From: julie@pascal.org   
      
   On Saturday, June 28, 2014 12:22:55 PM UTC-6, Shawn Wilson wrote:   
   > 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.   
      
   The pharma industry is based on the unique local biology.  Fungus, plants,   
   tiger gallbladders... it's the only real export the planet has other than   
   working holidays for archaeologists.  There will be on-site labs and a certain   
   amount of economic    
   speculation related to figuring out if the slime on a particular toad is good   
   for anything. The city supports the port so it will have all of the normal   
   things that are required day-to-day such as a construction industry, food   
   production and processing,    
   hospitals, transportation, and at least one repair yard for orbital shuttles.    
   Port City is what it is, a transplanted center of commerce and population.    
      
   On the other side of the world from where my story is set.   
       
   >    
   > 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.   
      
   And jack-all for population.  And it lasted all of 30 years, less than a full   
   generation.   
       
      
   >    
   > 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.   
      
   Well, if no one is going to question it, then I suppose that's the definition   
   of "not a problem".   
      
   It's still not stopping the author from having an issue with having plopped   
   down a small colony in the temperate zone of a planet and then having it stay   
   that way for several centuries.   
      
   -Julie   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)