I expect that some otherwise convinceable readers are not going to realize that in this fictional world, people haven’t discovered Newton’s physics or calculus, and those readers are therefore going to miss the analogy of “this is how MIRI would talk about the situation if they didn’t already know the fundamental concepts but had reasons for searching in the right direction”. (I’m not thinking of readers incapable of handling that counterfactual, but of readers who aren’t great at inferring implicit background facts from a written dialogue. Such readers might get very confused at the unexpected turns of the dialogue and quit rather than figure out what they’re baffled by.)
I’d suggest adding to the preamble something like “In a weird world where people had figured out workable aeronautics and basic rocket propulsion by trial and error, but hadn’t figured out Newton’s laws or calculus”.
The opening’s updated now to try to better hint at this, with: “Somewhere in a not-very-near neighboring world, where science took a very different course…”
I expect that some otherwise convinceable readers are not going to realize that in this fictional world, people haven’t discovered Newton’s physics or calculus, and those readers are therefore going to miss the analogy of “this is how MIRI would talk about the situation if they didn’t already know the fundamental concepts but had reasons for searching in the right direction”. (I’m not thinking of readers incapable of handling that counterfactual, but of readers who aren’t great at inferring implicit background facts from a written dialogue. Such readers might get very confused at the unexpected turns of the dialogue and quit rather than figure out what they’re baffled by.)
I’d suggest adding to the preamble something like “In a weird world where people had figured out workable aeronautics and basic rocket propulsion by trial and error, but hadn’t figured out Newton’s laws or calculus”.
The opening’s updated now to try to better hint at this, with: “Somewhere in a not-very-near neighboring world, where science took a very different course…”
That would break the rule of “show, don’t tell” of fiction writing, but working that into the story more explicitly would help, I agree.