Well, there does seem to have been some change over time.
Alkenstar show lots of technological and industrial growth and chnage.
My specific example was Alkenstar, which is being changed in the new campaign setting. I think the original timeline was something like 3000 years of making firearms. In that amount of time the weapons had progressed to revolvers (of some sort, I didn't have details of whether they use metal cartridges or not). Way too slow, and Paizo had come to the same conclusion independently and has vastly reduced the amount of time firearms were being developed.
I try not to think about how society would organically develop in a world with so much easily available magic - it makes my head hurt a lot.
Well, there does seem to have been some change over time.
Alkenstar show lots of technological and industrial growth and chnage.My specific example was Alkenstar, which is being changed in the new campaign setting. I think the original timeline was something like 3000 years of making firearms. In that amount of time the weapons had progressed to revolvers (of some sort, I didn't have details of whether they use metal cartridges or not). Way too slow, and Paizo had come to the same conclusion independently and has vastly reduced the amount of time firearms were being developed.
I try not to think about how society would organically develop in a world with so much easily available magic - it makes my head hurt a lot.
I imagine the 300 years thing was a typo that slipped in somehow. Of course, development does not occur in the real world at a set pace, fixed by some sort of 'laws of history.' Yes, it's hard for me to imagine having guns for three millenia and not having gotten much further along tha what we see in the books. However, it is not inconcievable that gunpowder tech has existed for, say, one thousand years. In our world, the Chinese seem to have invented gunpowder in the 9th century- and Colt patented his first revolver in the 19th.
PS- I see them as having cap and ball pieces, guiven the 'wad of guncotton and a bullet' description. The first smokeless powder was made from guncotton/nitrocellulose.
Development of firearms could be seriously slowed without adequate metallurgy - efficient gun/cannon barrels require metals with specific qualities. In our world gunpowder could be invented much earlier by accident as it is mixture of three simple substances known and used in various processes and crafts for multiple thousands of years but development of firearms probably would be slower than it was in our timeline.
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Development of firearms could be seriously slowed without adequate metallurgy - efficient gun/cannon barrels require metals with specific qualities. In our world gunpowder could be invented much earlier by accident as it is mixture of three simple substances known and used in various processes and crafts for multiple thousands of years but development of firearms probably would be slower than it was in our timeline.
Also, people on Golarion would have spells for fireworks -- so it might have taken more time for gunpowder to be invented.
As for the long history, both Robert E. Howard and H.P. Lovecraft had very long timelines in their works. Read the introduction to the Hyborian Age in some of the Conan collected stories and you will see timelines of tens of thousands of years. Lovecraft goes back much further. As both authors have influenced Golarion, perhaps it is fitting that the time line goes back to an almost legendary time. (We know very little about what happened in early Azlant and there may be other civilizations then current or even older.)
Development of firearms could be seriously slowed without adequate metallurgy - efficient gun/cannon barrels require metals with specific qualities. In our world gunpowder could be invented much earlier by accident as it is mixture of three simple substances known and used in various processes and crafts for multiple thousands of years but development of firearms probably would be slower than it was in our timeline.
Good points.
Something else to consider is how few nations have gunpowder technology. If there is less competetion and less diffusion of ideas and techniques, I'd expect development to be slower.As to WHY so few nations have the technology....
Well, I've given my ideas about that in another thread.
Development of firearms could be seriously slowed without adequate metallurgy - efficient gun/cannon barrels require metals with specific qualities. In our world gunpowder could be invented much earlier by accident as it is mixture of three simple substances known and used in various processes and crafts for multiple thousands of years but development of firearms probably would be slower than it was in our timeline.
And there is yet another factor: Capitalism. One of the prime movers of the Industrial Revolution was the birth of modern Capitalism, where private individuals had the incentives to develop new technologies over which they could earn royalties, something that prior to the XVIII century was a very sketchy and complicated matter.
Along with necessity of survival, economic incentives are the main causes for development, which is evident in the rate of technological progress during the past two centuries, which has mostly taken place within the world of private industry.
Guns are a very good example: Prior to the rise of the big firearms manufacturers of the XIX century, the technology had moved forward very slowly and with rather poor increments in the field of quality, because there was very little incentive to build a market around it, as only rich governments could afford substantial amounts of them, which in turn was problematic as the states often had monopolies over these sensitive products and supplied themselves. It was only when private investors noticed they could earn big bucks by improving the technology (and thus increasing effectivity and decreasing cost, which in turn led to firearms becoming cheap enough for individuals to get them, increasing the size of the market) and the new Capitalist mentality led countries to outsource their production rather than monopolize it (since it was more efficient), that we saw an explosion in the development of firearms.
In other words, there are so many different elements that determine the rate of technological development that we could easily find a reasonable explanation as to why stuff has been so apparently quiet in Golarion.
Population growth is also a huge incentive for progress, which we see in the 19th century.
Population growth is also a huge incentive for progress, which we see in the 19th century.
Well, I think it is a mutual relation: The huge population growth of the XIX century was caused by the Agricultural Revolution of the XVIII century (which proved false Malthus' theory of the world reaching its maximum food production capacity, since the better use of the land allowed to double, almost tripple the production efficiency), and then further increased by the medical developments of the Industrial Revolution, greatly decreasing children mortality, extending maximum lifespans and reducing the mortality of many diseases (Common Cold could often be fatal back in the Middle Ages).
This, in turn, results in bigger populations. But big populations by themselves do not lend well to technological development; in fact, they can do the opposite. What you need is for this bigger population to organize in such a way that they produce an increasing amount of sinergies through the way of specialization, competitive advantages and cooperation, which is what urban life allows. And that was the other great change of the Industrial Revolution: Better infrastructure allowed for cities to grow larger and denser, and for new settlements to rise in areas previously uninhabitable. This allowed more people to work together, depend on each other and trade, three fundamental aspects of a developing society.
Well, I think it is a mutual relation: The huge population growth of the XIX century was caused by the Agricultural Revolution of the XVIII century (which proved false Malthus' theory of the world reaching its maximum food production capacity, since the better use of the land allowed to double, almost tripple the production efficiency), and then further increased by the medical developments of the Industrial Revolution, greatly decreasing children mortality, extending maximum lifespans and reducing the mortality of many diseases (Common Cold could often be fatal back in the Middle Ages).
Oh, I think that Malthus was right- he just didn't predict the technological changes leading to increased productivity and better transportation that would alllow us to stave off the disaster for so long. We are headed towards a world that simply cannot feed itself. Food prices continue to rise while the population of the developing world continues to grow at an alarming rate. It aint gonna be pretty...
Oh, I think that Malthus was right- he just didn't predict the technological changes leading to increased productivity and better transportation that would alllow us to stave off the disaster for so long. We are headed towards a world that simply cannot feed itself. Food prices continue to rise while the population of the developing world continues to grow at an alarming rate. It aint gonna be pretty...
Going a bit off topic: The problem with Malthusianism (and, by relation, Neo-Malthusianism), is that it used a skewed function to determine potential productivity: Capital and Labour. There was X amount of resource available and Y labour to work it, which resulted in a Z maximum level of production. But he didn't incorporate a third faction, which is Technology. Technology itself does not increase the total production, but instead makes the other two factors more efficient, so instead of being able to grow 1 ton of food per acre, you could grow 2, 3 or more, and instead of needing 10 workers per acre, you could produce the same with 8, 5 or less.
Now, physically speaking, there is a maximum possible output for any given amount of Capital (in this case, the resources we use to make food), regardless of efficiency. However, said amount of energy is well beyond our needs (food is, in essence, energy). The key is how efficient we are at harvesting it.
So, a Malthusian Catastrophe is only going to happen if we reach a point where our increase in efficiency is slower than our increase in consumption, but history so far has shown that whenever we are getting close to this situation, we enter a "critical incentive phase", where it becomes very economically attractive to develop a more efficient mean of production (when I say economically attractive I mean more than just making money. It has to do with how much we are willing to do in order to achieve a particular goal).
In food terms, the First and Second Agricultural Revolutions, and then the Green Revolution, have all happened in the exact same way: Societies getting close to their maximum food output, and then developing a more efficient way of doing so.
And it makes perfect sense for it to happen that way: Say everyone has an acre to plant corn, so we plant corn. The more people there are, the more corn we plant, until we just can't squeeze more corn in the land we have. So far, it has been easy to just plant corn (since there has been room available), meaning we have no incentive to make better use of the soil. Now that the "easy land" is over, we have an incentive to make better use of what we have. So John Better Use develops a way to plant the corn in a more orderly way, increasing each acre's capacity by 100%. Now we have a new easy way of doing it, so we start planting corn in the new way, until we start getting close to the new maximum, where the "easy orderly lines" are starting to run out. The incentive to improve it shows up, and Bob Fertilizer comes around, and now we all can add fertilizer and increase the output by another 100%. Enter the age of easy fertilizer, and so on.
So while there is no way of knowing if we are going to reach a catastrophical point or not, at least history has shown that we *have* to get close to that point for there to be a truly fundamental development.
Of course, we have developed to a point where we can start making estimations about the future, and thus the horizon we use to determine how much we have until that critical point has shortened (since now we operate in longer terms), leading to a shift in the way these inflections happen (we have more incentives to start developing now the solutions to the problems we expect to have in 10 years).
But personally, I don't really see a Malthusian Catastrophe looming. It would be far too inconsistent with the evidence so far (doesn't mean it can't happen, though).
According to history book I read Japan reached capacity for producing food around XVI or XVII and population stayed capped at around 20 million until late XIX. It wasn't catastrophe. Yes, famines were occuring and people died but most of the time population remained stable.
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On Alkenstar slow firearms development
-The first rifles used bamboo and had a slow burn type of gun powder. It took the mongol conquest and their need for wanting better weapons combining chinese, european, middle eastern scientists(not really the right word) together to develop an explosive gun powder the led to actually useful rifles.
On the concept of stagnation of development.
-Also china developed lamellar/scale armor as far back as 300 bc and were still using it to the 20th century.
-and they developed brigandine as far back as 800 ce. Which they also used this into the 20th century. Europe didnt begin using this style armor actively till the 15th century.(by the way modern bullet proof vests use the same concept as brigandine)
-Of course they stagnated due to tradition more than any other reason.
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Gerard Kremer(Mercator) Map ~ 1569
an article that talks about it
interesting theory, may have some holes, but there are a lot of maps from before most people knew it was there
The major problem I have reconciling Golarion history with real-world trends is a comparative lack of mass migrations.
On Earth we have wave after wave of tribes coming out of Central Asia, rolling over Europe, settling down, then getting rolled over by the next wave of nomads -- look at the Book of Invasions from Ireland for the tail end of this process. On Golarion, just as one example, the Varisians and Shoanti seem to have been left almost completely alone for ten thousand years from the fall of Thassilon to the relatively recent intrusions of Cheliax and the other Inner Sea powers.
But as I have to remind myself, there are plenty of factors that mitigate such migrations -- chief among them the huge number of wild beasts, monsters, and savage humanoids roaming the landscape and forcing more civilized folks into defensive postures.
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The whole stagnation thing used to really bug me when I read David Eddings books (The Belgariad, The Mallorean) that took place in a world where borders had been stable for more than 1000 years and there was a civil war that had been going on for like 500 years. And the nagging question of why technology didn't progress at all in that time. Then, in like the 11th or 12th book (Polgera?), they explained it. The world was stuck in a loop. Eddings had this whole thing about a Prophesy and when it split by someone trying to do something they shouldn't have (Torak tried to control the Orb of Aldur), the Prophesy "broke," it divided in two, and until it was brought together again, the world couldn't advance. Events would repeat, innovations would simply fizzle or fail to catch on and spread. I imagine a it's a different mechanic, but I think the Wheel of Time use a similar explanation - cyclical time rather than linear time.
Maybe Golarion (and all fantasy worlds) are in the same boat. Maybe the fall of the Starstone (or some other not-supposed-to-have-happened event) has thrown the world in stasis. Or maybe the gods saw the future and they weren't in it, so they slowed things down a bit. It wouldn't be to hard to think of a dozen reasons why Golarion really is stagnant.
We don't even have to think of the world as stagnant from this point. The Golarion timeline is advancing no faster than one year per real world year, and there's no metaplot to keep track of -- in fact, nothing is exactly happening unless DMs want it to -- so who's to say that firearms technology isn't slowly spreading from Alkenstar, that the Technic League isn't actually figuring out how their alien plunder works, that industrial revolutions aren't beginning to erupt all over the place? It'd take a few decades to really spread and change, and by the time the official timeline gets that far we may all have downloaded the PS9 into our cerebral cortexes and be sculpting our own personal Golarion sim-realities. :)