somervta comments on Universal Fire - Less Wrong

63 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 27 April 2007 09:15PM

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Comment author: TJIC2 28 April 2007 02:00:30AM 17 points [-]

In his SF novel "Dies the Fire", S. M. Stirling posits some event that stops all electronic and most chemical technology from working. The 21st century world is quickly replaced by a medieval one.

Yet Stirling is a pretty bright guy, and he has some bright characters, so a few of them wonder at the subtlety and precision of the event, such that it stops gasoline from burning quickly, and gunpowder from working, and yet allows human brain cells to keep processing information at exactly the same rate.

As you might guess, Stirling never reveals exactly what fundamental constant became a variable, nor how much it changed, but that's to be expected.

It is fiction, after all.

Comment author: somervta 04 April 2014 08:17:48AM 0 points [-]

It's theorized by characters that ASBs did it:

The causes of the Change are subject to much speculation among the characters of the Emberverse universe, with a large range of theories relating to it. Popular amongst the Christian, Wiccan and other religious communities is the idea that the Change was a divine act by God, the Æsir, or the Lord and Lady, whether for punishment or to protect humanity from themselves. Another theory is that the effect was caused by an alien intelligence in an effort to minimize the ability of a competing civilization to wage war in their universe, or some other unknown purpose. These aliens apparently have the ability to affect matter and energy at the quantum level. This theory was referred by Ken Larsson, who referred to the alien intelligence as "Alien Space Bats". A smaller, less popular theory holds that the Change was a completely natural occurrence. There is no evidence that the Change is reversible.

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