nBSG Episode 319: "Crossroads, Part II"...

[Uraniun235]

If Ron Moore is willing to suggest that the Colonials, by sheer coincidence, composed a song identical to one created on Earth, then the notion that the Colonials might also coincidentally use 60 minute hours and wear ties is not far behind.

Except the 60 minute per hour, 24 hour per day parameters is less likely than the Colonials having Jimi Hendricks transcend space and time (something I support, actually), because they are directly based on Earth parameters.

So you're saying the Colonials use a time system which does not fit Caprica... just because? Wouldn't that create all manner of problems with time not being in synch with the actual days and nights?

[TimothyC]

I'm just re-iterating, but I have to find that version of All Along the Watchtower. Anyone know anything?

It was custom done for this episode by Bear McCreary's brother.

[Skylon]

Just a note, the music is not supposed to be from Earth. It's a Colonial song which just happens to have the same lyrics as an Earth song.

Was this noted in the podcast? Just curious because that's a pretty far-fetched coincidence they're reaching for it that's the case.

[General Zod]

Just a note, the music is not supposed to be from Earth. It's a Colonial song which just happens to have the same lyrics as an Earth song.

Was this noted in the podcast? Just curious because that's a pretty far-fetched coincidence they're reaching for it that's the case.

It's confirmed in multiple sources. Including Bear McCreary's website. (The guy that composed it.)

[Spanky The Dolphin]

The idea is that a Colonial musician and Bob Dylan both tapped into the same inspirational aether.

[Sam Or I]

The Chief is a character close to my heart, so I actually feel weird about it; I'd even go as far as to say that it reminds me of how I felt when I found out my older sister has a different father.

Anyone else? Or am I alone in being a bit emo about a favorite character's stunning revelation?

I feel you. Think of it this way, maybe him and Boomer get a happy ending. I am pretty sure the first place the Chief will goto is Athena and start asking questions.

I still don't want to believe it though.

[Admiral Valdemar]

The idea is that a Colonial musician and Bob Dylan both tapped into the same inspirational aether.

It furthers the link that the 13th Colony, that being us, are one with the other 12. Of course, I don't know what era Earth is supposed to be in. Is it the far future or distant past? Did we start there, then emigrate to Caprica etc., or vice versa? I was always under the impression the Colonials would come across contemporary Earth, or maybe us in our past. Now, I think it may be we created them, then buggered off. Us as the mythical "ancients" you usually see in sci-fi, rather than the other way around.

[Burak Gazan]

If it is present-day earth tech-wise, we are in for some major pain when the Cylons show up

[Admiral Valdemar]

If it is present-day earth tech-wise, we are in for some major pain when the Cylons show up

Indeed. So much for thinking we'd be of use.

Kara's comments, however, say otherwise. I doubt she got that super FTL with fleet fucking effects from General Electric.

[General Zod]

The idea is that a Colonial musician and Bob Dylan both tapped into the same inspirational aether.

It furthers the link that the 13th Colony, that being us, are one with the other 12. Of course, I don't know what era Earth is supposed to be in. Is it the far future or distant past? Did we start there, then emigrate to Caprica etc., or vice versa? I was always under the impression the Colonials would come across contemporary Earth, or maybe us in our past. Now, I think it may be we created them, then buggered off. Us as the mythical "ancients" you usually see in sci-fi, rather than the other way around.

Well, one possible timeline:

Earth makes significant advances in technology, starts exploring space and founds Kobol. Kobol advances considerably, something goes wrong and the thirteen tribes are formed on an exodus from the planet. (Biological warfare, perhaps?). Twelve of them go on to form the colonies, with the thirteenth retracing its way back to Earth. So by the current time in BSG Earth is highly advanced, but isn't out to settle the known reaches of the universe. (Due to the scarcity of habitable planets, possibly.)

[Admiral Valdemar]

How many years was it since the 13th left, 4,000 or so? That's likely more than enough time for them to spread to other potential habitable planets too. With FTL and their technology advances (remember, they'd not have the Cylons to deal with), they may have gotten around to a fair few Earth-like planets in various habitable systems.

[General Zod]

How many years was it since the 13th left, 4,000 or so? That's likely more than enough time for them to spread to other potential habitable planets too. With FTL and their technology advances (remember, they'd not have the Cylons to deal with), they may have gotten around to a fair few Earth-like planets in various habitable systems.

Hasn't it been stated that Earth-like planets in BSG are fairly rare though, and exploration is highly dangerous? (Possibility for running out of fuel, and such). People in the fleet seemed practically ecstatic over finding New Caprica when it wasn't even the most ideal of places.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Assuming their astrometrics and astronomy are as good as ours, they should know that the galaxy is potentially filled to the brim with potential habitable worlds that need only minor ecological engineering to make better suited for human habitation.

If the nBSG universe canon says otherwise, then that can't be helped. But in reality, there are still millions of such worlds out there, if not more, waiting to be found. Their FTL may be the limiting factor here, since these places won't all be within spitting distance of their current worlds, of which only Caprica seems to be really prosperous and Earth-like.

Baltar's homeworld was a barren farming colony with miserable lives toiling away for little real gain. A bit like Yorkshire, really.

[General Zod]

Assuming their astrometrics and astronomy are as good as ours, they should know that the galaxy is potentially filled to the brim with potential habitable worlds that need only minor ecological engineering to make better suited for human habitation.

If the nBSG universe canon says otherwise, then that can't be helped. But in reality, there are still millions of such worlds out there, if not more, waiting to be found. Their FTL may be the limiting factor here, since these places won't all be within spitting distance of their current worlds, of which only Caprica seems to be really prosperous and Earth-like.

Baltar's homeworld was a barren farming colony with miserable lives toiling away for little real gain. A bit like Yorkshire, really.

FTL seems to be the big limiter, since Tilium is apparently a rare commodity (considering that they'd risk battling Cylon Basestars over it in S1 rather than seeking out another source).

[Gil Hamilton]

So you're saying the Colonials use a time system which does not fit Caprica... just because? Wouldn't that create all manner of problems with time not being in synch with the actual days and nights?

And if they used a time based on Caprican parameters, the rest of the colonies would be screwed, since it would only work on Caprica. Why wouldn't they use a standard time scale, one they all could have historically inherited, rather than based on only one of the Twelve Colonies?

Besides, it's not that hard to keep day and night synched. After all, the plan for Mars, for instance, is to just add a several minutes of dead time between 23:59:59 and 0:00:00 to the clocks and the Martian day is synched. Unless Caprica has widely different parameters than Earth (unlikely), then they could do the same.

[Uraniun235]

So you're saying the Colonials use a time system which does not fit Caprica... just because? Wouldn't that create all manner of problems with time not being in synch with the actual days and nights?

And if they used a time based on Caprican parameters, the rest of the colonies would be screwed, since it would only work on Caprica. Why wouldn't they use a standard time scale, one they all could have historically inherited, rather than based on only one of the Twelve Colonies?

Besides, it's not that hard to keep day and night synched. After all, the plan for Mars, for instance, is to just add a several minutes of dead time between 23:59:59 and 0:00:00 to the clocks and the Martian day is synched. Unless Caprica has widely different parameters than Earth (unlikely), then they could do the same.

It's pretty apparent that Caprica heavily dominated Colonial politics and trade, so it's not too farfetched that it would become adopted if not as a 'universal' time standard than at least as a reference time which others would check against.

Consider the prospect of a Mars colony in the future. There's still going to be drift between Martian time and Earth time, as those "dead time" seconds add up. Don't you think the Marsies are going to keep a clock set on Earth time so that they can more easily coordinate with Earth?

Similarly, if Caprica is the most important (most populous, too? not sure) colony, and if the central government of the Colonies is located on Caprica, it makes sense that everyone would at least keep a clock set on Caprica time even if their local time is different. (And additionally, that the military would use Caprica time as well.)

Have we seen clocks mounted on non-Caprican ships?

Look, I understand where you're coming from. Yeah, it makes more sense that the Colonies are descended from Earth. But I'm not convinced that that is how it's actually going to be portrayed in the show. Remember that early on, RDM explicitly stated that he wanted to stay true to the original BSG's notion of "life here began out there", and I haven't yet seen any evidence that he's since changed his mind.

It's possible the writers will turn around and decide that the Big Twist is "oh man we actually came from Earth!", but I'm looking at this not from the perspective of "what would make the most sense?" but from the perspective of my belief that the writers will do whatever they want to do, and contrive a rationalization for it as needed. Therefore, because as far as I know RDM still wants BSG to incorporate the "life here began out there" line, I'm going on the assumption that's what he's aiming for.

[Uraniun235]

...from the perspective of my belief that the writers will do whatever they want to do, and contrive a rationalization for it as needed.

I meant to say that the writers would contrive a rationalization for it as needed, although admittedly I'm doing a bit of that myself in this thread.

[Gil Hamilton]

And if they used a time based on Caprican parameters, the rest of the colonies would be screwed, since it would only work on Caprica. Why wouldn't they use a standard time scale, one they all could have historically inherited, rather than based on only one of the Twelve Colonies?

Question is, what evidence do we have for that?

Besides, haven't we heard or countdowns on the show before? If their seconds are the same, then it is based on Earth parameters. Yes, I know, they could use the modern second, which is based on the spin of a cesium atom rather than derived from the length of an hour, but the only reason they used the atomic second is because it's absurdly close to the classical second to many decimal places.

If they are using Caprican time and they keep with a 24 hour per day time with 60 minute and 60 second division, then it stands to reason if the Caprican day was longer or short, the seconds and minutes would be longer and short in a related way. Have we seen that?

If not, it's reasonable to conclude they've inherited Earth time.

It's pretty apparent that Caprica heavily dominated Colonial politics and trade, so it's not too farfetched that it would become adopted if not as a 'universal' time standard than at least as a reference time which others would check against.

As I said, have we seen that? Don't get me wrong, it would make a great deal of sense for the to have a universial time standard, I'm just arguing that they use time scales derived from Earth time that they inherited as their universal standard.

Consider the prospect of a Mars colony in the future. There's still going to be drift between Martian time and Earth time, as those "dead time" seconds add up. Don't you think the Marsies are going to keep a clock set on Earth time so that they can more easily coordinate with Earth?

Same thing happens on Earth, actually, and with Zulu Time. Since the year isn't exactly 365 days long, we add a leap day to account for the extra time. With Zulu time, they are actually anal enough to have leap seconds on the day to keep it precise.

With Mars, I understand the plan is to adjust Martian months to compensate for the extra 30 minutes or so of Martain day, by adding and subtracting leap days in the Martian calendar to keep it roughly matching the Earth Calendar (which isn't as weird a thing to do as you'd think, it just requires a bit of accounting during the leap periods on the part of Earth-Mars business). Since the Martian year is just shy of twice Earths, for time keeping purposes it can be discarded and it's sidereal period being just part of the planets orbital parameters rather than being a "year" for time keeping on Mars.

Look, I understand where you're coming from. Yeah, it makes more sense that the Colonies are descended from Earth. But I'm not convinced that that is how it's actually going to be portrayed in the show. Remember that early on, RDM explicitly stated that he wanted to stay true to the original BSG's notion of "life here began out there", and I haven't yet seen any evidence that he's since changed his mind.

It's possible the writers will turn around and decide that the Big Twist is "oh man we actually came from Earth!", but I'm looking at this not from the perspective of "what would make the most sense?" but from the perspective of my belief that the writers will do whatever they want to do, and contrive a rationalization for it as needed. Therefore, because as far as I know RDM still wants BSG to incorporate the "life here began out there" line, I'm going on the assumption that's what he's aiming for.

Yeah, I'll agree with this. What makes sense isn't particularly relevant to TV sci-fi.

However, until they actually establish it, I'm going with what actually makes sense, rather than the crazy Mormon stuff from the original series.

[Lord Woodlouse]

Baltar's homeworld was a barren farming colony with miserable lives toiling away for little real gain. A bit like Yorkshire, really.

Aerelon has a vibrant independent culture nestled among beautiful countryside, I'll have you know. Sheffield and Leeds constitute two of the eight core cities from the Twelve Colonies. York is one of the oldest cities in the Twelve Colonies. Plus North Aerelon is the largest county in the Colonies.

Damn your eyes.

[LadyTevar]

Baltar's homeworld was a barren farming colony with miserable lives toiling away for little real gain. A bit like Yorkshire, really.

Aerelon has a vibrant independent culture nestled among beautiful countryside, I'll have you know. Sheffield and Leeds constitute two of the eight core cities from the Twelve Colonies. York is one of the oldest cities in the Twelve Colonies. Plus North Aerelon is the largest county in the Colonies.

Damn your eyes.

Where'd you get this?!

[Spanky The Dolphin]

I think he's transplanting the realities of Yorkshire, England into BSG.

[Koolaidkirby]

One question though, why is everyone so insistent on the fact that Kobol could not have possibly been the starting point of humanity and that Earth is in fact where humanity started. This is not SG-1 where humans did in fact originate on Earth. I don't see any evidence so far in the nBSG universe pointing to this being the same universe as the one we live in, in fact there is quite a bit to the contrary.

But then again, I could have just missed something huge, in which case please enlighten me

[Admiral Valdemar]

Aerelon has a vibrant independent culture nestled among beautiful countryside, I'll have you know. Sheffield and Leeds constitute two of the eight core cities from the Twelve Colonies. York is one of the oldest cities in the Twelve Colonies. Plus North Aerelon is the largest county in the Colonies.

Damn your eyes.

You also came second place to the Red Rose colony, so sucks to be you, fah'mah boyo! Also, Saxon comes from here. Yarr!

Is anyone else hoping Lampkin turns up later on in season four? I think that little thing Lee noticed with the stick may be relevant, though I can't help but think it too obvious at stating him to be a Cylon (and for what purpose?).

[Spanky The Dolphin]

Lee noticing Lampkin leaving the cane behind was just him realising that Lampkin was pulling the wool over his eyes regarding the severity of his injury from the assassination attempt.

[Lord Woodlouse]

You also came second place to the Red Rose colony, so sucks to be you, fah'mah boyo! Also, Saxon comes from here. Yarr!

The Wars of the Roses were a dynastic struggle, not a territorial civil war. The territorial definition was largely north-south rather than east-west. The House of Lancester never won, either. The House of Tudor did, who were incredibly minor former supporters of the Lancastrians, rather than a member of the dynasty itself (and at the end of the day they were both Plantaganets, sides of the same family). When Richard III died the last of the Yorks AND the Lancesters had died, and a whole new dynasty began, taking as it's symbol a combined red and white rose to symbolise things.

It's all explained in a diagramI once made.