This week, I’m talking about interchanging technology in worldbuilding. Specifically, how the nuts and bolts of the future that I’ve developed can be transferred between all the different settings that I use.
Once you have a good idea, it’s a shame to waste it. Even worse is spending time inventing something else that does the same thing as what you already have. Simply because it’s needed in a different universe.
There are several common themes running across my Sci-fi novels. Even though they don’t share the same universe or the same timeline.
I can’t claim to have invented these things. They’re based on real-life technology or ideas that I’ve seen or heard about over the years, random snippets that I’ve joined together. I’m just using them, or a modified version of them.
One is the concept of interstellar travel at faster than light speed. In my version of how the planets keep connected, the ships never enter a planet’s atmosphere. They follow a circular route and stop at each planet on it, where shuttles transfer the passengers and cargo to the surface. The advantage of this is that they can be larger, more powerful and ultimately more luxurious. Naturally, freight transport and private ships have their own arrangements.
Then there are interstellar communications. I’ve borrowed from the theory of quantum entanglement to provide an instantaneous means of transmitting audio and video between planets. I called it the Q-Com. To assist, I’ve placed a network of relay stations throughout the Galaxy.
Then we come to the Maglev. Originally suggested by Eric Laithwaite and others, it’s a monorail that uses magnetic repulsion to levitate a carriage over a rail and an effect called the magnetic river to propel it.
That’s the big stuff; other items that cross over include a specially modified gun that is safe to use in a spaceship and a portable generator that you put in running water. And in the ‘what I think ought to be invented’ category, a sonic deterrent to keep wild animals at bay.
Not forgetting the little things. There are the self-heating meals and the square coffee cups (so you can carry four easily). And the anti-static personal shielding, which keeps you dry on the rainier planets.
Then there are all the components of daily life, which will be familiar and still just as necessary in the worlds of the future. They can be incorporated as they are.
It all combines to create a realistic feeling, a believable universe.
Once you start, it’s easy to invent or modify things that are familiar to us. And, as you move forward in time, you can update and refine your inventions, so that the science keeps pace with the future you’re creating.
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