Mini-Scenario: The Great
Australian Rain Forest
The current issue of
Scientific American has
an interesting article on the animals of Australia as of about 5
million years
ago. It says that at that time the continent was pretty much covered by
rain
forests and had a much more diverse mammal fauna, especially in terms
of
predators. Eight to ten species of Marsupial Lion have existed at
various times
in the last 25 million years, ranging from almost the size of a lion
down to
the size of a large house cat. Six species of giant, partly carnivorous
Rat
Kangaroos have been found so far. Nine fossil species of Thylacines
have been
described so far. Four more species have been found but not yet
described. The
largest one probably weighed over 100 pounds. Some of them were more
cat-like
than wolf-like There was also a large flightless bird which may have
been
partly carnivorous. It probably weighed over 1200 pounds.
As the Australian
climate changed, most of
these animals died off. When the Aborigines arrived around 40,000 years
ago,
they found only a remnant of each of the major lines of carnivores
surviving in
a harsh, dry Australia.
What if the
Australian climate hadn’t
changed? Maybe the plate tectonics work out a little differently and
Australia
doesn’t go quite as far north as it did in our time-line. As a result,
Australia is still largely rain forest. Now assuming that doesn’t
change human
history over the rest of the planet—a major assumption I know—things
start to
really change as the Aborigines don’t make it to Australia, and the
continent
is first settled by Polynesians around the start of the current
era—maybe 50
AD.
The Polynesians have
no large-game hunting
tradition when they land, but they develop one as time goes on.
Consequently
some of the more exotic animals have died out by the time the first
European
settlers arrive. Others have become very rare. The Polynesians aren’t
there
long enough to totally destroy the mega-fauna though. Australia is
colonized by
a series of European powers starting not long after 1500. The
Portuguese and
Spanish fight over it, then the Dutch and French and English try their
hand.
What
kind of an Australia emerges? Does this
have potential? Do you want more next issue?
Ian Montgomerie’s
comments about the economic impact of war triggered this brainstorm.
It would be a very
challenging but interesting thing to do a scenario with World War II
delayed or
avoided altogether and try to predict the history of technological
advances
without the war. I suspect though, that any realistic scenario without
a World
War II in 1939 or 1940 would probably end with more than one country
using
nuclear weapons sometime between 1945 and 1950. The nightmare scenario
would
have Hitler or someone like him not taking power in 1933, but in 1938
or 1939,
with the rest of the developments leading up to World War II delayed
accordingly.
German science was
first-rate prior to the Nazi’s. Given another five or six years, I
could see
them being reasonably close to an atomic bomb by the time this
mini-scenario’s
Hitler-type took power. By reasonably close I mean at a point where
atomic
weapons would be achievable given a massive national effort by the time
the
rest of the arms buildup was remotely ready to go. I’m assuming here
that
Germany maintains the policy of officially abiding by the Versailles
arms restrictions
while in reality circumventing them for the intervening years.
So ‘Hitler’ comes
to power and begins an arms buildup in say 1939. He is ready to go to
war by
1945, having pursued approximately the course he did in our time-line,
and he
has atomic weapons in his arsenal. Presumably, England and France also
have
atomic weapons programs at some stage, probably several years behind
Germany’s.
Italy and the Soviet Union would probably also have programs, along
with Japan
and even Poland, but even the best of those programs (probably
England’s) would
be years away from a working bomb. Given isolationism and presumably
continued
economic problems, the US would probably be at the theoretical stage
only,
though with some very good theoretical people and a good shot at coming
up with
a bomb in a reasonably short time given the national crisis that would
be
precipitated by a Nazi regime with atomic weapons.
The rest of Europe
would have been getting some intelligence on the development of the
German
bomb, and the other powers would be getting more and more intimidated
by German
progress. It is quite possible that any German invasion of Poland would
be
unopposed by England and France. They would probably play for time,
while
pouring money into their own atomic bomb programs. I don’t think
‘Hitler’ would
give them that time. I think he would give them an ultimatum to open
their
atomic facilities for German inspection at some point. At that point,
well
actually I think that this has some good story potential, so I think
I’ll keep
a little ammunition for that story.
Precolumbian
Colonies: Carthage colonizes Mexico
This started as a comment to Johnson, and it
actually has two
inter-related parts:
1.
A
mini-essay: Does the fact that Indians were so susceptible to European
Diseases
rule out significant Pre-Columbian contact?
2.
A
mini-alternate history scenario: Carthage colonizes Mexico around 230
BC.
I don’t believe that American
Indian lack of immunity to European diseases rules
out as much as some people believe. There are two problems here. First,
immunity to a disease doesn’t last past the lifetimes of the people
exposed to
it. If smallpox sweeps through an area in say 1292, then burns itself
out, no
one alive in that area is immune to it in 1492. They may be genetically
a
little more resistant because they are descendents of the survivors,
but they
will still get hit very hard. Second, at least some of the big
Indian-killers
are relative newcomers to Europe. Smallpox apparently didn’t become
indigenous
to most of Europe until late in the Middle Ages. If Rome or Carthage or
some of
the seagoing Celtic peoples had short-lived colonies in the New World,
they
might or might not have spread smallpox to the Indians. Yellow fever
wouldn’t
be a problem until there was a lot of traffic back and forth because it
requires its own special species of mosquito. The nasty African kind of
malaria
might or might not be a problem. It depends on where else the
colonizing ships
have been.
I’m not sure how much credence to give to
ideas of pre-Columbian visits
to the New World. Certainly there were groups that had the potential
for
finding the New World, and then having that information get lost.
Carthage was
very secretive about its geographic discoveries, and any New World
discoveries
would have probably been lost when Carthage fell. According to the
Romans, some
of the Gauls were excellent seamen. We have no record of any
discoveries they
made. Some group was good enough at sailing to colonize the Canary
Islands back
in Neolithic times. We have only the vaguest idea who they were.
Let’s say a ship from Carthage made it to
the New World and back around
250 BC. Other ships come and they nose around the West Indies islands
for a
while, then discover the mainland. Maybe they even establish a trading
post or
two. What does that do? Probably some diseases spread to the locals,
but Indian
populations are much lower than they were in 1492. The diseases,
especially the
more deadly ones, probably wouldn’t establish themselves permanently in
the New
World. Malaria is the best bet for a permanent establishment and even
there the
chance of it happening is not that high.
What diffuses? Metalworking? The technology
takes a while to make it
across ethnic boundaries. Writing? The concept might spread in Mexico,
but I
believe it was already there.
Chances are that Carthage would find the
West Indies essentially
worthless—little islands thinly inhabited by hunter-gatherers and maybe
a thin
sprinkling of primitive farmers. They would find Mexico a little more
interesting. It had towns by that time and a few small cities. The gold
and
silver that the Spaniards found so attractive was still in the ground.
Metal
working didn’t spread to Mexico until 700 AD. Frankly, I doubt that
Carthage
would have found the New World worth the bother of continuing voyages.
Even if
they did establish trading posts, commerce would have been disrupted by
the
Punic wars for five or ten years at a time, and those posts probably
wouldn’t
have weathered that kind of neglect.
I guess that kind of scenario still meets
Johnson’s criteria of
occasional and light pre-Columbian contact, but I do suspect that you
could
have a surprising amount of contact without having much impact on the
disease
environment.
That reminds me of an idea I tossed out on
the net a couple of times:
What
if metalworking had
spread to Mexico sooner? It had been common in Peru and
Ecuador for quite
some time before it spread to Mexico. So the Mexican Indians pick up
metalworking starting around 450 BC. By 250 BC, gold and silver become
very
common. From then on, if a ship from the Old World reaches the coast of
Mexico
and then gets back home, the discovery is going to be followed up.
Let’s say
that one or more ships from Cartage reach the coast of Mexico in our
time-line
and in this one. In our time-line, nothing important comes of the
discovery.
There isn’t a compelling enough reason to make the long voyage. In this
time-line, Carthage starts doing a brisk glass beads and trinkets for
gold and
silver trade. Lots of ships participate in that trade.
The first Punic War comes along and trade is
disrupted to some extent,
but Carthage needs that gold and silver to help it fight the war, so
the Mexican
trade continues. Trading posts become more numerous and slowly develop
into
towns. Let’s say that the Mexican gold and silver is not enough to keep
Carthage from losing the first Punic war. The trade continues to grow
through
the years until the second Punic War. By that time, the trading posts
have
become small trading cities, with a reasonably complete package of
technologies, domestic plants and animals and diseases from Carthage.
The second Punic war comes along. Hannibal
does his thing and almost
but not quite defeats Rome. Carthage ends up totally defeated and
stripped of
her fleet. Hannibal and those to him are on a Roman hit list. They
eventually
flee to the new trading cities along the Mexican coast. Those cities
get their
self-sufficiency tested because they are totally cut off from the Old
World.
The innovations and food sources, and
diseases of Carthage diffuse to
the surrounding Indians, and gradually the entire arc of the Gulf of
Mexico
begins to look like somebody took the native cultures and morphed them
with
that of Carthage. The New World gets to jump past around 2000 years of
development and arrive at the level Europe was in as of around 200 BC.
Then it
develops in isolation for some number of centuries. The Romans may get
wind of the
Mexican settlements and may even send an expedition or two, especially
since
they think Hannibal is there. The Romans aren’t that good as sailors
though,
and after losing a fleet or two they find other ways to use their time.
Hannibal wants to develop the Mexican coast into a base to attack Rome,
but
that is the task of more than one lifetime, and his descendents are
more
interested in developing the economic potential of Mexico.
So, the two hemispheres develop in
isolation. How long does that
isolation last? What are the two sides like when they meet again? Which
side
starts the contact? What do you think? Should I develop this further
for next
issue?
Civilization
35,000 Years Early? You
are the Time
Traveler. Make it
Happen.
Let’s say that you have access to a time
machine. You can go back to
40,000 years ago and arrive anywhere in the world. You can stay there
for up to
a year. Your goal is to accelerate human technology development so that
Neolithic cultures will develop within a very short time—a couple of
hundred or
a couple of thousand years after you leave. You can observe the target
population of people long enough to thoroughly learn their language,
understand
their taboos, and analyze how to get them to change before you go. You
can
bring as much knowledge as you want to, but you can’t take anything
physical
back beyond what is necessary to sustain your life.
Piece of cake, right? Probably very wrong.
Let’s try a few innovations.
Try introducing agriculture. That probably won’t work. Your people are
nomadic.
They can’t stay in one place long enough to protect a crop form
marauding
animals, and even if they could stay in one place long enough, chances
are that
they don’t want to. Also, if you are trying to introduce grains, you’ll
need to
introduce an infrastructure of food storage technology, food
preparation
technology—including new types of grinding tools to grind up the grain,
and
you’ll have to get the people involved to accept a whole new range of
tastes.
Chances are that the current foods are tightly bound up with their
religion and
the rituals of their lives.
Even if you could overcome those obstacles,
you’d face political ones.
The adults in your society have grown up in the current system and are
comfortable with it. Chances are those expert hunters and expert
gatherers have
high prestige within the society. Chances are that expert makers of the
current
set of tools have high prestige too. They’ll probably resist any change
that
reduces that prestige. Wait until about ten thousand years ago, when
the
infrastructure of food preparation and storage is already in place, and
people
are already starting to settle down in areas with rich food resources,
and your
job would be easy. Of course that’s when agriculture became established
in many
areas.
Try showing the locals how to use bows and
arrows. They’ll be
intrigued. They may even make their own or try to use yours. Then,
chances are
that they will go back to their spears. It takes years to become a
competent
enough bowman to make it worth switching over from the spear. Also,
given the
type of game that they hunt or other aspects of their environment, the
bow may
not be superior to the spear. In our time-line’s Australia, some
Aborigines in
the northern part of Australia knew about bows and arrows. Children
even used
them as toys. Adults didn’t use them though.
Try introducing pottery. It wouldn’t work.
The pots are too heavy and
breakable for a nomadic people. Try to introduce writing. Again, it
probably
wouldn’t work. Chances are that the group has people with well-trained
memories
who can pass along all of the tribe’s useful knowledge and history. You
might
teach them enough that they’ll paint letters on whatever surface they
normally
paint pictures, but they’ll probably see little or no application for
it at
their level of social and economic complexity.
I’m not saying that it would be
impossible to set your society onto a
path that would quickly take them into the Neolithic. I’m just saying
that you
would need a thorough understanding of how the society works and how it
might
develop in order to set them on that path. I’d be interested in hearing
your
ideas on how you would handle that situation.
Alternate
Paleontology and Islands
This is a series of mini-scenarios and
brainstorming ideas triggered by
Kawato’s question:
Why are the sediments on the ocean
floors relatively young?
Answer: Because continental drift means
that the older stuff keeps getting
subducted and destroyed along plate boundaries. That has some
interesting
AH-related implications. We have no idea what happened on oceanic
islands
during and before the age of the dinosaurs. In the absence of evidence,
we can
have all kinds of good clean fun speculating, then look at those
speculations
for AH potential. In our era, the islands that have never been part of
a
continent or haven’t been connected for a long time tend to have very
interesting ecologies. For example, New Zealand had an ecology where
flightless
birds like the Moa took over most of the roles that mammals normal
play. It
also had two species of bats that spent most of their time running
around on
the ground or in trees rather than flying (inspiration for the bats in Bat
Out Of Hell). Numerous islands had dwarf elephants, giant
rats and one even
apparently had a highly carnivorous hedgehog almost as big as a fox.
Cuba had a
two-foot-tall flightless owl that apparently hopped around the Cuban
countryside playing the role that foxes and cats do on the mainland. In
the age
of the dinosaurs, islands could have harbored pygmy dinosaurs,
flightless
versions of the various flying reptiles, and so on. There actually is
an area
of what is now Romania which was an island for a time in the age of the
dinosaurs and which did develop a distinctive island fauna of
dinosaurs. Go
back further—to before the time birds and flying reptiles could fly,
and you
might be able to find remote islands where insects and spiders have
taken over
some of the niches normally held by mammals and reptiles. There are
limits to
insect size, but I suspect that you could see insects as large as a rat
or
slightly bigger. (Actually, that happened to some extent in New Zealand
in our
time-line. Some of the larger insects did take on some of the niches
that are
held by rats and mice elsewhere.) If the island was remote enough and
large
enough, you might even see a second independent emergence of life from
the
seas. I’m not sure how you work any of this into AH—maybe an alternate
geology
where dwarf dinosaurs survive on an island not far north of Antarctica?
What
about an alternate geology where there are two blocks of continents,
each with
an ecology that emerged from the ocean independently, and they collide
in a
colossal ecological ‘war’?
Any comments?Click to e-mail me.