Rationalizing a Firefly - Serenity type setting

[Anaraxes]

Originally Posted by ak_aramis

So do Barrow and McMurdo. Don't need sealed pressure suits for those, either.

But you do need more than just an oxygen mask.

[combatmedic]

Originally Posted by jason taylor

I don't see what the need is. It fits better with the travel system changed to a traditional FTL. The basic idea of Firefly is simply Space Cossacks running around in the grey zone of the law, blowing raspberries at authority, and being obscure enough to get away with it. That would work just as good in most 'verses.

I assume the reason the writers went with STL only was to limit action to the single super system. Going anyplace else with habitable worlds would take at least a century of flight. And Earth-that-Was may be wrecked...

The Alliance presents a bigger threat if there's no place to escape it and start over.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by combatmedic

If they have the terraforming tech to make any planet or moon in the "habitable zone" into a very earthlike world, then it seems unlikely they would leave Earth. They could have used the tech to fix the environmental problems on Earth.
...?

If they have the technology to send a generation or FTL ship anywhere, they have more than enough to fix earth.

I can't think of any vaguely realistic problem other than the clichéd grey goo scenario that would make earth truly uninhabitable.
It's best to keep it mysterious and unknown by the characters rather than try to explain or lampshade it.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Anaraxes

But you do need more than just an oxygen mask.

The cold, dryness, wind, thin air, and light/darkness circadian disruptions make the place sound like hell on earth.

My mild S.A.D. would make me homicidal in the summer, and comatose in the winter.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by combatmedic

I assume the reason the writers went with STL only was to limit action to the single super system. Going anyplace else with habitable worlds would take at least a century of flight. And Earth-that-Was may be wrecked...

The Alliance presents a bigger threat if there's no place to escape it and start over.

Why is the most obvious reason so hard for some people to accept? Poor science education? With how ignorant of space's vastness the general populace is, the writers may have though they were being realistic by not including FTL. They simply didn't think/care about the absurdity of so many garden of edens in one system.

[combatmedic]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

If they have the technology to send a generation or FTL ship anywhere, they have more than enough to fix earth.

I can't think of any vaguely realistic problem other than the clichéd grey goo scenario that would make earth truly uninhabitable.
It's best to keep it mysterious and unknown by the characters rather than try to explain or lampshade it.

They don't have FTL.

And generation ships?

Not known.

Given that the show did have suspended animation tech, I'm guessing cold storage sleeper ships are more likely.

[mindstalk]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Why is the most obvious reason so hard for some people to accept? Poor science education? With how ignorant of space's vastness the general populace is, the writers may have though they were being realistic by not including FTL. They simply didn't think/care about the absurdity of so many garden of edens in one system.

A lot of edens via unspecified terraforming is unlikely. FTL is impossible or problematic (causality-violating) by known physics. FTL only seems less absurd due to decades of SF tradition ignoring actual science in favor of storytelling.

Ditto for psychic powers, which Firefly eventually tipped over into (after having been coy for a while about whether River was just really hyperaware and smart.)

[combatmedic]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Why is the most obvious reason so hard for some people to accept? Poor science education? With how ignorant of space's vastness the general populace is, the writers may have though they were being realistic by not including FTL. They simply didn't think/care about the absurdity of so many garden of edens in one system.

FTL= poor science education

It's not possible, Flyn.

Why can you accept it, but not a miracle star system?

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by combatmedic

FTL= poor science education

It's not possible, Flyn.

Why can you accept it, but not a miracle star system?

We don't absolutely know that FTL is impossible. The faint hope remains for a loophole. But the idea of hundreds of earth-sized worlds just sitting around in the habitable zone waiting to be terraformed with a snap of the fingers takes more than a loophole.

[ak_aramis]

Originally Posted by jason taylor

I don't see what the need is. It fits better with the travel system changed to a traditional FTL. The basic idea of Firefly is simply Space Cossacks running around in the grey zone of the law, blowing raspberries at authority, and being obscure enough to get away with it. That would work just as good in most 'verses.

A true FTL drive makes the cluster (be it open or closed) unneeded.

The lack of FTL (albeit having what looks to be STL Alcubierre-style warp drive) makes the setting constrained in a way different from a significant FTL drive setting would be.

Keep in mind: with even a 1PSL Sublight drive, Mars is a matter of around 800 minutes at closest, and 2600 at furthest. 14 to 44 hours. At 10 PSL (0.1C), Mars is 1.5 to to 4.5 hours.

10PSL looks to be about right for Firefly's main drive.

Theoretically, we can build a stable mission duration of about 1.5 years (that's about what a nuclear submarine is capable of without any replenishments on low-crewing, from public sources.). Let's assume that's a reasonable non-colonial ship model; we'll call this science range. (Colonial range seems to be about 6 months travel time edge-to-core.)

• At 0.01C, everything in system (to the boundary of Pluto) is well within science range. (Pluto is about 3.5 weeks). Everything inside mars is within within 2 days - even Mars near opposition.
• At 0.1C, Everything is under 2.5 days - everything in the inner system is within day trip range.
• At 1 C, everything in the system (still to the pluto boundary) is under 0.25 days, and the oort cloud is still out of reach, but many of the KBOs can be reached.
• At 6 C, we get round trip to/from the Centauri Systems. (TOS WF 1.8)
• At 10C The Alpha Centauri and Proxma Centauri systems, Barnard's Star systems are in our hypothetical science reach. The Luhman A&B are barely reachable in that 1.5 years, as is WISE J0855-0714, and the Centauri systems are within colonial range. (TOS WF 2.2)
• At 100C, the Centauri Systems are within 17 days, and Barnard's within a month. (TOS WF 4.6) Science range hits 75 LY. Several hundred systems are in colonial range.
• At 600C, the Centauri systems are in Vacation Range - 2.5 days there, a week down, and 2.5 days back. (TOS WF 8.4)
• At 1000C, science range his 750 LY across - colony range is 500 LY, the size of Traveller's Imperium. (TOS WF 10)