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Consequences in Alternate History: Whither the Weather

Also The Year Without a Summer is the reason "Frankenstein" exists.

*Cough*

Anyway- good article, Thande. The part about the fixed calendar of volcanoes and earthquakes reminds me of an old AH idea of mine, the survival of New Zealand's Pink and White Terraces. This natural wonder of the world was destroyed by the Mount Tarawera eruption of 1886, buried under pyroclastic flows.

I've vaguely wondered whether a POD twenty years earlier could butterfly their survival- slightly different weather patterns lead to different landslips on the mountain, so that the ash and chemicals flow down a different course. It seems plausible, but on the other hand it feels a bit like cheating- saving beauty with a handwave, just as you complained about asteroids being moved into different courses by author fiat.

I suppose the broader issue is whether geographic and climatic changes can be satisfying even if they're just in the background of a timeline, part of the broader landscape. Or does such a fundamental physical difference require the close attention of the author? Would a reader be satisfied with an off hand mention that thanks to a POD fifty years ago Pompeii survived Vesuvius, or would they demand a full and detailed explanation.

I'm rambling. Thanks for the thought provoking read.
 
I'm not entirely sure Pyroclastic flows are that easy to butterfly- a lot of it seems to boil down more to the fundamental mechanics of how much ash is ejected.
 
Excellent article, Thande. Though weather is often cited as decisive in certain events, discussion of how they might have turned out if this had been different is noticeably lacking, IMO. Some examples can be found in compilations like What If? (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_If?_(essays), especially Rabb's on the "wet summer" of 1529 and Ambrose's on D-Day storms, yet it still seems to be a relatively obscure or understudied/unappreciated area of AH fiction and history. At some point in the not-too-distant future, I'd like to put together a collection of analyses of weather-impacted historical events, from major (D-Day, the Little Ice Age) to seemingly minor (the Donner Party blizzard, the Edmund Fitzgerald storm) for a nonfiction release that might spur more interest in AH; if you'd like to collaborate on this project, or just have some event suggestions, I'd be happy to chat!
 
Well done article, @Thande . It’s something I’ve always put thought to, and I’ve seen tackled before, but not something I’ve seen so well-summarized as you’ve done here.
 
[Lapsed Geologist incoming]

As a counterpoint I would hesitate to say that the dates of volcanic eruptions or earthquakes are "fixed" - as acknowledged the factors involved are on a superhuman time and spatial scale, but it feels like there's still room for variance and unpredictability in those timescales.

A structural geologist will probably be able to produce a stress/strain chart that can "predict" exactly when the weakest fracture along a fault plan will "give", and we know reasonably well which direction the major tectonic plates are being pulled over time, but there will always be error bars. OTL only gives us one data point for any particular tectonic event, so its rather hard to stake out a plausible event window - but certainty with a 18th Century POD it wouldn't strike me as implausible to see the San Andreas fault slip early at some point in the late 1890s for less iconic earthquake - or indeed in the 1910s for an utterly devastating one.

Likewise depending on the type of volcano, it may take years for a magma chamber* to fill to the point where an eruption tipping point is reached - and any network of tiny fractures around that chamber might allow e.g. higher pressure gases to vent during that time, delaying or possibly averting a big bang.

You're right to say that these are probably unlikely to ever be affected directly by human activity - unlike how the weather might be in a "there will be a casual link its impossible to predict how" interpretation of the butterfly effect

For the "quantum effect in which a small change anywhere will effectively instantly ‘reset the dice being thrown’ everywhere else in the universe" - tectonic effects are driven ultimately by the Earth's internal heat - part of which is which is released by radioactive decay - and I'm sure you can see where this is going :)

Ultimately I think there's scope for ever widening error bars with these kind of events. More importantly I've really enjoyed this series of articles as a review of what might be thought of as one of the "first principles" of AH.

Also a very kind plug, as always.


*which is of course more an interconnected web of tunnels, fissures, and porosity within the country rock, in various material states at various times; than the classic liquid-filled upside down lightbulb shape of the school diagram - though visualising the latter is probably why the over-pressured bottle of pop remains the most easily understood eruption metaphor
 
Natural disasters I feel come up oddly little in AH in contexts where such destructive events are seen as harbingers of change or collapse in a society or regime. China of course is discussed plenty given the precedents of the Mandate of Heaven, but few if any timelines I've seen actually go into the very real ramifications, both tangible and superstitious, of how such disasters can mark such a transformation. It is a huge missed opportunity given the precedents set by the 1931 Yangtze River floods, the 1938 Yellow River floods (which were man-made, in fairness, but the point still stands), or the 1976 Tangshan earthquake, to name a few.
 
Natural disasters I feel come up oddly little in AH in contexts where such destructive events are seen as harbingers of change or collapse in a society or regime.

IIRC Thande's own Look To The West got mileage out of this with the 1755 Lisbon earthquake, with the recovery efforts going better so it wasn't seen as a divine judgement
 
IIRC Thande's own Look To The West got mileage out of this with the 1755 Lisbon earthquake, with the recovery efforts going better so it wasn't seen as a divine judgement

That part stood out to me when I first read it. I used to be fascinated with natural disasters and the morbid details of their aftermath, and the Lisbon quake and how far-reaching its effects were always stuck out.

It does perhaps provide opportunity to consider, for instance, if the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake tempered rather than fanned the flames of Japanese militarism and ultranationalism, or if the Pakistani response to the 1970 Bengal cyclone didn't cause the already-volatile situation there to be inflamed to the point of the Bangladesh Liberation War.
 
One weather related PoD is the invasion of William the Conqueror. The invasion was delayed because of a storm in the channel. Without that storm, the Normans would have landed in England to find Harold much better prepared. Harold had called up the Fyrd to deal with the invasion, but had dismissed them at the beginning of September. Also, the battle would have taken place before Harold had to move north to deal with Harold Hardrada.

On the subject of earthquakes, Basel had to deal with a man-made earth tremor in 2007, caused by a Geothermal energy project. So, I’m inclined to the idea that human activities such as mining or drilling can have an effect on earthquake activity.

As an aside, the Black Forest area hasn’t had much luck with geothermal energy projects. At Staufen, drilling resulted in groundwater leaking into an anhydrite layer, causing it to turn to gypsum and expand. This resulted in the land being pushed upwards at a rate of about 1 cm a month, causing buildings to crack. Basically the town is slowly falling apart.
 
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Thanks for the detailed comments everyone - plenty more to say on this subject (and good point re. I should have mentioned Frankenstein - but I think I can figure out a future article to get that in).
 
Very pleased you made reference to my Copenhagen Interpretation of Alternate History! :p

The butterfly effect is also defined as a quantum effect in which a small change anywhere will effectively instantly ‘reset the dice being thrown’ everywhere else in the universe—but though this is probably the most scientifically rigorous approach to AH, it also feels disappointingly non-common-sensical to the human mind wanting a connected narrative.
 
Very pleased you made reference to my Copenhagen Interpretation of Alternate History! :p
I just re-read that part and now I'm wondering if saying 'instantly' conflicts with the idea of information propagating at lightspeed. Has anyone ever brought that up with regards to the many-worlds interpretation? Granted, it would be rather difficult to test!
 
I just re-read that part and now I'm wondering if saying 'instantly' conflicts with the idea of information propagating at lightspeed. Has anyone ever brought that up with regards to the many-worlds interpretation? Granted, it would be rather difficult to test!

I've certainly never thought of it, but you make a very interesting point. My understanding is that Fay Dowker's theory of causal sets might have something worthwhile to say on this point, but I'm afraid I'm rather unfamiliar with her work.
 
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