From: malloy@nprdc.navy.mil (Sean Malloy)
Subject: Re: How do axioms really work?
X-Gated-By: The Black Marble Wombat@morticia.cnns.unt.edu
X-Gated-From: torg mailing list
Organization: University of North Texas
X-Gatemail-Version: 1.0b
Date: Mon, 6 Apr 1992 14:13:53 GMT

On Apr 6,  3:52pm, marcogan@student.anu.edu.au wrote:
} Now, it would be just silly to say that the CE Tech axiom was 'lower' in
} the areas I'm talking about. Surely what the tech axiom marks is the level
} to which technology (define it how you will) *can* be used, not the level
} to which it *is* used.

There was an extensive thread on this recently, arguing about
precisely what the tech limits enforced by the Tech axiom of the
Living Land entailed, and whether or not a sailboat would _work_ in
that cosm.

There are two ways of looking at the Tech axiom -- either it places a
limit on the sophistication of the _equipment_ that will work, or it
places a limit on the ability of the denizens of a cosm to comprehend
how equipment works.

The problem I have with the first argument is that, depending on the
Tech axiom, it places too many special-case exemptions into the laws
of physics. For example, in the Living Land, sailboats are not
supported; neither are aircraft. However, flying insects and animals,
which use the _same_ laws of physics to be able to fly, are abundant.
It seems clear to me that, insofar as it comes down to a direct
application of fundamental physical laws, the Tech axiom controls what
residents can understand -- so, while a sailboat would function in the
Living Land, no one operating under its axioms would be able to make
the logic associations to get the _idea_ of a sailboat, nor would
they, if placed in a sailboat, be able to make any kind of association
between manipulating the rudder and sails and the boat's handling.

I recently ran across something in the Torg rulebook to support my
position, something I'd read when I first bought the game and didn't
really pay attention to. Chapter 4, the introductory solo adventure,
has your character flying over Minneapolis in a twin-engine airplane
(at least Tech 21). If you choose to enter the Living Land, your
plane's engines die, because "the Living Land is a primitive zone, and
its simple technical axioms will not allow a machine as complex as
your aircraft to function", and you have to make a dead-stick landing --
but your plane remains perfectly usable as a _glider_ (not a very good
one, but still a glider). A glider is _still_ beyond the Living Land's
Tech axiom limits. If the Tech axiom was a hard-and-fast limit on what
technology would _work_, then as soon as your character failed his
contradiction check while flying the airplane, not only would the
engines stop, but the plane would drop out of the sky like a rock and
be completely uncontrollable. 

Since WEG, in the solo adventure, demonstrates clearly that the only
difference between putting up a reality bubble or not is whether or
not your engines work, it's clear that the Tech Axiom puts a hard
limit on the comprehension of technology by a cosm's _residents_, but
only limits _active_ technology -- anything that contains a source of
power; technology that makes passive use of a physical law would
remain unaffected. So, where an ultralight would be a contradiction, a
hang glider would not; a cannon would be, but an arbalest wouldn't.
Oil and other hydrocarbons would burn and produce light and heat, but
attempting to use them to power a machine creates a contradiction.

-- 
random sig #117:
Sean Malloy                                  | 
Navy Personnel Research & Development Center | We'll get along just fine as soon
San Diego, CA 92152-6800                     | as you realize I'm God.
malloy@nprdc.navy.mil                        | 
Newsgroups: alt.games.torg