The Sword and Laser discussion

In the beginning of the book Louis mentions that transfer booths (instantaneous travel in other words) have made all the cities on Earth indistinguishable from each other. Do you agree that it would have that effect or do you think the creativity of different artists and artisans and people's different tastes would maintain some distinction as one travelled? I think that individual taste and even something as simple as climate would keep some differences but I do see the argument of growing homogenization with such freedom of movement for goods and ideas. I'm also not finished yet so no idea if this is ever brought up again in the book.

It's hard to say if it would go to that extreme, but the internet has already moved us in that direction at least a little.

I don't think distance is the only thing that makes for cultural diversity though. I think even in a single city, especially larger ones like NYC, you can go a few blocks and things can change dramatically.

What I'd suspect is that the kinds of people you'd see from city to city would be more consistent.

In other words, you wouldn't find a certain group of people/culture in only one or two places on earth, but rather they'd be represented everywhere.

So taken as a whole this might make each city feel Homogeneous with each other.

I suppose another questions is, would it really be a bad thing? How much of the worlds prejudice and racism is based upon around cultural heritage and national pride sort of discussions?

Would it be a loss from an anthropological perspective to lose distinct cultural identities? Yes, but I think on the whole you may end up with a world that would be a lot "calmer".

I think there is a point also at the beginning where Louis describes the way Teela looks and discusses the blending of culturual features in her. They are called flatlanders or something?

Well, we're already seeing the same big box stores and restaurant chains popping up in the same regions. If neoliberal globalization remains a dominant economic policy and more and more local and regional businesses are bought out by fewer and fewer multinational conglomerates, a lot of major cities might start looking the same.

Or it could just be transfer booths mean you don't have to go through the trouble of navigating a city to leave it, i.e., you don't have to look for train stations, airports, highway exits, bus stops, etc., and thus don't become at least passing familiar with the streets and landmarks. I could see people in that society pop across the world to visit a swanky nightclub and pop home without ever looking around at the architecture. You could say our smartphones are already moving us in this direction.

While I agree that we are on our way toward homogenization. I think it would be tragic if we get the point where one city is basically the same as the other. While different cultures can cause conflict I would hate to think that one culture has so dominated the globe that the others simply don't exist anymore.

I think language is one of the few things that still maintain distinct cultures on Earth, along with religion, geography and economic disparity. In my experience of international/intercontinental travel, every decade the cultural differences between cities around the world noticeably diminish. In the Earth of Ringworld, Niven has dispensed with linguistic, religious and economic differences (or at least doesn't talk about them), and ignores the geographical differences in his discussion of the transfer booths. It's clearly one inspiration for Banks' Culture setting, as it reads as the same sort of indulgent hedonism. People go where they want, live where they want, do what they want. Maybe Louis is fabulously wealthy compared to the norm, but maybe not. Maybe everyone has similar freedom. If everyone did, then regional differences would probably cease to exist, with regards to creative endeavors. But money isn't really discussed in Ringworld; who pays for all this stuff?

Harold wrote: "I think language is one of the few things that still maintain distinct cultures on Earth,"

For now. But that's changing too.

Matthew wrote: "I suppose another questions is, would it really be a bad thing? How much of the worlds prejudice and racism is based upon around cultural heritage and national pride sort of discussions?

Would it..."

Ah but then the calmness wouldn't be because we'd progressed to be more understanding or civil, it would just be the absence of difference. Joe Informatico points out the loss of languages already occurring which, as someone who loves language and linguistics, makes me really sad.

Joe you also make a good point that Louis isn't really seen exploring but it does seem he has friends all over so maybe he has on other occasions. His observation also could just be part of his personal funks he gets where he wants away from all people.

Harold, good question about whether Louis's lifestyle is the norm or far above, that would change things as well.

I remember some sort of short story by Niven where he proposed transporters wouldn't work because you had to somehow get rid of the extra energy from the Earth's spin or something...

Cattfish wrote: "I remember some sort of short story by Niven where he proposed transporters wouldn't work because you had to somehow get rid of the extra energy from the Earth's spin or something..."

If we're thinking of the same story, it was that transfer booths would need to deal with the changes in potential energy caused by instantaneously changing altitudes. I think he had a character nearly collapse from the heat caused by transferring to a booth nearer to sea level.

I agreed with Niven that such instantaneous travel would absolutely blur the differences between cities. But if the booths are mostly only in cities, then unless there was nothing left in the world but cities, then I can't picture the level of homogeneity he posits.

I would bet that right now with the internet, people in major cities around the world really are becoming more and more alike in their beliefs, clothing, purchases etc. Because so much in really big cities is already so artificial, climate controlled and multinational. But get out of a city and live somewhere rural, then the environment starts having a much bigger impact on who you are and how you react to the world.

What I think would be likely is cross national enclaves of like minded people, which, when it comes down to it, is just a redrawing of national lines.

I absolutely believe such homogenization would happen. I think that regions would retain their distinct flavor because of local influences and tradition -- New Orleans, Memphis and Austin are more similar than they are different, but they each have their own peculiarities -- but overall there would be shared commonality across a global culture comprised of people who could visit anywhere on a whim.

I don't know, Memphis may be a lot like Austin, but I can tell you, as someone who has lived just over the US, that has more to do with proximity than universal homogenization. The east coast is like a different country compared to the mid-west, and again to the Rockies, again to the west coast. Even more so are the big cities different from the rural towns. I just don't see that going away unless we start putting family members all over the place, really give people a reason to soak in five different places at once.

Deon wrote: "I don't know, Memphis may be a lot like Austin, but I can tell you, as someone who has lived just over the US, that has more to do with proximity than universal homogenization. The east coast is l..."

The instantaneous travel would make people more willing to move away from family or work overseas perhaps...or even live across the globe from work since the commute would be instant? That would allow more soaking up of different places. I would travel every weekend if it was so easy.

Katie wrote: "The instantaneous travel would make people more willing to move away from family or work overseas perhaps...or even live across the globe from work since the commute would be instant? That would allow more soaking up of different places. I would travel every weekend if it was so easy. "

Expense would probably be the only factor at first, but eventually it would be pretty cheap to travel anywhere. Breakfast in London, lunch in Hong Kong, dinner in Christchurch? You bet I'd do that sort of thing all the time.

I imagine in order to cater to a global clientele, there would be places in various cities that would be open continually, with restaurants serving every meal at every time of the day and department stores running around the clock, since you'd never know where your customers are coming from.

Maybe not Mom'n'Pop corner store in Bozeman, Montana, but FAO Schwartz in NYC would likely run 24/7.

I can imagine places like Hawaii would have to place severe restrictions on who can live there and who can visit. As much as I dig New Hampshire in the winter, I'd love to pop over to Maui for the day come February. Every day. There are probably 100 million people who'd like to, as well.

I grew up in Ohio and it's not radically different from NH. There are different attitudes about some things and different words are used for the same items ("soda" versus "pop") but they share more similarities than anything else. Midwestern practicality and Yankee frugality go hand-in-hand, for instance. So far the main difference is due to lower population density. There are no 24-hour stores near me... and I like it that way.

Alan wrote: "Cattfish wrote: "I remember some sort of short story by Niven where he proposed transporters wouldn't work because you had to somehow get rid of the extra energy from the Earth's spin or something...."

Some of his short stories go into detail on the system. The heat transfer is a feature of the early generation of the system, and becomes a plot point, as a murderer teleports a corpse to warm it up, changing the apparent time of death.

Either that story or a later one mentions that the Transport Booth system includes a massive rig moored out in the Atlantic into which all the momentum changes from transfers are "dumped" - each transfer gives it a little 'kick' of momentum, which is then absorbed by the surrounding ocean as it moves.

Cheap, instant transport like this would change the world so radically that homogenization would be only a minor blip. Consider:

Tourism/Travel (what does it mean to travel when you can walk through a booth and be there? How do hotels, restaurants, destination sites cope with instant, cheap travel where they can now be visited by anyone in the world with very little barrier? Why would airlines exist in this world when neither tourists nor business people would need to spend hours in a plane to get where they needed to go?)

Immigration (what does it mean to live in one country if you can instantly work anywhere and port back)

Shipping (gone as an industry that puts things on boats, trains, trucks)

Transportation (why have roads if you can zap from place to place?)

Urbanization (A big feature of living in a city is the ease of access to amenities. When I can step through a portal and walking through Rome, Paris, Bangkok or just downtown Seattle* why should I live in a dense neighborhood)?

Real estate (Following on the 'why live in a city' why would I pay a premium to live in a city vs out in the sticks? Values would adjust radically)

War (hi pocket nuke/bioweapon sent via a transfer booth)

* I live north of Seattle

Internet shopping would get a lot easier, too. Forget waiting days for home delivery - just order what you want, and it bamfs into your lobby.

I think people might still live in urban areas - there's no great advantage to living out in the sticks when you're a few keypresses away from the Rockies or Hawaii or the Australian Outback, and in the unusual event that your transport booth malfunctions, you're going to want to be situated somewhere that an engineer can easily commute to via conventional travel.

One of the consequences of the technology that Niven does explore is that of crowds instantaneously turning up to any major event, in the story "Flash Crowd". That one's since gone on to become a real phenomenon thanks to instantaneous social-media communication, and the modern term "flash mob" may well have its roots in that story.

Mark - good point about living urban, porting to the rural/wilderness/scenic areas. Of course then there's the environmental impact of that.

Interesting about Flash Crowd. I've not read much Niven, so didn't know that story.

Oh, another impact... energy and the related security and economic issues. For example, there's a lot of talk in the US about fracking to get at hard to extract petrol and about the Keystone pipeline that would take tar sand oil from Canada across the US. Both of those go away in Nivens world... why would we u use cars that burn petrol when we can zap from place to place? Why would delivery trucks exist? UPS/Fedex/DHL.... all change hugely to manage logistics but not, probably, to deliver.

Finally, people would face pressure to live near portals both innate (because it's so convenient) and social ('we should maintain roads and trucks to get out to your rural location that doesn't have a transfer booth... why?") In turn, this would raise issues of access similar to those we face now when we look at providing rural areas with high bandwidth internet access, physical mail delivery, etc.

Many (probably most, actually) of the issues you bring up are addressed in Flash Crowd. It packs a ton of speculation into a short story, which is why it's one of my favorites.

The protagonist, Jerryberry Jansen (it was the 70s, what can I say?) is a roving newstaper -- a solo act who reports on the news with just his video camera. That's one of the side things Niven tossed out there which has actually come to pass.

Jansen's dad bought stock in airlines when the first transfer booths came out, because there was a hard limit on how much you could transfer and how far. So truly global long distance travel was impossible... until they engineered a way out of it. Then the Jansens and millions like them went broke as the airlines and shipping industries collapsed.

I believe it's also in Flash Crowd or one of its sequels that Jansen witnesses people drag racing classic cars on one of the few roads still preserved in America. And he's absolutely horrified to learn that the people driving the vehicles are doing so without computer aids of any sort!

Rick wrote: "Cheap, instant transport like this would change the world so radically that homogenization would be only a minor blip. Consider:

Tourism/Travel (what does it mean to travel when you can walk thro..."

I guess resources that went into transportation and highways and such would go into managing the transfer booths to keep hot tourists spots from being overrun, security and maintaining sort of a 'maximum occupancy' for cities and sites rather than just buildings. Instead of roads for vehicles there would be a shift in focus to walkways, promenades.
There would still be a need for conventional transportation in the case of breakdown so that repairs could be made, as you pointed out.

Any change would take quite a while I think. Look how little hybrid and electric cars have really affected our lives in America because of how much our cars are part of our culture and habit...change would be slow and at first I'm sure many people would not trust transfer booths to be safe. Some industries would slowly fade but it wouldn't be immediate upheaval by any means.

Also is there a size limit to what can be transported? That may limit some of the shipping and keep old style transport around for longer.

But really what I keep coming back to in my pondering is how much more I'd get to see my Marine husband...we were long distance before we married and now with training and deployments....we have wished often that someone would figure out teleportation already, dammit. :)

Rick, I grew up north of Seattle (Bothell/Kenmore) and am about to head back there during my husband's upcoming deployment...staying with my parents, eek!

Kenmore? Bothell?? I'm just west of Lake Forest Park... small world. :)

Yay for the Lake Washington area haha! I went to Inglemoor & UW Bothell...aaaaand my 10 year reunion is being planned right now, oi. I've been stuck in NC with my Marine and it's so very different over here in the east, I'm incredibly excited to come back.

The Teleportation stories weren't strictly known space stories. I think they probably fit nicely but IMS they weren't in the Known Space anthologies by Niven's choice.

I have always preferred Niven's short stories to his novels. He runs with a few big ideas and leaves the stage.