For want of a nail the shoe was lost.
For want of a shoe the horse was lost.
For want of a horse the rider was lost.
For want of a rider the message was lost.
For want of a message the battle was lost.
For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.
And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.
We're probably all familiar with that proverb, which is often quoted in relation to alternate history. Many AH scenarios certainly exploit the idea of a small initial event having huge consequences, as in the proverb; EdT uses these brilliantly in his works (especially Fight and Be Right), I used it in Look to the West, etc.
However, I find it equally fascinating to find unexpected historical connections which mean that a small initial change can result in other relatively small changes--things far more minor and less obvious than wars going a different way, etc.--but in fields which, at first glance, would seem completely unrelated to the initial change. Of course, realistically sometimes these might come with bigger changes that would override or contradict them, but you get the general idea.
A note on terminology: this is not the same as the butterfly effect, but the two are often confused by people. The butterfly effect is a notion arising from chaos theory, and ultimately from concepts of uncertainty from quantum mechanics, which basically argues that as soon as you change anything in the universe--no matter what it is--that effectively 'resets' all the random chances rolling dice in the universe. For an everyday example of this, if you set a column in Microsoft Excel or similar to produce random numbers, the programme will re-roll the dice to produce new numbers every time you edit any cell in the spreadsheet. 'Hard' AH argues that the universe is like this, so if Abe Lincoln gets run over by a steam-powered Triceratops on February 4th 1859, then on the other side of the world, the King of Siam's latest turn at the roulette wheel might turn out black, when in OTL it was red.
This is not what we are discussing here - with 'for want of a nail', all the consequences are logically connected, cause-and-effect.
Here is an example of a web of consequences which I worked up to describe the impact of the premature death of one then-obscure officer in the American Civil War, for example. Add your own, either fully developed sequences or just odd connections of this type you know of that could help one be produced collaboratively!
For want of a shoe the horse was lost.
For want of a horse the rider was lost.
For want of a rider the message was lost.
For want of a message the battle was lost.
For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.
And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.
We're probably all familiar with that proverb, which is often quoted in relation to alternate history. Many AH scenarios certainly exploit the idea of a small initial event having huge consequences, as in the proverb; EdT uses these brilliantly in his works (especially Fight and Be Right), I used it in Look to the West, etc.
However, I find it equally fascinating to find unexpected historical connections which mean that a small initial change can result in other relatively small changes--things far more minor and less obvious than wars going a different way, etc.--but in fields which, at first glance, would seem completely unrelated to the initial change. Of course, realistically sometimes these might come with bigger changes that would override or contradict them, but you get the general idea.
A note on terminology: this is not the same as the butterfly effect, but the two are often confused by people. The butterfly effect is a notion arising from chaos theory, and ultimately from concepts of uncertainty from quantum mechanics, which basically argues that as soon as you change anything in the universe--no matter what it is--that effectively 'resets' all the random chances rolling dice in the universe. For an everyday example of this, if you set a column in Microsoft Excel or similar to produce random numbers, the programme will re-roll the dice to produce new numbers every time you edit any cell in the spreadsheet. 'Hard' AH argues that the universe is like this, so if Abe Lincoln gets run over by a steam-powered Triceratops on February 4th 1859, then on the other side of the world, the King of Siam's latest turn at the roulette wheel might turn out black, when in OTL it was red.
This is not what we are discussing here - with 'for want of a nail', all the consequences are logically connected, cause-and-effect.
Here is an example of a web of consequences which I worked up to describe the impact of the premature death of one then-obscure officer in the American Civil War, for example. Add your own, either fully developed sequences or just odd connections of this type you know of that could help one be produced collaboratively!
