Deterrents to Technological Advancements

[RobA]

The magical ruling elite might suppress some inventions while allowing others to develop. The Lord Mage is quite happy for you invent a steam powered carpet weaver, but when he hears about the development of guns or explosives he steps in.

I have that situation in my world at the moment.

I was watching a show on History Chanel last night that discussed the religions of Alexandria and the works of Heron. The show implied that most of his inventions were made for temples in order to better awe the common folk, and compete against the other temples, such as the ever classic "I get wine, you get water" gag.

-Rob A.

[waldronate]

Population was important for development in our world. Specifically, the population of poor people. In Western Europe before the great plague population was relatively stable. After the plague, though , there was a severe shortage of peasants. Those that survivied were a valuable commodity and they could begin to wring concessions out of their masters such as the right to move. Some were able to move toward middle class and this increased the shortage further. Labor-saving devices were adopted more rapidly in order to feed the population. A similar situation appeared in America - too much land and too few people. Contrast this to China, which began to stagnate as soon as the emperor made the decision to stop looking outside his borders. The population was stable and there was no reason to innovate. After all, why use a fancy ditch-digging machine that can replace 20 men if you still have to feed those 20 men anyhow?

Or so I've been told.

And never overlook the value of a frontier (a place where the unhappy can go to be away from society).

[gilgamec]

Another big factor in the rate of technological development, which has been hinted at, is social mobility. The people who create most technical innovation -- and here I'm talking about the little things from which progress grows, like a new block on your loom that lets you run a few more wefts an hour, or a new strap on the harness so your horse can pull a few more pounds -- are not the upper classes, but the people who are down and dirty, doing the work. There's a lot more of them, and they're much more familiar with how any given process works, what its flaws and strengths are, and so on. But in a lot of traditional societies, there's no impetus for them to improve anything. So what if they can increase the amount of land they can plough? At the end of the day, the local lord still owns the land, they won't be getting any more, they and their children and their children's children will still be peasants working the same acre until the end of time.

Differences in social mobility can be seen in a lot of societies. Medieval Scotland had very tightly defined social classes with very little mobility between them, and stagnated during the Middle Ages, while England had much more social mobility, and flourished. Hindu India, with its impenetrable caste system, advanced much less than China, which had greater social mobility.

And never overlook the value of a frontier (a place where the unhappy can go to be away from society).

And where social restrictions are lessened. This also happened in medieval times in cities (which is why city air makes free).

[Hai-Etlik]

Well, fundamentally, Technology is just using knowledge to accomplish a goal. So to cut off technology, you want to cut off the improvement of knowledge. Secondly, you want to cut off the use of it to accomplish new goals.

Of the examples given, Religion tends to cut off the advancement of knowledge. The availability of slave or magic and lack of social mobility tend to cut off new goals/uses for knowledge.

Keeping as much of the population stuck as subsistence farmers keeps them from having time to think of new ideas or ways to use them so agricultural technology is one of the primary things you want to control. Finance and trade also have strong enabling effects, especially as they tie in so much with pure math.

So, you probably want a dogmatic, theocratic caste based society with a large population of slaves and strong reinforcement between the societal structure and the religion.

The major Eurasian religions all have points to offer in developing something like this. The Abrahamic faiths are dogmatic and have a doctrine of preferring faith over knowledge and loads of agricultural/food taboos. A monotheistic viewpoint would also help reinforce the point of conformity. Confucianism makes a point of knowing your place and keeping to the natural order which kept the Chinese from exploiting many of their discoveries as readily as the Europeans later did. Hinduism provides a strong caste structure and karma/reincarnation as a justification for that rigidity (You can move up, but not in this life time, so don't even bother trying)

So I might aim for a huge empire with no rivals ruled by a hereditary, theocratic, oligarchy: a priest/leader caste. I'd give them a single, omnipotent creator god, but toss in karma and reincarnation as fairly key elements and Confucianism as 'icing'. The "mental state trumps actions" elements of Christianity and Buddhism might work well. Karma would be mostly "what the god thinks of you", and there would be LONG lists of bizarre and arbitrary things the god doesn't like. Trade and agriculture in particular would be heavily restricted by religious taboos. Slave and peasant/serf are castes and are the two biggest ones.

Actually there are plenty of things in the Abrahamic religions that work well inspiration for anti-technology taboos:

Planting different crops in the same field: Make that no crop rotation.
Pigs are unclean: There are also more efficient at converting food to meat than cows or sheep.
Usury: No remotely modern financial system.
Faith over Evidence (Doubting Thomas): Asking questions makes the god angry. Next time round you'll be a slave, maybe after being tortured in limbo until you are worthy of being a slave.
Disease is the result of demons sent against the wicked. Medical treatment is against the god's will.
Images of things in the real world are a mockery of the god's creations.

Some other good ones off the top of my head:

Horses are holy and only to be used by the upper castes. The yokes used with oxen for draft work would choke horses, and the god made them this way. No one would even imagine a horse collar.
Tilling the soil for new life must be done with that which was once alive. Plows must be made of wood, not metal.

[LonewandererD]

Sorry to bump this thread but I've got an idea about technology to run past the guild that relates to this thread.

The Dal are isolated from the rest of the "civilised world" who are going through a kind of magic-industrial revolution so the Dal wouldn't be at their level of technology. The Dal however are quite advanced because they are on a continent where Humans are a vast minority and so they had to advance rather quickly to compete and survive against the other dominant races. However, no matter how far they advance there is one thing holding them back, a lack of abundant iron ore. A lack of iron, used specifically to make steel, has held back there technology as iron is now a rare commodity controlled by the clan leaders and so the craftsman and inventors of the clans are somewhat limited to working with other less valuable ores like common stone and copper and an abundant supply of wood, but these can only go so far. So we wouldn't see fully amoured knights as the clan leaders wouldn't want to use so much steel on one person when they could make swords and arrowheads for multiple people and so weapons that were made to work against armoured foes like maces and crossbows would be rare in the Dal lands becuase they would less effective than bows, swords and spears which are simpler to make and work well against unarmoured foes. This would also prevent the Dal from creating cannons, why would use so much metal on an untried weapon when a wooden ballista or catapult have already proven their worth. This would also see an increase in fighting techniques and practices as warriors are not wieghed down by so much armour and don't have to train to overcome a foes amour but rather their foes skill.


Does all this seem reasonable?

-D-

[tilt]

yes - it makes perfect sense. It would be like making cannons of gold in our world (except for the strengt of the metal)

[Midgardsormr]

Yes, it makes sense, but remember that a lack of iron will likely cause other military technologies to accelerate to compensate. I'm not sure what the minimum required technological level for industrial ceramics is, but such materials can be lightweight and strong, and can carry a sharp edge. Failing that, some Central and South American societies used obsidian for their tools—an obsidian flake can be sharper than surgical steel. Others used sharks' teeth to make swords. Resins and leather might be used to construct armor that is far tougher than the leather armor in other parts of the world. A Korean Hwach'a, an ancient mobile rocket battery, requires no metal in its construction.

[cfds]

Great thread. I would never had linked the Renaissance to the plague but reading it now it sounds very logical.
I would go so far to say that the only thing to effectively hinder technological advancement is a stable society with many available workers (slaves or peasants).
Even strict authorities (be it priests or mages) can not stop inventiveness if there is enough outside (war or simple economical concurrence) or inside (famines, plagues) pressure.
I also agree with those who say that unavailability of "key elements" merely "reroutes" technology instead of slowing its advancement.

[Greason Wolfe]

I'm glad I started this discussion now. Lots of great input so far. Although I wasn't looking for something specific in terms of creating a particular culture or society ( I was just asking in general for the most part ), this has spurred a lot of great ideas and thought. Just wanted to thank everyone who has chimed in so far. I'm not sure how much I will be around here over the next month or so, my grandmother has taken a turn for the worse, so the family and I are a bit caught up in that situation, but I'll try to keep checking in from time to time just to see how things are going.

GW

[Aval Penworth]

Great thread. I would never had linked the Renaissance to the plague but reading it now it sounds very logical.
I would go so far to say that the only thing to effectively hinder technological advancement is a stable society with many available workers (slaves or peasants).
Even strict authorities (be it priests or mages) can not stop inventiveness if there is enough outside (war or simple economical concurrence) or inside (famines, plagues) pressure.
I also agree with those who say that unavailability of "key elements" merely "reroutes" technology instead of slowing its advancement.

Nah. Powerful mage-priest rulers can stop inventiveness. If a real omnipotent, interventionist GOD says no widgets, then it is no widgets. These guys can also prevent famines and cure plagues if it suits them. Fantasy worlds do not correlate to medieval or ancient earth.