The Doc's Bio Lab for Scav Experiments - & other oddities.

[Rman Virgil]

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After just posting Chapter 3 of "Crude in Sur Amerika" on the previous page ( viewtopic.php?f=3&t=10480&start=210 ) the following occured to me.

By way of a footnote for those with an interest in such things, I'm making use of Elman Service's basic Sociopolitical Typology in my differentiating depictions of the post-collapse factions. It is especially pronounced with the Seven Nations. Other influences come into play, but this one is the most straightforward & fundamental to relay. Here's a brief summary: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sociopolitical_typology

This should make clear some of my word choices which could otherwise be taken as fanciful and arbitrary when they actually are not.
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[Merowingg]

This should make clear some of my word choices which could otherwise be taken as fanciful and arbitrary when they actually are not.

[Rman Virgil]

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That said, even with just this wee bit of hindesight, some words & phrases strike me as might too fanciful making me wanna rewrite. But i'll chill a couple more days first. It's typical for me. The French poet Paul Valery once said poems are never finished, only abandoned. It can happen with prose too.
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[Rman Virgil]

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Another illustration for Chapter 3 of "Crude in Sur Amerika": The Seer's Ascent..

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[Rman Virgil]

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Ever moving onward...

In recent discussions with Goth about his Cam 4 backstory, two interesting questions came up.

~ What is The Project mission specifically ?

~ What is The Project's organizing power structure ?

The original canon answers the first question something along the lines of:

~ To restore civilization to its Pre-Collapse glory. My response is - What exactly does that mean ?

As to the second question - The Project's organizing power structure or governing body type - there really is nothing to speak of in the original canon.

Now while I've given much attention to fleshing out the Scavenger faction and Nexus, I've not expended nearly as much effort on doing likewise with The Project. This became very clear in those discussions with Goth. So, in looking for fresh inspiration to rectify this inattention, I turned to a couple of recent works by Noam Chomsky (are ya there Mero ? ):

- "Power Systems: Conversations on Global Democratic Uprisings and the New Challenges to U.S. Empire"

- "How the World Works"

I'm sure this is but the begining of my feeding the Janus beast of insatiable curiosity on the one hand and the compulsion to create anew on the other. .

To what end ?

~ Writing a yarn that takes place entirely within The Project, which I've yet to do... for one.

~ Another reason would be Cam 5 evolving out of Goth's Cam 4 down the road.

This is in part how I keep my interest up (after14 years actively engaged), till changing Command UI widgets becomes less grim and the camera scheme more robust as proposed (along with making good use of the JS API to tie it all together along with a re-vamped and fully integrated mini-map for swifter command-control execution, on the ground, in shifting centers of gravity).

All to reconstitute Commanders into what Pumpkin's original design had intended for them to be:

the means for a player to make effective use of multiple combat groups in multi-vector, coordinated, variable velocity, maneuver tactics in the heat of battle while still managing all supporting non-combat decisions & tasking GPMs.

In other words, achieving the fun sweet spot between decision making cognitive load / situational awareness vs. combat and non-combat cognitive switch tasking by way of elegant UI design and supporting a.i.

In this way a player can more readily (and more satisfyingly) engage, like never before, the following martial truth in combat command decision making gameplay.

"The battlefield is a scene of constant chaos. The winner will be the one who controls that chaos, both his own and the enemies." - Napoleon Bonaparte

Well, that be plenty 'nough for now.

Back in a couple weeks with Chapter 4 of Crude in Sur Amerika.

Till then there will be this 'n that...
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[aubergine]

Well, from the project logo I think it's safe to say they have more than their fair share of scientists at the top level. But it also bears some resemblance to various anarchy logos, which might be an interesting angle to explore. It would certainly be interesting to see why they go after so much military tech (obvious on the one hand - the game is called Warzone -- but using war for peace is a bit of an excessive strategy is it not?).

[Rman Virgil]

Well, from the project logo I think it's safe to say they have more than their fair share of scientists at the top level. But it also bears some resemblance to various anarchy logos, which might be an interesting angle to explore. It would certainly be interesting to see why they go after so much military tech (obvious on the one hand - the game is called Warzone -- but using war for peace is a bit of an excessive strategy is it not?).

Interesting possibilities, indeed. And a key question to be answered.

What I'm also doing now is going back to N.O.R.A.D. : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Amer ... se_Command

Trying to learn everthing I can about NORAD so I can make believable extrapolations based upon its history. I already have some of the pieces of the puzzle but I wanna work on fleshing it out a little more before I share where I'm at in answering the 2 questions posed in my last post. I'll do that soon.

Speaking of logos. Check out the NORAD logo. Facinating justaposition of imagery. Set me off on a brainstorming jag.

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[Rman Virgil]

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In conjuction with my NORAD investigation, I'm also looking into Martial Law : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martial_law

I'm thinking in tandem they are fundamental to any extrapolation.

Also note the Canadian connection to NORAD...

There is also the premise of a NORAD Mainframe not being infected by Reed..... and how that connects to both questions posed and Reed's grand strategy vs the Project.

And of course, anyone should feel free to jump in with their own take on these matters as I'm quite certain I have no monopoly on believable, imaginative, extrapolation in filling in the gaps in the original WZ Creators canon.

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[Rman Virgil]

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Another set of key questions that has just occured to me in confabulating this future history or extrapolation.

~ Should NORAD be "officially", and publically, decommissioned some years before the nuke strikes and the Collapse ?

~ How many years before and what would be the rationale for the public decommissioning (that really is not and is, in fact, something else entirely) ?

Once stated, the reason for these questions becomes apparent when you consider them in the context of the triggering events leading up to the nukes, the strikes themselves, the Collapse and, finally, the unfolding of the original campaign itself.

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And there is this contribution by Member Rommel in Goth's Cam 4 thread... viewtopic.php?f=49&t=10665&start=60

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As to the second question - The Project's organizing power structure or governing body type - there really is nothing to speak of in the original canon.

What about basing it on an existing or pre-existing socitical model. I think with the sacrifices and hard work done by the Project military it could be something like Sparta, with the military/warrior class holding some kind of special role so that they would not create a dictatorship. Sparta did have a king however and this doesn't seem right for the project, so maybe Spartan without the King and only the ruling council / senate.

In any case I don't think it would directly move to a democracy as the organizational infrastructure would not be present for some time - you wouldn't want the scavs electing a leader LOL

Oh an if you have ever read the Nights Dawn trilogy by Peter Hamilton you might remember the Edenists, if not check this out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edenism - or maybe Adamist is more appropriate.. idk

Rommel, I would agree with your insights.

Where I'm at now is an Oligarchy * comprised of 3 contingents of which I have only been able to identify 2 clearly: the military and the technocrats (scientists and technologists).

* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government

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For some reason, WZ inspires me to study more and harder, in conjunction with the acts of creation.

2 more works have once again engaged me by giant intellects of the last half century plus which, to my mind, beautifully dovetail with this WZ effort of re-imagining, re-creating and re-booting.

~ Architect Christopher Alexander's 4-volume magnum opus - "The Nature of Order: An Essay on the Art of Building and the Nature of the Universe"

~ Historian & philosopher of technology and the rise of the city, Lewis Mumford's 2-volume magnum opus - "The Myth of the Machine: Technics and Human Development / The Pentagon of Power".

Awe inspiring works and an autodidacts heaven.
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[aubergine]

To me the NORAD logo is fairly telling - the wings enveloping the world and the sword making it clear what their plans are.

Marital law and police states should definitely factor in the back story IMHO - USA is already a police state by all measures, and is on the verge of entering martial law (most likely triggered by gun controls as part of ongoing systemic legal destruction of the US Constitution).

I would imagine Martial Law would be very pleasant for people like Dr Reed, while he was on the right side of it. Your fannon about the attack that injured his son would most likely be a result of a general population brought to its knees by such a "society" as Dr Reeds work would be seen as a key monument to such a society by the masses of people it would oppress.

BTW, it's interesting how the cannon timeline from the WZ manual is starting to play out in RL, all be it in slightly different order & timescales.

2050 - "NATO collapse" - already starting to see growing public disapproval of NATO worldwide, not just in Europe
2075 - "Synaptic research begins" - scientists are already hard at work on very similar tech
2077 - "Mongolia attacks China" ...
2079 - "Korea allies with Mongolia" -- it's more likely that US/China war will be the big event, we're already seeing lots of positioning around that, particularly with US and China working hard to harvest Africa to oblivion
2080 - "NASDA formed" - I can't help but feel that a lot of the stuff we're seeing recently is part of a big push to increase US military budgets (or at least protect them from sequestration). In particular, there's lots of talk of N.Korea having nuke satellite and we're seeing US start to show off new laser weapons in mainstream/corporate media recently.

[aubergine]

Regarding decommissioning of NORAD, I would expect that to play out differently.

There is growing distrust within many branches of US Military over what the likes of DHS are doing (stockpiling enough ammo and armoured vehicles, etc - enough for a 25-year war against US civilians). There are many generals from the military now going public with their concerns. Likewise, police force elements (eg. local Sherifs) not yet fully controlled by Washington are also starting to voice concerns more publicly (particularly with regards to gun confiscation plans). I would imagine that large parts of US infrastructure will, if things keep going the way they are with the executive branch claiming full control over everything (fascism), splinter away from the fed and maybe NORAD could be one such element? In such circumstances, it's likely (and already widely reported by alternate media) that armies from other countries (eg. Russia and China) would be drafted in to fight in the war that would follow, which would likely bring about the demise of NORAD.

NASDA to me seems a strange proposition to happen immediately after that - most likely what would actually happen next is one world government, one world army, one world bank, etc (NWO). With NWO why would NASDA be required? It would only be when NWO starts breaking down that things like NASDA would become necessary. As such, it would merit much ponderance of what living in an NWO fascist society would be like to determine how that might eventually break down in such a way that paves the way for The Collapse. And in such a collapse, how would Dr. Reed factor in to things? What would the members of The Project and other factions be doing during that return to a more sustainable anarchy?

[aubergine]

...so if many members of The Project are from the likes of NORAD, that would go a long way to explaining why they are very keen to gain military power because they know at some point their former adversaries (NWO crowd) will be back on the scene. But as for the scientists within Project ranks, would they really be the morally-aloof crowd that formerly associated with military industrial complex, or would they be more from sustainability / humanitarian fields?

[aubergine]

You might like to add this to your reading list as well: http://www.amazon.com/Fourth-Turning-Am ... 0767900464

[Rman Virgil]

Regarding decommissioning of NORAD, I would expect that to play out differently.

There is growing distrust within many branches of US Military over what the likes of DHS are doing (stockpiling enough ammo and armoured vehicles, etc - enough for a 25-year war against US civilians). There are many generals from the military now going public with their concerns. Likewise, police force elements (eg. local Sherifs) not yet fully controlled by Washington are also starting to voice concerns more publicly (particularly with regards to gun confiscation plans). I would imagine that large parts of US infrastructure will, if things keep going the way they are with the executive branch claiming full control over everything (fascism), splinter away from the fed and maybe NORAD could be one such element? In such circumstances, it's likely (and already widely reported by alternate media) that armies from other countries (eg. Russia and China) would be drafted in to fight in the war that would follow, which would likely bring about the demise of NORAD.

NASDA to me seems a strange proposition to happen immediately after that - most likely what would actually happen next is one world government, one world army, one world bank, etc (NWO). With NWO why would NASDA be required? It would only be when NWO starts breaking down that things like NASDA would become necessary. As such, it would merit much ponderance of what living in an NWO fascist society would be like to determine how that might eventually break down in such a way that paves the way for The Collapse. And in such a collapse, how would Dr. Reed factor in to things? What would the members of The Project and other factions be doing during that return to a more sustainable anarchy?

...so if many members of The Project are from the likes of NORAD, that would go a long way to explaining why they are very keen to gain military power because they know at some point their former adversaries (NWO crowd) will be back on the scene. But as for the scientists within Project ranks, would they really be the morally-aloof crowd that formerly associated with military industrial complex, or would they be more from sustainability / humanitarian fields?

You raise much of import there to ponder before fleshing out the inner workings of the Project and its course post 2100. .

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You might like to add this to your reading list as well: http://www.amazon.com/Fourth-Turning-Am ... 0767900464

Done. My local library has 5 copies, all out on loan. I just put a reserve on it and should have it in hand in 2 weeks.

I read their earlier book "Generations" ages ago but I honestly don't remember any details. This follow-up book looks right up my alley.

I recently finished a really short work (130 pages) that was bursting at the seams with insights: The Folly of Repetition and the Wisdom of Remembrance: 30 Crucial Neglected Lessons of History http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/098262 ... ttom_links

Thanks for the recommendation. More grist for the mill.
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[Rman Virgil]

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Something else that occured to me today, that in itself is facinating, is that never once in 14 years, till now, have we turned the lens of scrutiny upon the inner workings of The Project itself. All along it has been focused on the other factions. Maybe that was because it was enough to feel, without questions of any sort, that The Project was entirely comprised of "good guys".... whatever that vague phrase means not being essential to our fundamental enjoyment of the original. However, in order to move foward in a fresh way, and not simply reiterate the original with just new, surface, window dressing, we have to dig deeper, ask key questions that have never been addressed and come up with compelling answers. At least, that's my understanding at present.

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