View Single Post
Old 12-28-2015, 01:22 AM   #64
Verjigorm
 
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Charlotte, North Caroline, United States of America, Earth?
Default Re: Technological development without fire.

Quote:
Originally Posted by starslayer View Post
And that's the sort of change that just a TL8ish UNDERSTANDING of genetics and inheritance could allow (which in my mind would mark them as a TL 0+8), which is pretty impressive.

What I was saying could not be done is some of the more freakish modifications relying on bombaring seeds with gold nanoparticles laced in genetic cutoffs or crispr-cas9 stuff, getting goats to have spider silk in their milk, golden rice, winter wheat, and other really cool 'full on genetic engineering' stuff.

In theory our ancestors could have brought about our current level of selective breeding pretty much anywhere along the line if they just had the understanding of genetics, inheritance, statistics, and measurement we have today (Oh, and if being able to wipe out a whole strain of goats because they are developing features you don't like would not cripple the farm/country- which comes with relative prosperity).
Uh, I don't think it's necessary to have TL8 biology to have extensive and successful selecting breeding over a period of time. Several of our current plant and animal species have been invented in the past hundred or two hundred years. And the Persians apparently had a substantial breeding program for their Nisean breed, keeping a massive herd of brood mares under royal control to provide the greatest war horses of the ancient age. In fact, these horses were prized by all the equestrian neighbors of the Persians and acquiring them for breeding stock was valued highly.


I think, however, that at TL7 and TL8 biology you can start theorizing with a much greater certainty about traits and their inheritance, while having much more precise records and knowledge of how the process works. But it's a technology as old as mankind. I know old ladies with greenhouses who have been doing this since before I was born(actually, that's exactly what my great grand mother and her sisters did).
__________________
Hydration is key
Verjigorm is offline   Reply With Quote