an explanation for this plausibility problem? E.g. magic? I'm not really looking to bring magic into the equation, in an attempt to balance the new and the familiar. So I'm tempted to just handwave the whole thing, and just write it as if the physics would not be an issue (and thus not explain why it isn't an issue).

Would you, as a reader, be okay with this?

 

[CupofJoe]

Personally I'd be fine with it if the story made sense...
I read Dune and loved that. I never really thought about the biology/physics of the Sandworms...
If you need an out then don't call your train-sized species "insects" but reference their insectoid features.
Let the reader join the dots.

 

[Holoman]

I'd be fine with it, even though I know about that rule.

I think you should try and avoid explaining it with physics, usually that is when I get picky with things. I'm fine with a book or movie breaking laws etc and will suspend my disbelief, but when they try and make it sound like it isn't breaking any laws by giving some pseudo-scientific explanation, then I start rolling my eyes.

 

[Penpilot]

For me it comes down to the type of story you're telling. What I mean by this is if I set out to write a hard scifi novel and I set up reader expectations as such, giant bugs ain't going to fly, literally and figuratively.

BUT, if I set out to write a story in the vein of say a campy 50's scifi thriller and set up reader expectations right, then it will work.

To put it another way, if you go to a comedy club and hear dick and fart jokes, you probably won't bat an eye and will laugh along. But if you go to the White House for a Presidential speech and hear dick and fart jokes, WTF will probably be the first thing that goes through your head. Even if the jokes are funny, they're out of place.

Again, it's all about setting up reader expectations. If I want to right a story about fully armored knights doing backflips and like gymnasts, I can make it work as long as I'm consistent, and set up expectations correctly.

 

[La Volpe]

Personally I'd be fine with it if the story made sense...
I read Dune and loved that. I never really thought about the biology/physics of the Sandworms...
If you need an out then don't call your train-sized species "insects" but reference their insectoid features.
Let the reader join the dots.

Dune is a great example. I wouldn't imagine the Sandworms are terribly plausible, but no one cares. So maybe if the idea is cool enough, the readers don't ask too many questions?

As for the insects vs insectoid features, the problem still remains that all the features that would be classified as insectoid (e.g. exoskeleton) is rendered implausible by the square-cube law.

I'd be fine with it, even though I know about that rule.

I think you should try and avoid explaining it with physics, usually that is when I get picky with things. I'm fine with a book or movie breaking laws etc and will suspend my disbelief, but when they try and make it sound like it isn't breaking any laws by giving some pseudo-scientific explanation, then I start rolling my eyes.

That's a good point. I actually have the same reaction.

So I'm actively leaning towards just ignoring the problem altogether, because trying to explain it with dodgy science will induce eye-rolling.

For me it comes down to the type of story you're telling. What I mean by this is if I set out to write a hard scifi novel and I set up reader expectations as such, giant bugs ain't going to fly, literally and figuratively.

BUT, if I set out to write a story in the vein of say a campy 50's scifi thriller and set up reader expectations right, then it will work.

To put it another way, if you go to a comedy club and hear dick and fart jokes, you probably won't bat an eye and will laugh along. But if you go to the White House for a Presidential speech and hear dick and fart jokes, WTF will probably be the first thing that goes through your head. Even if the jokes are funny, they're out of place.

Again, it's all about setting up reader expectations. If I want to right a story about fully armored knights doing backflips and like gymnasts, I can make it work as long as I'm consistent, and set up expectations correctly.

That makes sense, yeah. So how would one set up expectations for a story that's running on a central implausible concept? I'm interested in, say, exploring the kinds of technology that the humans could create from the various insectoid parts. If I go into too much detail about how it is created and/or manipulated, will that create the wrong kinds of expectations?

 

[Demesnedenoir]

Giant bugs are a staple of fantasy/sci-fi, everyone who is going to get over it, has gotten over it. Just roll with it, people who have problems with giant bugs on a physiology level probably aren't your audience anyhow. In a very basic way here is what I would do for set-up:

Here's the story! Here's the Bugs! Here we go!

Just write it.

Humans experimenting with bug parts is so hypothetical, I think it goes to setting the correct tone myself. Giant bugs? Let's see what we can make out of these things! That's fun.

 

[skip.knox]

If physics were a problem, at least half of science fiction literature would collapse. Count me in the "just write it" column.

Of course, you're talking here to a fantasy crowd. We are down with talking trees, flying dragons, and entire worlds that violate the laws of physics. We're a flexible bunch.

 

[FifthView]

I could imagine the scenario being plausible if you aren't relying purely on biology and organic composition. I'm no scientist and I don't write hard science fiction, but aren't we even now creating and/or discovering materials that are super strong and lightweight? Things like carbon nanotubes and metallic microlattice.

My understanding of the square-cube law is that organisms that have evolved at a certain size cannot simply be scaled up. More generally, the sort of complex organisms found on earth (insects, reptiles, mammals...) would collapse under their own weight if scaled up. But the law doesn't mean that larger structures or creatures cannot exist. The creature would need a truly alien internal structure, with materials we don't find in earth-based animals.

You could perhaps use the idea of carbon nanotubes, those lattices, etc., to come up with some sort of engineered creature that evolved on its own after some point—not entirely machine, or even primarily organic but coaxed to develop by incorporating or growing these materials through biological processes. (My own opinion is that biology is or may be simply a different kind of mechanics, anyway...incorporating chemistry, of course.) They may look like insects, but not really be insects.

Edit: BUT, to answer the more general question, I fall in with Penpilot's points. The type of story you are telling matters. Star Wars is basically science fantasy; or, space opera, which generally doesn't require a lot of adherence to the laws of science. I think that, as long as what you are writing is sensible to the characters, it can be sensible to us, as long as it's not too preposterous. Most people don't know about the square-cube law anyway, right? And if characters are believable, sensible in their own right, then their witness testimony can go a long way in selling the story to the reader also.

 

[BrainMatter]

I agree, Write it, Starship troopers, Dune, LOTRO, and many others have done the huge bug scenarios. So get at it boy!

 

[skip.knox]

One other observation. As you can see from the responses here, if you attempt to provide a rationale for the biology and physics, you are actually inviting your readers to pay critical attention to it. If you just serve it up as part of the story, your readers will be less likely to question it.

 

[BrainMatter]

Skip is right, we only nitpick when you allow us the option too

 

[La Volpe]

Thanks for all the answers, guys. By unanimous vote, I'll just write it without trying to explain how it's possible.

Onto a slight tangent that includes math:
For those interested (and too lazy to go look it up), the square cube law is basically this: area scales up slower than volume. Ergo, a bigger object has exponentially more volume (and thus weight) than a smaller thing.
E.g. If you have a cube of 2x2x2cm, it has a surface area of (2x2)x6 (which is the number of sides a cube has). So that's 24cm². It has a volume of 2x2x2 = 8cm³.
Now, if you double the size of the cube, it is 4x4x4cm. Now the surface area is (4x4)x6 = 96cm². The volume is 4x4x4 = 64cm³. As you can see, the volume:area ratio has changed.
Let's double the size one more time. 8x8x8cm has an area of (8x8)x6 = 384cm². And a volume of 512cm³. As you can see, volume has now overtaken area, and the further we go, the more skewed the ratio gets.

So basically, if you double an object in size, its area becomes four times (square of 2) more, and its volume (and thus weight) becomes eight times (the cube of 2) more.

A fun quote to demonstrate the implications of this: "You can drop a mouse down a thousand-yard mine shaft and, on arriving at the bottom, it gets a slight shock and walks away. A rat is killed, a man is broken, a horse splashes."​

 

[Miskatonic]

One problem is once you start trying to explain these things you are committing yourself to this for other aspects of the story. Explaining one thing in great detail and then just glossing over equally important elements of the story for the remainder will probably not sit well with readers.

My advice is do as little as possible to make it work and then see how that goes. Sprinkle in extra detail if needed but short and concise explanations that can be followed are usually your best bet.

 

[Penpilot]

That makes sense, yeah. So how would one set up expectations for a story that's running on a central implausible concept? I'm interested in, say, exploring the kinds of technology that the humans could create from the various insectoid parts. If I go into too much detail about how it is created and/or manipulated, will that create the wrong kinds of expectations?

There are lots of different ways to set up expectations, not all of them necessarily writing driven. For starters, a novel's cover can set up expectation. If the cover has a giant insect on it, it immediately sets up a general expectation. This book will have at least one giant insect in it.

Those who would dismiss the story because of the square cube law will probably avoid the book. Those who will be forgiving of the implausibility of things will pick up the book if interested and read the story blurb.

That leads us to the next thing that can set up expectations, the story blurb at the back of the book. This is another part where either people will put the book down because they can't suspend disbelief or they continue on.

Now for those who pick up your book and read, they won't put it down because of the breaking of the square cube law.

I think of it as being honest with the potential reader. For myself, I really hate it when I'm sold something as X and I get Y instead.

And finally, in terms of setting up expectations within the story. I think it's as simple as introducing the concept of giant bugs being a real thing in the story ASAP. Again, it's about being upfront about it and not dropping a bad WTF moment on the reader.

 

[La Volpe]

My advice is do as little as possible to make it work and then see how that goes. Sprinkle in extra detail if needed but short and concise explanations that can be followed are usually your best bet.

There are lots of different ways to set up expectations, not all of them necessarily writing driven. For starters, a novel's cover can set up expectation. If the cover has a giant insect on it, it immediately sets up a general expectation. This book will have at least one giant insect in it.

Those who would dismiss the story because of the square cube law will probably avoid the book. Those who will be forgiving of the implausibility of things will pick up the book if interested and read the story blurb.

That leads us to the next thing that can set up expectations, the story blurb at the back of the book. This is another part where either people will put the book down because they can't suspend disbelief or they continue on.

Now for those who pick up your book and read, they won't put it down because of the breaking of the square cube law.

I think of it as being honest with the potential reader. For myself, I really hate it when I'm sold something as X and I get Y instead.

And finally, in terms of setting up expectations within the story. I think it's as simple as introducing the concept of giant bugs being a real thing in the story ASAP. Again, it's about being upfront about it and not dropping a bad WTF moment on the reader.

That's solid advice from both of you, thanks.

 

[DragonOfTheAerie]

There are certain things that fantasy readers simply accept without questioning, knowing they are implausible in the real world. For example, dragons. There is no way that something as huge as they are often depicted as being could fly, but fantasy readers don't ridicule stories for having dragons. They don't laugh and say, "That can't be real!" The point of fantasy isn't to be realistic. It's to step outside the limitations of what could be possible in reality. Dragons are a staple of the genre. So are giant bugs. So just see where that idea takes you and don't worry about plausibility. Fantasy isn't the place for that.

Personally, I'm interested to see what kind of armor could be crafted from the bugs' exoskeletons.

 

[Drakevarg]

I think the Square-Cube law is one of those things where people like to cite it to sound clever without actually understanding what it means.

For example, King Kong: no, you couldn't just take a gorilla, make it 5 times as tall, and expect it to operate like a normal gorilla, because it weighs what, 125 times as much? Square-Cube Law! I'm so clever for telling kaiju fans they can't have any fun.

But guess what? There are examples EVERYWHERE of animals that are basically giant versions of other animals, and they work just fine. Why? Because they're not built the same way. OBVIOUSLY you need to change their internal makeup for them to work. A condor isn't built like a sparrow, a coconut crab isn't built like head lice, and a T-Rex wasn't built like a velociraptor.

We're writers here, not biologists. If a thing is implausible by conventional understanding but demonstrably exists in the world you create, the assumption is that nature was sufficiently creative to make the necessary design elements. That's not handwaving, that's admitting you don't need to be a rocket scientist to describe a rocket.

 

[sandtrout]

Just avoid your humans scratching their heads and wondering about this cube law thingy or the how these insects can be so large at all and you are fine.

 

[FifthView]

Most humans now living have very little knowledge of how flat screen televisions work or cell phones work.

 

[TheKillerBs]

I think the Square-Cube law is one of those things where people like to cite it to sound clever without actually understanding what it means.

For example, King Kong: no, you couldn't just take a gorilla, make it 5 times as tall, and expect it to operate like a normal gorilla, because it weighs what, 125 times as much? Square-Cube Law! I'm so clever for telling kaiju fans they can't have any fun.

But guess what? There are examples EVERYWHERE of animals that are basically giant versions of other animals, and they work just fine. Why? Because they're not built the same way. OBVIOUSLY you need to change their internal makeup for them to work. A condor isn't built like a sparrow, a coconut crab isn't built like head lice, and a T-Rex wasn't built like a velociraptor.

We're writers here, not biologists. If a thing is implausible by conventional understanding but demonstrably exists in the world you create, the assumption is that nature was sufficiently creative to make the necessary design elements. That's not handwaving, that's admitting you don't need to be a rocket scientist to describe a rocket.

This is mostly right, but let me nitpick for a bit. While it is true that there are animals that are similar to others, they usually look very differently. For example, if you were able to resurrect a T-rex and a velociraptor, and then shrink the T-rex to velociraptor size, you would realise that the velociraptor looks more like a turkey than a T-rex. Secondly, there is still a critical mass for any given condition. In modern Earth-like conditions, a condor is close to the limit of how large birds can get, for example.

But the keywords in my previous point was "in modernEarth-like conditions". A planet with lower gravity, for example, might be able to house giant LOTR-sized giant eagles, no problem. A planet with a higher carbon dioxide content and less atmospheric pressure could similarly have giant arthropods. After all, even the Earth had them, once upon a time.

Also, as numerous other people have pointed out, sometimes you can just throw out realism and just go with what looks cool.