Space in chrono trigger

[XcyrusX]

Quote~
With something like 5 astronauts in space (and probably a majority of males), humanity would surely still be doomed  .

Yeah i guess so but whoo this thread was getting hijacked like crazy haha. But yeah i bet there was somting to do with that iono 

[Kenji]

I gotta say, it'd be pretty interesting to see a scenario involving human colonization...

Like, say, Lavos rains destruction from the heavens and takes out humanity on the surface.  The colonists out in orbit and on the moon then rally and make war on Lavos and the machines.

Though, that would completely ruin what the developers were trying to say, as well as the sense of urgency (it'd still be there, just not as powerful) for the Kurono Senshi.

[alpha]

and even if we had space stations how long would the people last with out refuel and resupply from teh surface world. still just as doomed... even a station liek deep space nine needs raw materials

[Kyronea]

and even if we had space stations how long would the people last with out refuel and resupply from teh surface world. still just as doomed... even a station liek deep space nine needs raw materials

Given the level of technology demonstrated by 1999 A.D. era humanity/Mystics, I'm willing to be they'd have the technology to create their own supplies, of sorts, for a while at least.

But yes, eventually they would falter.

Though to be honest I don't see why Lavos wouldn't take out satellites, space stations, and the like...given the power of his rain of destruction and how it goes across the world, I wouldn't think firing it into space would be all that difficult.

[XcyrusX]

Unless they had food replicators! What a great thread.

[Radox Redux]

So we're talking about the ruined future here? I dunno. We don't really see any signs of technology progressing beyond the Day of Lavos. Most of it seems to be ruined with the only signs of scientific advances coming from the Mother Brain, who seems more set on repopulating Earth with robots, than space exploration.

So now the question is: Did they have space-travel technology in the year 1999? One thing you have to wonder about is the nature of the domed cities. Though they could be simply to protect against pollution or something like that, it's easy to imagine the technology being used to create space-cities. However a lot of this is based on the assumption that the Chrono worlds technology parallels ours. This may not necessarilly be the case. (For example, perhaps it tangents into more magical aspects after the humans and the mystics begin sharing cultures.)

Ultimatly the it doesn't really matter since I'd be willing to guess that if space-technology existed in 1999 AD it was likely made incapable, either by direct destruction, or by destruction of necessary resources and/or information. Either way, come 2400 AD if any humans did escape Earth before the destruction, I doubt they're coming back, and I doubt the 'Earthbound' have the means to travel after them.

It's quite a nice parallel that isn't it? The same sprites are used for the 'Earthbound' and the denizens of 2400. Perhaps some humans did escape. It would make a nice comparison to Zeal. The one relying on the power of Lavos is ultimatly doomed, whilst the one that occurs as a product of mankinds innovation succeeds. Maybe this space colony was called 'Zeal'. Cool idea methinks, but doubtful that the CT staff thought of it.

[Foxx]

first off... in the series' 1000 AD people were much more advanced than in our 1000AD, since they already possessed different technological gadgets like teleporters, so the likelyness of space travel in 1999AD would have to be rather large. Of course there are many factors that might have hindered the advancement of technology in the times we don't hear about.

technology can be destroyed in war or in cataclysmic events, but war can also advance technology significantly. If WWII never existed, it would be unlikely that we could split the atom for power, or that the personal computer and the internet would be invented (along with this forum).

So, either a rather devastating war or the lack of great wars could have slowed the advancement of technology, therefore making the evolution of space travel impossible. Also, in our world, the US and Soviet were engaged in the space race, which also advanced technology in general a great deal. What if the Chrono world never had a space race like that?

[VincentGAU8]

yeah, probably your right..

with their level of technology by 1000AD, i would assume that they would have
grown as a interplanetary empire by 1999, with warp drives and wormholes and stuff like that..

yeah, a great war or a period of no wars slowed advancement for a considerable amount of time,
and the tech level of the 1999ers weren't so advanced to the 'interplanetary empire' level...

[Foxx]

As an extension to the previous post, it would be likely that the humans on Chrono have at least settled a few planets in the time between 1000AD and 1999AD for a few reasons:

1. they have refrigerators.
This is a good place to start. refrigerators first got around in the 1960-70's at an affordable price in our world. In nearly every home in at least Chrono trigger, there's a refrigerator, even one of those with a built-in freezer (if you look close enough). This means, that already in 1000AD, they had a means to store food other than salting or pickling it. This aspect is important in space travel.

2. Lucca's teleporter:
Teleportation technology could have been refined during the years due to Lucca's work and the work of others. This refinement of one technology could be a start to at least a global network of teleporters. If not at least to any moons in orbit around the Chrono planet (or entity or whatever...)

3. 1999AD domed cities:
a worthy candidate for a type of interplanetary settling technology, especcially if the cities are self-contained for some reason (ie. protecting the environment), but it could also be used in any type of off-planet base (including space stations or migration ships)

4. data gathered from time portals and the like:
any data related to time portals could be used to create a technology that involved instantaneous travel across vast distances.

5. computers
Although we don't see much advanced electronics in 1000AD, there must have been access to extremely high technology somehow. Lucca's teleporter needs massive amounts of raw computing power to make a successful teleportation.

it would need most of its processing power for indexing every single ATOM in the object that would need to be teleported. This is to ensure that EVERY SINGLE ATOM would be set back into it's original place and in it's original state.

Another need for a teleporter is a means of knowing the difference between the atoms of the object and, say, a fly that happened to be there, since it would be rather bad if Marle got mixed with a fly... I bet her dad would be rather cross if a mutated daughter came back home 

Even if Lucca was a hardcore technology genius, she would still need something to make a lot of custom parts, it's not as if you could get a "teleporter on a chip" in 1000AD.

Computers are likewise very important for space travel, and they keep a lot of things automated.

so maybe humankind wasn't doomed by Lavos at all

[Thought]

Actually, I'd argue that the various factors you suggested aren't really as important as you suggested.

1. Refrigeration is quite nice for storing food for long trips. However, storing food is impractical for space travel. For every ounce you add, it takes that much more propellant to speed up and slow down the ship. For any length of time, people would need to be able to grow their own food.

Yet if we assume enertrons were created before the Day of Lavos (and I think this is almost definite), then food really isn't a consideration. The enertrons then, not refrigeration, are the key factor. Indeed, with the enertrons food is almost a nonfactor.

2. We don't know enough about Lucca's teleporter to know how practical of an application it would be. Does the technology have a limiting distance? Does there need to be a clear line of sight between the origin and destination? Does an increase in distance also increase the power requirements? If so is this a steady increase or is it exponential? Does an increase in distance also require an increase in computing power? How does the increase in distance effect the rate of error?

We do not see teleporters in Chronopolis or the Ruined Future, so this seems to have been of limited use.

3. Domes are useful, admittedly, but it really depends on what they were designed for. Are these for actually gathering resources or protecting the city (and if protecting, from what)? On one hand, the domes might only serve to catch carbon dioxide and other green house gasses for recycling and industry use. On the other, the domes might merely be a way to stop hail and hurricanes from damaging the city itself; useful, but worthless if one is trying to keep and atmosphere inside a city.

However, that is largely beside the point. Building a settlement underground, rather than entirely in domes, would be a better option for early colonization. Put a few rooms underground on the moon, equip them with an enertron, and a person might be able to live there indefinitely.

4. All the time portals closed at the end of CT. Thus, no data gathering.

5. Computers are nice devices, but not terribly critical. Sure, they can process information (thus critical for navigating a ship between planets for colonization), automate machinery, etc, but I am not sure how this makes it more likely that humans colonized another planet.

As a side note, we have no indication that there are any other planets in that solar system that are habitable. Even in Earth's solar system, there is only one planet in the Habitable Zone (Earth). Venus is too close, any colony there wouldn't have a practical means of heat exchange and even the machines would boil. Mars is a possible candidate, as it is right on the edge. If we assume Crono System is as lucky as earth, there would only be one practical location for colonies (the moon is not a practical location; people would be mining the cement for water!) and even that one would be dubious. If the Chrono System is just a little less lucky than the Solar System, colonization would be essentially impossible.

Now there might have been a few space stations (indeed, it is possible that Lavos actually did eradicate all humans on Earth and that the humans we see are really just space explorers that returned.

[VincentGAU8]

If the humans have indeed settled some other planets other than their own then 2300 AD would not have looked like a devastated wastleland. Naturally, the colonials would return to their home planet after recieving word of the disaster and help rehabilitate it, and Lavos would have failed in destroying human civilization.. One could say that Lavos also destroyed  the colonies, but i find it very unlikely, Lavos would have to be really powerful to strike other planets possibly hundreds of light years away..

And if they had a such high lvel of technology they would have at least fought back against Lavos, which was not indicated in the game..

(the moon is not a practical location; people would be mining the cement for water!) and even that one would be dubious. If the Chrono System is just a little less lucky than the Solar System, colonization would be essentially impossible.

Well, moon colonies arent impossible (the Chrono world has two right?) they would have just to import water from earth, which would have not been a difficult exercise.. Overpopulation could do that to a society, they would be forced to find new settlements to ease troubles at home, and the nearst land would be the orbiting rocks..

[Foxx]

If the humans have indeed settled some other planets other than their own then 2300 AD would not have looked like a devastated wastleland. Naturally, the colonials would return to their home planet after recieving word of the disaster and help rehabilitate it, and Lavos would have failed in destroying human civilization.. One could say that Lavos also destroyed  the colonies, but i find it very unlikely, Lavos would have to be really powerful to strike other planets possibly hundreds of light years away..

And if they had a such high lvel of technology they would have at least fought back against Lavos, which was not indicated in the game..

(the moon is not a practical location; people would be mining the cement for water!) and even that one would be dubious. If the Chrono System is just a little less lucky than the Solar System, colonization would be essentially impossible.

Well, moon colonies arent impossible (the Chrono world has two right?) they would have just to import water from earth, which would have not been a difficult exercise.. Overpopulation could do that to a society, they would be forced to find new settlements to ease troubles at home, and the nearst land would be the orbiting rocks..

what if the colonists never got the message, how were they to know Lavos destroyed their home. I bet when Lavos broke through the planet's surface, it would have done serious harm to much of the world's radio systems including telescopes and the like.

They might have tried to stop Lavos with laser weapons, heavy artillery and probably nuclear weapons, but none of those weapons may have helped due to Lavos' rather strange anatomy... in that case Crono and co. woudn't be able to stop Lavos except if Lavos has a weakness towards magic and the like

our own moon also has a rather thin hydrogen atmosphere made up of hydrogen ions from the sun. If mixed with oxygen it will make water.

I don't know if any of you have heard of the Biosphere 2 project (http://www.b2science.org/) that is located (I think) somewhere in Arizona in the US. This is pretty much a sealed ecosystem, theoretically able to supply colonists with food and water, along with shelter and many different recreational facilities... people could live for years if not centuries  or millenia in a base like that.
so in this case, plants produce oxygen and food, animals are kept there to keep the different ecosystems on track and human and animal waste is recycled into water or fertilizer for the plants. You need also to remember that we know nothing of the 1999AD government and how much money they were willing to put into space travel, if they even USED money in that timeframe.

[Thought]

Well, moon colonies arent impossible (the Chrono world has two right?) they would have just to import water from earth, which would have not been a difficult exercise.. Overpopulation could do that to a society, they would be forced to find new settlements to ease troubles at home, and the nearst land would be the orbiting rocks..

Not efficient or economical. First, fresh water is a limiting factor of the population earth can support, not physical space or even food production (well, food production relates to this as well). The need to colonize would be resulting from a need for water; if water was available to be transported to the moon, there wouldn't be a need to colonize the moon.

Besides, water is not cheap to transport. If I am recalling correctly, at its densest water weighs about 8 lb a gallon. Now water intake varies by person and diet, but if I am recalling correctly, the average person needs to consume about 3/4th of a gallon of water per day. You can't expect an entire system to recycle water every 24 hours, so lets say a colony would need enough water for 1 human for a month, or in other words 22 gallons of water. Again lets underestimate and say a colony would have 10,000 people. That means it would need 1,760,000 lb of water total. Standard space shuttles require roughly 6 times the cargo load in fuel just to get into orbit. So that would be 10,560,000 lb of fuel (admittedly, I am not sure how much this would be effected by a trip to the moon; the amount would increase, but I am not sure by how much). What is rocket fuel made out of? Well, not entirely water, but water is a significant component.

Of course, that is just what a human needs. An entire contained ecosystem would need more water than that.

So no, water couldn't just be transported to a colony on the moon; the majority of it would need to come from the moon itself.

our own moon also has a rather thin hydrogen atmosphere made up of hydrogen ions from the sun. If mixed with oxygen it will make water.

Yup. However, to my knowledge, hydrogen would actually be found easier by mining it.

Now that colonists have their hydrogen, they will still need oxygen. That can be mined on the moon too. But it is also needed for breathing and at least earth's moon doesn't appear to be oxygen rich enough to really cover both (and covering even one is questionable).

Only a masochistic society would try to colonize the moon, especially if there was anywhere else in the solar system even remotely hospitable.

[BROJ]

So that would be 10,560,000 lb of fuel (admittedly, I am not sure how much this would be effected by a trip to the moon; the amount would increase, but I am not sure by how much). What is rocket fuel made out of? Well, not entirely water, but water is a significant component.

Not to mention the weight of the fuel itself, but spatial gates are possible in CT/RD/CC so maybe that technology could be utilized?..

Only a masochistic society would try to colonize the moon, especially if there was anywhere else in the solar system even remotely hospitable.

Or a desperate one...

[VincentGAU8]

So that would be 10,560,000 lb of fuel (admittedly, I am not sure how much this would be effected by a trip to the moon; the amount would increase, but I am not sure by how much). What is rocket fuel made out of? Well, not entirely water, but water is a significant component.

Not to mention the weight of the fuel itself, but spatial gates are possible in CT/RD/CC so maybe that technology could be utilized?..

Only a masochistic society would try to colonize the moon, especially if there was anywhere else in the solar system even remotely hospitable.

Or a desperate one...

Well, the moon is a necessary part for further colonization.. Future colonists would need a mining base for metals and other minerals. I think I've read somewhere that your NASA is planning to return men to our moon, so become stepping stone for future manned attempts to mars.. And what about TERRAFORMING??

Lunar communities would be inevitably formed around these mining bases, and water would have to be imported from Earth to sustain them, at whatever economic cost..

Also, there are other ways to propel spacecraft aside from rocket fuel.. Ion drives are in experimentation nowadays i believe, nuclear propulsion, and hydrogen drives too.. if not, then tech level of the 1999ers in the Chronoverse would have possibly found a solution other than those..

If the humans have indeed settled some other planets other than their own then 2300 AD would not have looked like a devastated wastleland. Naturally, the colonials would return to their home planet after recieving word of the disaster and help rehabilitate it, and Lavos would have failed in destroying human civilization.. One could say that Lavos also destroyed  the colonies, but i find it very unlikely, Lavos would have to be really powerful to strike other planets possibly hundreds of light years away..

And if they had a such high lvel of technology they would have at least fought back against Lavos, which was not indicated in the game..

(the moon is not a practical location; people would be mining the cement for water!) and even that one would be dubious. If the Chrono System is just a little less lucky than the Solar System, colonization would be essentially impossible.

Well, moon colonies arent impossible (the Chrono world has two right?) they would have just to import water from earth, which would have not been a difficult exercise.. Overpopulation could do that to a society, they would be forced to find new settlements to ease troubles at home, and the nearst land would be the orbiting rocks..

what if the colonists never got the message, how were they to know Lavos destroyed their home. I bet when Lavos broke through the planet's surface, it would have done serious harm to much of the world's radio systems including telescopes and the like.

They might have tried to stop Lavos with laser weapons, heavy artillery and probably nuclear weapons, but none of those weapons may have helped due to Lavos' rather strange anatomy... in that case Crono and co. woudn't be able to stop Lavos except if Lavos has a weakness towards magic and the like

our own moon also has a rather thin hydrogen atmosphere made up of hydrogen ions from the sun. If mixed with oxygen it will make water.

I don't know if any of you have heard of the Biosphere 2 project (http://www.b2science.org/) that is located (I think) somewhere in Arizona in the US. This is pretty much a sealed ecosystem, theoretically able to supply colonists with food and water, along with shelter and many different recreational facilities... people could live for years if not centuries  or millenia in a base like that.
so in this case, plants produce oxygen and food, animals are kept there to keep the different ecosystems on track and human and animal waste is recycled into water or fertilizer for the plants. You need also to remember that we know nothing of the 1999AD government and how much money they were willing to put into space travel, if they even USED money in that timeframe.

Yes, i've read about the Biosphere project.. it seems to be a taste of a possible future settlement in another planet, naturally, a human community thousands of light years from home would have to be self-sustaining (terraforming would also be a possible solution).. And routine space travel would have ensured that the colonies would get the message through..

And the weapons of the 1999ers would be probably more advanced than our nukes and lasers.. Ion beams, orbital bombardment platforms and such things like that would have been in use...