Group: alt.philosophy · Group Profile
Author: Michael AshMichael Ash Date: May 1, 2007 10:56
In rec.arts.sf.science The Horny Goat wrote:
>>Actually Al, we don't know that.
>>
>>It might prove to be the case that FTL travel is trivially easy ...
>>with 20:20 hindsight once you've spent lots of money and time looking
>>at all the (with 20:20 hindsight) deadends and ignoring the trivially
>>easy solution.
>
> One of my favorite SF stories ever (though I've forgotten the title or
> author) involved human beings conquering most of the galaxy after we
> were invaded by a civilization with roughly English Civil War weapons.
> It turned out there was an "obvious" FTL method that mankind had
> somehow missed that was usually found by civilizations when at the
> 17th century level of technology - since we didn't find it, our
> military technologies kept developing and we were thus MUCH more
> dangerous when we accidentally captured such a ship.
This is "The Road Not Taken", by Harry Turtledove.
It's a good read, and probably short enough to finish without leaving the
bookstore. :)
--
Michael Ash
Rogue Amoeba Software
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