What would you add?

[Amanda N]

We all know that there are various differences between Pern and earth.  Certain things did not come over.  However, what if you could choose one thing that is on earth to have come over to Pern?  What would it be?

Me?  CHOCOLATE!

[PastMember]

Honestly, religion.

It just seems unrealistic that after how long on Pern? Humans would not come up with a religion. There has even been scientific evidence to support that some humans will naturally lean to the idea of a higher power.

With dragons and /between/ one would think that something would have arose out of the ashes, maybe even the idea that /between/ is that gate way to life after death, or that a deity placed certain special people in charge to guard Pern's most precious asset: Dragons. This would provide an explanation for some people why not everyone is not able to Impress.

Anne Mccaffrey later admitted to this error, which is why she wrote the short story "Beyond Between" and explains that she wrote it not only as a tribute to Moreta and Leri but because one thing that was taught was that "God is every where." Though I would not completely agree that the Pernese would become solely monotheistic (though it is very possible), I think a religion of some sort would have been created.

[PastMember]

We all know that there are various differences between Pern and earth.  Certain things did not come over.  However, what if you could choose one thing that is on earth to have come over to Pern?  What would it be?

Me?  CHOCOLATE!

And yes, of course chocolate. Woman's best friend :D

[Amanda N]

Anne Mccaffrey later admitted to this error, which is why she wrote the short story "Beyond Between" and explains that she wrote it not only as a tribute to Moreta and Leri but because one thing that was taught was that "God is every where." Though I would not completely agree that the Pernese would become solely monotheistic (though it is very possible), I think a religion of some sort would have been created.

I quite agree with you, Stasha.  In fact, I'd probably add religion before chocolate (though I do love chocolate).  I had no idea about that short story.  I shall have to try and find it and read it!

[Vix]

I agree on both counts.

And after an extensive search, it appears that I'll be heading out to buy the anthology that contains Beyond Between, since I've neaver read taht.

[Eimi]

That one would be an interesting read.  And yeah, it is rather hard to write Pern without a religion sometimes, especially when it comes to an afterlife.  I had always thought Faranth would have taken on a mythic, godlike quality.

Then again, in some of the later books, the dragons did seem rather godlike.  I mean come on, flying in space?

But I would add something else which might seem rather weird, but still I wish Pern had it - newspapers.  Especially now that they have firelizards that could carry new throughout Pern, and dragonriders that could carry it from Hold to Hold, why don't they write it in some printed form?  You could get into such interesting storylines.  Who controls the information?  Where do they get the information about when Threadfall is happening?   What would a Pernese gossip column read like?  Could you imagine Weyrleaders and Lord Holders giving interviews to reporters that put a spin either for or against them into the paper?  Can you imagine what sections your personas would read?  It could be really fun.

[Vix]

But I would add something else which might seem rather weird, but still I wish Pern had it - newspapers.  Especially now that they have firelizards that could carry new throughout Pern, and dragonriders that could carry it from Hold to Hold, why don't they write it in some printed form?

Hmmm. . . I wonder how long after Emma reads this Thanja will be proposing just that?

Or maybe it would be her husband's idea. . .

[Yvonne]

Religion, yes. Newspapers, heck yes.

I would have really liked to see dialects and language shifts. The Pernese have drifted across an entire continent, and while travel on a dragon is easy, travel for everyone else is bloody hard! This means that a lot of Pernese are quite isolated, and it therefore stands to reason that dialects would have emerged. I'm sorry, but there just aren't enough Harpers to make sure that 'language remains pure' .. and anyway, there are enough Harper Halls to make that an issue too. It seemed like a cop-out for Anne, but at least she acknowledged it and addressed it a little when her people found AVIS.

The correlation to isolated communities and dialects is that a large population turns into 'us' and 'them' and there's the potential for warfare. Unpleasant, but humans tend to be greedy buggers.

I also want honeybees.

[Eimi]

Dialects are a definite!  I mean, look how different all our dialects are in the former colonies!  Just a few hundred years seperated from England and you get completely different dialects - New Zealand, Australia, America, Canada, South Africa, the Carribean...  Even within those countries in a few short generations the dialects have changed.  Over thousands of years, it would unrecognizeable!  I swear mass media may be the only thing that saves all our versions of English from losing a common root.

[Amanda N]

That would be kind of cool, I think!

[emma]

Well my pet theory was always that the dragons were indeed the religion of Pern. Lets face it, people revere the dragons, and seem to think that they can don anything.  And when you look at where our naughty words comes from... Well most are related to either sex or religion.  They don't seem to have the same issues with sex on Pern, but their bad words or things that they swear by are dragon related.

[PastMember]

So, I'm assuming that the printing press was not that successful?  I had just arrived at the printing press in All The Weyrs of Pern when I misplaced the book on Saturday.  I still haven't been able to find it :(

If I could have anything on Pern, it would probably be the modern pen, though chocolate is a close second.

[Amanda N]

Chocolate is way better than pens!  You can't eat pens. ;-)

[Jane]

... but still I wish Pern had it - newspapers.

No reason for Triad not to have newspapers with the 1200 Turn gap.

[Amanda N]

Next thing you know, they'll have radio, then television! :compress: