Day to day lives of Starmen

[aspqrz]

However, developments in CATScan tech that I am aware of through my day job as a teacher (they're having a huge impact in measuring/mapping how learning works) would suggest that, in the near future, it is very likely that some form of indirect, non-invasive, brain interface may be possible for at least some elements of the control system, with Glass Cockpits being the low tech backup.

This idea has been used in a German science fiction series, Perry Rho-
dan, for quite some time now.
The ship's pilot wears a kind of helmet that enables him to "feel" the ship
almost as if it were his own body and to control the ship's functions with
his thoughts.

Aha, didn't know of the Perry Rhodan connection ... I know its been a trope (mostly in the form of direct neural plug connections) in a lot of "recent" SF, but this hints at the real likelihood of it being viable ...

While I see that you could input the commands from a cap, the problem with receiving information through it would be ... problematic ... since you'd have to project energy into the brain to change what's happening in the neurons to impart information, there'd be a serious energy bleed problem ... you'd be cooking the brain, possibly slowly, but cooking it nonetheless.

So I see the displays still being external, but the commands being direct neural feed.

I am sure others will tell me why and how I am wrong :wink:

Phil

 

[aspqrz]

Ah, now I understand what you were trying to say earlier in the thread.
Thank you.
Basically, hieroglyphics just wont work any more as a modern language.

4 eye sea u

(works better it the eye was a drawing of an eye)

Thank you for taking the time to explain and answer my question.

Ideograms have a place. A red barred circle for a stop/no access/danger sign works OK if everyone knows what it means ... but if they don't? Worthless.

4 eye sea u

Yes. You could write it in ideograms/heiroglyphics ... but, as you may or may not know, its not that simple ...

Egyptian heiroglyphics could be one of several things (sometimes simultaneously :shock ... an ideogram for a single word, an ideogram for a single concept, a ideogram representing the initial syllable of the word they represent, or an ideogram representing the initial letter of the word they represent.

I am sure you can already see some of the problems!

So could the Egyptians, which is why they developed demotic ... basically running writing shorthand cursive that bears no resemblance at all to the artistic heiroglyphics :wink:

So, does the picture of the Falcon in the passage refer to Horus? Or a Falcon? Or the concept of "flight"? Or the "Hor" sound? Or "H"?

And what about the Ankh? Is it really a sandal loop? What is its actual religious significance? (Answer" Lots of theories, but, really, no idea at all).

I understand that we can currently read about 80% of all heiroglyphics - some we know the meaning of because of multilingual inscriptions such as the Rosetta Stone. Others we think we know the meaning of because of context. Others, well, we frankly don't have a clew and probably never will because either the context of their use doesn't make it plain and/or it simply isn't clear what the picture is of.

Think "Muggle" from Harry Potter. Genuine word from Middle (?) English. However, our corpus of works for ME is small, and Muggle is used only a small number of times and, from context, you can't work out what it means.

So, really, heiroglyphics aren't a good example.

Ideogrammatic languages, like Chinese, are a problem ... if you come up with a new idea, or a new invention and need a new word ... and you can't talk about it until you do :shock: ... you have to create an ideogram and then widely disseminate it along with an explanation of what it refers to. Not easy.

Alphabetical languages don't have that problem.

Phil

 

[AKAramis]

Another question. This one is sort of personal preference and image of the game... not that important.

How do you picture the controls in Traveller spacecraft? Steering wheel/manual control or Star Trekish with automatic command buttons? Or some sort of mix or neither?

TL9-10: Inside of 747 or The Millennium Falcon
TL11-12: Classic Trek and STTMP, TNG
T13: STTNG
TL14-15: TNG but with holographic joysticks and levers.

 

[Woas]

Another quick question for you all...

What other sources of 'crude fuel' other than gas giants and liquid water can be turned into ship fuel? After generating some planets I had a system that had no gas giant an a 0 for hydrographics an a thin atmosphere to boot. So if you jump to this system, where does the fuel at the starport come from? How do you leave this "one way" system?

Thanks again.

 

[rust]

Hydrogen is a part of many substances, so chemistry offers a number of
ways to produce hydrogen, provided there are a high enough technology
level for a chemical industry and sufficient energy (e.g. from fission reac-
tors).
Another option would be to have the fuel imported from a nearby system.

 

[phild]

b) Money

There will always be physical money. Simply because there will always be some things you DON'T want your credit card bill to show. Even more so when you are a sailor...

Coming into this discussion very late, but I don't see what this has to do with much. Government's will save millions of credits every year by not printing money, banks will save massively on handling fees, retailers will need to employ fewer (or no!) staff. The economic advantages to cashless society are such that it is likely to be almost inevitable, and I'm not sure the mere consumer will have much input.

Current technology (a mere TL7.5) offers instant swipe cards which have to pre-loaded with monetary value. These would be a great idea for the average Traveller. No worries about credit, because it's pre-paid, and you can add hi tech security measures as far your imagination can take you. On a high law world, or corporate-led economy, your data will be held, tracked and used to encourage you to spend more money or to prevent criminal activity. On low law worlds, or high libertarian governments, your data probably won't even be held, let alone analysed in anyway.

And as for how things are used in actual transaction, any such futuristic cashless system will be developed - in all likelihood - by those who stand to gain the most. Probably the banks. So you can be sure that it'll be designed to make spending and borrowing as easy as possible! Walk into a shop, pick up a security-tagged item, walk out of the door and *bing* instant billing (which brings us another potential economic advantage - no more shoplifting - and another potential cyberpunk-esque social segregation - you're not allowed into the store unless your carried credit is of a specified level. WallMart will set it low, Tiffany's will set it somewhere else entirely...)

For the larger purchases, there will be the intergalactic equivalent of Securicor vans scooting around the universe, containing a data-drum holding the credit and financial records of everyone in the Imperium. In dedicated, heavily armed convoys, or maybe taken with the mail, these will ensure that all major Imperial outposts have accurate credit history for every citizen for at least a few days. Financial institutions will then authorise credit on the basis of this rating plus various risk factors, just as they do now.... but more pessimistically, since with that experimental Jump-6 ship of yours, there's every chance you can secure at least 2 or 3 major loans before someone clocks the recently emptied state of your bank account.

 

[phild]

Another question. This one is sort of personal preference and image of the game... not that important.

How do you picture the controls in Traveller spacecraft? Steering wheel/manual control or Star Trekish with automatic command buttons? Or some sort of mix or neither?

TL9-10: Inside of 747 or The Millennium Falcon
TL11-12: Classic Trek and STTMP, TNG
T13: STTNG
TL14-15: TNG but with holographic joysticks and levers.

In game, I'm thinking much more Star Wars / Firefly. It's more fun that way.

In a hyper-realistic setting, I think you'd be looking at touch-screen controls at Tech 8 and either direct neurological controls at Tech 9, or probably virtually AI-driven. But then in this sort of realistic setting you can forget about space combat. There's no way two objects travelling at a moderate fraction of the speed of light are going to maneuver in space and intercept one another. See, it's true - reality aint so much fun

 

[phild]

Empire-Wide most of the systems have the problem of data distribution. The OTU ALWAYS has at least 1 week delay so I don't need a high-tech ship, even an avarage ship will do. And you have a lot of systems to send data to, more than a local branch can afford ships. So it's back to the X-Boats and that do J4 only among the large routes. Many smaller planets are served by Subbies carrying the mail that last leg.

It would be very much in the interests of any Empire to promote free, easy and effective trade. In order to maintain an effective economy, I would expect an Imperial Central Bank to maintain the infrastructure, not individual commercial interests (again, it's to everyone's benefit for this to work smoothly). So it's not down to local branches to send ships. But I agree with the difficulties, which is why one of the key risk factors in any credit agreement would be time since last data update and distance from the central clearing bank.

Given that the OTU has at least two major banks (Hortalez and a Vilanie one) that is not likely. And as soon as you get multiple cards you are back to the "do I trust the issuer" problem. Modern CC work because the issuer (AMEX, Visa, Maestro etc) is "trusted" and you can actually check cards online. No can do in the 3I AND by having more than one bank we have just doubled the amount of data running around.

The number of cards isn't actually an issue if the mechanism is agreed. This is not the same thing as credit cards, remember - although even there, there is a common mechanism. It's an electronic replacement for cash. If you find it credible that an Imperium could maintain a physical currency over thousands of worlds, why is it not credible that they could do the same with an electronic currency? It's actually much the same thing, but rather than going to a bank or ATM for cash, you simply go there to top up your electronic device. This is already happening: in London, we have an Oyster card which is an pre-paid, electronic cash system for public transport which has also been trialled as a wider e-money scheme.

And the final problem is one of acceptance. Sure government and banks MIGHT like the "no more money to print" idea. Or maybe not, depending on how "perfect" your 3I is. The MT/TNE "rotten" 3I will have a lot of people in need off difficult to trace funds, including those in power (say for paying an assasin).

The trouble I have with this as an argument is the fact that it's such an minority of people - and for the vast majority, including most corporations, the economic benefits are significant. And this isn't just about Governments and Corporations - if there are savings to be made, they will ultimately be passed to the consumer in reduced transaction costs (assuming a competitive marketplace of course) just as we've seen in recent years with internet retailing, for example . Individuals wishing for traceless payments, however, will be creative just as they are now. An electronic auction for something valued at £1000 mysteriously bidding up to £10,000; the settlement of a rare antique in the will of a previously unknown distant relative; exchange of commodities; the trade of favours.

Hell. What's to stop an assasin being a shareholder or partner in a legally registered business. And as long as the business is otherwise legitimate, any negative impact by association will be minimised. There are still plenty of services out there which don't leave a completely clear audit trail in terms of cash and product - just what do you get for £100,000 of Management Consultancy fees nowadays?!

 

[rust]

My problem with this idea are still the low tech worlds, where one would
have to introduce the cards, the devices required to handle the cards, and
the skills necessary to maintain and repair such devices.
This may be possible in the immediate starport area and perhaps some
of the major cities, but I doubt very much that it would be possible - or
even useful - somewhere in the outback of a TL 1 - 3 planet.

And then we have all those minor races with their various different cul-
tures and probably quite different ideas of what "currency" is and how
an economic system should work.
You do not even have to "go truly alien" with this, just think of the way
a colony of uplifted Dolphins might handle such cards - if they would be
able to handle them, that is.

 

[phild]

My problem with this idea are still the low tech worlds, where one would have to introduce the cards, the devices required to handle the cards, and the skills necessary to maintain and repair such devices.

That's a fair enough comment. Much of the technology is relatively low (as I said, we're on the fringes of this technology now) but the Traveller universe for whatever reasons has these odd pockets were prevailing tech levels are not only below Imperium average, but are actually below our current level.

So yes, probably the biggest flaw in this is the internal "logic" of the Traveller universe that has high technology underpinning the trade infrastructure of the Imperium through fleets of jump-enabled ships, and yet doesn't ensure sufficient technological infrastructure to maximise the benefits of this. Any trading system that relies on manufactured currency, by-commission currency exchange and/or commodities and barter is going to be less efficient, and that's to the detriment of the entire Imperium. At the very least you'd think the core worlds would be desperate to hand out anti-grav tractors to those Tech 5 Agricultural planets... either that, or make sure they're fully laden with the latest imperial comms, defences and weather control, and develop a pastoral pleasure planet for the tired nobility!

Very odd. But I guess Traveller isn't a sci-fi economics simulator ;-)

 

[phild]

IYTU this might be the way it works. But it still retains some of the "data gathering/distributing" problem since you still get data from 11.000 sources and have to re-distribute it. A single gathering point won't work (Travel-Time Sylea-Borders is between 25 and 40 weeks) unless you change the FTL concept

No, clearly this is quite right. I'm not sure I can completely envisage the solution - except to say that I would expect a TL15 society which has broken some of the most intractible physical science problems to have at least a moderately effective method for synchronising 11,000 data sources. I could almost imagine a system where every single registered Vessel in the Imperium carries a data transponder, one of the functions of which was to maintain financial transaction records. But as ever security would be the issue.

OTU there is no "Imperial Bank" and there is a hard currency.

Yes, forgive me, I was stepping out of the bounds of OTU here. I also wasn't quite clear, as I wasn't meaning a single bank in terms of retail banking, but more in terms of financial oversight and central clearing: an IMF / Federal Reserve / Bank of England arrangement. If you're going to have a central currency, there's certainly going to have to be a body responsible for managing it.

Isn't Oyster the card with the recently cracked encryption?

Ah, I believe it was! But any financial transaction has this problem. The cost of producing hard currency varies, and current performance isn't necessarily an indicator of future trend. Nonetheless, it's all I have. A US quarter costs 7 cents to make, an a Nickel costs about 5 cents. Notes are more reasonable, at merely 5 cents for a 5 dollar bill. Nonetheless, this is a straight up cost of 1% on all financial transactions. On top of this, there's then counterfeit money (perhaps $43m in 2002, so it's measurable but hardly huge). You then have other forms of insecure payment - 2006/07, 1/8th of UK online shoppers were victims at an average of £875 per person, some £2bn. This sounds a tad inflated to me, but Wikipedia tells me that credit card fraud was $800m in 2006 for the US. So there are always going to be security problems with any form of financial transaction.

And, he adds sheepishly, Oyster's only TL7, what do you expect?

And while I'm here, I should finally just add that I highly recommend Niall Ferguson's "Empire" as providing excellent insight into the Imperium. It's a book about how the British Empire was established and functioned, but has a huge amount of relevance to Traveller - a largely economic empire, punctuated with periods of extreme violence, and maintained through a distant elitist oligarchy and communication taking several weeks.

 

[StephenT]

So you go to a completely cashless system, with electronic smartcards for all.

How do you pay your neighbour's kid Cr20 for mowing your lawn? How do you put Cr1 in the hat of a busker? How do you borrow Cr5 for lunch from your work colleague because you've left your own credstick at home?

Not every money transaction involves shopping. And that's not even considering the more dodgy financial transactions like the black market, or even paying a tradesman in cash "off the books" to fix your roof.

So it seems to me that if the banks and big retailers do try to introduce an entirely cashless economy, the result will be the re-emergence of barter. Followed, possibly, by the formalisation of barter with a system of tokens of agreed value that can be exchanged... at which point, you've essentially got two parallel currencies, the official electronic one and the unofficial hard currency.

(Which, I gather, was pretty much what happened in the final years of the Ziru Sirka in the OTU.)

 

[lurker]

So you go to a completely cashless system, with electronic smartcards for all.

How do you pay your neighbour's kid Cr20 for mowing your lawn? How do you put Cr1 in the hat of a busker? How do you borrow Cr5 for lunch from your work colleague because you've left your own credstick at home?

Not every money transaction involves shopping. And that's not even considering the more dodgy financial transactions like the black market, or even paying a tradesman in cash "off the books" to fix your roof.

So it seems to me that if the banks and big retailers do try to introduce an entirely cashless economy, the result will be the re-emergence of barter. Followed, possibly, by the formalisation of barter with a system of tokens of agreed value that can be exchanged... at which point, you've essentially got two parallel currencies, the official electronic one and the unofficial hard currency.

(Which, I gather, was pretty much what happened in the final years of the Ziru Sirka in the OTU.)

Sorry for jumping in without reading the entire thread but thought I'd retire from lurking.

Personally, I use very little cash. Probably less than $50 US per month and I could easily reduce that by getting an automated toll paying device and putting tips on the credit card instead of leaving it at the table in hard currency.

People can adapt if, for whatever reason, there is no cash system and they do not have to return to a "hard currency".

I would pay the neighbor's kid who mows the lawn with a check. To the guy looking for handouts, well, I'm the type to give them a sandwich before giving them hard currency. Have lunch delivered and pay for your friend who forgot their cred stick at home or go out to lunch with them.

Just about everyone over the age of 10 goes around with cell phones these days. I've even seen folks begging for cash while talking on their cell phone. Seams very possible that anyone who needs it could have a cred stick built in a portable device that accepts an amount and a signature, thumb print, voice recognition, retina scan or some other means of authorizing a transaction with the account being manually entered or somehow coming from the other persons device. You can even include wireless verification of funds.

Prepaid credit sticks could be thought of as hard currency and fill the other legal and illegal needs.

 

[phild]

Just about everyone over the age of 10 goes around with cell phones these days. I've even seen folks begging for cash while talking on their cell phone. Seams very possible that anyone who needs it could have a cred stick built in a portable device that accepts an amount and a signature, thumb print, voice recognition, retina scan or some other means of authorizing a transaction with the account being manually entered or somehow coming from the other persons device. You can even include wireless verification of funds.

Funnily enough, there are currently plans afoot (in the UK at least) to do exactly this, using mobile phones as e-payment devices. I, too, use virtually no cash, and I think that society will adapt to cashless payment just as quickly as it did to the concept of cash itself.

 

[rust]

Yep, I remember being unable to buy anything during a power network
failure because I did not have any cash with me. :roll:

 

[aspqrz]

My problem with this idea are still the low tech worlds, where one would have to introduce the cards, the devices required to handle the cards, and the skills necessary to maintain and repair such devices.

Are you old enough to remember the old "ka-chunk" manual impression Credit Card "machines" that used paper slips?

I know of several firms who have had to resort to them in times of electronic crisis in relatively recent years. :shock:

Even for the most modern chipped CCs, I believe, a signature or something resembling it is still required.

So there's that option for lower tech worlds.

Then, of course, there's my pet bugbear ... in an 1100 year old Imperium where even the border regions (like the Spinward Marches) have been, effectively, long explored and long settled (except for a few isolated and interdicted worlds) for hundreds of years, there simply aren't going to be "low tech" worlds in the sense that most people think.

"Low Tech" will simply mean "not using Average Imperial" -- so they won't have the latest CC readers, but they will have a "Ka-Chunk" machine.

I am minded of an *ancient* Hollywood movie (B&W, made in the 1930's) I saw lo, these many years ago, where one of the characters visits home after many years away ... he's been moderately successful "away" and home is "backwoods hillbilly" country, as isolated and backward as most isolated and backward worlds in the Imperium are like to be.

Anyway, he wants some money, so he writes a cheque (or "check" for the spelling impaired furriners who can't handle the Queen's English :lol: ) at the local General Store.

The owner is somewhat ( :shock: ) nonplussed ... he's never seen a cheque before, or, at least, not in the flesh in his business, evidently ... but he knows what they are and he is prepared to accept it ... and does. Is he taking a risk? Sure. But he evidently feels it is an acceptable one.

Financial institutions accept risk is a part of doing business, and allow for it ... well, at least in Australia they do ... evidently ( :shock: ) in the US this is regarded as unneccessary :shock: ... so we can assume that there will be similar ways and means in the future.

I mean, the Imperium, who (I know, I know, I belabour this repeatedly ... but it is important to remember) is there to encourage and enhance trade and commerce on an Interstellar scale and uses the profits from taxing such to support massive armies and fleets and extensive governmental authorities, which makes a mockery of assumptions that they would allow worlds to be backward, even if it weren't human nature to want to not be backward ... they simply can't afford it.

This may be possible in the immediate starport area and perhaps some of the major cities, but I doubt very much that it would be possible - or even useful - somewhere in the outback of a TL 1 - 3 planet.

And then we have all those minor races with their various different cul-
tures and probably quite different ideas of what "currency" is and how
an economic system should work.

You do not even have to "go truly alien" with this, just think of the way
a colony of uplifted Dolphins might handle such cards - if they would be
able to handle them, that is.

This might be applicable in a "first contact" situation, or with long distant contacts not belonging to the Imperium ... but, again, 1100 years is a long time and that's the key flaw in this sort of argument.

And, of course, it's the key flaw in the whole OTU -- the Imperium, and Known Space, is too old, too geographically confined, and too settled to really have these problems on any significant scale other than a minor nuisance.

YMMV of course

Phil

 

[rust]

Yep, I agree that the potential problems with the economy of low tech
planets should not be possible in a more plausible OTU, and I would not
try to introduce them into my own setting - my players simply would
refuse to believe in any technology level differences between core and
frontier of more than two or three levels within any mature interstellar
state.
However, when I look at the OTU as it is described in, for example, GT
Behind the Claw, the problems I mentioned in my previous posts seem
almost inevitable to me.

 

[AKAramis]

Another question. This one is sort of personal preference and image of the game... not that important.

How do you picture the controls in Traveller spacecraft? Steering wheel/manual control or Star Trekish with automatic command buttons? Or some sort of mix or neither?

TL9-10: Inside of 747 or The Millennium Falcon
TL11-12: Classic Trek and STTMP, TNG
T13: STTNG
TL14-15: TNG but with holographic joysticks and levers.

In game, I'm thinking much more Star Wars / Firefly. It's more fun that way.

In a hyper-realistic setting, I think you'd be looking at touch-screen controls at Tech 8 and either direct neurological controls at Tech 9, or probably virtually AI-driven. But then in this sort of realistic setting you can forget about space combat. There's no way two objects travelling at a moderate fraction of the speed of light are going to maneuver in space and intercept one another. See, it's true - reality aint so much fun

Unlikely... we're mostly TL8 already...

 

[hdrider67]

This idea has been used in a German science fiction series, Perry Rho-
dan, for quite some time now.
The ship's pilot wears a kind of helmet that enables him to "feel" the ship
almost as if it were his own body and to control the ship's functions with
his thoughts.

Rust,

Do you know if a parallel translation has ever been done on this series (German text on one page and English on the opposite)?

 

[whtknght]

First thing to remember is that Starports are going to have standardization. Weather that is an Imperial Starport or a Zhodani Starport, standardization and compatibility is good for business.

When the ship arrives in a new port (one that the ship has not visited before), the Captain or Master has some administration work to perform before any services are rendered by the Starport or any crew, passengers or cargo can leave the ship.

The first is Customs. The classic "Do you have anything to declare". The ships registry is recorded along with purpose of visit, the crews citizenship, how long you plan to stay, ect. This is also when the captain would be given a copy of the laws and regulations governing the starport and local planet.

The secound is Financial. The starport will want to be sure that they will be paid for services rendered, including the Landing/Docking fee. The Captain can pay the initial fees in cash or contact a local Bank (usually located at the starport). Arranges for his Letter of Credit to be accepted and or cash to be deposited. If the ship is selling goods, the bank might open a short term line of credit (with the ship as collateral) to cover initial expences.

Once these two major items are secured and verrified, the crew is allowed to leave the confines of the ship, passengers can dissembark, and cargo can be unloaded. Sevices are provided to the ship. These include but are not limited to power, sewer, water, communications, and air (as needed).

If crewmen want to use their personal communicators on planet, they need to sign up for an access plan to register their communicator on the planets network. Or, a local communications device can be rented.

If you don't want to pay for everything with cash while staying on planet, you will need to set up a local Bank account so that you can get a local Debit card. There is no universal debit card for use from system to system due to the communications delay through the X-boat network.