Bronze Age interplanetary travel

[S.T. Ockenner]

I want my lawyer.

 

[S.T. Ockenner]

Where is the jury?!

 

[Eduardo Ficaria]

Where is the jury?!

Right here!

 

[ThinkerX]

I am reminded of the old AD&D 'Spelljammer' supplement, though that involved magical ships traversing the void between worlds, and each 'solar system' was set within 'crystal spheres,' rather than portals.

Also reminded of one of the many, many not so good SF/Fantasy books I've read over the past year or so that featured a present day astronaut catapulted to a region of space that featured bronze age societies using magical starships. That work had severe plausibility issues, as the relevant cultures didn't even have the wheel, let alone telescopes.

That said...well, I live in a hilly forested region beside an oceanic inlet. Go down to the bluff, I see mountains that are a good 80-100 miles away. Get to the top of one of the taller hills - call it 200 yards up, find a good vantage point or climb a tree, well, I can still see those mountains, and pick out towns 30-40 miles away.

 

[Vaporo]

There's a book called "The Road Not Taken" that deals with bronze age civilizations traveling through space. I've never read it and it sounds pretty different from what's being proposed in this thread, but it might still be worth checking out.

Here's an excerpt taken from this website: Tech Level - Atomic Rockets

"Back then, on Terra, they knew FTL travel was impossible forever. It was a rude shock when they found that a couple of simple experiments could have given them the key to contragrav and the hyperdrive three, four, even five centuries earlier." (ed note: in the 1500's.)

"How did they miss them?" Chang asked.

"No idea — in hindsight they're obvious enough. What's that race that flew bronze ships because they couldn't smelt iron? And every species we know that reached what the old Terrans would have called a seventeenth-century technological level did what was needed — except us."

"But trying to explain contragrav and the hyperdrive skews an unsophisticated, developing physics out of shape. With attention focused on them, too, work on other things, like electricity and atomics, never gets started. And those have much broader applications — the others are only really good for moving things from here to there in a hurry."

With a chuckle, Chang said, "We must have seemed like angry gods when we finally got the hyperdrive and burst off Terra. Radar, radio, computers, fission and fusion — no wonder we spent the next two hundred years conquering."

 

[Aldarion]

There's a book called "The Road Not Taken" that deals with bronze age civilizations traveling through space. I've never read it and it sounds pretty different from what's being proposed in this thread, but it might still be worth checking out.

It is very different, and you should definitely read it. Except it is not a book; it is a short story.

 

[Electric Bone Flute]

I've read it. I like the "bugs for a lamp" and "burning stuff for air supply" ship tech.

 

[Don Coyote]

With a little imagination, it would be very easy to create a spacefaring bronze age culture and limit planetary porting.

Don't underestimate the human ability to figure out something out with minimal technology. Seafarers found their way across the oceans of the world despite the dangers and found their way back again.

One limitation would be the porter can't just open a port and usher travelers through. Porters have to travel with their clients from location to location. To port clients safely, a bubble needs to be created around a vessel to protect them from from the harsh environment through which they travel.

As most final destinations are habitable worlds, it would be assumed those worlds had bodies of water. So, goods and supercargo are loaded into docked sea going vessels. They then sail out to sea, the porter builds a bubble around the vessel and ports the whole shebang to a body of water on another planet, then it sails to the docks for unloading. (This would be the same as a starship lifting from a planet, jumping through hyperspace to another system, then navigating itself to a spaceport dirtside.)

Another limitation could be fatigue. There's a price to pay. It costs a porter to open a port, maintain the protective bubble and re-enter normal space at each stop. That's why porters work in pairs when they can. Of course, porter are expensive. Not many can afford two porters.

Why ports can't be used planetside is a matter of scale. Porting is for long distances. How does one measure a thousand miles when the smallest units of measure are lightyears?

Why haven't our spacefarers advanced from bronze to iron? Because copper, brass & bronze fittings are needed for a bubble to be erected. The result is, no one is bothering to experiment with making steel. Bronze is a harder metal than iron.

 

[Electric Bone Flute]

Why haven't our spacefarers advanced from bronze to iron? Because copper, brass & bronze fittings are needed for a bubble to be erected. The result is, no one is bothering to experiment with making steel. Bronze is a harder metal than iron.

Dang, I only said bronze-age because I imagine that if some humans were always like this then they'd be doing this early on (which is why the title isn't "medieval interplanetary travel"). Bubbles are an interesting extension on the idea.