Alberto Monteiro wrote: >If you replace "race" by "person" and "galactic society" by >"human society", you will see that 3,000 "generations" would take us >back to 100,000 years ago - and that 95% of this time is lost in >myth, speculation and (rare) scientific studies. The same goes for >Galactic Society. Ancient times are lost in myth, with only a few >races trying to study them scietifically. Taking the analogy again, >we have realiable written records of events for 6,000 or 3,000 years >ago. This would "extrapolate" to 200 My to 100 My ago, the canonical >[Heaven's Reach] time when the Library has decent data.
That's an interesting idea, and one I hadn't considered! However, as they might say at Terragens training schools, you can't really take human experience and overlay it onto Galactic experience. The extrapolation of "generations" makes some logical sense, but the core idea that you *can* extrapolate from human history to Galactic history may be flawed. Also, from strictly a "this is an awe-filled universe" point of view, I *like* the idea of races such as the Tothtoon and Krallnith still being out there adn having a legacy that stretches over half-a-billion years. It gives the Four Galaxies a broader and (while I know the Good Doctor would hate the expression) more romantic scope. >> So for CA we should divide all the long-lived races' timelines by >> 10? :-) >It's not that simple :-) It never is, is it? :-) I was exaggerating for the sake of simplicity, but it is jarring that some patrons wait 1MY or more for clients, while others that were Uplifted only 250,000 years ago have clients already nearing the end of their own indenture. >Most of the important clans have multiple clients: this is the >whole reason [with cause and effect mixed] that they are important! That would be an interesting avenue to explore. Which came first, the prestige and power or the clients? Do the Soro have...what, four clients I think, because they're a powerful clan, or have they become a pwoerful clan because they've been aggressively involved in Uplift? I have to figure it's a mixture of both, as you said. Get one high- quality Galactic citizen as a client, it increases your prestige and increases your chances of getting another and so on. I imagine that's just another reason why some Galactics hate Earthclan; here are these obnoxious wolflings who got to become treated like nid-level patrons because they've got two client races. >I am not the Evil Overlord, I just command one Legion of Terror :-) Yes, but that has to have some rewards? You know, pillaging peasants, impressing pneumatic young women, that kind of thing, right? Jim _______________________________________________ Join Excite! - http://www.excite.com The most personalized portal on the Web! _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
