Is the Technological Advances in The Legend of Korra Really That Unbelievable?

[CharlesPhipps]

Technology advanced relatively quickly for the past two hundred years in our world, but the foundations for that advancement were set long before the period of actual rapid change.

I think people find the Korra world implausible because, even with the Fire Nation quasi-industrializing its war effort, the foundations of a 1850s-1920s-like period of change aren't visible. Clearly the Fire Nation's technology was a massive danger, but it could either be accepted or rejected by the other nations, and accepting would require learning about and duplicating it. Japan and China both accepted Western technological know-how, but they hadn't defeated the West before doing so.

Well that actually is a clever bit of worldbuilding becasue it seems the industrial technology base of the Avatar World isn't the Fire Nation anymore but the territory they conquered and that achieved its independence in Republic City. It's the place where all of the various Benders are now combining their powers to create the technological wonders we see.

[Riedquat]

Precisely because a significant part of the population is able to manipulate the elements aka being magicians, tech-advances are questionable. Technologies are developed to fix gaps in our natural abilities and if you can fly, you don't need an airplane.

Since I'm only familiar with this through a few of Chuck's reviews this may not be accurate (because I don't know how powerful they actually are), but we can walk around on land but we've still invented cars and trains, and before that we've used horses to get around faster on land for thousands of years.

What we've not invented are anywhere near as many fancy ways of climbing, since we're quite good at that by most standards.

[Madner Kami]

Since I'm only familiar with this through a few of Chuck's reviews this may not be accurate (because I don't know how powerful they actually are), but we can walk around on land but we've still invented cars and trains, and before that we've used horses to get around faster on land for thousands of years.

You can't run as fast as a horse can carry you. Not even humans, which are the most relentless pursuit predators by the standards of any species on this planet, can run as fast or as far as a car can carry you and your stuff.

What we've not invented are anywhere near as many fancy ways of climbing, since we're quite good at that by most standards.

Climbing doesn't matter to most of us on a daily matter. Going places does. Going places fast does even more. Going places fast with a high cargoload is arguably one of the most important things in our lives. Can't remember when I needed to climb a tree or a mountain recently, beyond moving up a mountain road to reach a castle or other such sites on my vacations. Once climbing becomes important enough to matter, there's plenty of technology which makes it safer, slightly faster and a whole lot easier. We shoot ropes and place solid holdings in the steepest cliffs for (relatively) easy access. Outside of using ropes, not even spiders can keep up with us and we don't even try that hard... I mean, we outpace geckos already, if we put our minds to it... And if we're bothered enough, we either blow up or carve out a passage in the mountain or outright tunnel through it for our convinience...

[Riedquat]

Since I'm only familiar with this through a few of Chuck's reviews this may not be accurate (because I don't know how powerful they actually are), but we can walk around on land but we've still invented cars and trains, and before that we've used horses to get around faster on land for thousands of years.

You can't run as fast as a horse can carry you. Not even humans, which are the most relentless pursuit predators by the standards of any species on this planet, can run as fast or as far as a car can carry you and your stuff.

Quite. So we've invented other stuff, even though we can move around on land (and for longer than many things that can outrun us, which is one way we managed to be successful as hunter-gatherers).

What we've not invented are anywhere near as many fancy ways of climbing, since we're quite good at that by most standards.

Climbing doesn't matter to most of us on a daily matter. Going places does. Going places fast does even more. Going places fast with a high cargoload is arguably one of the most important things in our lives. Can't remember when I needed to climb a tree or a mountain recently, beyond moving up a mountain road to reach a castle or other such sites on my vacations.

Arguably that's because you take climbing so for granted, and over-emphasise getting around quickly (which I'd say is a refelection on the society we've built more than anything). If you want to get really fundamental forget about climbing and consider the ability to manipulate objects with our hands.

[Winter]

It's realistic rate of change compared to our world, but in theirs it's more technological change in seventy years than in the ten thousand before that. You could have dropped somebody from Wan's turtle city into a random town in TLA and they would have understood how everything works; drop someone from that town into Republic City and they would have no idea.

I mentioned this in the Zaofu but TLA having HUGE jumps in Technology is a franchise original sin with the most notable examples being the airships.

Now, airships WERE invented in the mid 1800's BUT the version that we see in Fire is obviously based on the Zeppelin which weren't really invented until the late 1900's. The show went from a Hot-Air Balloon to a Zeppelin in the span of a few months but the amount of time it took to make Airships in real life was about 60 years. Even if we assume the theory that a year for the World of Avatar is longer then a year on Earth (it's likely the 4th or 5th planet from the sun) then that still means that it took about a year to get working Zeppelins.

In other words, TLA had 1910's tech that is, in many ways, MORE advanced then what was around back then. So, if we dropped someone from Wan's time in the time of TLA then they likely would be JUST as confused by everything if they went to Korra's time instead.

Although the real question to all this is, how are these people moving through time in the first place? Did someone find the Tardis?

[phantom000]

Like Isaac Arthur likes to point out; a lot of technology comes down to the issue of energy density. Leonardo Da'Vinci had enough understanding of physics to design a working aircraft but couldn't actually build them because he didn't have an adequate power source. A number of his designs look similar to early aircraft but without a means of propulsion they could never fly. This is why The Wright Brothers needed a gasoline engine for their airplane because steam engines were too heavy and couldn't generate enough thrust.



Now A:TLA is a cartoon and so there is a lot it can get away with, but I imagine that airbending would solve about 90% of the design issues Orville and Wilbur had to overcome. The series even does similar things with Earthbending for tanks...



and Waterbending for submarines...



Therefore, it's not hard to imagine firebenders doing something similar; using their fire and lightening as power source for machinery. I think we even see Zuko using his fire bending to power a hot air balloon.