The Ur-Quan Masters Discussion Forum

I didn't feel like plundering through the piles of Orz comments to see if this has already been said, but feel free to flame if I'm just repeating.

I was reading my mechanics textbook last night and and the "elementary particles" chapter, I came upon an interesting blurb about quarks.

"There are a number of different varieties of quarks: there are thought to be at least six *flavors*, which we call up, down, strange, charmed, bottom and top. Each flavor comes in three *colors*, red, green and blue."

Again, probably already mentioned, but perhaps Orz dialogue is based loosely on the dimensions of quantum mechanics?

I think they are refering to Quasi-space, Hyper-space and Orz-Space (whatever it may be) Quasi is refered to as "above" and Orz-Space as Below...


But they say each flavor, which means those 6 have 3 each so 18 dimentions of travel?

I would believe that Orz come from blue...

Goraz is referring to Real Life science, strange as it sounds.  I don't know if anyone ever proffered the theory that Orz's language had its roots in an unknown love for QM by P&F.  Although... the language of QM sounds just as quirky, mostly because it's describing things we can't directly experience, and is using lingual best-fits, just like the Orz translations.  :)  You might be on to something Goraz.

Incidentally, the second-generation analog of the 'up' quark is 'Charm', not 'Charmed'.

And all of these quarks live in our 3-manifold; they do not require quasispace and hyperspace.

There are a lot of misleading names in quantum and especially particle physics.


That said, this WAS an original idea. Nifty!

errrrmm...he means RL QM....goraz you may be onto something.see ya **campers**

Good idea. So, since you came up with the idea, are you volunteering to attempt an experimental translation from Orz-tongue to english? ;)

haha, that's in second year of grad school

  Right, but I meant that the Orz saw in *many colors*, I suppose this doesn't corrolate much with using hyper and quasi space, but maybe that we're carbon-based life or something...I should try reading the dialogue first, but at first glance maybe they're talking about our molecular make-up?

Quirky as the names for colors and flavors of quarks are, I don't really see any reference to it in the Orz dialogue. I don't remember there being any reference to *many colors*, for instance, nor any mention of the colors red, green and blue, or any particular reference to "strange" or "charm". (You may be misremembering the dialogue where the Orz refer to humans as *many bubbles*.)

Since I don't think either Paul or Fred had a background in physics, I think it's much more likely that the Orz-speak is random gibberish than that it's meant to directly correspond to any terminology from real science. (Indeed, there's precious little real science to be found anywhere in SC2.)

Well there's been a lot of theories put forward about it (for example,people have made the claim that "many bubbles" may refer to cells, atoms, or  conciousness). A scientific explanation, or quasi-scientific if you'll excuse the pun, might not be compltely incorrect, but it's not likely to be entirely correct either.

Interesting thing to discuss. As for me, I always wanted to discuss ORZ a little bit more.

As it seems from SC2 and SC3, Orz are really not a race, but a mere real space projections of Eternal Ones, the creatures beyond the real space matter who eagerly want to eat all the sentience in hope to fullfill their energy requirements (this is from SC3). Their *EVIL* nature is here and there throughout the dialogues, in both SC2 and SC3. It is obvious they *played* with Androsynth unto death. The *sauce* term probably means energy. And *special sauce* means sentience energy (according to SC3). *Playground* is the battlefield.

Well, I'll sum and explain a bit more later. Someone wants to add, confirm or fix something here?

Here's a fix: Nothing that happened in SC3 can be considered official cannon. Sorry to burst your bubble.

SC3 didn't confirm that the Eternal Ones and the Orz were the *same*, did they? All I can remember is that the Orz called the Eternal Ones *friends*. Certain things don't make sense if they really are the projections of the Eternal Ones.

But whether you think SC3 is canon or not, I think there's enough evidence from SC2 to support the idea that *sauce* is some kind of energy that comes from sentient beings. One of the things Orz like about combat is that it allows them to *enjoy the sauce* -- to increase hostilities with a race is to *squeeze the juice* -- and so on. *Sauce* and *juice* and so forth seem to refer to some benefit they get out of fighting (*dancing* and *parties*), probably meaning they feed off the emotions released during combat in some way.