Yet another interesting Firefly technology comment

POSTED BY: millernate
UPDATED: Saturday, November 2, 2002 02:30
VIEWED: 4840
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LIVINGIMPAIRED

Wednesday, October 30, 2002 5:16 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by millernate:
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Quote:

In space travel, every cubic inch is precious, and expensive.

Well, unless the colonizing authority is completely and utterly idiotic (I'm talking *badly* stupid here folks) then they would have a ship that would posses a huge variety of technological goods for the use of the colony as a whole (much like Spainish/English colonist ships had a huge hold of items for use by the colony).

Missing the point here! A space ship is more like a submarine than a boat. Space is at a premium. TO illustrate, I once read somewhere that if you wanted to send a letter to your mother in style, and you decided to send it up in the space shuttle, counting in fuel, and the very precious space in the ship, it'd cost you around $100,000. Now obviously technology is more advanced in Firefly, and space travel is cheaper. But the cost of making a large ship on a budget is still a limiting factor. Space ships are expensive. So it's not as if colonists could just go wild and bring along the kitchen sink.

Oh, and yes, Serenity does use fuel. In the pilot, one of the factors stressing the characters was that they had this cargo to unload, and if they couldn't sell it pronto, they wouldn't be able to afford to fuel to keep her flying.

________________

You know, I think the thrall has really gone out of our relationship.

HOBBES

Wednesday, October 30, 2002 7:08 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by LivingImpaired:

Space is at a premium. To illustrate, I once read somewhere that if you wanted to send a letter to your mother in style, and you decided to send it up in the space shuttle, counting in fuel, and the very precious space in the ship, it'd cost you around $100,000.

Although the Central Planets (if they have any sense) would have skyhooks. Which would be much cheaper than using a space ship to lift it out of the gravity well.

Quote:
Originally posted by LivingImpaired:

Oh, and yes, Serenity does use fuel. In the pilot, one of the factors stressing the characters was that they had this cargo to unload, and if they couldn't sell it pronto, they wouldn't be able to afford to fuel to keep her flying.

If they're using tech that we know about than the fuel could be hydrogen - used in fusion engines. Or antimatter :)
Or (ultra simple) water replacing hydrogen. Not as good, but as a makeshift.

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May the road rise to meet you.
May the wind be always at your back.
May you be in heaven an hour before
The Devil knows you’re dead.

THEGN

Wednesday, October 30, 2002 8:06 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Hobbes:
Although the Central Planets (if they have any sense) would have skyhooks. Which would be much cheaper than using a space ship to lift it out of the gravity well.

Only if you assume the existence of "magical" materials.

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In the Dark Ages, Romano-Celtic Britannia was over-run by Viking-like cultures collectively called the Anglo-Saxons. They were led by warlords called Drytinns, and the greatest warriors among them were the Thegns.

BULBUS

Wednesday, October 30, 2002 8:21 PM

I think there's a lot of good points in all these quotes, and that there's not one that's absolutely correct though. I agree that some of the colonies we've seen so far have the average technology of a third world country, but that doesn't mean that ALL of them are the same way.

I imagine that after the war, the Allience probably took over a number of the colonies that had rebelled, thus prompting citizens fearing reprisals to seek out other homes. And given the nature of the other ship captains we've seen so far (think the would be hijacker in Out of Gas) I can imagine the cost of hitching a ride would jump astronomically. Mal might have a streak of nobility in him, but some others might just stop midway and decide to up the price before going any further. So it's very possible that some of these refugees might have arrive on a new planet with nothing but the clothes on their back.

Of course, not all the colonies might be this way. Some might be the bustling and futuristic metropolis' we've come to expect. There might be big money there just waiting for Serenity, but what else would you find there but a big Alliance presense. Remember, Serenity and her crew are trying to stay under the radar of Alliance types, so they'd avoid those colonies like the plague. So just to stay hidden they might have to restrict themselves to scraping for jobs in these one horse towns.

Not to say that there are probably some well to do colonies out there without an Allience presense. There might be, but it's just the start of the series so maybe we haven't seen them yet.

One last thing to bring up. "Jeremiah" made a point about the levels of technology. Just because someone might be a oh... systems engineer or a worker in a steel plant, doesn't automatically mean they know how to build a working windmill and grinding stone to grind wheat or something like that. Some of these refugees could very well have doctorates in physics or be computer mainframe designers and have absolutely no use for their skills on a primitive world.

EVANS

Thursday, October 31, 2002 2:01 AM

My ex said, years ago, that not too far into the future most of us will be living in shacks, but we'll have really neat toys (such as future versions of cell phones and PDAs).

m.

QUILL

Thursday, October 31, 2002 11:58 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Thegn:
Quote:
Originally posted by Hobbes:
Although the Central Planets (if they have any sense) would have skyhooks. Which would be much cheaper than using a space ship to lift it out of the gravity well.
Only if you assume the existence of "magical" materials.

Well, according to a discussion I've kibbitzed on among some scientists, it could be done with variations on buckminsterfullerine--carbon nanotubes. Not possible as yet, but they're working out a path to get there.

Inside every cynic there's an idealist desperately yearning to be let out, and when they are let out they're usually a real pain and cause all sorts of trouble. --Chris Boucher

THEGN

Thursday, October 31, 2002 3:26 PM

That may be possible. Carbon nanotubes are theoretically stronger then any known material, but that is still just theoretical, based on computer simulated quantum bond strength. There's a big jump between that and building a space tower, but I'll grant you that if anything could it would probably be carbon nanotubes.

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In the Dark Ages, Romano-Celtic Britannia was over-run by Viking-like cultures collectively called the Anglo-Saxons. They were led by warlords called Drytinns, and the greatest warriors among them were the Thegns.

QUILL

Friday, November 1, 2002 12:15 PM

More science-fiction than fantasy.

Inside every cynic there's an idealist desperately yearning to be let out, and when they are let out they're usually a real pain and cause all sorts of trouble. --Chris Boucher

THEGN

Friday, November 1, 2002 7:58 PM

I'm not a big proponent of space towers or FTL travel, but I would concede that a space tower is probably the more plausible of the two. It's hard for me to imagine how such a thing would be built, though. Then again, it's hard for me to imagine how anyone could build a 6000km wall, but someone managed to do that. However come to think of it, there's really a very big difference between building a 6000km horizontal wall and building a 40,000km vertical lift. But my biggest problem is, if you assume that a cable of carbon nanotube filemants would be strong enough, then you have to decide how you are going to keep it in place. If all you built was the 40,000 km section needed to get you into orbit, it wouldn't work. That section would fall back to earth as its orbit decayed. You would need to build a counterweight that might extend another 50,000 to 100,000 km out. Now you're talking about building a cable maybe a third the distance to the moon, with a counter weight at the end of it.

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In the Dark Ages, Romano-Celtic Britannia was over-run by Viking-like cultures collectively called the Anglo-Saxons. They were led by warlords called Drytinns, and the greatest warriors among them were the Thegns.

QUILL

Friday, November 1, 2002 11:06 PM

The discussion can be found at
http://forums.keenspace.com/viewtopic.php?t=40000&highlight=nanotubes

I'm no scientist, but it sounds interesting to me.

Inside every cynic there's an idealist desperately yearning to be let out, and when they are let out they're usually a real pain and cause all sorts of trouble. --Chris Boucher

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