A Thought about 'Safe'.

POSTED BY: SerenitysGirl
UPDATED: Friday, May 27, 2005 05:57
VIEWED: 8863
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MANTICHORUS

Tuesday, May 24, 2005 2:20 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by TheRealMe:
Alliance?

The Tams sent their daughter to an academy, a challenging one, so that she could learn.

Was there any reason to connect this academy to an Alliance project? Okay, WE know what went on there, but...

The Real Me, First Officer of the Sereni-Tree

(The Real Me cannot currently receive messages from this site; he is not ignoring you. But he CAN receive e-mail at realme@pcibroadband.net.)

In the pilot, Simon states that it was a government-sponsored academy... The government in this case bein' the good ol' Union of Allied Planets, or as we know and love them...
...The Alliance.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
ZOE: "Sir, I think you have a problem with your brain being missing."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
VINCENT: "I don't care what you are doing, so much as the idiotic way that you are doing it."

BROWNCOAT1

Tuesday, May 24, 2005 2:27 PM

I believe that the reactions of the Tams is based on two things:

- the illusion that their social & financial standing protects them from harm

- fear of the Alliance if they do anything to interfere with what is being done to River

I was disturbed by the way that Simon's father acted in the Alliance police station when he had to bail Simon out of jail. He was more concerned about the fact his record would show him entering a police station than he was about the possibility of Simon getting hurt in a restricted zone or that River might actually be in trouble.

Perhaps the trouble that Simon was getting into in his efforts to discover what was happening to River and where she was caused Simon's father to realize there is some substance to Simon's suspicions. This realization might very well dispel the illusions of how secure the Tam place in the scheme of things within the Alliance actually is and his fear of losing everything overrides his paternal instinct to protect his children.

__________________________________________

"May have been the losing side. Still not convinced it was the wrong one."

Richmond, VA & surrounding area Firefly Fans:

http://tv.groups.yahoo.com/group/richmondbrowncoats/

GRRARRG

Tuesday, May 24, 2005 2:52 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by reginaroadie:
You know, that whole bit about crickets and stuff like that seems to be a big scientific inconsistency to me. I know that FIREFLY has a strict "no aliens" policy. And for the most part, I'm OK with it. But I think it's just stupid to think that we move from one galaxy to the next, find planets and systems that are already developed and have their own ecosystems (I'm sure not all colonized planets were terra-formed), and out of all those planets, they couldn't even find new species of insects or single cell bacteria, let alone quadrapeds or something similar.

Why do you think that some of the planets had their own ecosystem? It's possible, but it is in no way implied or requisite.

Quote:

So it seems really odd and glaring, from a biologistic point of view that in 500 years of space travel and exploring the galaxy, that if we were to discover planets that already have ecosystems of their own, that we wouldn't have catalogued a couple thousand brand new species of plants, insects, bacteria, amphibians, fish, reptiles, mammals, you name it.

I agree that if we discovered planets that already had ecosystems, we'd find all of those things. But your whole argument hinges on their being pre-existing ecosystems, which is not a given.

Quote:

I remember that quote Joss made about him believing that we're the only sentient beings in the universe now and 500 years from now. Now, I'll follow Joss wherever. But to me, to not have your mind open to the possibility that there might be another civilization out there of beings similar to us is incredibly closed minded, even from him.

Not necessarily closed minded - I don't believe there are sentient beings, but I could be wrong. I'm just slightly over 50% sure on that. Joss doesn't think that their are sentient beings, but that doesn't mean he's not open to the possibility that he could be wrong (unless he's said as much at some point). My interpretation of "no aliens in Firefly" is that

A) Mainly, Joss doesn't want to use that metaphor in the show. Trek did that, and Joss had already done it (and was still doing it at the time) extensively in Buffy and Angel with demons.

B) He doesn't really believe in aliens, anyway, so he was even less inclined to put them in the show.

Also note that Joss (and I) specified "sentient beings." I expect we'll find some bacteria or even plants out there.

Quote:
That we still havn't made contact with Klingons or Vulcans or anything similar to that, I can buy. But that we hadn't even discovered new forms of single celled organisms? Yeah fucking right.

How many thousands (or millions, or billions, I don't know) of galaxies and solar systems are there? What tiny, insignificant fraction of those do you think we'll have explored in the next 500 years? If there is intelligent life out there, then I seriously doubt it would be in every system, or even close to a majority of them (the more groups of intelligent life, the greater the chances that there are some well more advanced than us, and that some of them might have contacted us. If we're talking millions of different goups, or even just hundreds, then chances are very likely that one of them would've said hello by now). So it does not seem that unusual, from a statistical point of view, that we wouldn't have found anything out there, even if they did exist.

I mock you with my monkey pants.
Oh, yeah - check out my rock band: http://www.readyempire.com/index.php?option=com_artistdirectory&task=s
howCD&id=1
Click on "Play Entire CD"

BRUISERSMOM

Wednesday, May 25, 2005 6:46 PM

Is the wikki script an actual script that Joss's people wrote for "Safe?" I was reading about wikki from the Firefly Wikki page and it sounds like anyone can change the content of the stuff on the site. It's that way so that people can collaborate on stuff in an online environment.

BRUISERSMOM

Wednesday, May 25, 2005 6:47 PM

Is the wikki script an actual script that Joss's people wrote for "Safe?" I was reading about wikki from the Firefly Wikki page and it sounds like anyone can change the content of the stuff on the site. It's that way so that people can collaborate on stuff in an online environment. If that's true, this script may have been changed by people having nothing to do with the writing department at Firefly. It might not have even originated with the writers of Firefly.

CHANNAIN

Wednesday, May 25, 2005 7:53 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SergeantX:
The Tam's struck a deal with the Blue Hands, before the kids were even born. They signed up to have their kids genetically altered. In exchange for money, social standing, and a genetically superior son, they'd turn over their second born for whatever nefarious plans Blue Sun was working on. Thus the emotional detachment shown toward River in the first flashback, and the hasty dismissal of Simon's concerns later on.

That's my story and I'm stickin' to it.

Whoa... good story. Wouldn't be going beyond the realm of possibility at all, now would it? In fact, it sounds just twisted enough to have come from the mind of Joss Whedon. Hokey smokes - imagine Simon's reaction when he finds out... I mean if he ever found out... of course.

I draw...therefore I am. http://www.mnartists.org/artistHome.do?rid=7922
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CORWYN

Wednesday, May 25, 2005 9:43 PM

I think that Joss' comment is more that we _think_ we are alone in the universe; that is we haven't found any aliens. 500 years from now, we still haven't. Given the first, the second is extremely likely. There is not much exploring going on that we see. 70 planets is at MOST 70 solar systems. there are 100 Billion stars in this galaxy alone. Unless aliens are EVERYWHERE, we would likely not have run into any yet.

Concerning what the Tams know, I don't think they are evil people, just rich jerks. So they think their daughter is safe. But the sticking point on this is Mrs. Tam saying, "jeopardize your future...", why would say going to visit your sister at boarding school jeopardize a doctor future?

VETERAN

Wednesday, May 25, 2005 10:49 PM

Thanks for the "wiki" link.

SOLABUSCA

Friday, May 27, 2005 4:53 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by PurpleYin:
hi all, just got here- first post and all

just wanted to reply to reginaroadies post-

I understand your point about alternate adaptive strategies, but FireFly can’t be set in another galaxy- without faster than light travel (and as far as I can tell they’re still using fusion drives) it would take thousands of years to span the void of the galaxies.

Personally, I think that it must be a star-cluster (I think Mr. Whedon wants it to be in one system, but really, there are just too many planets) and terraforming ships were sent ahead from earth- equipped with genetically modified bacteria, protozoans, fungi, and a bunch of nanobots, and turned the planets from whatever they were to what a trekkie would call an M-class planet, that is one that can support life. I think the inner planets were made first, so are most like Earth, and the outer ones are still being finished, so they’re all desert-like, there are probably still seas of water being pumped up to the surface of the planets, or trans-located from planets with a surplus of water.

I think the terraforming ships were sent first because they could feasibly be unmanned, allowing them to get there faster, because there’d be a higher tolerance of inertia.
The generation ships carrying colonists and livestock and databanks with literature, science, culture, media then left the earth, accelerating slower then the terraforming ships, but still travelling at relativistic speeds. The generation ships probably held the living crew compliment in stasis, but to the ships chronometers, probably a couple of hundred years past, but to the terraformed systems, thousands of years passed (because of the time-dilation caused by the ship travelling at relativistic speeds). The ships landed, and off-loaded the living compliment, were disassembled and used to build the first cities in the central planets.

Ok ok, what im getting at is- I think all the organisms there came from here- although some may be genetically modified to fare better away from Earth. The crickets would indeed be important to the ecosystem, since they’re a staple for insectivores.

Umm…yeah… sorry about such a long post..heh...

Nothing to apologize for - I basically suggested the same thing. Nanites, cloning and imported life overall. The time-dilation due to reletavistic travel is a nice touch as well.

I'm fairly certain that initial terraforming would be a wholly automated proceedure - probably run by gigantic automated factory-vessels a la the BioBombers in the Independence War universe ( http://www.i-war2.com/). For those of you not in the know, IWar is a science-fiction space-combat sim. IWar2 is very, very Firefly-esque.

After the initial seeding process is done, the hard part begins - that's where the terraforming crews would come in. Picture something along the lines of the planet in Aliens - hellish, but becoming something inhabitable.

I'm pretty sure that any existing bio-system would most likely be wiped out by a concerted effort at terraforming - sort of an uber-powerful genetic wipe of the planet to prep it for the new inhabitants. As a large system (or small cluster, for that matter), you would have enough worlds to terraform to actually HAVE a frontier, were this the case. You'd be able to have 70 worlds spinnin', with not a one being inheirited by the meek, as it were.

Again, random thoughts on the matter, throwing in some of the ideas that I've developed for my Savage FF game.

.j.

___________________________

The devil's in the details. Well, all around the details, really, but you get it.

D Jeremy Brown
Writer, editor, karaoke wargod.

PURPLEBELLY

Friday, May 27, 2005 5:46 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by BruisersMom:
... this script may have been changed ...

You've made a prediction, but have you conducted an experiment? Before you spread FUD about wikis and Internet collaboration, some real evidence would seem to be in order

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