Not enough change?

[Dannyalcatraz]

Maybe the question is...how much is considered too little change? A game set in the 63rd century where gunpowder-based firearms are still the most common military weapon? A setting 200 years from now that has no nanotechnology? I'm sure that there were people in the 60s who couldn't conceive of not having settlements on Mars in 2005...but we don't.

It depends on the preconceptions of your setting.

There was a great, old hard sci-fi story about how humanity colonized virtually the entire galaxy without FTL and without encountering intelligent alien life...until they did, right at the "end" of the galaxy! The 2 cultures were deeply involved in communications- deciphering languages, techologies, etc. for a while until they discovered...

The aliens weren't aliens- they were actually 2 branches of humanity closing the circle. It had taken so long to explore and colonize the galaxy that the vanguard going "left" and the vanguard going "right" had evolved into seperate, but still human (to themselves, at least), species.

You might have gunpowder weapons predominate in the 63rd century if energy weapons are too expensive or difficult to mass manufacture (think of Firefly/Serenity), or perhaps if a theocracy controls most of the "empire" and has banned energy weapons as "unholy."

In Ben Bova's (utterly awesome) "Planetary" series, nanotechnology has been banned (on Earth) because of certain "industrial accidents" plus cultural phobias whipped up by religious ultraconservatives brought politial pressure to bear upon the government. Even offworld, nano has a mixed rep, and isn't used openly, and only rarely and in certain circumstances.

 

[deClench]

No, we don't have our Jetsons' hover cars, but for millions of dollars you can get one. The dreamers create the visions of an advanced future, but the realities get in the way. Whether it be monetary issues as above or ethical issues as with cloning or whatever. Food pills: you gonna willingly give up your fresh vegetables and juicy meats and... cheese, for a tasteless pill everyday (likely need several pills a day)? Not until you have no other choice I'd wager. There's nothing preventing some company from pressing a daily dose of protein and vitamins and fiber into a pill, but I doubt there's a market for it. Point being that many of the technologies "of the future" already exist, they simply aren't ubiquitous (sonic guns in the military) or aren't fully developed due to lack of a market or due to societal pressures.

Progress, however you define it, is in constant struggle with outside forces. It has won out in the long-term so far, but it doesn't go unopposed. Also I think progress often appears as the unexpected.

In regard to games, it's already been suggested that realism is not mandatory and sometimes simply gets in the way.

 

[Wil]

In regard to games, it's already been suggested that realism is not mandatory and sometimes simply gets in the way.

Actually, I'm challenging the notion I've seen regarding futuristic settings being somehow less believable if they lack certain things (genetic engineering, nanotechnology and AI being the biggest culprits). I'm the first one to stand behind a setting being compelling on it's own merits, but it just seems kind of odd that anyone (even a small minority) would consider a setting less realistic if it lacks one or all of those features. Not meeting personal preferences I can see, just not "less realistic". It's not just on this board, or any other boards - I've seen the attitude crop up here and there and it perplexes me.

 

[deClench]

Actually, I'm challenging the notion I've seen regarding futuristic settings being somehow less believable if they lack certain things (genetic engineering, nanotechnology and AI being the biggest culprits). I'm the first one to stand behind a setting being compelling on it's own merits, but it just seems kind of odd that anyone (even a small minority) would consider a setting less realistic if it lacks one or all of those features. Not meeting personal preferences I can see, just not "less realistic". It's not just on this board, or any other boards - I've seen the attitude crop up here and there and it perplexes me.

Now this is shear off-the-cuff speculation, but maybe it's that we've been inundated with the ideas of nanotech and cloning and AI and others to such a degree and for so long that they've gone past the point of being future possibilities and have become future certainties as far as we're concerned. We just can't fathom, at this point with all the energy that's gone into such ideas (whether fiction or science or policy) that our future won't have these things and so any game purporting to map our future development better include these now staples of our subconcious. I mean how can they not happen at this point and why the hell haven't they happened yet? Maybe it's a sense of future entitlement.

 

[Wil]

Now this is shear off-the-cuff speculation, but maybe it's that we've been inundated with the ideas of nanotech and cloning and AI and others to such a degree and for so long that they've gone past the point of being future possibilities and have become future certainties as far as we're concerned. We just can't fathom, at this point with all the energy that's gone into such ideas (whether fiction or science or policy) that our future won't have these things and so any game purporting to map our future development better include these now staples of our subconcious. I mean how can they not happen at this point and why the hell haven't they happened yet? Maybe it's a sense of future entitlement.

This makes me want to develop a science fiction setting that does something different...I'm not sure how different yet, just different. Kind of along the lines of, "AI didn't really pan out, but we got this instead. I just need to go mining for alternate future technologies...

 

[WayneLigon]

This makes me want to develop a science fiction setting that does something different...I'm not sure how different yet, just different. Kind of along the lines of, "AI didn't really pan out, but we got this instead. I just need to go mining for alternate future technologies...

Dune does that fairly well. They had intelligent machines... but they almost destroyed mankind. So they went the opposite direction when the mind-expanding properties of Spice were discovered, creating the Mentats who could act as living computers.

 

[deClench]

This makes me want to develop a science fiction setting that does something different...I'm not sure how different yet, just different. Kind of along the lines of, "AI didn't really pan out, but we got this instead. I just need to go mining for alternate future technologies...

Perfect. Sounds interesting already. Make sure to let us know when it's done.

AI has been mined pretty hard. As you're making me stop to think about it, I'm realizing how hard it is to get out of that paradigm: AI is the natural evolution of computers and will play an important role in our future. It seems almost a given -- simply a matter of "when." In itself it's neither good nor bad, but you're right damnit, let's find something new to dream about for a while.

Good luck with it. Now I'm gonna have to think about this for a while.

 

[Michael Silverbane]

Another trend in science that the future predictors have gotten wrong... Things are getting smaller, rather than larger. Where are my giant robotic death machines? and... what good is a car the size of an atom going to do me?

Giant. Killer. Robots.

That said... I don't think that you have to have great, huge changes to your societies and/or cultures because of advancing technology... However, I think that in science fiction, like fantasy, there is a greater tendancy to get away from the standard (today's standard, that is) forms of cultures and/or governments because it is fiction, and its more fun to imagine these differing ideas and values than to cling to those that are familiar to us.

Later
silver

 

[DMH]

I hope you will forgive the tangent into fantasy, but this reminds me of certain bits in Lords of Madness under the illithid and aboleth sections. What I am envisioning is merging them and making skum (or a varient of them) the ancestors of the aboleth. Thus the aboleth travelled back in time to change certain people into skum. Heck, making aboleth good would definately throw a wrench into the standard party's plans.

Oathbound takes transhumanism into fantasy a bit, but those changes are not inhertable. It would be interesting to have a setting that takes fullbore transhumanism into fantasy.

Back to the thread proper

What if it doesn't? [change humanity]

Then it won't. Technology might get a huge blow from a strong Luddite movement (maybe religious in nature, maybe not) and society could be forced to live with less than we have now. The last episode of the new Outer Limits was about this, but unfortunately they made it into a clip show so the value dropped a bit.

Or, it could end up like the early sections of Man After Man and JAGS Haves-Not where humanity breaks up into 2 very different species based upon the wealth of their ancestors. The poor remain us (or may be forced to change into something else that is useful for the rich) and the rich become something else...

I have no reason to do so, but I believe that we will travel to the stars (very slowly at that) and have to become new species to survive the trip and where we end up.