I, um, got a little enthusiastic while responding, so this is coming in two parts. Here's the first half.
The Friction _is_ minimal because th H-Gs realize that it's the DaVinci crowd which _enables_ them to live the way they do.
Possibly. But the driving motives of both groups are so different I can see some friction arising from basic incomprehension. "You spent three days stalking a deer why?" "Plasma, parts per billion, quantum singularities, whatever. If this gets you people excited you need better parties." There's one scene in Blue Mars where the H-Gs go into town and get in at least one squabble with the locals, which is what got me thinking about this. Why don't we see more of the "techno" versus "in touch with nature" snobbery?
And it's not as if the DaVincis are strip mining and logging, what-have-you. They are relatively _low_impact_ (when not constructing moholes and the like).
They went back to being fairly innocuous after the war (with the ground-to-air missiles, knocking Deimos out of orbit, & Sax's little "Johnny Fireseed" project in Kasei), yeah. Except for the fundamental impacts of theoretical and/or advanced science on technology, economics and the world. But that's unlikely to harm the H-Gs directly.
Also, given the extreme social flexibility and long lifespan, I imagine quite a few martians cycle back and forth between tech and no-tech.
The possibility of that flexibility moderates a lot of my objections. If you live (and remember) 200 vigorous years, it's likely you'll get bored with your first career (and your second, and possibly your third) and try a number of things during your life. So you may start out in a small town on Oceanus Borealis, attend college and work on the Hellas Sea project for a few years, discover an interest in painting and join an art co-op for a few decades, get drafted for your turn in the legislature and realize you're fascinated by working with the law... and so on.
As for education, to call the system distributed and wireless would be a gross understatement.
That would make enormous sense, and be very cool. Especially with the proposed AI tech, which is (IIRC) really high quality stuff.
IIRC there is no mandated or formal schooling (at least not until you hit higher education), so its all student-directed learning, which lessens the advantage of the city kids.
Maybe. But there's a cultural gap there - the city kids are going to get environmental encouragement I don't think the H-Gs will. If you're living in a town, there's a lot more stimulus to learn what the street signs say.
(This can, of course, be argued the other way: that the H-Gs may rely on maps and so have a huge impetus to learn to read them. There may be other benefits to the H-G lifestyle that moderate the ed gap, too; leadership or self-reliance skills that encourage the kids to really hit the books once they decide to attend Pavonis Mons College or wherever.)
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baggyeyes
Re: It's called a utopia for a reason. (Part 1)
Date: 2004-06-14 09:51 pm (UTC)The Friction _is_ minimal because th H-Gs realize that it's the DaVinci crowd which _enables_ them to live the way they do.
Possibly. But the driving motives of both groups are so different I can see some friction arising from basic incomprehension. "You spent three days stalking a deer why?" "Plasma, parts per billion, quantum singularities, whatever. If this gets you people excited you need better parties." There's one scene in Blue Mars where the H-Gs go into town and get in at least one squabble with the locals, which is what got me thinking about this. Why don't we see more of the "techno" versus "in touch with nature" snobbery?
And it's not as if the DaVincis are strip mining and logging, what-have-you. They are relatively _low_impact_ (when not constructing moholes and the like).
They went back to being fairly innocuous after the war (with the ground-to-air missiles, knocking Deimos out of orbit, & Sax's little "Johnny Fireseed" project in Kasei), yeah. Except for the fundamental impacts of theoretical and/or advanced science on technology, economics and the world. But that's unlikely to harm the H-Gs directly.
Also, given the extreme social flexibility and long lifespan, I imagine quite a few martians cycle back and forth between tech and no-tech.
The possibility of that flexibility moderates a lot of my objections. If you live (and remember) 200 vigorous years, it's likely you'll get bored with your first career (and your second, and possibly your third) and try a number of things during your life. So you may start out in a small town on Oceanus Borealis, attend college and work on the Hellas Sea project for a few years, discover an interest in painting and join an art co-op for a few decades, get drafted for your turn in the legislature and realize you're fascinated by working with the law... and so on.
As for education, to call the system distributed and wireless would be a gross understatement.
That would make enormous sense, and be very cool. Especially with the proposed AI tech, which is (IIRC) really high quality stuff.
IIRC there is no mandated or formal schooling (at least not until you hit higher education), so its all student-directed learning, which lessens the advantage of the city kids.
Maybe. But there's a cultural gap there - the city kids are going to get environmental encouragement I don't think the H-Gs will. If you're living in a town, there's a lot more stimulus to learn what the street signs say.
(This can, of course, be argued the other way: that the H-Gs may rely on maps and so have a huge impetus to learn to read them. There may be other benefits to the H-G lifestyle that moderate the ed gap, too; leadership or self-reliance skills that encourage the kids to really hit the books once they decide to attend Pavonis Mons College or wherever.)