TECHNOLOGY (v2.0)- hosted by SnowFire

[NotLikeTea]

Thanks for mentioning Invention! I had forgotton that it was an actual tech, and a dumb one at that.

Invention? Invention? What do you call the creation of the wheel??

I like the idea of necessity, as I mentioned earlier... Caravels wouldn't need two continents.. let's just say two coastal cities further apart than 30 squares. Why not use boats to go from the north to south of a continent? Just as handy as from one continent to the next...

Of course, you should be able to research caravels in any case. Necessity hastens invention, but it doesn't have to be the only force. Of course, researching caravles if you don't need them won't serve as the same inspiration.

[korn469]

Flavor Dave,

your idea though stated in different manner is on the same wavelength as mine.

my idea works kind of like how the gateway techs in the summary do but not exactly so if your having problems grasping this idea look at the gateway techs part of the summary

yeah you are missing my point because i'm having a hard time articulating myself. but your idea is virtually identical to mine. my idea is that technology by itself doesn't do anything for you. so if you turned on cheat mode and gave yourself every tech in the the tech tree, you would still only be able to build warriors.

the various applications associated with technology (by applications, i mean units, special ablities, buildings, wonders) wouldn't be triggered by just discovering the tech alone, you'd have to have an enabler. and enabler is like a technology but you can't research it. it happens, and it'd happen like in your example...if you build five libraries then the conditions are right for your people to get the renassanse enabler education

ok civ2 has ages, ancient, renassance, industrial, and modern...CTP has even more ages than that. what i'm trying to do with the enabler idea is represent the underlying reasons why we went from one age to another. I mean there is a reason that the renassance happned when it did, and that reason was more because of non technilogical factors than some inventor saying..."oh i created the renassance!" this explains why taking the blueprints for an AK-47 back in time to ancient rome wouldn't mean that they could suddenly outit all their legions withs Ak-47s

here's an other example (maybe it will be easier to understand than the one in my previous post) you just started the game and a goody hut is right beside of your city. you step into the the goody hut and you get the technology for bronze working. in civ2 this means that you now can build the colosses and the phalanx unit. under my system you wouldn't be ale to build the phalanx or the colosses. you would need an enabler to let you utilize bronze working capabilities. lets say when you built 5 military units you'd get the ancient era enabler organization that would then enable you to build a phalanx. this wouldn't enable the colosses, some other thing would enable it. that is an example of how it would work. in the ancient era maybe you wouldn't have enablers for strictly play balancing reasons. however to advance to the renassance age you'd have to set up the conditions it would take to start the renassance. maybe you'd have to switch out of despotism and build four libraries to trigger the renassance. these conditons would be partially random and partially "build 5 libraries to start the renassance". it's work like this you build 5 libraries then you'd have a good chance (%80) of the renassance starting. the enablers for the renassance might be like this

-reach a population of 50 in your empire, and be a monarchy: triggers one enabler(%80 chance of this happening)
-build five libraries: triggers another enabler (%80 chance of this happening)
-establish an embassy with one other civilization: triggers a different enabler (%80 chance of this happening)

it could be like a scenario victory condition except that would be what triggers the renassance era.

therefore enabler+tech=applications (which are units, buildings, wonders, special abilities)

this to some extent seperates techs from units. it gives you intermediate goals for your empire, (i wanna make the industrial revolution happen fast! how can i get 100 people in my empire and demacracy by 800A.D.?) it also means that even if you are the first one to discover a tech you aren't necesarily the one to put it to a good use. for example China invented gun powder in the early 1100's i think. but they didn't equip their armies with guns. because they didn't have the right mindset and factors to do this. the enablers would represent the midset and the infrastructure present that triggered the each age.

maybe that makes some sence. i'm still stiking to my main defense of this idea. it'd be alot of fun! especially when you played your first game and didn't know what triggers the modern age. (perhaps 5 cities size 10 or larger along with the knowlegde of electricity) and then to accidently stumble upon the combination of events thats triggers your modern age it'd be awsome. i'm also sure that techniques would develop for getting to each age as fast as possible. also a player who took advantage of infinite city sprawl and just built elephants would never trigger the renassance. so it'd strike more of a balance between war and development

korn469

ps if you still don't get it tell me and i'll try to explain it even better...if you do get it tell me if it needs improvment and if so how

[EnochF]

I think necessity should be a prerequisite for invention.

well I'm lost

p.s. I love the new look - you know what i'm talkin about

[Flavor Dave]

korn--I think you need to be careful about the enablers--if you make this too much a part of the game, you're just slowing it down.

How about this-
You have one enabler for units, and one for buildings, in each age. Wonders never need enablers. The enabler is different and random each game.

Like this--you can only build warriors until you get organization. Organization might be triggered whenever you have 2 warriors in the same city. Or it might be when your military has 5 units total. At that point, you are enabled to build anything up to musketeers and dragoons.

You can't build anything except city walls and temples until you've discovered architecture, which is triggered by a total of 5 buildings, or if your science output per turn equals 20 beakers, etc. Then you can build everything up to banks and universities, which need the renaissance trigger/enabler. Etc.

Change the tech for dragoons to mounted war or something, and make leadership the tech for musketeers and dragoons and everything this side of MIs and tanks and howies, which need another tech to enable modern warfare. And leadership might be enabled by having killed a certain number of enemy units, or by a certain size army, or embassies with over half of AI civs. The random thing might be cool.

The renaissance and industrial and modern (may not want industrial to be its own age, tho) could be triggered by a combo of techs, or even a combo of 3 of 5 techs and a certain number of cities, or population, whatever.

I see what you mean about ICS, but at deity, I don't really know if this works against the AI that well anyway. HG is a necessity, and even with it, you kinda run out of steam after a while. I've had stronger games with modified perfectionism, where I have 10-12 great cities entering the industrial era, and then go to war after I've finished Hoover Dam.

That's the best I can do with your idea right now. I still think the other idea is better, that navigation means Magellan's but not caravels until something else happens. Higher learning doesn't allow universities unless XX happens also.

But I kinda think that the above idea would be better with random triggers, where possible. It's a neat twist--more realistic, more fun, helps avoid the strategy funnels. But if it adds too much luck to the game, then this should be an option.

[SnowFire]

korn/Flavor: Check out #39. Rather short, I know, but is there anything I'm missing? Tell me if so.

Alexander: Cool idea, but I think that's more a job for the SOCIAL ENGINEERING thread than this one.

[Miner]

QUOTE:
"One little niggling note, though, just to intimidate one more time: the study of the earth's crust, which is related to the exploration for oil and other undergrond resources, is Geomorphology - had a roommate in college majoring in it years ago.
Geology is a better title for the game, though: CivIII as a College Catalog won't sell any extra games to anyone! "

Ahem!

The study of mineral deposits is called Mining Geology. Geomorphology (lit: shape of the earth) is just Physical Geography, ie glaciers make valleys.

My alibi isn't Miner for nothing!

Here endeth the lesson

From the point of view of Civ, Geology as an advance should enable things like advanced/deep mines or increased resource production from mines. It represents the change from mining being "I'll dig here because the rock is glittery" to the formal study of rocks & minerals. Therefore a prerequisite should be University.

[Jon Miller]

hope this gets read, this thread has not been used much recently

I think that you should learn theories and learn seperate applications of those theories, getting some free applications for each theory based on your current condition, like if you are at war and there is a war application you might learn it for free, while if you aren't at war you would have to seperately study each military application

what application you learned would be somewhat based on chance (you would get like one free application with each theory)

if you decide to study like war applications, then you could get past applications, applications from the most recent theory, or an application from a theory only one step up, and you would not know what one you would get (like in blind research

there would be certain ages where you could no longer get past applications (why learn longbows when you have guns)

some theories would require different sets or groups of sets previous theories and applications as prerequisites

some applications might have different sets and groups of sets of previous theories and applications in order to build them too

an example would be a frigate, you would have to have the theory of map making, navigation, metalurgy, magnetism, and have the application of cannons (following the old civ2 techs and applications)

I'm sure that some better set of theories and applications could be thought of

theories would do nothing but allow more applications

this is realistic to have them seperate because they where throughout history that is how it has been

it takes theories and previous ideas on how to use them to make up new ides on how to use those already thought up applications for a new application

there should always be a chance (maybe affected by how obvious that application is, which would be a factor based on how many historical civilizations thought of it) of getting a related when you learn a theory or application

even if you don't get the related application it should get easier and easier for you to learn it when you learn a related theory or application (this makes sense, as you delve more and more into one area your understanding of that area grows)

these additional applications would be the sudden flashes of insight mentioned earlier

this would handle the longbow and other advances that not every civilization had because in this idea as in real life what you learn is based on your need, if you ask for war application at the proper time and you have the proper prerequisites then the longbow will be one of the applications that you will be able to get, (which one would be figured by blind research, if you wanted to complicate it farther the whole process could be affect on some level by nearby resources, such as no ship applications (nor maybe certain theories) if you have no cities by the sea or longbow comes up more often if there are a lot of trees by you)

people seem to often misinterpret or ignore my ideas so if you don't understand something please post or email the question


Jon Miller

[Theben]

Enablers: do you really want them?

1) Tech advances, while not really accurate, do represent advances of society accurately enough. To take korn469's 3 examples:

-Reach pop of 50: Already in Civ you research quicker if you have higher pop
-Build 5 libraries: Libraries enable quicker research
-Establish embassy: If other civ has tech you can trade or demand it. Even if no new techs, trade routes enhance research,and there are players who demand research treaties for civ3.

Defeats strategy funnel: Instead I see a different style of strategy funnel developing here. The player will race for all the enablers before the AI -which is too stupid to understand what it should research 1st- gets them, especially once the player is familiar with the game. This might be avoidable if Firaxis had random enablers for certain things, but they'd have to be VERY creative AND do A LOT of extra research to find variants that sound reasonable to players. And for all that, there'd still be people unhappy with this system. So I vote NAY to enablers.

Jon Miller,
perhaps if you used commas correctly and didn't have run on sentences and made a list before you post and read the list and then posted it cause if you don't follow it easily then maybe other people will have difficulty following you and then they will be frustrated trying to follow it and then won't post so if you did that we could respond to your ideas better.

[Scooter]

Per Snowfire's request, I'm posting this here. It was originaly in the unofficial GAME OPTIONS, PREFERENCES, & UNIT OPTIONS list.

How about a Tech accelerater option. If Civ A has twice the accumulated science as Civ B, then Civ B get's double science points for X turns. I use these numbers as an example, they would have to be tested of course. This would be nice for newbies who get far behind, but more importantly it would extend the games of experts by "cheating" on behalf of the AI to get them back in the race. I stop playing a lot of my games once it's academic that I've won, just systematic, boring mopping up remains. With this option, the game would still be interesting till the end.

Other ways to accomplish the same goal would be to grant the "technologically challenged CPU opponent" an Edison's Lab type of effect until it recovers, or for X turns. Or give them a few spies placed throught the world that have a better chance to steal advances.

Just some way to extend the challenge would be really great.
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"BEEFCAKE, BEEFCAKE!!!

-E. Cartman
<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by Scooter (edited July 09, 1999).]</font>

[Harel]

Talking about sci.fi games, I just got a copy of a grand space-conquering game: Malkari.
Now, Malkari has a wonderful idea on how to handle technology. This idea, put into civ III could allow us several key ideas people asked: theortical/pratical research, catgorial research, improvment, etc.
Now, this is how the Malkari research model works:
You have several catagories for models: propulsion, weapons, computers, etc. in Civ III, ofcourse, it can be: combat, biology, physics, etc. Every section contained several concepts. Things you allready know are colored green, and new items to acquire are noted red and with a progress bar.
You spend points on allready available models. For every model, you have another bar: pratical/theortical research. More practial research allows improve the current model: cheaper, faster, works better, etc. Theoritcal research boost the speed in which you acquire new models. When you gain a certain amount of new models, you move into a new tech level, which allows you a totaly new set of new models. You can still build the older ones: they would probaly be improved and cost a lot more.

In civ III, for example, you gain Phalanxs. Do you spend research to improve it ( gaining speed/attack/defence bonus, and reducing cost ) or speding more or theortical research which will boost the speed which you will gain legions?
We can divide the entire game into 9 tech levels:
1: bronze age
2: iron age
3: old age ( advanced-roman )
4: middle-ages
5: borok
6: industrial
7: pre-modern ( 1900-1950 )
8: modern ( 1950 - 2010 )
9: futuristic ( 2010 -

[Jon Miller]

Theben, if you had read my passage you would have read that if you wanted say a war application, what you actually get depends on chance and which one has the most chance, affected by previous enablers as I have said

the human couldn't be sure what they would get either and since you choose the applications you study based on need (and you study theories if you need more knowledge), if a human needs a war application he will get one the same way as the computer player

and since it is possible to get application from one level higher in theory, the computer player won't get stuck there, especially if they are programed properly on when to get military applications, different types of domestic applications, and theories

Jon

[Ecce Homo]

Harel, is there any info about Malkari on the Internet?

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The best ideas are those that can be improved.
Ecce Homo

[Harel]

Yes there is Ecce homo, MINE. For all my information, I have the second site on the net which is only dedicted to Malkari.
The interface is a little blocky, but enjoy:
http://members.xoom.com/Chronicals

Also, check IMagicGames:
http://www.imagicgames.com/Malkari

Hope this help! Malkari is a grand game!

[wonderdog4]

I don't know if this is the right place to post this or not, but MING suggested I post it so here it is.

How about a new tech called nationalism which follows monarchy or republic but precedes conscription. It was nationalism, afterall, which allowed Napoleon to "invent" national conscription.

Nationalism could make cities more difficult (or expensive) to bribe. It might also make
one unhappy person content.

If it does these things, then it need not be accompanied by a special wonder or a new unit.

[Gregurabi]

This matches some of the ideas in the summary, but I'd like to throw some support behind the idea of technologies which don't just allow you to build things. I'd like to see a better variety of advances which, having been learned, give immediate benefits.

Examples of this in past Civ games include Navigation (in Civ2, your Trireme units have less chance of sinking if they end a turn away from shore), Nuclear Power (sea units get 1 extra movement point), Mysticism (doubles the effect of temples), and so on.

I'd like to see this expanded. The first one that comes to mind is Mass Production -- this should boost the effect of factories. Nuclear Power should not give extra movement points to Triremes, but it could (continue to) give a boost to Submarines and other high-tech sea units. Someone just suggested that Nationalism should give a small happiness boost -- good idea, but it might vary with one's government type. Crop rotation and certain other techs should give a bonus to food production -- you shouldn't have to go build "rotating farm" tile improvements or something equally silly; the farmers will just farm more efficiently.

(CTP takes this to an extreme, and lets you build Lawyer units which can actually be killed in battle. If you want to engage in economic warfare, that's great, but not by *building* and sending Lawyer *units* into enemy territory -- it should be done from a central menu, perhaps spending money and diverting resources into an economic warfare system.... So along with the tech of Economics (or equiv.) you'd get the ability to wage economic war, but this wouldn't mean building some silly unit.)

Automobiles should increase happiness. (They should do a lot of things, actually -- the introduction of the automobile triggered some of the biggest social changes of this century. But this implies that you can actually build the things, which ties back to the notion of acquiring techs well beyond one's current level of development....)

There should also be more of an obsolescence effect as well -- the other side of this coin. There's already a precedent for this, too -- Communism decreases the effect of Cathedrals in Civ2, and the Automobile increases pollution. Again, I'd like to see this expanded. Rationalism (call it what you like -- the Enlightenment, Secularization, etc.) should decrease the effect of religious institutions, before Communism does, but should increase research speed and lead (eventually) to non-religious means of happiness. Reliable Contraception (a good and useful tech, I agree -- unreliable alternatives have existed for thousands of years...) should decrease your growth rate (but increase productivity and happiness).

Anyway, I could come up with more examples, given more time, but the overriding point is that I don't think that technologies should be defined by what they let you build.

[NotLikeTea]

Agreed!

As a note on contraception... this is where Civ and the "Real World" (tm) diverge. In Civ, all population is good population, the more the merrier! In the real world, over population is as much a problem, if not more, than underpopilation. In the real world, population grows without surplus food all the time.

If there were bad aspects to overpopulation, contraception would be a wonderful, and needed tech. If this is not changed, it would only be a penalty.

[FinnishGuy]

There's an interesting discussion going on in CIVILIZATIONS about barbarians = minor civs and civs splitting. Anyway, the concept of nationalism was brought up by Zakalwe. So, a proposal for a new advance: Nationalism.

(I see in the summary someone has suggested "the Enlightenment" advance. It could be a prerequisite for Nationalism.)


from CIVILIZATIONS thread:

Zakalwe:
"Later, Nationalism should really open the can of worms. In my opinion, it would have to be a 'gateway' tech for many other advances, such as consription (levee en masse), but also carry a heavy burden. All those cities your civ captured during the last few centuries should be much harder to control, and the chances of them slipping off to form their own states should be increased."

me:
"I agree with the comment about Nationalism being a gateway tech. BTW, I proposed "the Great Revolution" WoW in WONDERS thread (civs can't switch to modern republic/democracy before it has been built, gives half military unit costs for 20 turns to the civ that builds it, ...). It could well be linked to Nationalism tech advance."

Zakalwe:
"The "Great Revolution" wonder sounds like a good idea. Combined with nationalism, it would be a sort of a turning point in the game - ushering in the new era of nation-states and increased unrest."

[EnochF]

I guess this would be the right forum to make this suggestion...

One aspect of Alpha Centauri I think would be perfect for Civ III is the "datalinks"-style of presentation for technology. By that I mean that, whenever you discover a technology, a window will pop up that describes the technology and also begins playing a sound file. In fact, I think that the sound files would be a lot more entertaining for genuine technologies than for the imaginary technobabble found in SMAC.

Hire some competent actors to read the parts, so we hear Socrates for Philosophy, Sun Tzu for Tactics, St. Augustine for Theology, Solomon for Monarchy, Hammurabi for Code of Laws, Aristarchus or Ptolemy for Astronomy, and later on maybe Gustavus Adolphus for Gunpowder, Newton for Gravity, Marconi for Radio, Watt for the Steam Engine, Carnegie for Steel, Einstein or Oppenheimer for Atomic Theory, Jefferson for Democracy, Marx for Communism, Patton for Mobile Warfare. Maybe for Seafaring, have an excerpt from Homer's Odyssey, or the Iliad for Bronze Working.

Sure, there should be an option to switch off the tech blurbs, because after a while, hearing the same future tech blurb over and over is no fun. (I'm so sick of the Planet-voice saying "eternity lies ahead of us...") But it would make the first few games a lot more fun, and it would really help to rope in the first-time players.

What others? Uh, for mathematics, Pythagoras... or maybe Euclid, or perhaps that should be for Geometry. For Chivalry, an excerpt from Sir Thomas Malory would do. The Wright Brothers for Flight, perhaps, or maybe Montgolfier. Dalton for Chemistry. Keynes for Economics. Goddard for Rocketry, or maybe Von Braun, just to be perverse. For Monotheism, something biblical (probably the commandment "thou shalt have no other gods before me" would be apropos). Lorenzo de' Medici for Banking. Henry Ford for Automobile. Some of the early techs might be difficult... I can't think of a proper blurb for Writing or Ceremonial Burial, for example, though perhaps some Amerindian sources might help.

[loinburger]

This will likely be my one and only contribution to this forum--

Trade. In CivI and CivII trade was only good for increasing the 'trade' output at your bases and thus was only indirectly resonsible for aiding in technological advances. However, trade (and contact with other civilizations in general) should do more towards assisting research. As the example is, you don't 'know' you're trying to develop gunpowder, it just happens; BUT, if you're on a (un)friendly visit to a civilization that posesses gunpowder, say your caravan just arrived at China and you've got yourself a trade pact cemented, and lo and behold you witness the glory of gunpowder! "I must have the secret to this stuff so that I can conquer later on," you blurt out, but alas! the chinese keep the secret of gunpowder to themselves and will not give you the tech. BUT, your contact with the Chinese should boost your research efforts, and should help you direct them towards gunpowder instead of blindly researching. The closer you are with other civilizations (not to mean that you are on friendly terms, but just the closer you are to each other and the more often your units meet either in communication or combat) the more research bonuses you should get from them. Johnny Civilization in the mountains isn't near water, and Billy Civilization isn't near mountains, but they both expand and meet on the plains and trade whatever. Eventually they expand elsewhere where there are both mountains and water--they will both be prepared for this change with water/mountain units, as they have learned the secret art of boating/skiing from each other. They're not perfect at it, but they've got a good start.

[Theben]

Gregurabi,
I agree, sir (good name, btw)! I had some ideas regarding the expansion of techs that give you small bonuses w/o needing a unit or city structure to implement:

Medicine: +1 food for every 4 citizens/city. It's not really food, but reflects extra growth for longer lives.

Sanitation: As medicine; combined you get +1 food per 3 citizens.

Public Health: +1 per 3 citizens on it's own; w/ one above tech=+1 per 2; both=+1 per 1 citizen.

The construction of a factory creates 1 unhappy person per 4 citizens in a city; combined w/ a manu. plant= 1 unhappy per 2 citizens. Labor Union tech would negate this unhappiness.

Techs such as mapmaking, literacy, flight would add a small % bonus (2-5%) to both espionage missions and to the combat bonus of units.

These are older ideas, now I think that happiness should be % based, and the "food" bonuses above could be represented by a bonus to happiness instead. A happy pop grows quickly, while unhappy ones grow slower or shrink (emmigration).

Other ideas tommorrow.

[SnowFire]

Sorry all for the delay. My connection/Netscape crashed alternately several times yesterday (and I hadn't saved my work- argh!). And Apolyton was down today.

I'm working on a new list to send to BR that has all of the specific ideas to go along with all of the general ideas in the current list. I'm still here and watching this, don't worry!

Some comments:

Technophile: Check out idea 54, Diplomatic Research Synergy.

Nationalism: A big goal of CivIII should be discouraging huge, sprawling empires. The discovery of Nationalism should allow stronger armies and happier home cities, as well as any cities of yours that are captured violently hate your capturers. But it works both ways, too. All cities part of civs that were recently conquered by your empire, were conquered long ago and are still mistreated (i.e. they have imperial garrisons built from your home cities imposing martial law, rather than native-grown garrisons), will start to fester with nationalist feeling.

Well, that's my take on the subject at least, as a poster not a TM.

More on Monday, or earlier.

[loinburger]

Research Specialization:

An idea has been proposed by Korn in the Movement/Supply thread that in order to support troops one must create "Soldier Specialists" in the cities supporting the soldiers. His initial proposal was that each Soldier Specialist would give a +1 bonus to psych, -2 to econ, and -2 to labs. I liked his idea with one exception, that being the labs penalty. I proposed (and I think Korn agreed with me) that the Soldier Specialist should give a labs penalty ONLY TO "PEACEFUL" TECH ADNVANCEMENT! IOW, "agriculture" is a good peaceful tech, which means that if your civilization was allocating research to "agriculture" then each soldier specialist would give a -2 tech penalty (but only towards research in ag). However, if you were allocating research towards, say, Stealth Technology, then each soldier specialist would give a +2 penalty to research in that field. A neutral tech (neither peace or war oriented), such as Media (propaganda and National Public Radio) would receive neither a labs bonus nor penalty. This would essentially lock a civilization into researching only war-related techs so long as a standing army exists, or that civ would suffer severe lab penalties (once you start down the dark path, forever will it control your destiny).

What's this got to do with a tech thread? Well, what if ALL scientists could be specialized? Biologists, Chemists, Physicists, Anthropologists--they would all increase the effeciency with which you research your tech advances. Changing specialists around would cause a loss in effeciency, so once you give a guy a job you don't want to change it. However, if you MUST change a scientists specialty, then the amount of effeciency lost would depend on how related the scientists' old and new fields were (a Physicist could easily become a Chemist but would have problems becoming an Anthropologist). Scientist Specialist Specialists would receive additional lab bonuses if their city contained the proper city improvement (Physicists would function best if they had a Physics Lab, or whatever).

This would add another layer to research, as you don't want to be changing your specialists around too often (if ever) and you would therefore be locked into a research path. However, this might make the game too complex and/or tedious. You decide. This bevy of scientists could always be reduced to three-five scientist types (from least inclined to war to most inclined to war, for example).

[Iceman88888888]

I think cloning should be one of the most important advances you can get. I agree that religious groups and rights activitests would object, their should be lots of benifits as well, eg. Large untrained cloned armys, Cloned workers working for peanuts, Pefect entertainers, Pefect food there are millions of benefets

[NotLikeTea]

I disagree on the cloning issue.

Untrained Cloned armies - Why? An untrained cloned army would be just as succesful as an untrained normal army.

Cloned entertainers - Why? A cloned elvis would be physically identical, but might not be interested in music. Maybe they'd be a great rocket scientist..

Cloned workers working for peanuts - Why? A cloned person is just like an uncloned person, except physically identical.

[loinburger]

I agree with NotLikeTea about clones. It is feasible that you can genetically engineer a society into a biological machine by giving everybody a full frontal lobotomy, and this would mean that "nature" would describe a person while "nurture" would have no part whatsoever. But you can't just clone Einstein and expect to get another genius. Just for a primitive example, what if the cloned Einstein was brain damaged? (or worse yet, what if the REAL Einstein was brain damaged?) What if his foster parents beat him or something? Genetic engineering could play a major part in the game (biologically enhanced soldiers with no emotions to get in the way) but cloning should do nothing more than act as a population boom.

[SnowFire]

Check out <a href="http://apolyton.net/forums/Forum28/HTML/000176.html">Tech 2.1</a> for more. This thread has died an honorable death.
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