[LT] Brigandine TL question

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by mhd

I would've thought that a Roman parellel would probably be a TL worst case…

Why?

They were at TL5 in architecture and civil engineering and regarded engineering as a prestitious and sensible career path. They had TL4 metallurgy and TL3 medicine. As far as administrative methods are technologies, I'd call them TL4 there too.

In many ways, if the political developments from the Roman Republic on had been different, it would have been rather plausible for Rome to reach solid TL4overall with many TL5 elements within a few generations.

[mhd]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Why?

Because of this:

Originally Posted by Icelander

They were at TL5 in architecture and civil engineering and regarded engineering as a prestitious and sensible career path. They had TL4 metallurgy and TL3 medicine. As far as administrative methods are technologies, I'd call them TL4 there too.

I didn't mean "worst TL evah!", I meant using the pure TL as a quick tool to check what's possible.

By the way, does anyone remember an old time-traveling story where someone ends up in ancient Rome and quickly wants to improve technology, but isn't exactly on par with Connecticut yankees… (IIRC he then "invented" the printing press and newspapers)

[Polydamas]

Originally Posted by mhd

I would've thought that a Roman parellel would probably be a TL worst case…

New World societies are worse, since they split off from the Old World in the Paleolithic. Try figuring out what TL to give the Six Nations in 1700 (they are farmers and hunters who can work a bit of iron, which sounds like TL 2, but they have some of the best boats in the world and can make and repair TL 4 muskets and farm as well as their TL 4 neighbours ... but they can't build a powder mill, a printing press, or an oceangoing ship). Or the Aztecs in 1500 (a regional empire of farmers with a literate philosopher-priest class and numerous stone monuments sounds like TL 2, but little metal other than gold and silver is used (TL 0), and there are no large livestock or wheeled vehicles at all).

[Not another shrubbery]

Originally Posted by mhd

By the way, does anyone remember an old time-traveling story where someone ends up in ancient Rome and quickly wants to improve technology, but isn't exactly on par with Connecticut yankees… (IIRC he then "invented" the printing press and newspapers)

That sounds like Sprague de Camp's Lest Darkness Fall. I remember liking it when I read it as a boy... dunno how it would stand up now.

[mhd]

Originally Posted by Not another shrubbery

That sounds like Sprague de Camp's Lest Darkness Fall. I remember liking it when I read it as a boy... dunno how it would stand up now.

Checked the plot summary, and yes, that's what I read quite a while ago, too. Had some interesting ideas. People think they can "uplift" technology way too easily, but forget all the technological prerequisites and the sheer amount of knowledge required...

[Verjigorm]

Well, you can uplift a small area rather easily, but making it "stick" may prove to be harder. That requires an institutional effort on a large scale.

For example, there used to be a line of thoughtthat exploitation of Europe's wilderness depended on a more efficient horse collar, and heavy plows. However, there doesn't appear to be a correlation between heavy plows and the colonization of Europe, and horses were rarely used for plowing, so the horse collar doesn't matter: you use oxen.

[Lord Carnifex]

Originally Posted by Verjigorm

For example, there used to be a line of thoughtthat exploitation of Europe's wilderness depended on a more efficient horse collar, and heavy plows. However, there doesn't appear to be a correlation between heavy plows and the colonization of Europe, and horses were rarely used for plowing, so the horse collar doesn't matter: you use oxen.

I'd don't know so much about the exploitation of wilderness, but the horse collar did trigger something of a transportation revolution in Europe. A horse-drawn plow works faster and for longer than an ox-drawn one. This in turn changes horses from an economic net loss used only for military transportation and as transport and recreation of the wealthy, into an investment that ultimately pays off for yeoman and lower class farmers.

This changes horses from a luxury buy into a capital investment. So more people start raising, breeding, and selling horses. Horses then become more common, and their use expands outwards from the farms and camps.

By 1500 or so, only the very poor manors and farmsteads were still using oxen to any great extent. They'd largely been replaced by horses and then mules (which also use horse collars).