Rationalizing a Firefly - Serenity type setting

[The Colonel]

Originally Posted by Anaraxes

What makes you think the firearms are 19th century designs? Mal's pistol makes a weird whining "power up" kind of noise that certainly doesn't come from a regular revolver. Might just be retro looks, though there's also a large amount of "form follows function" in a pistol.

Point of fact I strongly suspect electrothermal propellant - they still seem to be using some kind of chemical propellant, but the capacitor whine makes me think that there's some kind of electrothermal business going on.

[cptbutton]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

Well they have instant-terraforming super-science but nothing else that would implied by that godlike capability. Other than that, the core is a pretty typical TL 10, while the fringe is schizotech with late 19th century firearms coexisting with lasers, stunners, forcefield windows, maglev monorails, 20th century atvs, horse drawn transport whatever. Primitive locally produced stuff, and really over priced core tech.

Two of the things I am trying to justify or explain away here.

The rest of the godlike technology has been suppressed because it is too scary.

And the Core worlds are intentionally not making stuff the fringe needs. In the vain hope that the fringers will come back, or start behaving properly. And if they won't, to hold back their technology level.

But the Core worlds can't get too blatant about it, because they have to maintain the fiction they are trying to help the fringers, not suppress them. And of there isn't total agreement on what to do and not do. Plus of course human corruption.

So the fringe has to make it themselves, or adapt stuff the Core worlds make for themselves, when they can get it smuggled out, with the extra cost of smuggling.

[Irish Wolf]

I figured it was a case of trade embargo. After all, the Core tales go, those rebellious outer worlds are obviously hotbeds of potential treason, so we can't trade with them and empower the rebels - then the terrorists will win!

So any world that doesn't knuckle under to the Core makes do with whatever tech they can put together and keep running, even such primitive items as six-shooters or Yamaha quadrunners...

[The Colonel]

Also, who said "instant terraforming"? We're not given any in-verse timescale for terraforming AFAIK - could have taken centuries to complete.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by shawnhcorey

Considering what has been seen of extrasolar planets, anything can make sense. All models of planet formation and stability have been invalidated by observations. The 'Verse cannot be considered irrational simply because we do not know what rational is.

Which gives you the problem of having lots of planets with no FTL travel. It's hard to make it make sense.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by thrash

That's untrue. Nothing in recent extrasolar planetology has invalidated orbital mechanics, nor is terraforming a world made primarily out of water ice ever a good idea.

Regardless of how the 'Verse formed, there is only a very narrow range of distances from each star where a world can be considered "habitable," and only so many worlds large enough to retain an atmosphere can orbit in that range. Given this, a 'Verse of five (or so) stars can rationally support maybe a dozen habitable planets and moons -- not more than 70. A 'Verse of more than 70 habitable planets and moons needs dozens of stars -- which is an open cluster, not a star system.

I'm thinking those terms weren't known to the authors. If you're doing a Sci Fi series, you should hire a Science grad student to point out the major mistakes in your senario.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by cptbutton

.

And the Core worlds are intentionally not making stuff the fringe needs. In the vain hope that the fringers will come back, or start behaving properly. And if they won't, to hold back their technology level.

Both Whedon and the show make it clear that the Core is supposed to be strictly Imperialistic in it's goals. They support slavery, clearly not a way to make people see you as friendly and benign. Also Corperations warping science to force profitable answers (which of course either doesn't work or supresses better answers) is also a theme of the show.

No the Core Worlders clearly dispise the Fringe Worlders in much the same way the 19th century British elites dispised the Irish, or the way most Americans looked down on Native Americans through the 19th and early 20th centuries.

[The Colonel]

Originally Posted by Astromancer

Both Whedon and the show make it clear that the Core is supposed to be strictly Imperialistic in it's goals. They support slavery, clearly not a way to make people see you as friendly and benign. Also Corperations warping science to force profitable answers (which of course either doesn't work or supresses better answers) is also a theme of the show.

No the Core Worlders clearly dispise the Fringe Worlders in much the same way the 19th century British elites dispised the Irish, or the way most Americans looked down on Native Americans through the 19th and early 20th centuries.

I understood the Alliance as far more utilitarian and happy to sacrifice a great many individuals for ther "great project" ... whatever that turned out to be. If the most efficient way to achieve a given goal is to enslave hundreds of people (who may not even be citizens) then they will be enslaved. If it's easier to deport them all from their homes and build an automated refinery where they used to live, that will happen.
The fringe worlders are barbarians because they deliberately choose not to assist in the grand project and even insist on getting in the way by asserting their "rights" against those of the polity as a whole.
This would actually be a logical outgrowth of some of the more collectivist currents in Chinese philosophy, which are traditionally prone to placing the needs of the many above those of almost any number of individuals - although you can apply the same critique to any form of oppressive state, including the Soviet system and many aspects of Western Corporatism.

[mindstalk]

Originally Posted by Astromancer

Both Whedon and the show make it clear that the Core is supposed to be strictly Imperialistic in it's goals. They support slavery, clearly not a way to make people see you as friendly and benign. Also Corperations warping science to force profitable answers (which of course either doesn't work or supresses better answers) is also a theme of the show.

No the Core Worlders clearly dispise the Fringe Worlders in much the same way the 19th century British elites dispised the Irish, or the way most Americans looked down on Native Americans through the 19th and early 20th centuries.

No, Joss has made it clear he doesn't see the Alliance as all bad guys, or even all that bad overall. He's said so outright, and the first aired pilot involved an Alliance delivery of medicine. Classic "good works".

The slavery we've seen was on the Rim, not the Core. Support it, or insufficient law enforcement to stomp it out? Debt-slavery's weaselly, anyway.

OP: interesting idea! Orderly crew and ornery passengers makes some sense. So would an exploitative crew a la _Lord of Light_ (not as badly as them.) "We make our paradise, we feel obligated to decant you, if you don't fit we'll dump you over there."

I think I recently saw work suggesting the habitable zone may be wider than thought. It's not something we can claim to have reliable knowledge on, especially given how diverse planets are. As for the 'verse, they have gravity-altering tech (don't ask out), and I think artificial zones. At that point realistic expectations about habitable worlds simply don't apply.

[pfharlock]

Originally Posted by RogerBW

The basic problem seems to be that, like many TV-SF writers, Josh wasn't too clear on astrodynamics and didn't realise that he could get advice on it. Like Terry Nation in the 1960s who didn't know the difference between a solar system and a galaxy, he just wrote more or less what other people had written.

The "all one solar system" stuff only comes in in the film, and stinks of desperate retcon. Treat it as RyanW says, a Traveller-style polity of several solar systems, and it pretty much works.

Or, some sniveling editor who didn't understand the ridiculousness of the statement got his hands on part of the dialogue, and then once it was said it was cannon.

I doubt that's the way it was originally written, (at least I like to think that's the way it came about).

I try to ignore that statement when watching the series/movie and then my brain can buy it again.