Where do elves get metal?

[skip spence]

Marwhini,

While I remain sympathetic of your quest for a unified theory to explain Arda and Middle Earth I hope you realize that the result can only be another work of fiction, unlike say the mathematics of Pythagoras, or the physics of Newton or Einstein's special theory of relativity.

Much like you, many of us here enjoy speculation in how Middle Earth 'worked'. The first and foremost Tolkien scholar and son, Christopher, shared this interest and thanks to his work we have a lot of intriguing material apart from his father's published work. It's fascinating to look at the "white spots" of the maps and imagine what you might find there.

In our real world scholars and scientists, kings and commoners used to do they same. They knew there had to be "something" out there beyond their knowledge, they wanted to learn and understand, but in lack of solid data they used their imagination to fill the unknown. Often they populated the imaginary lands with strange legendary beasts, like unicorns, pygmees, satyrs, dragons etc of course overseen by the mighty Gods. But slowly and surely the white spots of this world have been charted and now we know much more about its nature and natural laws, enough to disprove most of the historical misconceptions.

But unlike the real world we live in Middle Earth is fictional. The white spots on the maps of Middle Earth are unknown, but unlike in the real world there is really nothing there to be found.

Except in the mind and imagination of the reader. A fun pass-time I think, and one that JRRT embraced fully, but please don't forget that your "unified theory of Arda" can never have any relevance in relation to JRRT's actual creation. It is not natural science, only a product of your own imagination and if that is to be of any interest to other readers I suggest that you approach it in a more humble and, well, reasonable manner.

[Marwhini]

Originally Posted by skip spence

Marwhini,

While I remain sympathetic of your quest for a unified theory to explain Arda and Middle Earth I hope you realize that the result can only be another work of fiction, unlike say the mathematics of Pythagoras, or the physics of Newton or Einstein's special theory of relativity.

Of course it would be a fiction, because it is being used to describe things that cannot exist in this universe.

But that does not negate that this was a singular goal of Tolkien's, nor that such a thing is possible.

It would not be as "complete" as a completely Unified Theory (as we have no means to test it).

But Tolkien was pretty clear about Middle-earth having operational Sciences that could basically describe its workings, even if he could not.


In Letters #153 to Peter Hastings (draft), Tolkien says:

I suppose that actually the chief difficulties I have involved myself in are scientific and biological.

Here he is referring specifically to how Elves are "Immortal," yet essentially the same biological Species as Humans (and thus capable of breeding with them to produce fertile offspring).

– which worry me just as much as the theological and metaphysical (though you do not seem to mind them too much). Elves and Men are evidentially in biological terms one race, or they could not breed and produce fertile offspring –*even as a rare event : there are 2 cases only in my legends of such unions, and they are merged in the descendants of Eärendil. But since some have held that the rate of longevity is a biological characteristic, within the limits of variation, you could not have Elves in a sense 'immortal' –*not eternal, but not dying by 'old age' –*and Men metal, more or less as they now seem to be in the Primary World –*and yet sufficiently akin. I might answer that this 'biology' is only a theory, and that modern 'gerontology', or whatever they call it, finds 'aging' rather more mysterious, and less clearly inevitable in bodies of human structure. But I should actually answer: I do not care. This is a biological dictum of my imaginary world. It is only (as yet) an incomplete imagined world, a rudimentary 'secondary'; but if it pleased the Creator to give it (in a corrected form) Reality on any plane, then you would just have to enter it and begin studying its different biology, that is all.

As with most of the Sciences here in our world, what Tolkien called the "Primary World," we don't actually need to have direct access to something to derive from it scientific facts about it.

Generally, observed behavior is enough, given the breadth of our current physical knowledge, to begin to understand its physical structure and operation.

We need only the same things for Middle-earth, fictional or no, to get an idea of how it must operate, given what we know about it, and about physics (and thus chemistry and biology, etc....), whether it is "Fictional" or not.

If, in a book, we observe someone fall roughly 20 feet, and the book says that it took roughly half a second to fall, we can infer that gravity in the world described by that book is roughly the same as in ours.

If it is observed to be different, then we can calculate it with some precision based upon how it is described.

Much like you, many of us here enjoy speculation in how Middle Earth 'worked'. The first and foremost Tolkien scholar and son, Christopher, shared this interest and thanks to his work we have a lot of intriguing material apart from his father's published work. It's fascinating to look at the "white spots" of the maps and imagine what you might find there.

In our real world scholars and scientists, kings and commoners used to do they same. They knew there had to be "something" out there beyond their knowledge, they wanted to learn and understand, but in lack of solid data they used their imagination to fill the unknown. Often they populated the imaginary lands with strange legendary beasts, like unicorns, pygmees, satyrs, dragons etc of course overseen by the mighty Gods. But slowly and surely the white spots of this world have been charted and now we know much more about its nature and natural laws, enough to disprove most of the historical misconceptions.

But unlike the real world we live in Middle Earth is fictional. The white spots on the maps of Middle Earth are unknown, but unlike in the real world there is really nothing there to be found.

Except in the mind and imagination of the reader. A fun pass-time I think, and one that JRRT embraced fully, but please don't forget that your "unified theory of Arda" can never have any relevance in relation to JRRT's actual creation. It is not natural science, only a product of your own imagination and if that is to be of any interest to other readers I suggest that you approach it in a more humble and, well, reasonable manner.

The "It's just fiction" deflection?

If that is the case, then any speculation regarding Middle-earth is just as misguided.

One of the blurbs in the Jacket cover of the first edition of The Lord of the Rings described it as "First Rate Science Fiction."

"Fantasy" is just a derivative of "Science Fiction." It is just proposing different laws of the Sciences.

And by the quote above, of Tolkien's... The world functions by the rules of the "Natural Sciences" as much as does ours, only with deviations from them, which are just as knowable (within the evidence we have) as they are in our world.

MB