Did anyone Watch the Premiere Episode Of...

[Lord Jim]

Jim--after watching two episodes. my guess is that the writers don't really have a coherent vision of what caused the massive power disruption

Well, that's kind of disappointing, because there's an obvious gp-to scientific explanation....

Solar flares....

The way science fiction is supposed to work is to take something that could happen and expand on it....

Like this true story:

Power Failure in Canada During 1989
[no, it wasn't the failure of the Liberal Government]

On March 13th, 1989 a huge solar induced magnetic storm played havoc with the ionosphere, and the earth's magnetic field. This storm, the second largest storm experienced in the past 50 years, totally shut down Hydro-Quebec, the power grid servicing Canada's Quebec province:

Montreal, March 15, 1989

Hydro-Quebec confirms that the March 13 blackout was caused by the strongest magnetic storm ever recorded since the 735-kV power system was commissioned. At 2:45 a.m., the storm, which resulted from a solar flare, tripped five lines from James Bay and caused a generation loss of 9,450 MW. With a load of some 21,350 MW at that moment, the system was unable to withstand this sudden loss and collapsed within seconds, thereby causing further loss of generation from Churchill Falls and Mania-Outardes

The system-wide blackout resulted in a loss of some 19,400 MW in Quebec and 1,325 MW of exports. An additional load of 625 MW was also being exported from generating stations isolated from the Hydro-Quebec system.

Service restoration took more than nine hours. This can be explained by the fact that some of the essential equipment, particularly on the James Bay transmission network, was made unavailable by the blackout. Generation from isolated stations normally intended for export was repatriated to meet Quebec's needs and the utility purchased electricity from Ontario, New Brunswick and the Alcan and McLaren Systems.

By noon, the entire generating and transmission system was back in service, although 17 percent of Quebec customers were still without electricity. In fact, several distribution-system failures occurred because of the high demand typical of Monday mornings, combined with the jump in heating load after several hours without power.

.

http://www.ips.gov.au/Educational/1/3/12

Okay, now you have an historical incident, that knocked out power to Montreal for nine hours...

Now just throw a little Steveism in there:

Powerful Solar Storm Could Shut Down U.S. for Months

A new study from the National Academy of Sciences outlines grim possibilities on Earth for a worst-case scenario solar storm.

Damage to power grids and other communications systems could be catastrophic, the scientists conclude, with effects leading to a potential loss of governmental control of the situation.

The prediction is based in part on a major solar storm in 1859 that caused telegraph wires to short out in the United States and Europe, igniting widespread fires.

It was perhaps the worst in the past 200 years, according to the new study, and with the advent of modern power grids and satellites, much more is at risk.

"A contemporary repetition of the [1859] event would cause significantly more extensive (and possibly catastrophic) social and economic disruptions," the researchers conclude.


'Command and control might be lost'[ ]

When the sun is in the active phase of its 11-year cycle, it can unleash powerful magnetic storms that disable satellites, threaten astronaut safety, and even disrupt communication systems on Earth.

The worst storms can knock out power grids by inducing currents that melt transformers.

Modern power grids are so interconnected that a big space storm — the type expected to occur about once a century — could cause a cascade of failures that would sweep across the United States, cutting power to 130 million people or more in this country alone, the new report concludes.

Such widespread power outages, though expected to be a rare possibility, would affect other vital systems.

"Impacts would be felt on interdependent infrastructures with, for example, potable water distribution affected within several hours; perishable foods and medications lost in 12-24 hours; immediate or eventual loss of heating/air conditioning, sewage disposal, phone service, transportation, fuel resupply and so on," the report states.

Outages could take months to fix, the researchers say. Banks might close, and trade with other countries might halt.

"Emergency services would be strained, and command and control might be lost," write the researchers, led by Daniel Baker, director of the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado in Boulder.

"Whether it is terrestrial catastrophes or extreme space weather incidents, the results can be devastating to modern societies that depend in a myriad of ways on advanced technological systems," Baker said in a statement released with the report.

Stormy past

Solar storms have had significant effects in modern time:

— In 1989, the sun unleashed a tempest that knocked out power to all of Quebec, Canada.

— A remarkable 2003 rampage included 10 major solar flares over a two-week period, knocking out two Earth-orbiting satellites and crippling an instrument aboard a Mars orbiter.

"Obviously, the sun is Earth's life blood," [now that's a line that belongs in a Sci-Fi movie ] said Richard Fisher, director of the Heliophysics division at NASA. "To mitigate possible public safety issues, it is vital that we better understand extreme space weather events caused by the sun's activity."

"Space weather can produce solar storm electromagnetic fields that induce extreme currents in wires, disrupting power lines, causing wide-spread blackouts and affecting communication cables that support the Internet," the report states. "Severe space weather also produces solar energetic particles and the dislocation of the Earth's radiation belts, which can damage satellites used for commercial communications, global positioning and weather forecasting."

The race is on for better forecasting abilities, as the next peak in solar activity is expected to come around 2012.

While the sun is in a lull now, activity can flare up at any moment, and severe space weather — how severe, nobody knows — will ramp up a year or two before the peak.

Some scientists expect the next peak to bring more severe events than other recent peaks.

The report was commissioned and funded by NASA. Experts from around the world in industry, government and academia participated. It was released this week.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,478 ... z27aS63KbK

[Lord Jim]

And that's how you write science fiction....

And you're telling me that with such an obviously quasi-credible plot device available to them (ie, massive solar flares) to set the stage for the post apocalypse scenario they were constructing, they didn't take advantage of it...

Without having seen one minute of the show so far, that doesn't bode well in my book...

[Big RR]

Jim--to be fair it's early on, but if we look at this as a series that the network wants to last for years, there has to be flexibility in the plotline and the writers won't want to be tied to a single explanation (which usually comes at the end of a story); better to have relationships that can be changed to keep it interesting. There could be a lot of credible (at least in the SF universe) explanations, but that requuires the writers to wrote consistent story lines over the span of the series--something not all that easy. Which is why SF series usually fall apart or become less SF, and more soap opera.

[Scooter]

And that's how you write science fiction....

And you're telling me that with such an obviously quasi-credible plot device available to them (ie, massive solar flares) to set the stage for the post apocalypse scenario they were constructing, they didn't take advantage of it...

Without having seen one minute of the show so far, that doesn't bode well in my book...

At least one of the characters (husky, glasses, beard) has guessed that whatever has caused this must be manmade. So it looks like the story is going to go in the direction of trying to figure out what that was and how to undo it (the "amulets" that a few people have might contain that information, or assist in getting it).

[Lord Jim]

Okay, I suppose in the grand sweep of things, in The Pantheon Of Mind Bogglingly Stupid Things Rube Has Said....

With such contenders as "Catholics don't value education" , "genocide didn't exist before Christianity" "Rouseau was a reactionary" and "Ronald Reagan was responsible for the terrorist attack on the Murrah Federal Building"

It doesn't loom particularly large, but nevertheless, I think in passing, it's worthy of comment:

Most S-F writers are fairly dripping with appreciation for the products of science so there is often a pro-knowledge bias which is inherently anti-conservative

So, on Planet Rube, "conservatives" have no appreciation of Science Fiction , is that it? Dull witted sorts that we are, it's just inherently not in our nature to be able to appreciate it...

So if I told you, that I have read numerous works of science fiction from such luminaries as Philip K. Dick and Ursula Le Guin, (almost certainly more than you have) that would create a cognitive dissonance for you to deal with, wouldn't it?



Norman Coordinate....

[Big RR]

Jim, heinlein, a fairly celebrated SF writer, had conservatism oozing through his books, Stranger in a Strange Land notwithstanding. Indeed, I recall one of his books or stories dealt with the world being taken over by cannabalistic blacks who hunted whites (which was the last thing I read by him). I agree politics doesn't dictate who writes, or even just appreciates, SF.

[oldr_n_wsr]

From what I can see so far it is trying to be a type of LOST. People stripped of the basic ways of getting their needs met (food/water/etc) and trying to survive. Begin with some manmade disaster which caused it but a few have a way to undo it, the usual "I'm in charge", "no I'm in charge" and there it is. At least so far.

Don't forget the prequisite hot young babe (in tight leather pants no less) and a good looking older babe and a guy who can kill anyone anytime with nothing more than his stare.

[Gob]

Jim, heinlein, a fairly celebrated SF writer, had conservatism oozing through his books,

Read "the roads must roll", it could have been written by Ayn Rand..

[rubato]

Jim, heinlein, a fairly celebrated SF writer, had conservatism oozing through his books, Stranger in a Strange Land notwithstanding. Indeed, I recall one of his books or stories dealt with the world being taken over by cannabalistic blacks who hunted whites (which was the last thing I read by him). I agree politics doesn't dictate who writes, or even just appreciates, SF.

Not conservatism but more an Ayn Rand Libertarianism.

yrs,
rubato

[rubato]

"...
The way science fiction is supposed to work is to take something that could happen and expand on it....

Like this true story:
... "

You really are a total illiterate.

Science Ficton (aka "speculative fiction") breaks down in the several different sub-genres. "Hard" science fiction is an attempt to base the speculation on a realistic extension of current knowledge about science and the writers are generally somewhat well-versed in the technical areas they write about. There is always some element of imagination involved but there is a serious attempt to make everything reconcile with the known physical universe.

But most writers don't work in that area. Some because they don't have that kind of background, some because that is too limiting, and some because they have other fish to fry, literarily speaking.

Mostly I have lost interest in the genre. But there are a few good books out there.

Heinlein was a local resident, btw.
"...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_A._ ... Philosophy

Heinlein is usually identified, along with Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke, as one of the three masters of science fiction to arise in the so-called Golden Age of science fiction, associated with John W. Campbell and his magazine Astounding.[65] In the 1950s he was a leader in bringing science fiction out of the low-paying and less prestigious "pulp ghetto". Most of his works, including short stories, have been continuously in print in many languages since their initial appearance and are still available as new paperbacks decades after his death.
....

He was at the top of his form during, and himself helped to initiate, the trend toward social science fiction, which went along with a general maturing of the genre away from space opera to a more literary approach touching on such adult issues as politics and human sexuality. In reaction to this trend, hard science fiction began to be distinguished as a separate subgenre, but paradoxically Heinlein is also considered a seminal figure in hard science fiction, due to his extensive knowledge of engineering, and the careful scientific research demonstrated in his stories. Heinlein himself stated—with obvious pride—that in the days before pocket calculators, he and his wife Virginia once worked for several days on a mathematical equation describing an Earth-Mars rocket orbit, which was then subsumed in a single sentence of the novel Space Cadet.

Heinlein has had a nearly ubiquitous influence on other science fiction writers. In a 1953 poll of leading science fiction authors, he was cited more frequently as an influence than any other modern writer.[66] In 1974, he won the first Grand Master Award given by the Science Fiction Writers of America for lifetime achievement. Critic James Gifford writes that "Although many other writers have exceeded Heinlein's output, few can claim to match his broad and seminal influence. Scores of science fiction writers from the prewar Golden Age through the present day loudly and enthusiastically credit Heinlein for blazing the trails of their own careers, and shaping their styles and stories."[67]



yrs,
rubato

[Gob]

Retard just proved himself wrong again...

From his link;'

Heinlein's juvenile fiction of the 1940s and '50s, however, began to espouse conservative virtues. After 1945, he came to believe that a strong world government was the only way to avoid mutual nuclear annihilation. His 1949 novel Space Cadet describes a future scenario where a military-controlled global government enforces world peace. Heinlein ceased considering himself a Democrat in 1954

[Gob]

Political tags - such as royalist, communist, democrat, populist, fascist, liberal, conservative, and so forth - are never basic criteria. The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire.

When any government, or any church for that matter, undertakes to say to its subjects, This you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know, the end result is tyranny and oppression no matter how holy the motives.

Robert A. Heinlein


Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/autho ... mQ0JDGP.99

[Gob]

Robert A. Heinlein, however, was a conservative. Heinlein had a libertarian streak to him, and if you meet a Heinlein fan that has named his cat “Adam Selene,” you’ll find someone who believes Heinlein to be a simon-pure libertarian. But Heinlein’s patriotism and strong support of the military ensure that he must be thought of as a conservative.


Heinlein’s conservatism extended to his non-political juvenile fiction of the 1940s and 1950s. There are hundreds of thousands of Baby Boomers who read such books as The Star Beast (1954) and Have Space Suit, Will Travel (1958) and discovered exciting novels, set in a future of limitless wonder and exploration, told by a writer who seemed like a kindly uncle who whispered, “Yes, I know being a teenager is a struggle. But knowledge is important. And I know math is hard, but you’ve got to understand math if you want to do well in life.”

Heinlein, in his juvenile novels, taught conservative virtues. “I have been writing the Horatio Alger books of my generation,” he wrote to his editor, Alice Dalgliesh, in 1959, “always with the same strongly moral purpose that runs through the Horatio Alger books (which strongly influenced me; I read them all). ‘Honesty is the best policy.’ — ‘Hard work is rewarded.’ — ‘There is no easy road to success.’ — ‘Courage above all.’ — ‘Studying hard pays off, in happiness as well as money.’ — ‘Stand on your own feet.’ — ‘Don’t ever be bullied.’ — ‘Take your medicine.’ — ‘The world always has a place for a man who works, but none for a loafer.’ These are the things the Alger books said to me, in the idiom suited for my generation; I believed them when I read them, I believe them now, and I have constantly tried to say them to a younger generation which I believe has been shamefully neglected by many of the elders responsible for its moral training.”

As William Patterson shows in Learning Curve: 1907–1948, the first volume of his authorized biography, Robert A. Heinlein: In Dialogue with His Century, Heinlein’s political evolution was somewhat comparable to that of Ronald Reagan. Until the 1950s, Heinlein thought of himself as a liberal. After 1945, he thought that the only way to prevent global atomic annihilation was a strong world government. In his 1949 novel Space Cadet, Heinlein depicts a future where peace is preserved through a global government controlled by the military.

Reagan and Heinlein both moved to the right in the 1950s, partially due to wives who were more ardently conservative than they were. Heinlein’s discovery of conservatism must wait for the sequel to this book, but Patterson provides one clue: In 1954, Heinlein read an article that was critical of the official U.S. government story about Pearl Harbor. This led Heinlein to become more skeptical of the state, and he quit being a Democrat.

Robert A. Heinlein was born in Butler, Mo., in 1907. As a child, Heinlein loved to read. As a teenager, he read every book he could find by Edgar Rice Burroughs, Jules Verne, Rudyard Kipling, Jack London, and Mark Twain. H. G. Wells was a particular favorite, and Heinlein absorbed Wells’s sf novels and his socialist politics. Heinlein, writes Patterson, “read everything, in fact, except the usual run of nauseating Victorian children’s literature.”

The Heinlein family had a strong military tradition. Heinlein’s father, Rex, was a Spanish–American War veteran. His older brother Lawrence was a captain in World War I, and became a major general in World War II, becoming one of Douglas MacArthur’s key aides during the occupation of Japan. Heinlein’s younger brother Jay served in World War II and Korea before beginning a distinguished career as a political scientist.

Heinlein would have liked to have had a naval career. He entered the Naval Academy in 1925, an era so far in the past that he trained on coal-fired ships and even once came down with scurvy when the food rotted during a training voyage. After he graduated in 1929, Heinlein rose to the rank of lieutenant. Two of the captains under whom he served — Ernest King and William “Bull” Halsey — later became two of World War II’s greatest commanders.

[Lord Jim]

I love Heinlein....

I was introduced to him in High School with Time Enough for Love...

I was hooked...

He had such an enormous impact on the sci fi film genre....

He's one of the three towering Sci Fi greats of the 20th century, along with Clarke and Asimov....

But he never got the kind popular public credit they did...

[Lord Jim]

Oh and just as an aside....

I see rube shoved an exploding Cubano in his mouth and hit it with a blow torch yet again....

[rubato]

As we showed in another thread where you were too ignorant and stupid to actually read the book in question, Heinrich Boll's
"End of a Mission" you really don't know shit about Heinlien either.

Try reading his books and comparing the message with conservatism? Moron.


yrs,
rubato

[Lord Jim]

Moron.

The man most lacking in intelligence on this board has called me a moron....

Gonna lose a lot of sleep over that....

[loCAtek]

Oh! Oh! oH! I get it!


THIS IS ALL A SIMPSONS EPISODE

Either: 'Last Exit to Springfield', seventeenth episode of Season 4 - Where Mr. Burns cuts off all power to the town.

Or: The Simpsons, The Movie - Where the government cuts off Springfield from everything, under an Impenetrable Dome©




...which still doesn't make sense, but was hella entertaining.


They should go for that: inexplicable, but funny.

[Rick]

The premise is amiss I understand that maybe the power went out but where there is magnetism there is still the potential for electricity.

They are using paraffin candles and kerosene but having hard time making bullets?

It moves kinda slow, I'll give it a couple more weeks to improve before I bale though.

I really don't think the rest of the world will be that forgiving...

[oldr_n_wsr]

I saw last night they had a tornado. While they made it sound like thunder they did not show any lightening. I kept waiting for the lightening to point out the "mistake"

We don't know about magnetism as I have yet to see anyone whip out a compass. I wonder how they get around so easily direction wise.

As far as bullets, I was a little bewildered on that also. They have gun powder (muzzle loaders). After that they need shells and bullets and a press. All components should/could be found. No electricity needed.