Operation Ark - Original Plan?

The Empire of Man and Starfire books pretty much ended. Sure, there can always be more books in a setting, but the storylines were complete.

SWM wrote:The Empire of Man and Starfire books pretty much ended. Sure, there can always be more books in a setting, but the storylines were complete.

I want to find out the story of how Roger and company corral Prince Jackson in the Empire of Man series...

I agree that Starfire has reached a natural conclusion, although that hidden colony of Arachnids does leave some wiggle room for another story if our author wants to write it.

Don

Apparently John Ringo has some ideas about how Roger and company will deal with Prince Jackson.

Not sure where it is in Ringo's and Weber's schedule.

n7axw wrote:

SWM wrote:The Empire of Man and Starfire books pretty much ended. Sure, there can always be more books in a setting, but the storylines were complete.

I want to find out the story of how Roger and company corral Prince Jackson in the Empire of Man series...

I agree that Starfire has reached a natural conclusion, although that hidden colony of Arachnids does leave some wiggle room for another story if our author wants to write it.

Don

DrakBibliophile wrote:From what David Weber has said, the original plan was to preserve high tech knowledge in two remote areas.

What became Zion was one of the areas with Shan-wei's enclave as the other area. I'd note that some of the characters have wondered why the Archangels chose Zion as their headquarters. There would have been better areas on Safehold for it.

The command crew *and* their descendants would be the guardians of such knowledge with limited high tech resources.

I don't believe David Weber has said how high tech would be revealed to the rest of Safehold when the low-tech period was over.

I've been wondering sort of control mechanism the original plan envisaged. Langhorne had the Holy Writ and the CoGA. I assume the original plan had something like the Writ simply because it includes a LOT of practical information - agriculture, medicine and sanitation, terraforming - all in a low-tech wrapper.

The original plan would have one big advantage - a limited time horizon. It only has to work for a about 5 centuries and the main constraint is no radio or high energy sources during that time. With a total initial population of a bit over 10 million, and a relatively low-tech base, most of that time (and the populace's energies) would be spent just expanding out of the initial enclaves and growing the population. A 1.5% growth rate (which is probably optimistic) gives a half-century doubling time. That means at least 3-4 centuries to reach a billion. Another century for first-wave innovation (scientific method, steam power, initial industrialization) and you're pretty much out of your window of vulnerability.

The high-tech enclaves could monitor things and simply recruit anyone who looks to accelerate things too much too soon. Add in a mythology that has a simplified version of the truth, and maybe a time capsule from the past to be opened at the appropriate time to set the course for the future.

What think you?

jms

jmseeley wrote:I've been wondering sort of control mechanism the original plan envisaged.

At a guess? The Truth.

"Hey, there's big nasty aliens out there that would love to exterminate us all. So as long as you guys don't build anything that emits radio signals until Year X+500, you can do whatever you want!"

There'd be no need to create a church to stifle innovation. Hell, there'd be no need to stifle innovation period! The colonists could have started off with a 19th century or even early 20th century tech base, with explicit guidelines on electricity and where and how it's safe to be used.

Arguably, there wouldn't be much impetus to innovate simply because everyone knew that once the time limit ends, they could all upgrade to spaceships and computers again. So why bother reinventing the wheel?

DrakBibliophile wrote:Apparently John Ringo has some ideas about how Roger and company will deal with Prince Jackson.

Not sure where it is in Ringo's and Weber's schedule.

n7axw wrote:

SWM wrote:The Empire of Man and Starfire books pretty much ended. Sure, there can always be more books in a setting, but the storylines were complete.

I want to find out the story of how Roger and company corral Prince Jackson in the Empire of Man series...

I agree that Starfire has reached a natural conclusion, although that hidden colony of Arachnids does leave some wiggle room for another story if our author wants to write it.

Don

Um, it's being currently worked on. Of course, it's in competition with several other projects at both my end and John's end, so I don't have any sort of completion date for you. We discussed several plot points which needed to be hammered out at Dragon Con, however, and John went away grinning. I take this as a good sign.

evilauthor wrote:

jmseeley wrote:I've been wondering sort of control mechanism the original plan envisaged.

At a guess? The Truth.

"Hey, there's big nasty aliens out there that would love to exterminate us all. So as long as you guys don't build anything that emits radio signals until Year X+500, you can do whatever you want!"

There'd be no need to create a church to stifle innovation. Hell, there'd be no need to stifle innovation period! The colonists could have started off with a 19th century or even early 20th century tech base, with explicit guidelines on electricity and where and how it's safe to be used.

Arguably, there wouldn't be much impetus to innovate simply because everyone knew that once the time limit ends, they could all upgrade to spaceships and computers again. So why bother reinventing the wheel?

The original plan envisioned a self-replicating command staff located in remote enclaves with a functional (but small and carefully shielded) tech base to ride herd on the remainder of the colonists. Recall that the "pre-tech" industrial base they had going for them by Nimue's arrival was pretty darned good. This was not a subsistence-level society and, as Nimue and Co. have demonstrated, it could have been improved upon still further without crossing the "radiating lots of energy" line. Essentially, the folks in the enclave would have interacted with the colonists and their descendants as mentors and teachers. They would have provided the equivalent of college professors, for example, with impeccable backgrounds (i.e., they would have been humans, not "angels," with a fully developed back story who would interact with the rest of the colonists for 40 or 50 years and then "die of natural causes" and return to the enclave.) In addition, there would have been interaction between the enclaves and the evolving local governments, where the truth would have been known to a small circle of leaders. Even if rumors of the full story had leaked out, the enclaves would have been in a position to control the situation --- by moral suasion by first, second, and third choice, or by physical coercion should more diplomatic efforts fail --- without plunging the entire surviving human race into an abyss of ignorance. In addition, the plan from the beginning was that the enclaves would maintain an advanced medical capability which would have been available to intervene in the case of pandemic disease or similar catastrophe.

In other words, the original plan never envisioned simply throwing the colonists ashore in Safehold without a very carefully arranged and preserved reservoir of the human race's knowledge under the care of custodians charged to preserve it for later return to the descendants of the original colonists. And those same custodians would have been available to handle any emergencies which might have arisen, which would almost certainly have included squashing the reemergence of serfdom or some of the other societal ills which have afflicted Safehold.

Is it possible that the enclaves as envisioned under the original plan would have gone off the tracks in the half millennium of low-tech? Yes, it is, of course. That plan was far less likely to have gone astray than Langhorne's "solution to the Gbaba problem," however. It was also the basis for the Alexandria Enclave's disagreement with Langhorne's policy of book burning. They were trying to follow the original mission plan; Langhorne was the one who'd trashed his own orders and gone off on a wild tangent.

runsforcelery wrote:The original plan envisioned a self-replicating command staff located in remote enclaves with a functional (but small and carefully shielded) tech base to ride herd on the remainder of the colonists. Recall that the "pre-tech" industrial base they had going for them by Nimue's arrival was pretty darned good. This was not a subsistence-level society and, as Nimue and Co. have demonstrated, it could have been improved upon still further without crossing the "radiating lots of energy" line. Essentially, the folks in the enclave would have interacted with the colonists and their descendants as mentors and teachers. They would have provided the equivalent of college professors, for example, with impeccable backgrounds (i.e., they would have been humans, not "angels," with a fully developed back story who would interact with the rest of the colonists for 40 or 50 years and then "die of natural causes" and return to the enclave.) In addition, there would have been interaction between the enclaves and the evolving local governments, where the truth would have been known to a small circle of leaders. Even if rumors of the full story had leaked out, the enclaves would have been in a position to control the situation --- by moral suasion by first, second, and third choice, or by physical coercion should more diplomatic efforts fail --- without plunging the entire surviving human race into an abyss of ignorance. In addition, the plan from the beginning was that the enclaves would maintain an advanced medical capability which would have been available to intervene in the case of pandemic disease or similar catastrophe.

In other words, the original plan never envisioned simply throwing the colonists ashore in Safehold without a very carefully arranged and preserved reservoir of the human race's knowledge under the care of custodians charged to preserve it for later return to the descendants of the original colonists. And those same custodians would have been available to handle any emergencies which might have arisen, which would almost certainly have included squashing the reemergence of serfdom or some of the other societal ills which have afflicted Safehold.

Is it possible that the enclaves as envisioned under the original plan would have gone off the tracks in the half millennium of low-tech? Yes, it is, of course. That plan was far less likely to have gone astray than Langhorne's "solution to the Gbaba problem," however. It was also the basis for the Alexandria Enclave's disagreement with Langhorne's policy of book burning. They were trying to follow the original mission plan; Langhorne was the one who'd trashed his own orders and gone off on a wild tangent.

Having the command staff interacting with (and I assume recruiting from) the people would also pre-empt any tendency for them to start seeing themselves as a superior breed. If they kept apart and just monitored civilization via the SNARCs there would be a chance they'd end up where Langhorne went.

It seems to me that the Original Plan would also leave the trauma of humanity's destruction behind. From what you've said, by the time of Operation Ark, pretty much everyone was psychologically walking wounded. Getting a chance to leave that behind would be worth the price of memory erasure. By the time the truth was fully revealed the new civilization would have its own sense of identity and could see the revelation as an inspiring story of sacrifice and a challenge instead of a threat and a burden.

jms

runsforcelery wrote:Um, it's being currently worked on. Of course, it's in competition with several other projects at both my end and John's end, so I don't have any sort of completion date for you. We discussed several plot points which needed to be hammered out at Dragon Con, however, and John went away grinning. I take this as a good sign.

Yea! The Empire of Man series is one of my all time favorites. John grinning I would agree is a very good sign, especially if it was an evil "they'll never see this coming" kind of a grin.

Hello RFC!

Thanks very much for this detail on how it was supposed to work1

It sounds much better than I'd hoped for.

Thanks again.

L

runsforcelery wrote:

evilauthor wrote:*quote="jmseeley"*
I've been wondering sort of control mechanism the original plan envisaged. *quote*

At a guess? The Truth.

"Hey, there's big nasty aliens out there that would love to exterminate us all. So as long as you guys don't build anything that emits radio signals until Year X+500, you can do whatever you want!"

There'd be no need to create a church to stifle innovation. Hell, there'd be no need to stifle innovation period! The colonists could have started off with a 19th century or even early 20th century tech base, with explicit guidelines on electricity and where and how it's safe to be used.

Arguably, there wouldn't be much impetus to innovate simply because everyone knew that once the time limit ends, they could all upgrade to spaceships and computers again. So why bother reinventing the wheel?

The original plan envisioned a self-replicating command staff located in remote enclaves with a functional (but small and carefully shielded) tech base to ride herd on the remainder of the colonists. Recall that the "pre-tech" industrial base they had going for them by Nimue's arrival was pretty darned good. This was not a subsistence-level society and, as Nimue and Co. have demonstrated, it could have been improved upon still further without crossing the "radiating lots of energy" line. Essentially, the folks in the enclave would have interacted with the colonists and their descendants as mentors and teachers. They would have provided the equivalent of college professors, for example, with impeccable backgrounds (i.e., they would have been humans, not "angels," with a fully developed back story who would interact with the rest of the colonists for 40 or 50 years and then "die of natural causes" and return to the enclave.) In addition, there would have been interaction between the enclaves and the evolving local governments, where the truth would have been known to a small circle of leaders. Even if rumors of the full story had leaked out, the enclaves would have been in a position to control the situation --- by moral suasion by first, second, and third choice, or by physical coercion should more diplomatic efforts fail --- without plunging the entire surviving human race into an abyss of ignorance. In addition, the plan from the beginning was that the enclaves would maintain an advanced medical capability which would have been available to intervene in the case of pandemic disease or similar catastrophe.

In other words, the original plan never envisioned simply throwing the colonists ashore in Safehold without a very carefully arranged and preserved reservoir of the human race's knowledge under the care of custodians charged to preserve it for later return to the descendants of the original colonists. And those same custodians would have been available to handle any emergencies which might have arisen, which would almost certainly have included squashing the reemergence of serfdom or some of the other societal ills which have afflicted Safehold.

Is it possible that the enclaves as envisioned under the original plan would have gone off the tracks in the half millennium of low-tech? Yes, it is, of course. That plan was far less likely to have gone astray than Langhorne's "solution to the Gbaba problem," however. It was also the basis for the Alexandria Enclave's disagreement with Langhorne's policy of book burning. They were trying to follow the original mission plan; Langhorne was the one who'd trashed his own orders and gone off on a wild tangent.