From: ikonoqlast@gmail.com   
      
   On Wednesday, June 25, 2014 10:30:43 PM UTC-7, J.Pascal wrote:   
      
      
   > But I'm realizing... why *wouldn't* they have a couple big cities?     
      
      
   Cites serve an economic end that defines their location and size.  If the   
   economic situation doesn't call for/support a large city, one won't exist.     
      
   Here, what is basically going on is mining.  For tech/information rather than   
   gold, but the same forces apply.  A local pharma industry is unrealistic.    
   Those will always be high civilization adjacent.  Agriculture for specific   
   components and preliminary    
   processing of those components is perfectly fine.   
      
   So, you have an amount of economic activity on the planet.  Obviously it must   
   be scattered.  There aren't large unified deposits of [economia] to exploit,   
   so no large cities to exploit them.  QED.  Think the 19th century American   
   frontier.  If the    
   inhabitants wanted large cities they would have stayed back east.  St Louis to   
   San Francisco that was jack-all for large cities.   
      
   What else?  The low tech is obviously domestic, the high tech imported.  They   
   may have maker machines (*we* have those, forget 3d printing, an automated   
   milling machine can make damn near anything) to make one off items of high   
   tech on an as needed basis.   
        
      
   As I see it, and I am an economist, I don't think your situation requires   
   justification.  It's fine.     
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)