Speish mash flow, or how the Dune universe works
The release of Denis Villeneuve's films and their success is a special holiday for long-time fans of Frank Herbert's book epic. Finally, they (we) can discuss the painful details of the fantasy universe without fear of seeming (to be) complete nerds. Now everyone knows that somewhere in space there is a planet Arrakis, on which the spice necessary for all intelligent humanity is mined.
At first, this article was planned as a text about whether an economic system similar to the one described in Herbert’s books could exist in reality (and how it could function), but it quickly became clear – the uniqueness of spice is so unique, that any description rests on the sacramental “spice must flow”. Instead, they decided to tell us how the Dune universe works, why spice is needed and about its cost. Well, we’ll also touch on the economy, of course. In general, a story for those who have not read all the books (and there are more than twenty of them, together with the main series), but have only watched Villeneuve’s films.
Warning: spoilers at every turn!
“May you not create a machine in your own image and likeness.” ChatGPT Underdog World
Although the first volume of the epic was completely transferred to the screens, it will not be possible to understand the full depth and problems of a universe densely addicted to spice. The details are revealed in the following volumes, which become more and more psychedelic with each book. And even in the printed primary source, it is not immediately possible to understand: what, exactly, is this spice needed for?
The main common denominator is that spice replaces almost all technologies. In the world of Dune, even a calculator is a terrible threat. This happened after thousands of years ago, humanity experienced a terrible, devastating war with ChatGPT intelligent machines.
Spoiler
Psychoactive spice (aka “melange”) has successfully filled the vacated niche, subjugating all the computational aspects of this brave new world, becoming a commodity with an extremely low elasticity of demand.
A bit of economics: elasticity of demand in the world of Dune
The elasticity of demand parameter in economic theory estimates how much a change in the price of a product affects its consumption. In this paradigm, spice is a commodity with unprecedented low elasticity. Its cost is enormous (one gram is more expensive than a house on Caladan, the capital planet of the House of Atreides, and a suitcase of melange can buy a small planetary system), but despite this it remains EXTREMELY in demand and a unique natural resource.
The supply is strictly controlled by the ecosystem of the planet Arrakis, creating huge demand, which in turn leads to high prices and monopoly control. The demand for spice remains extremely high, despite any fluctuations in its price.
Parallels between spice and oil come to mind. Desert, oppressed local residents, exploitation of natural resources… But the problem is that from an economic point of view this analogy will be incorrect. No resource mined on our planet is as important and irreplaceable as spice. After all, the same oil is produced in many places, and recently they have begun to find alternatives to it in some areas.
Here you can remember that the cult game Dune II, which began the era of real-time strategies (such as the legendary Warcraft or C&C), was also completely built around the extraction of a unique resource. And spice mining is the prototype for collecting any resource, be it “minerals” or Tiberium, in all RTS games known to players.
The role of spice is much more complex, which we will discuss below. To appreciate its importance, you need to understand exactly which aspects of the life of the Galactic Empire are affected by the spice monopoly. Spoiler: for everything.
One resource to rule them all. Who needs spice?
With the disappearance of cars, people did not become dumber, but on the contrary, they expanded the frontal lobes of the brain and began to rapidly become smarter. Spice was a help and an indispensable nootropic. In what areas?
Space travel. Space Guild navigators use spice to travel at superluminal speeds. To avoid materializing, for example, in the core of a planet after exiting a hyperjump, they need to look into the future at least for a second.
Spoiler
Capable students are selected as navigators, who, to confirm their status, will have to pass a final exam – awakening in a vat filled to capacity with spice fumes. The psyche of some people falls into confusion, and they drop out of the tests. The “lucky ones” who are able to cope with the flow of visions and hallucinations continue their lives in such vats, gradually mutate into something like huge fish and develop the ability to foresight.
Calculations and analysis. Mentats are people who replace computers. They carry out mental calculations at tremendous speed, make forecasts and predictions. To do this, they take spice in quantities that their employer can afford.
Eugenics and “genetic Wikipedia”. The Bene Gesserit sisters are not only able to command people with the help of their “voice”, as shown in the film. Thanks to spice and training, they are able to control every muscle and even every molecule of their body, and also consult the “genetic memory of their ancestors” along the female line. They can also choose the sex of a child after conception, block poisons inside the body, and even store them in a “canned” form until a special occasion.
Spoiler
For example, Baron Harkonnen, who before meeting one of the sisters was a superbly built athlete, became a victim of such poison.
Finally, spice prolongs life and causes physiological dependence if consumed in too large quantities. But this is not easy to do – because it is incredibly expensive. Recreational use of spice is not described in any book, it seems.
Psychedelic logistics
As is clear from a short excursion, although melange gives cool bonuses to almost all aspects of life, the main benefit is the possibility of intergalactic flights. Of course, without mentats and an extra hundred years of life, it’s not so fun. But the fact that without taking a psychedelic the entire logistics chain will collapse, and flights from instant superluminal jumps will turn into snail races at pre-relativistic speeds, outweighs all other inconveniences.
“How many light years away from your planet, you say? About forty-five? Great, we’ll give the package to your grandson.”
That is, here between resource logistics and the very possibility of logistics you can draw an equal sign. One does not exist without the other; the resource itself is logistics. Its shortage will lead to a shortage of ANY conceivable resource, because it simply cannot be supplied.
A world without access to melange would have sunk to plus or minus our current technological level, and there would be no communication between planets as a class.
Denis Villeneuve found this moment so difficult for the screen that he even decided to change the ending of the novel.
Spoiler
In the book, Muad'Dib's main lever of influence on the opinion of the Great Houses was the threat to change the ecology of the planet and destroy spice. “The only one who controls something is the one who can destroy it, and I can,” said the messiah Paul Muad'Dib Atreides. And the navigators of the Space Guild, capable of foresight, looked into the options for the future and confirmed that the messiah was not bluffing. The film replaced this difficult moment with uncompromising bloody carnage.
If not oil, then what?
“In pre-Columbian America, the coca leaf, like melange, was the lot of the nobility and priesthood of the ancient Incas. In fact, the ruling classes maintained their power partly thanks to their monopoly on the coca leaf.” writes in The Science of Dune by Dr. Carol Hart.
Another analogy comes to mind with the situation in which humanity found itself at the beginning of the twentieth century due to the shortage and geographical monopoly of another critically important resource – ammonia. They did not know how to synthesize it from available raw materials, and the main natural source of the nitrates necessary for its production was in Chile. Whereas without ammonia fertilizers it was impossible to feed the growing population of the planet.
Starvation due to ammonia deficiency for a time became the main scenario of the apocalypse, until the German chemist Fritz Haber developed a method for its industrial synthesis from hydrogen and nitrogen. For this discovery, which prevented millions of deaths from starvation, he received the Nobel Prize. True, then he began developing chemical weapons for Germany… But that's another story.
In the world of Dune, over the course of six volumes, a similar metamorphosis occurs: from a geographic monopoly (the planet Arrakis), spice first becomes the sole property of the Emperor of the Galaxy, and then its synthetic analogue appears, created by the frightening and unprincipled Tleilaxu scientists.
Spoiler
The son of Paul Atreides became the immortal emperor, who fulfilled the promises of his ancestor and turned the planet into a blooming garden, making the production of spice impossible. He kept all the world's reserves in his pantry, keeping humanity on dry rations for thousands of years. What allowed him to live for so long was that he… turned himself into a sandworm. They warned you that the books would slide into an acid trip at breakneck speed.
Why doesn't anyone…
The political structure of the Empire has all the features of feudalism: at the top is the father-emperor, below are the Great Houses that own the planets and manage their resources. Greatness is partly bestowed by the Emperor, partly built on heritage. Despite the fact that the Houses have a certain analogue of parliament (landsraad), the emperor can deprive the Great Houses of greatness depending on the political situation, or, on the contrary, can exalt a smaller house.
Since the Houses control hundreds and thousands of planets, armies and generally enormous resources in terms of resources, the question arises from the title of this part: why doesn’t anyone capture Arrakis?
The answer is the Space Guild. As we have already discussed, it has a monopoly on interstellar travel. As the only force in the universe capable of moving cargo across space, the Guild is an entity equal to or perhaps even greater than all the emperors and their houses combined.
Despite its loyalty to the Empire, the Guild is a powerful political force and acts as an arbiter in conflicts between the Great Houses and the Emperor. You can plot as much as you like and try to overthrow the system (which, given the number of houses loyal to the Empire, is extremely difficult), but without the ability to simply transport troops to the desired point in space, these conspiracies will be of no use.
Game theory and strategic behavior
All the characters in the book understand that control of Arrakis (Dune) means control of spice, which in turn is critical to interstellar navigation and the economy. This makes Arrakis a strategic target and the object of a constant zero-sum struggle, where a “everyone wins” situation simply does not exist.
In game theory, there are different types of characters that differ in their reactions to betrayal by other players. The most universal of them is the one that responds to meanness with one-time meanness, but quickly replaces anger with mercy if the enemy stops attacking.
Using a “forgiving” way of interaction would change the outcome for all parties, from the collapse of the House of Atreides to their resurrection “from the ashes” and the subsequent destruction of the Harkonnens, the fall of the Empire (SPOILER) and genocide with tens of billions of victims.
In the midst of all these events, it is easy to forget that the Atreides did not initially aspire to Dune and did not even lay claim to the imperial throne. The whole story (and books) would not exist if the parties had discussed their affairs over a cup of tea.
How could this have been avoided?
In addition to changing the parameters of players in game theory, it would be possible to prevent the collapse of a monopolized system by reducing dependence on spice, through the development of alternative technologies for space jumps. It would also be worthwhile to diversify control over mining by giving equal rights to spice mining to different Houses to encourage competition and test different strategies.
It wouldn’t hurt to conduct a more thorough study of the ecosystem that is the source of this vital resource in order to understand where this spice actually comes from.
Spoiler
In a simplified form, its synthesis is provoked by sandworms. But if you go into details, the main role remains with the sand trout. These are the larvae of giant worms, because of which the planet turned into a desert, preparing the Shai-Khuludam an ecosystem suitable for survival. Spice essentially comes from their feces.
The Atreides successors will solve this problem in a very unusual way, destroying the monopoly of one planet and preparing the “sandtrout” to colonize and change the ecosystems of other planets into biomes suitable for them.
But this story can no longer be hidden under any spoiler.
