We know carbon is present in the pre-spice mass because the bubble that causes the spice-blow is said to be carbon-dioxide.
(This was one of the things I was hoping for from that
Science of Dune book: a biochemist actually working out a hypothetical cycle of reactions and substances that
could fit the bill. Hechtel said she didn't take that approach because it would have made her article into fanfic. I don't agree necessarily. I note that there have been those on the DN BBS recently who also disparage such speculations. Little minds don't like to strain too hard, huh?)
Tleilax Master B wrote:Chigger addressed that; organic as in "relating to or derived from living matter." More specifically, I suggest it is cellular.
Hmmm. I'm having a hard time seeing how it could be cellular (meaning formerly alive?) except for any dead cells injected into the water capsule by the surrounding sandtrout. Could you elaborate on what you're thinking, B?
Um...IMO WoL isn't exactly the same thing as spice although they must be very close (source is different life-phases of the same super-organism; both have similar effects on humans). Concentrated spice in liquid form isn't WoL.
Spice is from spice-blows, WoL/spice essence comes from...wetting yer worm.
FH in CoD wrote:[The] sandworm vector could handle small amounts of water—the amounts held in cellular bondage by human flesh, for example. But confronted by large bodies of water, their chemical factories went wild, exploded in the death-transformation which produced the dangerous melange concentrate, the ultimate awareness drug employed in a diluted fraction for the sietch orgy.
Here's the only passage by FH that I've found which can remotely be interpreted to mean that the worms themselves produce spice internally:
FH in CoD wrote:It was a small worm, but strong. He could sense the strength in its twisting as it hissed across the dunes. There was a following breeze and he felt the heat of their passage, the friction which the worm converted to the beginnings of spice within itself.
But note that he wrote "the beginnings of spice", not spice per se; open to interpretation, IMO. Other than the bit about the worms scattering the spice (of a blow), FH writes nothing about the worms excreting spice or spice-like substances from their bodies in any of his books. (He certainly never has them depositing "veins" of spice like in
Sadworms.)
If there's something contradictory to this in the Notes, let them reveal it. (Unedited verbatim text, backed up by an unretouched image [blocking out of surrounding, unrelated text acceptable], authenticity notarized by a reputable third party willing to provide documentation thereof.
That's right: their word and a few pix on a website don't buy it anymore.)
Leto's body produced spice essence from little cowl teats. But he was a special case, a hybrid of sandtrout/worm and human. Which, IIRC is the excuse Kevin gave for the new/post-Leto worms producing spice internally, no?
Sorry, this is a bit scattered...like spice after a worm passes?
"Let the dead give water to the dead. As for me, it's NO MORE FUCKING TEARS!"