AHC: Have 2020s/2030s level technology available by the late 1980s...

missouribob

Banned
You're not making up 70-odd years of technology in just 40, not when technology was already moving pretty bloody rapidly.
Why not? I mean do you really have any evidence that the capital outlays for say computers or medical technology have hit a point of diminishing returns? Note also that many of things we are talking about like "advanced internet" or a man on Mars are more of a factor of political will and economics than technological ability. We've had the technical ability to put a base on the moon for decades and ditto for going to Mars. You don't need a POD pre-WW2 to achieve what the OP is asking.
 
Why not? I mean do you really have any evidence that the capital outlays for say computers or medical technology have hit a point of diminishing returns? Note also that many of things we are talking about like "advanced internet" or a man on Mars are more of a factor of political will and economics than technological ability. We've had the technical ability to put a base on the moon for decades and ditto for going to Mars. You don't need a POD pre-WW2 to achieve what the OP is asking.
You know why the Soviets pulled out of the Space Race? Because they couldn't afford it, a moonshot would have bankrupted them even if they had done it. And that's the problem, the Soviets didn't have the financial stability to push things faster than they did, and realpolitik being what it is, if the Soviets don't push, the Americans won't either. No, there's no way a post WW2 world would get 21st century tech back in the 80s, the social factors involved in doing it simply wouldn't arise.
 

missouribob

Banned
You know why the Soviets pulled out of the Space Race? Because they couldn't afford it, a moonshot would have bankrupted them even if they had done it. And that's the problem, the Soviets didn't have the financial stability to push things faster than they did, and realpolitik being what it is, if the Soviets don't push, the Americans won't either. No, there's no way a post WW2 world would get 21st century tech back in the 80s, the social factors involved in doing it simply wouldn't arise.
Once again we aren't really talking about "2030s" tech. We are talking about diverting capital spending into certain areas and taking it from others. Like I've already noted such a world would be poorer, relatively behind in other areas. Basically it would be cyber-punk.
 
Once again we aren't really talking about "2030s" tech. We are talking about diverting capital spending into certain areas and taking it from others. Like I've already noted such a world would be poorer, relatively behind in other areas. Basically it would be cyber-punk.
Then it doesn't work for the purposes of this thread.
 

missouribob

Banned
Then it doesn't work for the purposes of this thread.
Well no. I don't think the OP's thread is possible to the fullest extent. I agree with you there. I'm just saying that as far as the Space Travel stuff goes that isn't ASB. The rest is impossible by the late 80s BUT an ATL could have greater investment in those areas and look cyberpunk. Sorry I think we were talking past each other for a bit there, my fault.
 
Don't let Europe's best and the brightest get slaughtered in the trenches of world war one.They pissed away an entire generation of Scientific talent.
If the United States introduced something equivalent to the GI bill in 1919, several geniuses would emerge.
 
Pre 1900 but we could have had radio and radar fifteen years earlier if someone had taken Mahlon Loomis seriously. And a bright Austrian and a bright Anglo-Australian both worked out how to build tanks in 1908. If the military commands had possessed anyone with a bit of imagination, there could have been operational tanks in 1914. Mind you that might have made the slaughter worse.
 
Well no. I don't think the OP's thread is possible to the fullest extent. I agree with you there. I'm just saying that as far as the Space Travel stuff goes that isn't ASB. The rest is impossible by the late 80s BUT an ATL could have greater investment in those areas and look cyberpunk. Sorry I think we were talking past each other for a bit there, my fault.
Except that I don't think it is, not if you avoid WW1, that saves you like 70-120 million young lives in the 'teens, plus all of the money spent of the war.
 
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