Science, Technology and Civilization in the pokémon world

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Well, inspired by Arcy's political thread - what kind of technologies have we seen in the pokémon world? What kind of society are they? Obviously sedentary, but beyond that? There is evidence of spacefaring (Pewter museum and Space Center in the game, the anime episode dealing with Lisa and Tate), but beyond that, what do they have? How far ahead/behind us do you feel they are?
 
I'd be interested to know how recent a development the warp tiles are. Takeshi recognised them in the episode they turned up, but Satoshi and Kasumi didn't seem to have a clue.

In any case, the teleportation of Pokéballs alone would be astounding (For that matter, so are Pokéballs), but with these, which one assumes can probably be made with the same sort of range as the transfer units....if they're common enough, it's no wonder we don't see much in the way of powered transportation.
 
I don't think warp tiles are that common, as we probably would have seen more of them. There ARE roadways and automobiles; I recall seeing them in various episodes (especially with Junsars and their motorcycles and cars). It's just that they aren't important to a young, not of driving age, Pokémon trainer. It is unecessary to feature them unless they have relevance.

What intrigues me most are Pokéballs.
 
Warp tiles may not be used outside Saffron City. Don't forget that the people around the Gym can use Psychic powers to teleport, and of course certain Pokémon can. So the invention of warp tiles does make sense in that situation. Maybe if they studied Celebi they would gain the ability to build a time machine.

Space travel is something I would like to see more of how far they have progressed. Since Porygon2 is a man-made Pokémon designed for Space travel, they already have an episode that can show it. I just hope the seizure incident won't stop them making any episodes with Porygon or Porygon2.
 
Which is kinda weird considering Pikachu's thunder attack caused the seizures.

Porygon 2 is so cute, I don't see why showing it would hurt people.
 
It wasn't designed to be cute. It was designed to explore Outer Space!
They seem to know about as much about it as we do. I don't recall any mention of humans actually going into Outer Space, unless they mentioned that in Mossdeep City.

I watched Pokémon Heroes this afternoon, and Misty makes an interesting comment about the planet being "so blue" when they are viewing it via Latios' sight share. I don't know if it was in the original, and this could be just the impact of actually seeing it, but it may suggest that humans do not commonly see it.

An important factor is education. Kids go off on Pokémon Journies at the age of 10, so do not receive a higher education, which limits those who get a job exploring science. Even the Proffessors we've met study Pokémon!
 
FabuVinny said:
They seem to know about as much about it as we do. I don't recall any mention of humans actually going into Outer Space, unless they mentioned that in Mossdeep City.
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They did. Tate & Liza's father is an astronaut, and he was seen blasting off in a space shuttle. No, not the kind of "blasting off" TR always does, the "real world" kind. :p
 
Did they give a reason for the trip into Space?

It seems clear that humans have not colonised other planets yet, though a number of Pokémon do inhabit Space.
 
Well, obviously, another thing you could say about the technology is that video phones seem to be used in place of regular phones, cause they have them at every Pokemon Center and the professors also have them in their labs.

And I think most people might have them in their houses too. We saw Ash call his mom on the video phone a number of different times in the first season.

Although, I'm not sure if the fact that they use video phones instead of regular phones means anything....

I mean, don't they have video phones in Japan?
 
Well, obviously, another thing you could say about the technology is that video phones seem to be used in place of regular phones, cause they have them at every Pokemon Center and the professors also have them in their labs.

And I think most people might have them in their houses too. We saw Ash call his mom on the video phone a number of different times in the first season.

Although, I'm not sure if the fact that they use video phones instead of regular phones means anything....

I mean, don't they have video phones in Japan?
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Well, once upon a time video phones were a science fiction aspect, but nowadays, they exist. It's just that they're not widely used.
 
We know that they are able to de- and re-molecularize creatures using Pokéballs as well as transport them to various cities. Space travel is not unusual for them. Video phones are in most homes. Pokédexes, PokéGear, and PokéNavs are commonplace among trainers, a bit similar to our PDAs. Monorails are a form of transportation as well, if I remember 'Destiny Deoxys.' Heck, they had an AI citywide security system.
 
More to the point, dexes, Gears and Navs have relatively advanced data analaysis system (ie, a dex being pointed at a pokémon can match it with profiles in its databse.
 
The most amazing technology in the Pokemon world is the ability to turn molecules into pure energy and transmit and store said data on computers. Unfortunately, the anime doesn't really touch on that aspect as much, with Pokemon being "more real" - they can't be held in suspended animation in PCs and such. Similarly, we've never seen any evidence of physical goods being transmitted via data signals in the anime, either. We've seen Pokemon transported that way. But seeing as how everyone uses the same type of PokeBall, that could very well just be Pokemon being shot from one ball to another - rather than the physical ball actually being transmitted with said Pokemon inside.
 
I interpret pokeballs and the transport system as magic - which does canonically exist in the anime world - so thoroughly integrated with technology that most people don't realize it's there at all.
"Sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology."
 
Murgatroyd said:
"Sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology."
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Clarke's Third Law: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

I'm inclined to agree with the inverted analysis (which is known as Raymond's Second Law) - it's probable that their technology is implemented using magic.

However, because this is a children's show, perhaps Sterling's Corollary to Clarke's Third Law is more appropriate: Any sufficiently advanced garbage is indistinguishable from magic.

Or maybe Rosenbaum's Corollary: "Any magic, sufficiently debased, is indistinguishable from technology."
 
Please note: The thread is from 17 years ago.
Please take the age of this thread into consideration in writing your reply. Depending on what exactly you wanted to say, you may want to consider if it would be better to post a new thread instead.
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