To play the devils advocate, suppose only the tools that allowed advancement
were lost. then the research of new advancements would start over on the
curve at the very slow rate. Exhisting technolgy that was self supporting
could continue to function although with out advanced knowledge many would
not understand how they work.
----- Original Message -----
From: Luca Lettieri <magnus_at_...>
To: <netepic_at_egroups.com>
Sent: Friday, May 26, 2000 9:59 AM
Subject: [NetEpic ML] Re: On Imperial armies and original fluff
> > While 10000 years IS a long time given the social climate of the
> > Imperium I would not be too surprised that nothing new gets done.
>
> Sorry Peter, but I couldn't disagree more.
>
> First of all, it's a well-known fact that technology is following an
> hyperbole curve - very slow in the beginning, ludicrously fast right
> now. This is due to the "self-supporting" phenomenon - the advances
> in technology allow for the construction of advanced tools which in
> turn help research to advance even more etc. It would take some
> massive world-wide catastrophe to clean the slate. Considering the
> fact that the Imperium starts from an even more advanced state and an
> even more distributed approach, I just cannot see how this could
> happen. While the Heresy arguably WAS a major catastrophe, they STILL
> had trans-light speed at the end. And ten thousand years with such a
> start is more than enough to recover.
>
> Second, it's not even true that progress was THAT slow in ancient
> times. Not MILITARY progress at any rate. And historically, wartime
> is the time in which military research gets huge boosts for obvious
> reasons. I could imagine the Empire not devoting that much effort to
> the welfare of its citizens, but... but... 10000 years of perpetual
> war, and not only they didn't advance, but they couldn't even figure
> out how to rebuild something which they already have in thousands of
> perfectly working copies (e.g: Termie suits)??? Come on, this is
> TOTALLY ludicrous.
>
> Religious mumbo-jumbo... low-level rank and file goons, maybe. But
> when you have 100 different war fronts at any given moment, you'll
> MOST DEFINITELY want high-level competent technicians and
> theoreticians who're getting assigned outrageous amounts of money to
> research new nifty weapons with which to smite your enemies.
>
> Sorry but I'll repeat myself: there's NO WAY than a technically
> advanced civilization, spanning a whole galaxy, and in a situation of
> perpetual warfare is not going to evolve in 10000 years. TEN THOUSAND
> YEARS, for crying out loud!! Billions of planets! Uncountable
> individuals... and not one of them comes up with something new??
> Spare me.
>
>
> Luca Lettieri
>
>
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Received on Fri May 26 2000 - 14:08:17 UTC