The Navy of God against Charis naval superiority

Hi Henry Brown,

We had from HFaF, that Safehold had all sorts of 19th century agricultural equipment including reapers etc which require at least some steel [blades etc] to work, cast or wrought iron being too heavy and too inflexible for long term affordable farm work.

So steel was being used for major societal applications but couldn't be made in the bulk quantities of the non-war obvious demand, and while Charis was iron master to the world, iron boring tools were evidently limited compared to brass, which Charis has a lot given all the church bells Merlin noted when he arrived.

Howsmyn's tool master [re-]invented the micrometer and dozens of other standard measure tools, that are critical for universal interchangeability, not just within the same factory, that the Go4 and their artisans may still have no clue about their critical importance.

While steel production may go up in the Go4 lands thanks to the stolen open hearth designs, being largely restricted to blockaded South Harchong won't help until they are supplemented by others on Haven.

Until then the Go4 will be stuck in the iron era, even they can make very good near steel iron, a bottleneck which will hold them back until they lose the current war.

L

Henry Brown wrote:*quote="n7axw"*I,for one, will admit that, with the possible exception of Charis, I had Safehold comparable more to 17th century Europe before the age of industrialization than to the 19th century.

I suspect what is happening here is that when we think of the Writ, we tend to think only in terms of the proscriptions rather than the guidance it provides in such areas as chemistry and agriculture. Much of what Safehold takes for granted, we on Earth had to figure out a step at a time.

Don*quote*

Like you, I mentally had the mainland around late 17th century real world in industry pre-Merlin. Mainly due to the repeated emphasis on what is prohibited and on how difficult it is for new innovations to be approved. I DID think of them around 19th century RW in agriculture. So I guess I was half-right.

Still loving the DW Info dumps

I even find DW disagreements tend to bring more info that opens up my mind so in that sense thank you [i]Dilandu [/i

]

n7axw wrote:I,for one, will admit that, with the possible exception of Charis, I had Safehold comparable more to 17th century Europe before the age of industrialization than to the 19th century.

I suspect what is happening here is that when we think of the Writ, we tend to think only in terms of the proscriptions rather than the guidance it provides in such areas as chemistry and agriculture. Much of what Safehold takes for granted, we on Earth had to figure out a step at a time.

Don

Yeah, Langhorne really messed up there IMO, both in introducing too much technology from day one and in setting up a monotheistic system with the concept of God's Creation and a divine plan - which tends to bring in, IMO, the concept of a rational understandable world. Setting up a religion with a bunch of squabbling gods, or something like a maya doctrine of illusion or a Gnostic "the material world is a trap" picture, would have served his purposes much better IMO. The rational planned world requires something like the Proscriptions...

Of course, his errors are all good from the protagonists' perspective....

cralkhi wrote:
Yeah, Langhorne really messed up there IMO, both in introducing too much technology from day one and in setting up a monotheistic system with the concept of God's Creation and a divine plan - which tends to bring in, IMO, the concept of a rational understandable world. Setting up a religion with a bunch of squabbling gods, or something like a maya doctrine of illusion or a Gnostic "the material world is a trap" picture, would have served his purposes much better IMO. The rational planned world requires something like the Proscriptions...

Well, his idea eventually worked for nearly 900 years.

I don't think that would have worked as well. The notion that the world is an illusion or unimportant doesn't prohibit innovation. Merlin would have found it easier to train people from a far lower tech base into modernity as the clergy would have seen such activity as harmless delusion. God's truth or the gods' truth will eventually show those delusional idiots why.

Merlin would have a much easier time yet with warring devine factions. Since devinity is not absolute, neither is morality. Morality become what the winning faction says it is. Innovations that foster victory are justified by the superiority. Teaching a society with that as their base ethos would be easy. Heck, Langehorne's stability would not have lasted nearly as long or Safehold's base tech would have to have started from a much lower place.

No, in order to create stasis Bedard chose the best course with monotheism. It gave hers and Langhorne's vision the imprimatur of absolute Devon's truth.

cralkhi wrote:

n7axw wrote:I,for one, will admit that, with the possible exception of Charis, I had Safehold comparable more to 17th century Europe before the age of industrialization than to the 19th century.

I suspect what is happening here is that when we think of the Writ, we tend to think only in terms of the proscriptions rather than the guidance it provides in such areas as chemistry and agriculture. Much of what Safehold takes for granted, we on Earth had to figure out a step at a time.

Don

Yeah, Langhorne really messed up there IMO, both in introducing too much technology from day one and in setting up a monotheistic system with the concept of God's Creation and a divine plan - which tends to bring in, IMO, the concept of a rational understandable world. Setting up a religion with a bunch of squabbling gods, or something like a maya doctrine of illusion or a Gnostic "the material world is a trap" picture, would have served his purposes much better IMO. The rational planned world requires something like the Proscriptions...

Of course, his errors are all good from the protagonists' perspective....

cralkhi wrote:Yeah, Langhorne really messed up there IMO, both in introducing too much technology from day one and in setting up a monotheistic system with the concept of God's Creation and a divine plan - ...

What Langhorne set up was a situation where the argument "If God had wanted ... He would have given it to us on the day of Creation" has a lot of reality behind it.

Improve a reaper? "What? Do you think you can improve on
God's Design?"

In providing all the technology that was required for a low-tech civilization, Langhorne established the idea that innovation was contrary to God's Will.

PeterZ wrote:I don't think that would have worked as well. The notion that the world is an illusion or unimportant doesn't prohibit innovation.

Individual innovations, no. The combination of them into a scientific mindset (which you need for anything near spacefaring tech, which is what Langhorne really wanted to prevent) probably yes.

Ancient Greece and Rome and medieval China never developed anything like science despite many geniuses and many inventions.

It took the Western Christian assumption of a rational comprehensible world, combined with elements of Greek philosophy filtered through that assumption (scholasticism), to prepare the intellectual soil for science. Without that I don't think you would have gotten spacefaring in tens of thousands of years of civilization (or more).

Merlin would have found it easier to train people from a far lower tech base into modernity as the clergy would have seen such activity as harmless delusion.

That's true, but with Merlin in the picture Langhorne's plan is doomed anyway.

If Merlin hadn't been a good person and thus unwilling to claim angelic status, it would have been really quick (remember he can alter the PICA to look like anybody - and there are surviving pictures of Langhorne...)

Heck, Langehorne's stability would not have lasted nearly as long or Safehold's base tech would have to have started from a much lower place.

That's exactly what I'm suggesting - starting the base tech much lower, without any kind of precision manufacturing, steelwork, etc. Maybe high Bronze Age, Mycenaean Greece level (~1200 BC).

How many angels can dance on the head of a pin has no interest for me, I just love to watch the unfolding of the story of releasing the pent-up urges of man to Invent! and Better! that seems to be a part of our innate make-up.

This is the story that we are reading and experiencing!!!

Of course it is the story as predicated by rfc, how could it not be? After all, he is the author.

I am more amazed by his being able to plan and juggle the many pieces of it as the complete story unfolds and touches all parts of the Safeholdian society. This is why I buy and read almost everything DW writes (I don't particularly care for werewolves).

Wanting to understand is reasonable, quibbling isn't. Hey, just enjoy it! I an not aware of another author that has the ability to tell as complete and consistent a story as David does.

I enjoy his writings!

cralkhi wrote:
[Snip]

Individual innovations, no. The combination of them into a scientific mindset (which you need for anything near spacefaring tech, which is what Langhorne really wanted to prevent) probably yes.

Ancient Greece and Rome and medieval China never developed anything like science despite many geniuses and many inventions.

It took the Western Christian assumption of a rational comprehensible world, combined with elements of Greek philosophy filtered through that assumption (scholasticism), to prepare the intellectual soil for science. Without that I don't think you would have gotten spacefaring in tens of thousands of years of civilization (or more).

[Snip]

The reintroduction of ancient thought IE Greek and Roman came from the Moors in Spain. This kick started the Renaissance and the development of the scientific method as the introduction of Arabic numerals, and algebra gave the west the mathematics that allowed the scientific method. Early Christianity destroyed the works of the Romans and Greeks as Pagan literature leading to the dark ages. Odd how the once rational Islamists are now the book burning beheading fanatics.

Poker

pokermind wrote:The reintroduction of ancient thought IE Greek and Roman came from the Moors in Spain.

Islam had that God's plan, monotheistic set-up too and at one point it was moving in a proto-scientific direction - the potential was indeed there. But then the philosophy of occasionalism (in which there are no natural laws, every event is a direct miracle) became widely accepted and that was pretty much the end of it.

(Although I don't think the Byzantines get enough credit for retaining a lot of Greco-Roman stuff).

Early Christianity destroyed the works of the Romans and Greeks as Pagan literature leading to the dark ages.

Maybe in some isolated cases, but not in general. The Dark Ages were a result of the destruction/collapse of infrastructure not any organized rejection of pagan knowledge or literature.