those that are mentioned only in this single work;
those that form the common background of the series, binding it into a single fictitious history.
Despite their pioneering work in interplanetary colonization, the Pilgrims and the White American Church are mentioned only in The Snows Of Ganymede (New York, 1958) - please correct me if I am wrong (Wrong: see combox) - whereas other passages in this work refer directly or indirectly to major events in the Polesotechnic History.
With the help of the Chronology in Starship, we can list these events more precisely:
1958 World War III
1965 First Conference of Rio makes UN world government
1975 Psychotecnic Institute founded
Mars and Venus colonized
2009 Second Industrial Revolution causes mass technological unemployment
2035 Second Conference of Rio begins move towards Solar Union
White Americans begin Ganymede colonization
Venus clans break from UN
2045 City of X founded on Ganymede
2055 Planetary Engineering Corps founded
2080 Corps becomes independent Order
2100 Ganymede isolated from inner Solar System
2105 Solar Union founded
2125 Humanist Manifesto published
2170 Humanist Revolution
Psychotechnic Institute banned
2180 Humanists overthrown
2220 Order now wealthiest, most influential private organization in the System
White Americans ask Order to terraform Ganymede and Callisto
I have not listed events in this pre-FTL period that do not impact on The Snows Of Ganymede. However, these are:
2126 First STL ship launched
2130 Cosmic religion begins
2200 Limited physical immortality developed in secret
2205 Psychodynamic social engineering in an STL ship
The historian de la Garde is short-sighted enough to think that nothing beyond the Asteroid Belt will ever be economically important because:
too few resources;
too difficult to colonize;
energy needed for mere survival.
Therefore, he thinks that the main line of history will remain in the inner System, despite the colonization of Ganymede and the launch of STL interstellar ships.
De la Garde made no allowance for further technological advances. Despite the Second Dark Ages beginning about 2300:
the hyperdrive is invented in 2784;
Nomad culture begins in 2815;
the Stellar Union and Coordination Service are founded in 2900;
the Third Dark Ages do not begin until 3200;
there are interstellar Empires, then a multi-species galactic civilization with extraordinary personal control of cosmic energies, after that.
Excelsior!
4 comments:
The Pilgrims are mentioned in "Un-Man," I believe.
I have not read The Snows of Ganymede; maybe I ought to try to find it on the Intertubes.
Best Regards, Nicholas
Nicholas,
...GANYMEDE is pivotal, like MIRKHEIM.
Paul.
"energy needed for mere survival."
Only a problem if energy is hard to get.
There are several possibilities for making energy abundant for an outer solar system settlement.
Even solar would be useful farther out than at first glance.
Large areas of aluminized plastic could be made cheaply so sunlight could be concentrated for power well out from the sun.
Fission would be usable. Uranium & thorium might be available far from the sun or might need to be imported from the rocky bodies closer to the sun.
Fusion fuel would be plentiful if we can get fusion to work. Even more so if we can get the CNO cycle to work so ordinary hydrogen can be fused to helium.
There is the possibility of using electrodynamic tethers to get energy from the motion of moons relative to the magnetic field of a planet, especially Jupiter.
Kaor, Jim!
And we have plenty of oil, natural gas, and brown coal on Earth itself. Altho I would rather we no longer used coal. To say nothing of nuclear power, using current technology, use of which would lessen the need for oil.
Ad astra! Sean
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