Daybreak, Part 3 (421)

[VSS]

Written communication is limited if those reading it do not understand the concepts. (Would a society that hasn't had telephones for centuries understand a job description of an operator or a call center rep? If I use the term 'party-line' - a term from just a decade or two ago - do you even know what I'm referring to?)

Spoiler:

If the Colonials had written their own history using terms and concepts in their own language such as Cylon, robot, thinking machine, artificial intelligence, the meaning of those concepts would have been lost over time. The first generation Survivors would of course know them, but when the second generation came around, even if the 1st Generation described the concepts, the 2nd Generation wouldn't fully understand them. (How do you describe a 'copy machine' to someone that's never seen one?) They might understand the concepts, but the full understanding wouldn't be there. Then when the 2nd Gen passes on to the 3rd, the 3rd wouldn't have the same understanding. It becomes a situation of the children's game Telephone. Each generation describes to the best of their ability the technology, the events, the lessons, but over time the understanding would be lost. Stretch that over 150,000 years and its all easily lost to time.

We see this even today. I work in the Meeting & Trade Show industry. If I tell you that I'm a Travel Director or Field Staff, you won't fully appreciate all that that entails unless you're in the industry. Even if I go into specifics of the job duties, after I've described my job to you, if you try to describe it to someone else and I ask that 3rd party what my job is - they won't come nearly close to communicating all that it is. If I write down a detailed job description and place that in a time capsule to be opened in 150,000 years, those that read it may or may not understand it. If I use words such as transportation, meetings, conventions, programs, events, if the audience from 150,000 has no concept of what those words mean, the meaning has been lost. Even if the language of 150,000 from today is based on English, the concept of what the words mean may have been lost. (How does someone who hears the phrase 'please answer the phone' know what 'the phone' is if they don't have one? If in 150,000 years there are no phones and there haven't been for centuries, how does someone know what 'answering the phone' means even if its written?) When you factor in that languages evolve and change over time, English in 150,000 may not even have the word 'telephone' in their vocabulary even if the device still exists. Case in point, the term horseless carriage is not in our everyday vocabulary, although the device is. I dare say if I were to walk up to someone and ask if they own a horseless carriage they may pause for a moment, if not flat out say no. If I ask if they own a car on the other hand...

I'm not talking about the content of the language, vocabulary, etc. I'm talking about the existence of a written language. Civilization would be much, much older than we consider it to be now if there had been a written language of any kind 150,000 years ago.

[knowles2]

I was referring to the distance that a ship using FTL drives would cover versus a ship traveling at the close to the speed of light - not the unit of measure.

If a car were to cover 1,000 miles in 1 second via a dimensional jump, it has traveled further than a car driving at 85 mph. In the 1 second that it covered 1,000 miles a car at 85 mph would have only covered .02 miles. If that same car were to continue driving for 2,000 constantly, the distance that it would cover would still be minute compared to the distanced covered by the car making the FTL jumps - assuming that the car was making the FTL jumps somewhat constantly.

to you just talking about speed of travel and not distance of travel. If it was a race both cars have still travel the same distance just different speeds. That what I could interpret from that. May be I just not getting it.

[BobBot]

Hahahaha, sorry nothing hahahah, sorry hahahah, really if there was nothing new to say Hahahaha then why are they doing a other film. Why are there so many people asking so many questions on here, nah there plenty of stuff they could of covered, they did not because they choose not to, not because there not stuff to cover or to say or stories to tell.

I meant in the context of the finale he had written. In the two-part finale he wrote, he said all he wanted to say - and he didn't want to say anything about the questions us viewers still have, because he only wanted to say 'god did it'. So he had to pad out the time to three episodes, but didn't want to add anymore detail. So we got vague flashbacks that added nothing. Of course, the last 5 or 6 episodes could have been filled with answers, but the writers didn't want to write the ending that way.

[BobBot]

So no one really answered because of all these thread mergings with this thread.

How can 38,000 english speaking humans be dropped onto our Earth 150,000 years ago across the entire planet, one of them (Hera) apparently breeds with a LOT of people and is the common ancestor for most humans 150,000 years later.. but in this world (OUR world now), they would have been speaking English in Tanzania.. and South America.. and America (before Aztecs, before Native Americans, etc.). So kind of a big plot hole to be saying that 38,000 cultured, educated and English speaking citizens from another world landed on ours 150,000 years ago and their history turned out the same as ours.

I'm pretty sure if someone took a time machine right now and shoved a random 38,000 people from America into it, dropped them off 150,000 years ago, Times Square wouldn't be there.

Why do people on this forum keep assuming Hera bred with a lot of people? She only needed to have one daughter!!! Basic genetics, you people should have learned this in high school! Or at the very least, Wikipedia.

And their history wasn't the same as ours - it is the same history. The show says they are our ancestors, so all we are is down to the Colonials, Cylons and indigenous peoples merging into one species.

Good grief, none of this is hard to understand, why are people so confused?

[Rob052067]

...Lee and Kara started their futile dance (I took Zak's "something's broken" comment to signify Lee, Kara, and their potential relationship more than the glass).

I just got a chill down my spine when I read that. So many little things to catch that I missed the first time through.

[bmadiuk]

I was so let down by the ending. The Adama's after all they gave for humanity end up alone? Starbuck "disappears" into nothing.

Sending the fleet into the SUN? I don't know about you guys but I was SAD not relieved at the end of the series. I love the characters and the show... but the way it turned out just made me sad on the inside for all of the characters.

[Skydiver]

I'm not talking about the content of the language, vocabulary, etc. I'm talking about the existence of a written language. Civilization would be much, much older than we consider it to be now if there had been a written language of any kind 150,000 years ago.

written on what? they h ad no paper mills, not tech to capture thier words. maybe they did write but it simply did not survive. there were countless cataclysms in the past 150,000 years, any one of which could have wiped out thier whole library - like the Library at Alexandra, that was burned to the ground, who knows, maybe that's where all the galactican history went, up in smoke

Why do people on this forum keep assuming Hera bred with a lot of people? She only needed to have one daughter!!! Basic genetics, you people should have learned this in high school! Or at the very least, Wikipedia.

And their history wasn't the same as ours - it is the same history. The show says they are our ancestors, so all we are is down to the Colonials, Cylons and indigenous peoples merging into one species.

Good grief, none of this is hard to understand, why are people so confused?

or lots of daughters that had lots of daughters that had lots of daughters

do the math - which i won't

say she had 3 daughters that had 3 each, that's 9, that then had 3 each, that's 27...so 2 generations and we're up to 27 descendants. and continue that (times three) for 15,000 more times.....or something like that, i nkow the math is flawed somewhere. anyway, as long as her children were 'fruitful and multiplied' it's very conceivable for us all to be descended from her.

every single person on this planet now is 50th cousins or less from anyone else. we're all related, if you go back far enough

[HAL2100]

I'm not talking about the content of the language, vocabulary, etc. I'm talking about the existence of a written language. Civilization would be much, much older than we consider it to be now if there had been a written language of any kind 150,000 years ago.

Not neccessarily. The existence of a written language does not predict the degree to which the civilization will advance. If the members of the civilization are not pursuing science, technology and mathematics, the existence of a written language will not do any thing to advance the civilization. You also have to factor in that although there my be a written language, catastrophic events may occur which result in the society having to put aside knowledge for the sake of survival. (If your scrounging for food, I don't think that you'll have too much time to consider String Theory.) While the society might eventually recover from the catastrophic event, there would enevitibly be some knowledge that is lost.

[HAL2100]

to you just talking about speed of travel and not distance of travel. If it was a race both cars have still travel the same distance just different speeds. That what I could interpret from that. May be I just not getting it.

No you're not. It doesn't matter if you're using the same unit of measure. The fact is if one car can travel the same distance at 1/100th the time it takes for the another vehicle to travel the same distance, the other vehicle will be able to cover more distance.

Let's say for example, that you have two cars. One can travel at 85 mp the other at 35 mph. The car that can travel at 85mph will be able to travel a farther distance simply because it can cover more distance in a shorter period of time.

We know for a fact that the distance between Earth and the Twelve Colonies can be covered in less than 4 years by using FTL jumps, probably less in fact. We also know that a ship traveling at sublight speeds takes nearly 2,000 years to cover the same distance. Therefore if a ship with a FTL driver were to jump constantly for 2,000 years, it would cover a further distance.

In your example above, YES both vehicle would cover the same distance at different speeds, but the TIME necessary to do it would be different.

[VSS]

Not neccessarily. The existence of a written language does not predict the degree to which the civilization will advance. If the members of the civilization are not pursuing science, technology and mathematics, the existence of a written language will not do any thing to advance the civilization. You also have to factor in that although there my be a written language, catastrophic events may occur which result in the society having to put aside knowledge for the sake of survival. (If your scrounging for food, I don't think that you'll have too much time to consider String Theory.) While the society might eventually recover from the catastrophic event, there would enevitibly be some knowledge that is lost.

Written language makes it possible to pursue science, technology and mathematics. Human nature, being what it is, provides the motivation. Furthermore, they scattered the former members of the Colonies all across the face of the earth, making it very unlikely that all writing would be lost in a catastrophic event. And since we had plenty to write about before string theory, I'm sure it has uses other than advanced physics.

Writing is like the discovery of fire. Once achieved, it's the kind of tool that will never be lost. It is the factor that is the dividing line between historic and prehistoric. It's the most valuable tool we have. That's why enforced illiteracy is used as a tool of oppression and control- because the ability to communicate ideas (even if it's just recording crop rotations, weather and trade accounts) is powerful. But even with enforced illiteracy, there are people who still risk life and limb to learn how to read.

[VSS]

written on what? they h ad no paper mills, not tech to capture thier words. maybe they did write but it simply did not survive. there were countless cataclysms in the past 150,000 years, any one of which could have wiped out thier whole library - like the Library at Alexandra, that was burned to the ground, who knows, maybe that's where all the galactican history went, up in smoke

The Library of Alexandria was burned, but written language didn't die out, did it? It never has, not since it was first invented. One civilization or another has possessed it since Babylonia. It's too persistent. And there were too many individual groups of people after the dispersion of the Colonists for me to believe that every one of them regressed to that point.

ANd you don't need paper to write. Although paper is actually not that hard to make, you can even make it at home. Or around a campfire.

[garhkal]

Another comparison would be that a jump drive Folds space. That is at least one theory. An other theory about Jump drives is that is creates a spacial disturbance and the ship uses that disturbance to go from point a to point b. One additional theory which violates theory of Relativity is that it goes through space so quick it seems like it is instantaneous.

I am probabily in the former catagory in that it is a space time teleporter like drive...

[rockerlad]

what away to end the show, gutted its finshed tho, there is a nice special on sky1 now called the last fracking special

[chaotic_uk]

what a pile of crock the final few ep's were tbh , was expecting much better than this rubbish .

[hamatau'ri]

Brilliant ending to the show, its sad its gone now, all that's left is "The Plan" and thats it. Liked the ways they solved the mysteries of the Opera House, very nice actually. The bit where one of the Ones said "Frak!" and shot himself made me laugh! As I said, Brilliant episode, nice links to Tollund Man (Woman) aswell!