Tech Estimate Question: James White's Educator Tapes?
Freelance Traveller 08 Aug 2014 14:05 UTC
In his Sector General series, James White "solved" the problem of
doctors/surgeons operating on patients not of their own species by using
recordings of expert doctors of the "target" species, which carried the
entire personality of the doctor, as well as his skills and knowledge
(the doctors were always male; White's universe accepted that females
were 'too mentally fastidious' to allow this type of recording to be
used).
In Traveller terms, it would be like a human doctor taking a mental
recording of a K'kree doctor in order to be able to operate on a K'kree.
A side-effect of having such a recording in one's memory was that (for
example) normal food for one's own species would become visually,
olfactorily, or gustatorily objectionable, because of the equivalent
life conditioning of the donor of the tape.
(Incidentally, while the universe of Sector General isn't really
Traveller-compatible, the stories are still good reads, and
recommended.)
Having explained the basics, I now pose some questions:
1. What Traveller (Classic/Mega/Mongoose) Tech Level would be
represented by such recordings?
2. Assuming that the TL is low enough, would this be in use in the
Imperium on any sort of widespread basis? Or would it smack too much
of "evil Zho mind-raping psionics" and thus be shunned?
3. Given the generally lower TL of the Zhodani vs. the Imperium, would
it be within the realm of possibility for the Zhodani, with their
stronger emphasis on mind- and psionics-related sciences and
technology, to have developed and deployed this?
--
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