In all ISOT's the people are unprepared, the supplies and facilities are not going to run forever and the the area and the people are not self sufficient. This is not something that has ever been done. I was hoping to get a conversation going on the topic of all that would be required for a small region to be sulf-sefficient, have enough people to keep it going, how many people are needed to make sure of genetic viability, and lastly a consensus about when the ISOT should be located, how the group planning this can create the ISOT, where they should plan to go. My last idea to write a timeline fell flat, I'm hoping that info gathered from this conversation will help me. I want a group to plan this and then have these people become the infamous ASB's. I may not get to actually writing anything for a while but this is an idea I would like to run with. If I don't get to it, maybe someone who preferably asks me, could run with this idea and the tons of info I hope is gathered in this thread.
An observation of ISOT's
- Thread starter The Doctor
- Start date
I've thought of two ways to address that problem: have what I calculate with the understanding I have to about 1 million people or to have the background and resources not too difficult to come up with and build at a later time.
Michael Busch
What they require to be self-sufficient is entirely determined by where & when they end up. For a single group of people that remain genetically isolated indefinitely (either out of separation or their own choice), you need somewhere between 100 and 200 at a minimum for inbreeding to not be a problem in the long run.
So, before you start asking what we send, tell us where we're going.
Where we are going I was hoping to be another topic of conversation. I want people to keep in mind in all of this that these people are going to end up creating the infamous ASB and that I'm still debating about weather this ISOT is planned or just an accident. Either way I want the goal of the company or government group governing all this to create self-sufficient community.
Some thoughts of mine on things that are needed for self-sufficiency.
Schools: day care through University
Water Treatment facilities
Power plants
Industry: cars, household appliances, etc.
Farming of multiple types: Grains, Tropical fruits, animals, etc.
Banking centers
What else?
Schools: day care through University
Water Treatment facilities
Power plants
Industry: cars, household appliances, etc.
Farming of multiple types: Grains, Tropical fruits, animals, etc.
Banking centers
What else?
Michael Busch
This again depends entirely on where they are ending up. If you're sending 200 people back to Eocene southern California, I can design an eco-village that keeps them and replacement-rate descendants at a comfortable standard of living and learning, but it is not going to be anything like our cities. It's expensive to build such a village, but that expense has to be less than that of ISOTing it.
E.g.: solar thermal for water, bio-remediation for waste, photovoltaic for power; guns, computers, and communications built in bench-top manufacturing units; library and resources for home-schooling the kids; seeds for modern crops; a shipping-container hospital; the mining supplies to extract oil (for chemistry only), iron, aluminum. They will have some farming vehicles, ultralight aircraft, and bicycles, but a settlement this small doesn't need cars, freeways, public transit, or much bureaucracy to function. Who needs a bank when there isn't really a market economy?
Now if you're sending them back to 1900 England, we can skip almost everything. 1200 China is somewhere in between. A habitable extrasolar Earth-like planet needs more material; Mars needs more still.
For an unprepared group, you need a larger structure. I made it work with a college campus (2000 - 10000 people) and all the supplies on it, but even then there were problems.
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To sustain an industrial society like ours will take more people and stuff. Maybe even an area the size of a European nation or an American state. Oil's going to be needed, bad. To "gear down" and bootstrap the locals up will take less. If you're talking a time where there's some notion of metalworking (iron, steel) and firearms, I'd say the following based on the discussion in this thread a while back where I asked a similar question.
The conclusion was that a farm school like Purdue might be a good bet (I think a few others were mentioned as possibilities). Some have power-plants on-campus, you'd have a good agricultural knowledge base, ditto for engineering and then some other discipline scattered in. And it's a population with an low-skewed age balance, lots of 20-ish people, so a good start for building the next generation.
I'm thinking of technology about our level, maybe with the people having expertise with ours but cut back a few decades so they can survive and then gear up to our level later. Is that possible? What level and where would the cutbacks be needed?
Michael Busch
So, are we going to an Earth that is otherwise devoid of an intelligent species and trying to eventually replicate current global society? If so, we can massively cut back heavy industry, many areas of civil engineering (e.g. urban planning), and military technology. The first two are only needed when the population grows by about three orders of magnitude, and the last only when there is a large population and some serious internal conflict.
Of course, you bring back the books and media to replicate everything we know now.
Do you want to replicate our current society? That seems against the spirit of the ISOT (which is usually to build a better world).
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I plan to keep them on earth, but the resulting society will eventually be futuristic to the point that they become like the aliens that created the 1632 universe. A society that sees ISOT's as art possibly?
ATL earth yes. Time period where they go. Undecided. Or maybe OTL. I'm not sure.
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Maine Factory Town
I read a tale a long time ago about a Civil War unit ISOTed to another world (The Lost Regiment)
Overall, I wasn't impressed--but it did strike me as about the latest technology that could be reproduced with a relatively small band, well equiped, with a steamship, canons, and a broad smattering of talent. Much higher, and you start needing a much bigger base of skills--and will have a much harder time educating the locals to your tech, even to use it.
I read a tale a long time ago about a Civil War unit ISOTed to another world (The Lost Regiment)
Overall, I wasn't impressed--but it did strike me as about the latest technology that could be reproduced with a relatively small band, well equiped, with a steamship, canons, and a broad smattering of talent. Much higher, and you start needing a much bigger base of skills--and will have a much harder time educating the locals to your tech, even to use it.
The drama would be the interaction with the surrounding population. Even if the people can keep the standard of living and start moving ahead like we do in real life, they need to interact with the surrounding population. A population that is self-sufficient is still going to need trade with outside sources to create the all important growing economy. Can't exist in a vacuum and grow.
Thande
Donor
How about drawing on a community which has high technology now but has gained First World status recently enough that there are still plenty of older people who remember having to grub out a life on the soil and could teach the younger ones how to survive the dangerous first winters after the ISOT etc.?
Parts of Southeast Asia would qualify nicely for this, and the conflicts there in the 20th century might also ensure there being veterans around if they need to train a militia and so on.
Parts of Southeast Asia would qualify nicely for this, and the conflicts there in the 20th century might also ensure there being veterans around if they need to train a militia and so on.
How about this. What about the idea that they build a community that is missing some important things that would easily be recreated later or found in the new world they land in? What could a community live without that would be easily replaced, television for example....
i did a semi-TL about just this topic, where AH members were ISOTed to a world that is a duplicate of our world (including the infustructure and the such). it was actually kinda interesting... it addressed some of these issues