True. Perhaps our perspective here is slightly clouded by the events of OTL.
Also, you should have a Snowden-type character at some point.
So we have drones now?
The Union Forever: A TL
- Thread starter Mac Gregor
- Start date
True. Perhaps our perspective here is slightly clouded by the events of OTL.
Also, you should have a Snowden-type character at some point.
So we have drones now?
Ah, so relations are better than expected. Good news overall, bad news for China.
With the Commonwealth members most likely to keep it from being integrated more closely leaving, the Commonwealth is likely to consolidate more.
Are the Carlists friendly to the Chinese, because they're the leading opposition to the liberal world order, or to the Russians, out of ideological affinity?
I would imagine it would be Russians, both because of ideological affinity and hostility to Technocracy.
I doubt that strongly. Carlists are ultraconservative, religious and monarchist when Technocrats are radicals, anti-religion and I think that they too don't like monarchies very much. Carlists might be closer friends with Germans and Russians.
They are still in their infancy but are developing. What should their name be in the TL?
That's an interesting point. That may be true in some ways but I think the Commonwealth does better with more members. Otherwise you might as well join another power bloc.
A Lalli, pointed out the Carlists and Technocrats are not friends due to strong disagreements over religion, monarchy, and modernity. The Carlists are on relatively good terms with Russia as they are both conservative monarchies. Germany remains the Carlists greatest supporter.
Hmm. Given that OTL it was coined in 1921 (and would thus be well after the POD), would the term 'robot' still exist? If so, maybe you could take a page from Asimov and simply have unmanned vehicles prefixed with 'R' - a UAV becomes an R. plane, an underwater ROV becomes an R. sub, and so on.
On the other hand, given the strong butterfly principle in the writing of this TL, 'robot' probably won't exist as an English word to begin with, and so per the above you could prefix your unmanned craft with any number of things. IOTL, 'robot' comes from Czech and is derived from the term for (roughly) 'forced labor' or 'drudgery', so perhaps something like 'servitor' or 'helot' would become the accepted English term instead. Depending on who first described the concept, 'golem' might work quite well as a generic replacement for OTL 'robot', but might already be too recognizable and widely understood in its other meaning to stick.
'Drone' might just be the best overall option anyway, as it's short, intuitive, easy to remember, and distinctive, but ultimately that's up to you, Mac.
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I found this online and thought a realized vision of it might fit in this timeline
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thai_Canal
The Japanese, if I racial correctly, owned that region as a colony got a while before the Pacific War, and it seems like something they would do.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thai_Canal
The Japanese, if I racial correctly, owned that region as a colony got a while before the Pacific War, and it seems like something they would do.
Well I did mention back in the 1975 update that the TL's term for robotics was "automatonics" using the older term automaton. However, I don't really like this as I think it is to unwieldy. In the 1990 update I referenced the eventual creation of "self-driving autos and autonomous unmanned machines" but I think we need a shorter terms to describe different kinds of robots. Maybe some shortened form of automaton/automatonics such as "maton" or simply "ton" ? Drones could still be a term. I wasn't aware of golems but that is a cool concept. Any more suggestions?
Very cool. The Japanese didn't build the Kra Canal but did think about it. Maybe Siam will try one day. This might put them at odds with Malaya though because it would divert traffic from the straight of Malacca.
Damn, I feel stupid for having completely forgotten about that. I considered 'automaton 'in my earlier post, but figured it was a bit clunky for everyday use. Personally out of the ones I mentioned, I like 'golem' a lot too, because of how well the concept seems to map onto OTL robots. 'Dalit' might also work, but that would probably have too much historical baggage to catch on.
Just describing unmanned aircraft, 'vulture' or 'buzzard' might work as a term, especially for military craft early on, based on how they tend to loiter and circle for a while over something that's usually about to die.
Perhaps autocraft? You could abbreviate it as 'AC' for short (e.g. AC-1 Eagle Eye for a surveillance drone).
Interesting comments y'all. I could see "autocraft" be a useful term for drones, so there would be aerial autocraft (AAC), ground autocraft (GAC), maritime autocraft (MAC) etc. Buzzard and Vulture could be used as names for aerial autocraft so AAC-2 Buzzard.