The author doesn't seem to take into account Luke's snowsuit. Given that we are in a highly advanced past, Luke assuredly has some form of temperature-control body glove (as snow/sand troopers do), as well as the simple dynamics of wearing cold-weather clothing. In addition, his clothing (due to the constant snow) almost certainly has some form of waterproofing, diminishing the cold-transfer effects of being inside the tauntaun. The tauntaun would also serve the purpose of transferring it's core body warmth to Luke for a while. One would think that the tauntaun would have excellent insulation, as they normally spend the night in those temperatures, so it wouldn't lose heat as quickly as the author thinks it will. As for the bile and feces, Han didn't appear to cut into any organs, so there would be no problem there.

As for Han and the shelter, one would presume every tauntaun saddle is outfitted with cold-weather survival gear for the express danger of being caught out in the wild. It would have to be simple and easily built, in case the person caught outside was injured.

Let me start at the beginning ...

Luke Skywalker George Lucas should have died in the tauntaun's Rancor's belly. Here comes the science nerdrage.

Uh, Luke had the Force, dumbass.

cretinbob: It's a movie

Nadie_AZ: Let me start at the beginning ...

[i.imgur.com image 600x450]

That is awesome.

In the 40th Anniversary re-re-re-release of the movies, Lucas will finally have the technology to digitally insert cold survival gear onto Han's saddlebag.

The midichlorians vibrated their cilia and warmed his blood* thus keeping his body temperature elevated. Duh.

_{*And by extension the cockles of his heart.}

Once in a while IO9 does something useful to help me. Like give me a nice article that lists all the different places I could stream/watch the Curiosity landing.

99% of the time it's just another goddamn stupid Gawker website.

PC LOAD LETTER: www.thinkgeek.com

kronicfeld: PC LOAD LETTER: www.thinkgeek.com

[i.imgur.com image 453x604]

kronicfeld: PC LOAD LETTER: www.thinkgeek.com

[i.imgur.com image 453x604]

I hate you so much because I want that so bad

It's great when something has been bugging you for 30 years to finally write it down so it can get the attention it deserves.

I always thought that scene was farking weird.

TheBeastOfYuccaFlats: 99% of the time it's just another goddamn stupid Gawker website.

As such, none of my computers at home will load any Gawker based sites. I have no idea why. No matter the OS, or browser. Amazing huh?

TeamEd: Ok Farkers, I've got a question: how does Han use Luke's lightsaber to open up the Tauntaun? I thought you needed to use the force to wield a lightsaber.

Nah. you don't. Luke was swinging his around before Ben even told him what the Force was.

TeamEd: Ok Farkers, I've got a question: how does Han use Luke's lightsaber to open up the Tauntaun? I thought you needed to use the force to wield a lightsaber.

I think it's, you need the Force to WIELD a lightsaber, given how they have no blade mass and you really need to know where the beam is at all times.

Anybody can use one, but without the Force, you risk royally farking yourself up if you try to fight with it.

IIRC, General Grievous had zero Force ability, but he was pretty good with a light saber. Probably had some wicked anti-collision subroutines in his prosthetics, too.

/someone far more geeky than I will be by shortly to correct me or agree with me

Speaking of which. It's been forever since I've seen that movie.

But... were there any rocks in the area?

Light saber + rock = heat source.

Hell, Wesley figured it out in an episode of TNG. Make some rocks glow with energy weapon, and you won't freeze to death.

What I don't get is why Han didn't take the Falcon instead of a taun taun.

Endive Wombat
As such, none of my computers at home will load any Gawker based sites. I have no idea why. No matter the OS, or browser. Amazing huh?

They only work if you have Javascript enabled or if your browser pretends to be Google.
So I would look into something filtering out Gawker's bullshiat Javascript:
Because - If you don't pretend to be Google - the content, its markup, scripts and CSS will all be stored inside a giant Javascript variable which gets inserted into the page by a script when your browser loads the page.

Really, if you care about functional web design, looking at the source code of a Gawker site will make you want to shoot someone, for example the pointy-haired marketing drones who probably were the ones who came up with that general concept.

Old enough to know better
One would suspect with their technology, they have some pretty fancy versions of heat packs built into their gear. No doubt Han packed some extras before he ran out into the storm.

Yeah, given that he's Han Effing Solo, it's a pretty sure bet that he was packing heat.

*groan*

Han said something like, "This will keep you warm until I can get the shelter set up." That may have only been in one of the myriad re-releases, though.

Mugato: What I don't get is why Han didn't take the Falcon instead of a taun taun.

I think the M. Falcon was still being repaired at that point.

I knew it! The Empire Strikes Back is a documentary that happened in real time!

Alephnaught: The author makes the assumption that the tauntaun hasn't involved a passive heating mechanism that continues after death. I assume that a couple billion years on an icelocked planet is going to lead to some interesting adaptions to either deal with the temperatures or to circumanavigate them.

So theoretically the dead tauntuan may have continued to stay heated for a long time after death.

Perhaps a bacteriological process that continually generates heat even if the animal is stationary. The bacteria, like gut flora, would continue to live long after the host dies, feeding off of the dead flesh.

And you thought they smelled bad on the OUTSIDE.