11-11-2016, 04:27 PM | #41 |
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: Berkeley, CA
|
Re: Roads Not Taken
Well, cheap and reasonably easy to use; it's not like dynamite is cheaper than nitroglycerine, it's just safer and easier to use.
|
11-11-2016, 04:38 PM | #42 |
Untagged
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Forest Grove, Beaverton, Oregon
|
Re: Roads Not Taken
I meant cheaper than good quality gun powder of equivalent explosive power. Nitro was cheaper, but as you say horribly dangerous. And probably more so when used day in and day out in the field as mining ops would be.
__________________
Beware, poor communication skills. No offense intended. If offended, it just means that I failed my writing skill check. |
11-11-2016, 07:44 PM | #43 | |
Untitled
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: between keyboard and chair
|
Re: Roads Not Taken
Quote:
I think we aren't too worried about scientific plausibility in this thread.
__________________
Rob Kelk “Every man has a right to his own opinion, but no man has a right to be wrong in his facts.” – Bernard Baruch, Deming (New Mexico) Headlight, 6 January 1950 No longer reading these forums regularly. |
|
11-11-2016, 07:45 PM | #44 |
Join Date: Dec 2007
|
Re: Roads Not Taken
Fully developed babbage engines don't.
|
11-11-2016, 07:50 PM | #45 |
Join Date: Aug 2007
|
Re: Roads Not Taken
However, the _utility_ of fully developed Babbage Engines gets exaggerated so much that they are almost superscience.
__________________
Fred Brackin |
11-11-2016, 07:51 PM | #46 | |
Join Date: Jun 2006
|
Re: Roads Not Taken
Quote:
__________________
-- MA Lloyd |
|
11-11-2016, 07:57 PM | #47 |
Join Date: Feb 2011
|
Re: Roads Not Taken
I put together a world line for cold fusion.
It might need more tweaking to be more reasonable, (as a weaker rocketry program presumably changes the British view of the war,) but it's a fun ride. Playing with fusors getting distributed around the world. A '60s China leaping forward with fusion, for instance, could be very interesting... |
11-11-2016, 08:55 PM | #48 |
Join Date: Feb 2007
|
Re: Roads Not Taken
Regarding medicine, if they made the connection, even a fairly low-tech but well-organized society could do a great deal with basic hygiene and organizing themselves to remove sewage and animal wastes and so forth even modestly efficiently. It's possible (at least under some circumstances) for a low-tech society that has a good level of social organization to arrange running water, it's been done. That in turn can allow hygienic steps that can be a very good line of defense against disease.
As for taking tech away, you could assume that the level of U-235 to U-238 was worse than it actually is. That could happen if a planet was older when its inhabitants reached nuclear technology levels, because U-235 has a much shorter half-life than U-238. Take away the U-235 and nuclear weaponry gets a lot harder, even if you have the knowledge. |
11-11-2016, 09:04 PM | #49 |
Join Date: Oct 2006
|
Re: Roads Not Taken
I was thinking more in alternate physics/chemistry way. Otherwise they will get discovered one way or another.
|
11-12-2016, 01:38 AM | #50 | |
Untagged
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Forest Grove, Beaverton, Oregon
|
Re: Roads Not Taken
Quote:
Not quite as influential as Darwin or Watson, Crick, and Franklin, but important nonetheless. Removing Franklin, or having her be a bit more paranoid about hiding research from prying eyes, could have an interesting effect on the proof for D.N.A.'s shape.
__________________
Beware, poor communication skills. No offense intended. If offended, it just means that I failed my writing skill check. |
|
Tags |
divergent technology, technology |
|
|