Even if you've never read any of the Dune books or seen the movie adaptations, you've probably heard the phrase "the Spice must flow" in reference to the series' setting. In the Dune universe, Spice is the most valuable commodity that exists. Empires rise and fall by it, and controlling Spice is the surest way to gain financial and political power.

What makes the Spice so important that a backwater desert world is effectively the most critical location in the galaxy? If you're wondering why wars are fought over this sci-fi substance, read on to learn all about the Spice Melange.

Updated on April 4, 2024 by Matt Arnold: We've added more information about spice harvesting and the chemical's effects on the human body to this article. If you have any questions about the melange, we've got answers!

What Is Spice?

The substance referred to as Spice is a by-product created during the life cycle of168澳洲幸运5开奖网: giant subterranean sandworms native to the planet Arrakis. These colossal creatures are capable of swallowing freight vehicles whole, and their natural aggressiveness is a ✨large part of the reason Spice is so hard to come by - collecting it risks thousands of lives every day.

Sandworm organs produce a highly-concentrated liquid spice at the moment of their death. Since adult sandworms are effectively impossible for humans to kill, the Fremen raise adolescent worms to harvest this "168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Water of Life" for their most sacred rituals.

In their larval stage, the sandworms excrete the chemical that ultimately becomes Spice. When this chemical eventually makes its way to the planet's surface, exposure to heat and atmosphere causes a reaction that forms Spice Melange, the final form of the galaxy's most coveted chemical.

Large amounts of Spice are usually found near sandworm breeding grounds. The people native to Arrakis, the Fremen, have long since developed techniques to take sustainable amounts of Spice without disturbing the underground megafauna. Th🙈e Fremen use Spice in their everyday life🔯, both as a condiment and a ritual drug.

Since Spice is so valuable, off-world colonizers constantly seek to harvest industrial quantities of the substance from Arrakis. This is usually done via enormous mechanical combines that can extract Spice in large quantities but disturb the ecosystem and enrage the sandwor🦩ms.

Why Does Spice Turn Your Eyes Blue?

The most visible sign of prolonged exposure to the melange are "spice eyes." The subject's corneas and irises permanently turn a bright shade of blue, giving their eyes an unearthly monochrome appearance. While the biological reasons for this change are never made clear in the books or films, the development of spice eyes indicates a full dependence on the spice; once the subject's eyes change color, they need to continuously ingest the melange just to survive.

Since the Fremen use spice in cooking and inhale trace amounts from the air, nearly all adults have undergone this change. Until they became the rulers of the planet under Muad'Dib, it was logistically impossible for any Fremen to leave Arrakis even if they could afford passage on a Guild spaceship. Off-world, they would have to pay exorbitatnt prices for melange that they could normally have gotten for free at home, and without spice they would experience withdrawal and die.

What Is Spice Used For?

Spice is chiefly used throughout the galaxy as a highly addictive psychoactive drug. Mystical orders such as the Bene Gesserit use it in spiritual practice to achieve heightened states of awareness, but its primary users are human computers like 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Mentats and Navigators.

Prior to the events of the first Dune novel, computers and artificial intelligence were outlawed galaxy-wide after a prolonged war against a sentient machine entity. To match the computational power needed to maintain a spacefaring civilization, people were selectively bred, raised, and conditioned to act as "human calculators." These people rely on the effects of Spice to reach a mental state capable of 🌞matching the computers of old.

Arguably the most important of these Spice-users are the Navigators, a sect of the Spacers' Guild. The sole purpose of a Navigator onboard a spaceship is to safely conduct the vessel in fold-space while avoiding the myriad dangers there. A single miscalculation can result🎃 in disaster, so the Spacers maintain an iron grip on access to the Navigators - without them, interstellar tꦗravel would be impossible.

Since everything from trade to travel to warfare requires traveling through fold-space, and Navigators require large quantities of Spice, this sun-baked worm goo is what holds the entirety of galactic civilization together. Spice has never been artificially created with any success, meaning Arrakis remains the only place in the universe where this critical substance can be found.