Future Tech

[DarkCloud]

Here are some of my ideas on future tech for Civ III.

I will elaborate on some of them soon due to lack of time now but here are the bare ideas.

Mobile Warfare- (World War I Tank) (preq. Tactics,Automobile)
Advanced Mobile Warfare- (Armor, Armored CAr) (preq. Car production,Mobile Warfare)

Car Production (Highway) (Preq. Automobile)

Genetics (Infector) (Preq. Advanced Medicine, Genetic Engineering)
Advanced Medicine (AIDS Cure) (Preq. Genetic Discoveries, Genetic Engineering)
Genetic Discoveries (The G-Nome Project) (Preq. Computers, Genetic Engineering)
Genetic Tailoring (Preq. Genetics)
Cloning (Clone Warrior, Human Cloning) (Preq. Genetic Tailoring, Genetics)
Genetically Engineered Humans (Million Dollar Warrior) (Preq. Genetic Discoveries, Cloning)

The Modern Car (Car production industry, Ford Motor Co.) (preq. Labor Union, Car Production)

etc. (Posted later *note* Space Flight)

[UltraSonix]

I would like a "cold fusion" tech - prereg fusion of course, and maybe something else.

How's this for a side-idea: maybe some of the latter days techs would require a building/improvement to be built before you can discover the tech. eg in the cold fusion above, you'd have to have a fusion reactor (in the form of a power station maybe) somewhere.

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No, in Australia we don't live with kangaroos and koalas in our backyards... Despite any stupid advertisments you may see to the contrary...

[UltraSonix]

quote: Originally posted by Shadowstrike on 10-01-2000 01:27 PM I would like to see it work with near-future technologies, like cold-fusion, solar sails and asteroid mining (not as far off as it seems) as well was what were future techs when Civ first came out, i.e. hydroponics, the Internet, ion drive, antimatter implosion.

- I just saw this in another thread...

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No, in Australia we don't live with kangaroos and koalas in our backyards... Despite any stupid advertisments you may see to the contrary...

[Shadowstrike]

The new techs would fit into general groupings that I'll use to simplify this post.

Biotech

Hydroponics: Growing plants without soil. Already possible.

Cloning: Duplicating a living being from a single cell of it. Possible, can be improved in near future.

Genetic Modification: Modifying something's genetic code. Make two versions of this, one for humans and one for animals/plants. The latter is possible, the former is somewhat unethical, and in near future.

Protein/Gene Study: Understanding what each gene & protein does. Only possible after completion of Human Genome project. Under research.

Organic Waste degradation: Breaking down organic waste. A potential boon for sewage treatment facilities and may reduce polluton drastically.

Power Sources

Nuclear Fusion: Yeah, its in Civ2, but research is almost complete on this (making it actually generate power).

Cold Fusion: Causing fusion through cooling it down to absolute zero, and then begining fusion. Possible, within next 25 years.

Solar Power (improved): Generating electricity by sunlight. Nothing new, possible now, needs higher yield.

Tidal Harnesses: Blatently ripped from SMAC. Possible now, but is anyone doing it?

Antimatter Implosion: Generating energy through imploding matter & antimatter. Only in theory now, but research can start immediately (because we have the facilities)

Controlled Singularity: Generating power through controlling a black hole. Highly impossible now, maybe in a century or five...

Energy generating element: We haven't found this yet, but it could be the energy source of the future.

Hydrogen Engine: A conventional electrolysis reactor, small enough to power small appliances. This may appear in a couple of years, but may take longer.

Computers

Quantum Computers: A Computer using particles on the quantum scale for calculations. under research, commercial versions in a decade or so.

Cybernetic Computer: A Computer that is a mixture of biological processes and mechanical parts. Still under research, and has ethical problems. Maybe in 20 or so years...

Biological Computer: A purely biological computer. Very unethical, and will take a long time. Somewhere from a half century to 200 years.

The Internet: What I'm using now. Should be part of Civ3. Here, now!!!!!

Optical networks: One of the fastest connections now. Availble to public, but expensive.

Data crystals: storing data in a crystal form. A figment of sci-fi now, but in a century, they may be commonplace.

Virtual reality: generating a virtual envoirnment made up of data that is immersive to the user. Basic models function now, but may require a couple of decades before commerical use.

Artificial Intelligence: giving a robot, or other machine sentience. Research is in its early stages, may not happen for hundreds of years, or may happen in decades.

Space

Ion Drive: A system of propelling a spacecraft through space with ions. Under investigation by NASA. May bee seen on spacecraft in 5 to 10 years (assuming NASA does not go broke)

Solar Sails: A possible idea in the future, but restricted to mostly within the solar system. A decade, at the most before it is seen on a spacecraft.

Cities in Space: Possible now, but unfunded. Cities in space can be self-suficient and house a large population, but with tremendous monetary outlay.

Moon Bases: Possible now, but idea is unused. A base on the Moon would have the same difficulty as the space cities, but could produce moon dust and other elements from the Moon.

Planatery Colonies: Same as Moon base, but add a couple decades/centuries to the date. Colonies on Mars, Ceres, Titan, Europa and others could prove fruitful.

Asteroid mining: Possible in the next decade. Basically, its sending out a space probe into the asteroid belt and mining an asteroid for minerals and metals.

Adv. Mining Techniques: The frontier of space require a different style of mining (as mechanized as possible) requiring new technologies and techniques.

Military

Military lasers: Under research. Ethics and other thing constrain it. However, the possiblities it opens are huge. On a wide spread, it could vaporize incoming missiles, while on a focused beam, it could cut through most military systems availble. I wouldn't be suprised if it was used today.

SDI: Every Civver should know about this. Maybe withing the next 205 years.

Space-fighters: Could bombard planet from orbit. Great potential for great distruction. A decade at most.

Killer satelites: Same as above. Possible in a couple of years.

Laser Stations: Large stationary lasers, which at a wide spread could vaporize incoming objects.

Engineering

Nanotechnology: Building things up from atomic particles. Techniques require refining, but its effects we be felt within the next quarter of a century.

Arcologies: A entirely contained world, in which the envoirnmentcould be carefully controled. Possible, but may take years before it can be implemented. Can increase living spce, through more efficent design (i.e. no roads)

Turbolifts: Elevators that can go in any dircetion. May take decades to work out the problems with this system. Main problem is that the cars must work without a rope.

Mass driver: A magnetically propeled system of transporting cargo. Has been tested, but not on large scale. Could prove useful in space.

Bionics: The techniques of replacing lost limbs and body parts with artificial components. Widely availble now, but some organs cannot be replaced.

Nanoprobes: A extension of nanotechnology, nanoprobes are microscopic devices, which injected by the billion into the human bloodstream, could repidly repair a damaged body.

Replicators: Copied from Star Trek. Basically, this uses a energy to matter conversion process (still theoretical) to create objects.

Transporters: Copied from Star Trek. A transporter operates off of the same principle as a replicator, but it is more complex. It turns matter into energy, transports it and turns it back into matter.

Political

The Referendum: A system of government that depends on the people voting for a to make a choice. Technically possible, but may take time to perfect a device that could let people vote from anywhere. This would give tur democracy. As soon as 5 years, or more depending on political changes.

Well, that's it. I'll add to this list, eventually. Just keep posting suggestions.

Last Updated:October 14, 2000
[This message has been edited by Shadowstrike (edited October 05, 2000).]
[This message has been edited by Shadowstrike (edited October 06, 2000).]
[This message has been edited by Shadowstrike (edited October 07, 2000).]
[This message has been edited by Shadowstrike (edited October 14, 2000).]

[Dienstag]

Well, many of the above ideas are obviously highly speculative. I'm pretty sure that that Cold Fusion has nothing to do with absolute zero, and Fusion, commercial Quantum Computers, and Space Fighters are more than just a decade or so away. A Controlled Singularity would be cool, but I can't imagine how this would happen in the forseeable future.

I think a big section of future techs should be in the Geology/Meteorology catagory:
-Predicting Earthquakes/Volcanoes/Hurricanes/etc...
-Understanding climate change
-Cleaning-up/avoiding pollution
-Converting desert to something else

uh oh gotta go. see ya later

[UltraSonix]

ShadowStrike's techs are very good and I think Civ3 should not have any techs more advanced than what he's got - else the game would just be SMAC 2.

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No, in Australia we don't live with kangaroos and koalas in our backyards... Despite any stupid advertisments you may see to the contrary...

[Ribannah]

Darkcloud: none of those, I fear: too vague
Shadowstrike: some cool ones, but some are faaaaaar into the future

How about the following:

Nanotechnology
Optical Processor
Bionics
Virtual Reality
Artificial Intelligence
The Referendum
Organic Waste Degradation
The Hydrogen Motor
Arcologies
Tube Transportation
Global Marketing
Basic Income


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If you have no feet, don't walk on fire

[Shadowstrike]

Well, other then the singularity, the others aren't that far-fetched.

As for the space fighters, I'd expect them to be nothing more then stealth fighters modified for space. (they already have their own atmosphere.

Quantum computers might be a little further off...

I'm going to upgrade the list now...

Rib, would you mind explaining what Bionics and the last 2 are? IIRC, an optical processor uses optical fibres instead of wires, right?

[Hannibal3]

Whats the current stand on space? Is there going to be a space environment after the earth environment? I mean, if it is not going to be in it, a lot of these space technologies are unneccessary.

[DarkCloud]

More ideas:

Space Colonization (Colony Ship, Moon Terraforming) (preq. SS Components/ Space Flight)
Other Life (Deep Space Probe) (preq. Advanced Space Flight, Space Colonization)
Advanced Space Flight (Defence Shuttle, Attack Shuttle, Space Laser Attack) (preq. The Laser, SS Components)
Space Mining (Mars Irrigation) (Moon Mining) (Preq. Space Colonization, SS Components)
Colony Defense (Laser Defense, Laser Gun) (preq. Advanced Space Flight)

Television (T.V. Plant) (preq. Mass Production)

Computer Network (The Internet) (preq. Electronics, Computers)

More and explination avaliable upon request...

[Vrank Prins]

I can't say I like the idea of future tech's. Somehow it's too fantastic, too speculative and wishfulthinking. And also, the lot of the idea's we now can think of are usually phenomenon which will be realized in the nearby future (say up to a 100 years). Letting the game run into the future also means there's is less room for a more detailed approach of the techtree of the past. CTP has got a bit of a weird techtree !!!
Let scifi be the terrain of SMAC or CTP.
Though, I would like it if it was possible to run from CIV into SMAC, where CIV would concern things up-to-now, and SMAC would take you of into the future. Quite a bit of an adjustment, but you never know.

[Ribannah]

quote: Originally posted by Shadowstrike on 10-05-2000 05:24 PM Rib, would you mind explaining what Bionics and the last 2 are? IIRC, an optical processor uses optical fibres instead of wires, right?

Bionics = Using electronics to repair/improve/enhance the human body (next step from using mechanics, followed by using microchips = Cyborg tech). Remember Lee Majors, the 6 Million Dollar Man?
Has already started.

Global Marketing = The Earth as your sales area, as opposed to picking your home country and maybe later some expansion elsewhere. New attitude, new requirements, new means (the Internet being a big boost).
Quickly becoming the standard in several industries.

Basic Income = The next step in social security after Welfare. A (minimum) income for every citizen without quid pro quo. Releases the bond between work and income, thereby generating more freedom of choice and reviewing our values.
The idea has existed for several centuries (since Thomas Paine), but we seem to be not quite ready ...
There is the oil dividend in Alaska though, for one.


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If you have no feet, don't walk on fire

[Shadowstrike]

Thanx Rib...

DarkCloud, most of those ideas are just elaborations on what is already here...

I'll update the list in a little while.

[Evil Capitalist]

SS: Just so you know- the DNA computer has already been researched, and is useful for large numbers of calculations.

Laser weapons- IIRC the US are researching something called point laser defenses to replace the chainguns on the side of their ships. They also have plans for a laser in the nose of a jumbo jet to shoot down missiles.

[DarkCloud]

Well, Shadowstrike it looks I beat you by 6 months to a year on the 'elaborations' for I created this list over a year ago, before I even had home internet access!!! !!!

32 Pages of written documentation...