Like most seven year olds, when I saw "Star Wars: A New Hope" in the fall of 1977, I didn’t know how many laws of physics Han Solo broke when he made the jump to light speed. I didn’t consider how unlikely it might be that life could evolve into such distinct humanoid forms as those that filled the Mos Eisley cantina. I simply knew that the Millennium Falcon was cool and those cantina creatures were really, really neat.
Though I’ve become a more critical viewer in the intervening decades, "Star Wars" still holds a special place in my heart, and, with that in mind, I approached Jeanne Cavelos’ book The Science of Star Wars with a certain amount of skepticism. I worried that she might be setting out to make a Happy Meal out of a sacred cow.
Luckily, my fears proved entirely unjustified. The Science of Star Wars doesn’t attempt to debunk the rich tapestry of George Lucas’ universe but, on the contrary, Cavelos uses science to explain how the wonders found in a galaxy far, far away might have come to pass.
The book is divided into five chapters, covering topics ranging from planetary environments and aliens to the Force itself.
In each section, Cavelos enlists the help of experts in various disciplines – including physics, biochemistry, statistics and cybernetics – to part the curtains of ignorance and answer such burning questions as:
* How might worlds like Tatooine, Hoth and Endor’s moon evolve?
* The asteroid-dwelling space slug: what’s up with that?
* How would we program robots to understand and replicate human language, personality and emotion?
* How can the ships in "Star Wars" travel faster than the speed of light?
* What is the force that binds the universe together and how are the Jedi able to manipulate it?
A "sad devotion to that ancient religion"
As can be expected of such a wide-ranging survey, this book raises more questions that Cavelos can successfully answer. While the science behind The Science of Star Wars is inconclusive at best, the writing is above reproach. Cavelos explains the basics of astrophysics, relativity and quantum mechanics in a clear and direct style. She uses plenty of effective examples and thought experiments to make these matters highly accessible to even the casual reader.
However, given the theoretical nature of the science at their disposal -- and the ultimately non-scientific fabulist concerns of George Lucas -- the author and her experts are hard pressed to definitively explain the state of the "Star Wars" environment. As Cavelos herself notes numerous times, beliefs about how our own corner of the universe operates have changed radically in the 22 years since the release of "Star Wars." If that is the case, it is difficult to apply this limited understanding to the "arbitrarily advanced" civilizations at the bright center of Lucas' universe.
The other problem with the theory is that speculative science can often be a matter of opinion. The scientists Cavelos cites throughout the book rarely agree on anything. For every expert who holds the opinion that everything in ‘Star Wars’ is patently impossible, she finds another who subscribes to a view of the universe that suggests that with the right knowledge, these things might not only be as possible -- and achievable -- as bulls-eyeing a womp rat.
Simply put, there's a gap between our rational understanding of known space and the fantastic worlds that Lucas depicted on the movie screen. It’s called "willing suspension of disbelief." Nowhere in the book is this tension between the limits of science and the limitless frontier of imagination so distinct than the final chapter, where Cavelos attempts to create a logical explanation for the explicitly ineffable, mystical Force out of whole theoretical cloth.
To do this, she has to lead her readers on a whirlwind tour through the fundamentals of quantum mechanics, and still comes up short of explanations for the Jedi might manipulate these quantum forces to perform their amazing feats. Faced with the shortcomings of quantum theory, Cavelos turns her back on the worlds of theoretical physics and turns instead to the arena of parapsychology to explain how the Jedi might be able to master telepathy, clairvoyance and mind trickery.
In the end, the only insight Cavelos is left offering into the power of the Jedi is one that they themselves might agree with, if they existed: "Reality may be different than we believe." The Force is larger than we can imagine.
If this is the case, then we’re back to the willing suspension of disbelief, which given Lucas' Saturday matinee sources may be the best way to approach it after all.
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