Satellites

[WhiskyJack]

from the fcc.gov's explanation about sats to children:

 

"In the end, all human-made satellites will fall back to Earth, since objects eventually lose velocity and are overcome by the Earth’s gravity. It may take a very long time for this to happen, however, because satellites are so high in space. Satellites near the Earth in low-Earth orbit may take 10, 20, or 100 years to fall back to Earth. Satellites higher up in highly-elliptical or geostationary orbits may take hundreds, thousands, or even million of years to fall back to Earth. Objects falling back to Earth will burn up in the atmosphere due to the friction caused by the Earth’s atmosphere."

 

gravity always wins.

 

 

I think all these falling satellites are given a nudge. Once you have a stable orbit, it's the gravity that is keeping you up there! And since there is no friction, no reason for you to slow down.

[sandoz12]

I remember Alviarin thinking how she wishes they had lifts (which Messana) had told her about. So I assumed that while they used the OP a lot in the AOL they also had electricity and all the trappings that go with it. In the scene Alviarin thinks how she can much easier imagine lifts rather than planes.

 

Our modern elevators run on electricity. Elevators per se don't need electricity to run. If you can have flying machines based on OP, you can have elevators based on OP.

Good point. Still as Siun says in TGH that it's easier to get a blacksmith to make a knife rather than use the OP to. So while they could have had elevators running on the OP they may still have used electricity.

[Jon Paul]

They didn't?

 

No they did not.

 

So what was the job of Hall of Servants?

 

The Hall of the Servants regulated the affairs of the Aes Sedai. But it was nothing like the White Tower.

 

Is there any mention of other form of government especially since Hall of servant clearly was the only place where war policies were made.

 

The reason war policy was decided in the Hall of Servants was because they were fighting a war against channellers. But in the BWB a non-channelling government is declared to have existed and it was not subservient to the Hall of the Servants.

[algspkr]

Given that we seem to be the first age I would expect some of our satellites to have survived; particularly those in geosynchronous orbit to have survived. That said the third age seems to lack the science of astronomy and so any satellites would just be points of light little different from stars or planets. And there is a very good possibility that archaeologists from the Age of Legends "excavated" most if not all of the survivors.

 

As has been previously pointed out the Age of Legends had little practical use for satellites.

[WhiskyJack]

They didn't?

 

No they did not.

 

So what was the job of Hall of Servants?

 

The Hall of the Servants regulated the affairs of the Aes Sedai. But it was nothing like the White Tower.

 

Is there any mention of other form of government especially since Hall of servant clearly was the only place where war policies were made.

 

The reason war policy was decided in the Hall of Servants was because they were fighting a war against channellers. But in the BWB a non-channelling government is declared to have existed and it was not subservient to the Hall of the Servants.

 

 

Am I asking too much by asking you to actually prove all that?

 

P.S: Why did these people call themselves Aes Sedai?

[Jon Paul]

Am I asking too much by asking you to actually prove all that?

 

Not at all. It's all in the BWB.

 

P.S: Why did these people call themselves Aes Sedai?

 

They called themselves Servants of All because they served society.

[WhiskyJack]

Am I asking too much by asking you to actually prove all that?

 

Not at all. It's all in the BWB.

 

P.S: Why did these people call themselves Aes Sedai?

 

They called themselves Servants of All because they served society.

 

 

I am clueless about BWB so if you can point me to a quote from book...

And why exactly all Aes Sedai were Channelers? I am pretty sure that "serving the society" can be applied to anyone, the soldiers, the educators, the government officials, the cobbler, the farmer,you know the non-channeling crowd. Why would bunch of channelers specifically call themselves Aes Sedai as if rest of the world didn't serve the society?

[Remy Blobet]

I really like the whole Mosc and Merc going to the stars on a ship idea being Russia and America. Props to whoever found that.

 

Maybe in the first age, the ability to channel was created (say by genetic mutations or some other scientific method we don't know about yet). Taking into consideration how much technology has advanced within the last 100 years, I don't think it's too far of a stretch to believe something like that (in say 1000 years) is achievable. Maybe the introduction of channeling ended the first age.

With the introduction of channeling, people started to get lazy and not work on the (non-"power") technological side of things. I mean, why would they? It sounds like the Age of Legends was a time when there was no sickness, starvation, etc. Then the introduction of the True Power (I think that's the DO's power?) to be used by people ended the second age.

And possible Fain's new power will somehow be made available to people thus ending the third age. And channeling is a recessive trait (genetically) and the reason why the amount of channelers have been dwindling.

 

Of course all of this is just a stab in the dark. I'm sure we'll never get an answer on whether the first age really is our age, but it would have been cool to talk with Robert Jordan and actually learn what the first age was and how things got to where they were today (today as in Wheel of Time today).

[Jon Paul]

I am clueless about BWB so if you can point me to a quote from book...

 

According to all sources the Aes Sedai in the Age of Legends had a very loose sort of organisation. To what extent that organisation was part of the world government is not known; clearly Aes Sedai were highly influential, with considerable power, at least at times, but equally clearly they were not the entire government and did not necessarily dominate it.

 

From there it goes on to explain the organisation of the Aes Sedai etc.

 

And why exactly all Aes Sedai were Channelers? I am pretty sure that "serving the society" can be applied to anyone, the soldiers, the educators, the government officials, the cobbler, the farmer,you know the non-channeling crowd. Why would bunch of channelers specifically call themselves Aes Sedai as if rest of the world didn't serve the society?

 

Simple. The channellers got there first.

[Agitel]

Why do people think the AoL wasn't technologically advanced? Aes Sedai were considered too valuable to mass produce magical goods. The One Power was a very valuable research tool, it could be used to study the very fabric of reality and to learn things about physics and what not that would have been impossible otherwise. Once the research was done and the principles understood, loads of highly advanced technological tools could be made without channeling.

[WhiskyJack]

I am clueless about BWB so if you can point me to a quote from book...

 

According to all sources the Aes Sedai in the Age of Legends had a very loose sort of organisation. To what extent that organisation was part of the world government is not known; clearly Aes Sedai were highly influential, with considerable power, at least at times, but equally clearly they were not the entire government and did not necessarily dominate it.

 

From there it goes on to explain the organisation of the Aes Sedai etc.

 

And why exactly all Aes Sedai were Channelers? I am pretty sure that "serving the society" can be applied to anyone, the soldiers, the educators, the government officials, the cobbler, the farmer,you know the non-channeling crowd. Why would bunch of channelers specifically call themselves Aes Sedai as if rest of the world didn't serve the society?

 

Simple. The channellers got there first.

 

 

I am still trying to find the book in your post...channelers getting there first notwithstanding (let me guess, another assumption on your part if that is even suppose to make sense). So again, what book was that?

[Zentari]

I am still trying to find the book in your post...channelers getting there first notwithstanding (let me guess, another assumption on your part if that is even suppose to make sense). So again, what book was that?

Education time.

[WhiskyJack]

From link:

 

 

The World of Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time is a reference book for the bestselling The Wheel of Time epic fantasy series of novels by Robert Jordan. It is published in the United States by Tor Books and in the United Kingdom by Orbit Books. The bulk of the text was written by Teresa Patterson based on notes and information provided by Robert Jordan, with Jordan also serving as overall editor on the project.

 

Whilst the information in the guide is broadly canonical, the book is deliberately written with vague, biased or even downright false (or guessed) information in places, as Patterson felt this would reflect a key theme of the series (the mutability of knowledge across time and distance).[1]

 

 

 

So did wheel go round round round or square? Looks like whatever I do, can't shake the trolls

[Zentari]

So did wheel go round round round or square? Looks like whatever I do, can't shake the trolls

Massive, 100-gallon cast iron pot calling the kettle black.

[WhiskyJack]

So did wheel go round round round or square? Looks like whatever I do, can't shake the trolls

Massive, 100-gallon cast iron pot calling the kettle black.

 

 

You are 100-gallon cast iron? Sounds..heavy...Don't worry, it's all the will of wheel. No one even pees in the RJ's world without wheel willing it

[PastorDeSemolaDeGranoDuro]

It is not likely these satellites would be usable, if they were still in orbit.

 

If they were in orbit, and worked like ours do the control segment that aligns and 'repairs' these satellites would have long been wiped out, let alone the user segment, i.e the AoL citizens using it or us. So there would be no phase coding, no time calculations, in fact probably nothing in the way of signals.

 

Given that Siuan was easily able to generate a TAR map I could speculate the AoL Aes Sedai at least could generate maps. Maybe there were ter'angreal that could create maps.

[Terez]

I seem to remember a line somewhere, I think it was when Elayne and Avi are talking about ter'angreal when they reference something called the "standing weaves" which powered small ter'angreal like call boxes so non-channelers could use them. I think Elayne was talking about a discussion she had with Moghedien. That would also explain how jo-cars and sho-wings were powered and why they all seemed to stop working, seemingly at the same time (from what we can tell in Rand's vision in the glass columns in Rhuidean). That being the case, it seems like things like satellites would be unneeded and would either have crashed to the ground long ago or been removed from orbit.

 

EDIT: Ahh yes, here's a wiki entry that references the "standing weaves."

 

My link

I hate the Wiki.

 

For a moment' date=' Alviarin only stared at the package. Her most precious possession, a thing from the Age of Legends, but she had never dared use it before. Only in the worst emergency, Mesaana had said, the most desperate need, yet what need could be more dire than this? Mesaana said the thing could take hammer blows without breaking, but she undid the wrappings with the care she would have used with a piece of fine blown glass, revealing a [i']ter’angreal[/i], a brilliant red rod no larger than her forefinger, utterly smooth except for a few fine lines worked into the surface in a sin­uous interconnecting pattern. Embracing the Source, she touched that pattern with hair-thin flows of Fire and Earth at two of the interconnections. That would not have been necessary in the Age of Legends, but something called the “standing flows” no longer existed. A world where almost any ter’angreal could be used by peo­ple unable to channel seemed odd beyond comprehension. Why had it been allowed?

Read the BWB. Technology was developed with the Power, but it wasn't always necessary to make the technology work. In any case they didn't seem to use electricity, and the communications systems were most likely Power-based. Supposedly, ter'angreal like this one were common.

[algspkr]

Why do people think the AoL wasn't technologically advanced? Aes Sedai were considered too valuable to mass produce magical goods. The One Power was a very valuable research tool, it could be used to study the very fabric of reality and to learn things about physics and what not that would have been impossible otherwise. Once the research was done and the principles understood, loads of highly advanced technological tools could be made without channeling.

 

Their technology was One Power based, rather than electricity based. We know they had standing weaves and that ter'angreal were common, they were even used for mundane applications like flower vaces. I believe that there were Aes Sedai "engineers" who designed new ter'angreal where were then manufactured on a large scale using other ter'angreal.

[Erunion]

While I'm certain that the AOL people discovered electricity, they seem (according to what we know from the BWB + the series) to have had no real need for it, as they had a far more readily available, effective and reliable power source in The One Power. Why use electricity, which requires a huge energy infrastructure, when you can just tap the seemingly infinite power that keeps the universe going? It's just not an economically viable tool in the world of the Age of Legends.

 

On satellites, what few satellites that were 'perfectly' placed (IE: Geosynchronous orbital satellites that can last thousands upon thousands of years) would no longer have been in 'perfect' positions after the Breaking (if any were still in the air at that time), as it is likely that the severe magical destruction of the planets surface would have had enough of an effect to shake up the satellites slightly (it may even have happened when the Collam Daan exploded, and the bore was drilled).

While it is possible that some still remain, it is very unlikely, and even if there were some they would likely degraded to the point of uselessness.

 

If you want to see a bunch of references to the 20th century, read the chapter in EOTW where Thom is introduced and talks about such things as "Mosk and Merc the giants who dueled with spears of fire that reached around the world" (US + USSR dueling with ICBMs), "Alsbet, Queen of All" (likely Queen Elizabeth II, with a bit of Queen Victoria and Queen Elizabeth I thrown in), and my personal favorite "Lenn, who flew to the moon in the belly of an Eagle of fire, and his daughter Satya who danced among the stars" (a reference to the Lunar Landings and the International Space Station).

 

(Note, I'm going from memory, so the above tales may be slightly reworded or misspelt. I apologize for any errors, and encourage you to go read the chapter yourself.)