Where does Firefly take place? by Hans

FIREFLY EPISODE DISCUSSIONS

Where does Firefly take place?

POSTED BY: HANS
UPDATED: Saturday, July 1, 2006 19:23
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Thursday, August 4, 2005 4:13 AM

You did indeed write a very eloquent Firefly essay. I trod some of tghe same territory on the OB:

http://forums.prospero.com/foxfirefly/messages?msg=3863.269
and http://forums.prospero.com/foxfirefly/messages?msg=3863.275

Just sayin'.

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Thursday, August 4, 2005 4:18 AM

OLDFAN45

I got fidgety about that myownself.

http://forums.prospero.com/foxfirefly/messages?msg=3863.275

Ringworlds solve problems that cryoships don't.

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Thursday, August 4, 2005 10:56 AM

the movie is not the Series. Only the facts have been changed, to irritate the innocent; the names of the actors and characters remain the same

Quote:
Originally posted by WibbledtoDeath:
VERY fast sublight speeds are routine (how far did those Blue Sun agents travel again?....it was done in the space of a few hours to half a day max..the time between them being captured and the hands of blue turning up..was not much over the timetable quick get in and out with the River).

One of us is confusing two eps. On the chance it might be you, here's where I think the confusion arises:
In Train Job, one of the Blue Hands ops says they travelled 86 million miles (from memory). That would be to an Alliance cruiser, somewhere in space (I presume not too far from the world with the train). We aren't told where they started. In Ariel, which I think is the story to which you refer above, as far as I can recall they could have been coming from elsewhere in the same city.

I like your essay.

Keep the Shiny Side Up . . .

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Thursday, August 4, 2005 7:39 PM

WIBBLEDTODEATH

Yes, thank U, I was indeed confusing 2 eps.

This occured in the Train job (not Ariel, as I 1st suggested), it took the blue sun agents an afternoon to travel 86million miles...a little under 1 AU

But I still hold to my belief that very fast non FTL speeds are commonplace.Travel time from a frontier moon to one of the core planets in A firefly class ship is 5 days (in, um, our Mrs Reynolds)....still makes it real fast(besides...the firefly drive effect..was designed to signify real fast (non ftl) speeds are available..without having to go into distracting technical exposition).

Perhapse the best evidence of very efficient sublight travel is Serenity's manouverability in atmosphere and ability to cheaply make escape velocities......this displays some pretty advanced tech.

Tanks to others also for the links to their ringworld explanation/discussion of the exedos from earth that was. It does indeed bear a strong resemblance to the way I imagine things could go (at least regarding the multiple nearby system colonisation)...

although, I imagine that the ringworld model would create more hemogenous societies than we see in firefly (rather than the extreems of primative isolated settlers and core worlds) and kinda reduces the need for terraforming new worlds(you already have a habitable environment...just need to park it near a convenient star and maybe do a lil more asteroid mining for raw resources...if my thinking of it it rightways up...please let my know if not).

Personally, I doubt that society would have got it together enough to have such a coordinated mass exedos (with temps an avarage 1-1.5 celsius higher now than when I was a kid...and weather patterns in Australia changed dramatically..we still cant agree to something so simple as reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. Individuals can be smart...humans en mass tend to be really stupid) More likely that...after developing the technology to travel fast within system (gravetic drives, and nuc fusion thrust etc) and mining/colonising other nearby worlds (Mars, moons of local gas giants etc)....conditions on earth deteriorated to such a degree that alternatives became desireable.

Once conditions got bad enough...and given that travel through space (in system at least) was routine..organisation would have been irrelavent..people would pay what they could/do what is needed to get on a colony ship and get away without any need for organisation on a global scale (although, the practice of terraforming worlds and supplying peeps with transport would have been a real money spinner for corporations and businesses with the ability to do so.....)

Teraforming missions would have been sent out 1st...and colonists...as the environment deteriorated and the means were ready and available anyway...would have departed earth over time in a piecemeal fashion. Thus we have backwater colonies that have been been isolated for ages...reavers...panets upon which the principle form of entertainment is bird juggling etc..along side more modern developed worlds.

Also, I cant see that people would have been particularly concearned about getting to a far off high density star cluster..at least without taking the option of colonising multiple closer to earth systems 1st....Why would you bother travelling 60+ years to get to a system with many planets when you could take a 30 year voyage to a more modest location that would prove just as viable?...Plenty of good looking stars exist within any 10ly wide patch of nearby space..(see this great star chart of systems within 12.5ly: http://www.anzwers.org/free/universe/12lys.html)

That said...the closest system to earth is a star that is a mere .24ly away from aother likely looking binary system...for all you "single" system nuts out there.....I mean, technically its 2 systems...but the distances are more manageable for non ftl travel (although you need to be faster than 2AU/day unless you got a lot of time on your hands..like 6000 days or so...)

Travel to stars within 15ly or so (let alone 4.22ly it takes to get to the nearest 3 star cluster) doesnt require sleepers, ringworlds or generational arcs...if you have very fast space travel A well supplied colony ship (as the one already seen in firefly) could do it (once again though, at the aforementioned 5 days to reach another planet...any in system world...a 4ly trip would take more than many lifetimes)

The speeds we have seen so far in firefly dont support multiple system travel...but maybe can support a star cluster consisting of 1 or 2 primary stars and a few gas giants and red dwarf companions each able to support a few viable worlds (most planest in such a system would be rather dry..according to planetary formation simulations.although i guess you could divert comets and icy asteroids in outer (like, 70AU)orbit as part of the terraforming process).

This would be enough for 70 worlds....but probably not 70 inhabitable ones...if you factor in Earth that was and its system...still not enough but getting in the region of half that, believably...

Nevertheless, you need to have much better sub light propulsion through space than so far seen, getting from earth to another place is gonna take a long time...gravitic drives, as exist in firefly, could (potentially) allow gradual acceleration up to (and maybe beyond) high light speeds for crossing vast gulfs of space, and may make rocketry involved in exiting earth sized gravity fields viable as seen in the show(assuming gravitic drive allows one to bypass certain theoretical relativistic limits tied to gravity and inertia). Very high relativistic speeds are possible even without this...assuming you have huge amounts of fuel to burn...(way more than is realistically viable)

...all of this is, of course, just hypothetical dreaming on my part.....but it does make some sense of the evidence available.

Build a man a fire and he will be warm for a day. Set a man on fire and he will be warm for the rest of his life (:~D

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Thursday, August 4, 2005 10:54 PM

the movie is not the Series. Only the facts have been changed, to irritate the innocent; the names of the actors and characters remain the same

Quote:
Originally posted by WibbledtoDeath:
although, I imagine that the ringworld model would create more hemogenous societies than we see in firefly (rather than the extreems of primative isolated settlers and core worlds)

Well, Larry Niven's ringworld (the original), which is a simplification of a Dyson Sphere, is pretty big -- on the close order of 6 x 10 to the fourteenth power square miles, or about 10 million times the total surface area of Earth, including oceans & polar caps. That's enough elbow room to enable one to get really far away from the nearest neighbour.

Quote:
and kinda reduces the need for terraforming new worlds(you already have a habitable environment...

You certainly won't be terraforming another solid body in a ringworld system. You'd want the mass for the ring itself but, more importantly, anything in the system that isn't attached to the ringworld poses a potential threat, in the astronomically long term.

Keep the Shiny Side Up . . . Train, "Drops of Jupiter"

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Thursday, August 4, 2005 11:12 PM

the movie is not the Series. Only the facts have been changed, to irritate the innocent; the names of the actors and characters remain the same

Quote:
Originally posted by WibbledtoDeath:
Personally, I doubt that society would have got it together enough to have such a coordinated mass exedos (with temps an avarage 1-1.5 celsius higher now than when I was a kid...and weather patterns in Australia changed dramatically..we still cant agree to something so simple as reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.

What's your preference?
Encourage vegetarianism & kill meat animals?
Reduce milk consumption & kill cows?
Outlaw composting? (each of these three should reduce methane production)

Or are you more of a gambler?
Fund design, production & dissemination of methanophagic bacteria? (presumably reducing methane in the atmosphere, but what would they excrete? Downside risk estimates are left as an exercise for the student)
Promote automotive engines that reduce carbon dioxide emissions & increase water vapour emissions? (ooops, I'm sorry, you wanted to decrease global warming, didn't you?)
Offer to take in obsolete nuclear warheads from Russia & the USA to explode them in a spare desert you have laying around (& hope that models indicating more aerosols would have a cooling effect are right & those that indicate it would have a warming effect are wrong)

How 'bout something that does work, @least in the short run:
Replace fossil fuel fired electric power generation with nuclear electric power generation

Or do you want a sure thing, short & long term:
Legislate & enforce reductions in power production
Legislate & enforce reductions in power consumption
Radically increase (factor of 10 @least, to be increased later as needed) taxes on power production & consumption

Simple

Keep the Shiny Side Up . . . Stones, "I'm Alright", "Out of Our Heads"

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Friday, August 5, 2005 2:14 AM

WIBBLEDTODEATH

Actually, I was thinking we could bottle all those greenhouse gases up...keep em for a rainy day.

I am sure they will come in very handy when we are attempting to terraform some cold rock out there in space....

And yes, more use of nuc power sounds good 2 me

(What, you think Serenity runs on Kaylee love alone?)

Actually, we had the option of a perfectly viable solar power generation method proposed some years ago (all that hot arrid outback and no ozone layer has its uses) but it was rejected by a typically conservative government.....now we are investing in desalination plants (HUGE ENERGY HOGS..and very costly) TO SUPPLY WATER...oops, caps.....water for us thirsty people in NSW (who, as it stands, have had
Legislated reductions & Radically increased taxes on water consumption..at least in my lil patch of the verse). Anyhoo...this is not the correct thread for such a discussion...although I am sure that those living on the Earth that was suffered many such issues before they decided to go star trekin.....

Build a man a fire and he will be warm for a night. Set a man on fire and he will be warm for the rest of his life.

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Friday, August 5, 2005 11:27 AM

the movie is not the Series. Only the facts have been changed, to irritate the innocent; the names of the actors and characters remain the same

Quote:
Originally posted by WibbledtoDeath:
Actually, we had the option of a perfectly viable solar power generation method proposed some years ago (all that hot arrid outback and no ozone layer has its uses)

P'r'aps, but proposals for centralized solar-electric power conversion seem lacking in imagination (stuck in a mental rut). A cool thing about solar power is it is so scaleable. Why incur transmission losses of 30% from a regional power station when one can heat water & generate electricity @one's house? The coolest thing about solar is, of course, using more of the fusion power already being generated for us, without our having to ask, tax & utility rate free.

Quote:
now we are investing in desalination plants (HUGE ENERGY HOGS..and very costly)

I'm not sure why nobody seems to want to use solar distillation. It would require more area (1 order of magnitude? 2?) for similar output, but operating costs exclusive of debt service would be far lower. I can't find a comparative analysis.

Y'all in Oz (& SA) might be better off investing in B D Nuclear-powered Marine Engines, to move ice islands from the ice cap.

Quote:
Anyhoo...this is not the correct thread for such a discussion...

True, and I do apologize to everyone; it's just that the Real World Events forum makes my skin crawl.

Keep the Shiny Side Up . . .

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Friday, August 5, 2005 12:15 PM

the movie is not the Series. Only the facts have been changed, to irritate the innocent; the names of the actors and characters remain the same

Quote:
Originally posted by WibbledtoDeath:
although I am sure that those living on the Earth that was suffered many such issues before they decided to go star trekin.....

Unfortunate choice of phrase, that. But @least now we're into General Discussions about Firefly -- still not quite the right forum, but a fair number of threads here in Ep Discussions seem to drift that way.

Lotta room for conjecture, here. Returning to your original question (title of this thread), I @first thought that the three possible answers could have different implications for the demise of Earth-that-Was. Then thinking back to your essay, I realized transport options were the key, and my response began to grow like Topsy. I'll work offline &, if it makes any sense, I'll post.

Keep the Shiny Side Up . . .

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Wednesday, October 5, 2005 8:18 PM

LUPINDA3RD

okay get ready cause i'm going to cover plenty of stuff. *takes a deep breath*

1 in the movie serenity they show a picture of a large solar systern with about 12 planets i guess (not sure cause it was a short glympse)

2 Joss says he dosn't believe in the use of FTL travel

3 the best sources of power would be Fussion, Fission, and Solar

4 many of those worlds were moons which is possible to teriform with my guess.

5 they later mention in the movie that there were planets that couldn't be inhabited

6 I figure Green House Gases could be used to create a thicker atmo for planets that are farther out then others (the gases would trap heat)

7 Well i got nothin for 7 but thanks for listenin

people don't really apreciate what we do in this world, and when we're gone they're gonna wonder why the world sucks

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Sunday, December 4, 2005 6:04 PM

SPACESAMURAI

i think they're might be a third possibility. While not really sceintific in anyway, and more of a cop out than anything else, it could be possible the the 'verse is some kind of unique astrological phenomenon. Just a big group of planetoids kind of like a big ass ort cloud. (I'm terrible at astrology, so this really has no sceintific basis, I got no clue if it's even possible, but it's just an idea).

I aim to misbehave
-Mal-

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Sunday, December 4, 2005 6:04 PM

SPACESAMURAI

sorry, double post.... whoops.

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Monday, December 5, 2005 2:29 AM

DONCOAT

Quote:
Originally posted by spacesamurai:
i think they're might be a third possibility. While not really sceintific in anyway, and more of a cop out than anything else, it could be possible the the 'verse is some kind of unique astrological phenomenon. Just a big group of planetoids kind of like a big ass ort cloud. (I'm terrible at astrology, so this really has no sceintific basis, I got no clue if it's even possible, but it's just an idea).

I think you mean Astronomy, not astrology.

That said, I agree that we don't know enough about other planetary systems to completely rule out the idea of a single-system 'verse, especially if we allow the possibility of some exotic new technologies for terraforming. If we assume the new sun is a large, hot star (which gives a wide "habitation zone") and that there are a lot of planets and moons available as raw material, I'm reasonably comfortable with the single-system scenario as laid out in the Visual Companion.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ain't about you, Jayne. It's about what they need.

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Sunday, June 11, 2006 7:20 AM

KYOBONITSUKI

God! Reading over all this stuff since my last post has been fun.

Well this is my current ides...

IT IS ONE SYSTEM.... THERE IS NO FTL.

Joss has stated this and in the intro to the film the teacher states they found "a new solar system with dozens of planets and hundreds of moons."

There! It's one system... the Verse and Galaxy are slang referring to populated space.

Exactly how big the Verse is is rather difficult to pin down.

In Serenity (the film) the map behind the teacher in River's nightmare shows us a 20 orbit system (however the 6th orbit seems to be unoccupied). In this map there does not seem to be any indication that the system is a multistar system. It is possible that this map only covers the core.

Problems with this map are that the instructor mentions "dozens of planets and hundreds of moons"... 20 is a bit low for "dozens." When she speaks of "the savage outer planets" the 11th planet in this system is detailed, seeming to suggest that this map includes the outer planets. the shooting script also indicates that the planet we are meant to see is on "the edge of the galaxy."

The map featuring Miranda, later in the film, seems to show a completely different and complicated system. It appears to be at minimum a 5 star system (quintary?) with four star systems around the central core system. Miranda is indicated as being in the Burnham quadrant - seeming to indicate a division of the verse into 4 parts - perhaps these satellite systems.

This map seems to show a core system of 6 orbits around a yellow-white star. Clockwise from the 2 o'clock position we have: 9 orbits and one ring around a small blue-white star; 5 orbits around a medium-size red star; 15 orbits and one ring around a slightly smaller yellow star; and 8 orbits and 3 rings around a midsize orange star.

This map seems to feature worlds that match the "Worlds of the Alliance" graphic, and the blue-white star could have some significance to the Blue Sun corporation. The problem is the severe improbability of a quintary system. A rather laboured explanation could be that some or all of the satellite stars are engineered, (perhaps from grey dwarf gas giants a la 2010).

The fact that these two maps seem to contradict each other seems to indicate that the creative staff has no idea how the Verse is laid out. Making any attempt by us fans to figure it out nigh impossible - but mighty fun to ponder.

Myself... for my own little selfish purposes (read: RPG) have decided that this is a 5 focus system as shown in the map in the visual companion. Each of the 4 remote stars is a grey dwarf... and provides the name of the quadrant... thus Miranda orbits Burnham.

The system is not beholden to Bode's Law and habitable planets are not strictly required to be in the biozone of the star. The core system consists of 20 planets as shown on the teachers screen but only the orbits shown on the Miranda graphic are terraformed.

Now how to explain "dozens" of planets.....

cheers

matt

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Tuesday, June 27, 2006 3:16 PM

TRAVELER

The one thing I've learned about science fiction is you have to learn to bend. Travel to another star you invent hyper drive or if your a Star Trek fan warp drive. What are they? There had to have been some way to travel to other stars for this story to end up in another or as some people beleave several other solar systems. It most be a very early type of travel or they would be hopping to other systems. But nobody seems to be doing that. I get the feeling they are at one solar system that mUst have a large star with alot more planets around it than our own system. The planets nearer the star would be like Earth and they call them the central planets. The other worlds are moons of gas giants like Jupitor, which are farther from the star like our own. These moons would have to be fairly equal in size to Earth to have the right gravity. A planet the size of Jupitor could have more than one moon like this and the heat produced by this gas giant would help to support life on these moons. Now there must be several of these planets in order to have all these habital moons. So again I think the star must be much larger than our old Sol to have produced all these satelites. But I beleave Joss didn't worry about any of this. He had a ship and he sent it where ever he wanted it to go. If it stayed in one solar system or traveled beyond didn't matter to him. They never explain the engine. It revolves. Why? It looks good if you have moving parts. If their engine had the capacity to travel to other solar systems then firing it up, to do the Crazy Ivan in the atmosphere of Whitefall, in the first episode would have destroyed that planet. And how come when they are in space and another ship comes by they are going so slow. If they are traveling countless thousands of miles the ships would be a just a flash on their screen if they were lucky. Not this holding their breath hoping the reavers don't spot them. In order to create a story you most bend. And science fiction has done that since Flash Gordon and will continue to do it, whether it be Star Trek, Farscape, or any other show you can name. Write the story and don't worry how far they traveled or how fast. So it doesn't matter if it is one solar system or several the cows will forget they are cows until they are outside again. And Jayne will always lie and whore. You can bend science fiction but you can't bend Jayne.

Traveler

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Tuesday, June 27, 2006 9:14 PM

MAGHAFFAR

Well no one's weighed in with the obvious assessment (OK, except for the guy right above me who sneaked in while I was editing this thing)vis a vis looking at the show from Joss and the writers P.O.V. Joss has said he doesn't know beans about science and doesn't really care. The focus was always on storytelling. So it's clear to me (as a writer) that no one was paying that much attention to the details about what the size framework was for the show, just that it "appears" to be based on a single system with major terraformed planets that have lots of terraformed moons around them. As this scenario is highly improbable scientifically, it seems clear to me that Joss and the writers weren't trying to play "Mr. Science" in their stories. Just trying to tell human-based stories set in a "small" framework of Alliance = core worlds, Independents / the rest of humanity = rim worlds and outer moons. This was done to provide a dramtic background for lots of things to work with story-wise, and not for scientific consistency. There are all sorts of scientific improbables you can chalk up if you start looking -- the ol' "how many angels can dance on the head of a pin" debate. Meaning, it's irrelevant. The show and the movie were never about the science but about the people. So let's not get all bogged down in a geek-fest debate on intangibles that none of the creators / writers even cared about (said by a true geek from the original Star Trek days). OK, that's my 2-cents.

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Wednesday, June 28, 2006 1:24 PM

TRAVELER

Guess I'm a faster editor MAGhaffer. But your angels on the head of a pin is a perfect example of what is happening here. The wonderful thing is, nobody is wrong. You can make the story anywhere you want it. Jayne won't stop bedding every whore he meets if you change their location or the size of space they travel in.

What do we do with the chain of command?

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Wednesday, June 28, 2006 2:25 PM

MAGHAFFAR

Quote:
Originally posted by traveler:
Jayne won't stop bedding every whore he meets if you change their location or the size of space they travel in.

What do we do with the chain of command?

What else? Give it to River -- she'll
whup EVERYBODY'S ass!
...Or we could talk more.

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Wednesday, June 28, 2006 2:26 PM

MAGHAFFAR

dble post. oops. [ducks River's mean-ass
swing with that ol' Chain of Command]

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Saturday, July 1, 2006 10:56 AM

OVERLORD

Well said, MAGhaffar! People tend to forget that Firefly is Science-Fiction. The planets could be anywhere at anytime and it does not really matter.

Now, say I wanted to be geeky enough and bring Science into the picture. Well, chances are the setting of Firefly is in one or two galaxies. The crew of Serenity is not flying from one part of the Universe to the other or else most of the show would be spent seeing the crew's life onboard during spaceflight. Either way, it is still fiction. Best to take the Science aspect of Firefly with a pinch of salt.

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Saturday, July 1, 2006 7:23 PM

EXODUS

Well, I favour Hypothesis #2 for a couple of reasons.

1. The fact that other colonized solar systems are discussed is pretty much a straight answer.
2. The statement used to defend Hypothesis #1 about how Earth found a new solar system to use up could have referred to past colonies being terraformed in only one solar system. This could have changed over time to many solar system thus creating jurisdictions (ie. core planets, outer rim).

I would also like to say though that this is Science-Fiction and therefore it is best that it is not analyzed scientifically (especially if the writer of the series comes from a weak scientific background). If I had to choose, I would choose Hypothesis #2 but either way, it is Firefly and I love it.

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