future Interplanetary Civilization discussion.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Also are there hostile elements out there on the fringes? That would tend to favor a centralized authority as well...

actually, that seems like another point for debat.

i think that if there where hostile elements within reasonable space travel, we'd already be conquered.

well, that's kinda vague.

um, no conspiracy theory's on that Last please.

[ January 31, 2004, 04:59: Message edited by: narf poit chez BOOM ]

[narf poit chez BOOM]

what, all these sf buffs and nobody's interested?

[capnq]

IMO, we don't have enough information to make useful predictions. Interplanetary law will evolve organically, based on immediate needs.

Frex, when we have interplanetary colonies, what will happen when one tries to declare independence? Whether they can do it will depend a lot on who founded the colony and what its purpose was.

[Member 4148]

interstellar empire possibilites will depend on two things: communication and travel time

without high ftl communication and travel, no empire is possible
its possible, just barely, to hold an empire together with travel and communication time measured in weeks
more than that, and it simply won't work long term - if it is six weeks between when a colony rebels and you find out about it, and another six weeks to get any forces there to do something, the rebel colony will be pretty much lost to the empire by the time the troops arrive
with delay measured in weeks, a loose confederacy is about the most that is possible

if travel/communications measured in years due to non-ftl travel, no empire possible beyond local star system

if travel/communications measured in days or less, pick a government - any large-scale government that has worked for a time on earth could work for a time in space - with the proviso that people could flee a long long ways

[Renegade 13]

Likely, there would only be pockets of 'civilization' where there are habitable systems. Each group would answer only to themselves and have very little or no contact with the other systems. That is, unless a method of FTL travel and communication is devised. In that case, a traditional empire like association may be possible, still depending on how much faster than light the communication and travel were.

[rdouglass]

I agree that if there is no FTL communications, there would be local authority control. Without effective communications to govern colonies, no authority would realistically take place.

Has anyone read the two Frank Herbert books;'The Jesus Incident' and 'The Lazarus Effect'? (those are the titles if my memory serves me correct) 'Jesus Incident' was based around the concept of no FTL communications or travel and a ship named "Ship" (notice capital 'S' like capital 'G' in 'God'.) Ship went thruout the universe cloning humans from the genetic material on board and training these folks (with their inherited traits and abilities) to establish colonies. 'Lazarus Effect' was a book about the 'end results' of one of the colonies.

I won't spoil the books by telling the story, but the concept was an interesting twist on celestial 'seeding' of human colonies. A good read for SF fans IMO....

[Will]

Amazon {link} says those are the middle two in a series of four. Sounds interesting, though.