Possibilities for post-industrial technology to be "stuck" at a certain level?
- Thread starter baltur2
- Start date
That has massive butterflies. Not only no computers but also no portable radios and pretty much all consumer electronics.
marathag
Banned
Data compression predates the Transistor.
Morse Code is data compression, after all, when abbreviations and Procedure signs were used to reduce keystrikes
I'm recalling the Rumanian computer industry. They jumped on desktops back in the day, & continued building the same model with the same software right up into the 1990s.
*Looks at his copy of Ignition
Sure there are some "better" rocket fuels, but safely handling them is a huge task, beginning with their toxicity, over the near impossibility of storing them all the way to them running so hot they'll melt the rocket engine leading to rapid self disassembly.
What's used today might be old and boring but it's the best bang for the buck.
Replacement of heyroglyps with ideographs & then phonetic alphabets was data compression. Scrolls were more compact than clay tablets, codices then books were the next step. I'm always amused when current communications gurus start talking about their software enabling "horizontal" communications & data distribution. lateral information transfer was a important feature of the artillery fire control or command systems the Brits and US Army used across their division and corps artillery groups in the 1940s.
BigBlueBox
Banned
That depends on what you mean by “portable” radio. But obviously yes, it would have a massive impact. If transistors exist though, it’s only a matter of time until someone invents an audio compression data format like MP3.
The first Integrated Circuit chips could have failed and the idea been abandoned as just another idea that didn't work. After that electronics stalls at the transistor level. Eternal 1950's technology.
One that doesn't require a backpack. Thermionic valves are energy-greedy and require large batteries to have a decent autonomy.
That is very possible, since the first IC chips took a while to perfect. Transistors, though, were invented in the thirties and perfected in the fifties to produce portable radios and eventually televisions.
The biggest "delayed" technology I can see is the first aid response CPR. It was not established until 1958, yet it requires only a trained staff and a flat surface. For witnessed electrocutions, it saves lives immediately.
marathag
Banned
1940's Motorola portable AM 4 Tube Radio 1941-1947, two 1.5V 'D' Drycells for the heaters and one 67V Drycell for the rest
smaller units with tubes existed for hearing aids, and miniaturization was helped by WWII, but was not the initiator for it.
The problem is that the integrated circuit was basically at "steam engine time" by the late 1950s, with many people proposing and working on the idea. If the first chips fail, they'll just take another approach--hell, that's what happened IOTL, with TI's chip design quickly falling out of favor for Fairchild's.
The reasonable way to find some kind of "sticking" is to look for cases where a "primitive" technology could be improved to the level where it wouldn't be worthwhile to replace it with a "more advanced" technology, like with the rocket example. For example, with the "no DVD" example, well, modern data tapes actually have a very high data storage density, much higher than even Blu-Ray disks, and there were various attempts to develop video tape standards that could have competed with DVDs, but they failed mostly because they came onto the market too late. Switch things around so that DVDs are delayed and advanced video tapes are, well, advanced, and you could very well end up with a universe where tapes are the standard for video data for at least quite a while longer. After all, the advantages of DVDs at that point would mostly be things like "random access" and "extra content," which aren't exactly a firm foundation for selling customers new, expensive equipment and new, expensive disks.
GeographyDude
Gone Fishin'
Very good point.
And here in the U.S., we've just recently, like within the last decade, and very spottingly have started putting AEDs in public buildings. [Here's calling you out, Walmart!! who generally does not put them in their stores, at least not here in the U.S.]
GeographyDude
Gone Fishin'
Does getting stuck at a certain social set-up count?
For example, in the United States, middle-income jobs have slowly eroded since the early 1970s. And even though somewhat more people have moved to upper-income jobs than lower-income, not everyone has been a "winner" by any stretch. Instead, it's been more like a slow-motion crisis, and like a drought which brings out the worst in people, not like a hurricane which brings out the best.
In a sense, we need to get past the whole metaphor of having "a job." Yes, metaphor. And that's going to take some doing!
For example, in the United States, middle-income jobs have slowly eroded since the early 1970s. And even though somewhat more people have moved to upper-income jobs than lower-income, not everyone has been a "winner" by any stretch. Instead, it's been more like a slow-motion crisis, and like a drought which brings out the worst in people, not like a hurricane which brings out the best.
In a sense, we need to get past the whole metaphor of having "a job." Yes, metaphor. And that's going to take some doing!
Computers certainly don't require transistors.
Vacuum tubes could be miniaturised quite significantly.
https://www.extremetech.com/extreme...istor-that-could-one-day-replace-silicon-fets
*Looks at post*
*Looks at username*
*Looks back at post*
I expected nothing less...