A Bridge To The Quiet Planet

A Bridge To The Quiet Planet: Medicine

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(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com and Steve’s Tumblr.  Find out more at my newsletter.)

Let’s get to know more about the setting of my upcoming novel, A Bridge To The Quiet Planet.  It’s out late this fall but you can find out about the world now . . .

Medical Care

Medical care on a world of sorcery, super-science, and eccentric gods is complicated. Throw in other worlds, ancient bioweapons, and more and you have a place where “hypochondria” might be considered a rational reaction.

Medical care on Telvaren and it’s worlds has the following common traits:

Prevention

Preventative medicine is paramount for all inhabitants of the worlds, at least in the Great Cities and Unaffiliated Nations. Most people are raised very young to engage in healthy habits and activities, and its a popular area of discussion on talk shows, magazines, and books.

Vaccines

Vaccination is also of major importance in the setting, and for some Great Cities not being vaccinated is considered a criminal offense – one can be literally exiled in Olanau-Kau or Vasikon Zek for not vaccinating oneself or their children. Followups are also important. Many Guilds provide related medical service.

Diet

Diet is considered a core part of health, and is a mixture of scientific pratcie, ancient and at times unquestioned tradition, and personal preference. Most people have a decent amount of dietary knowledge, though in some Cities and Wars/Districts people tend to eat locally as opposed to cook.

The mixture of good ideas, traditions, and useless habits is hard to separate, and often varies from region to region and City To City. It’s not common to argue diet and food among people.

Testing

With so much unpredictability, medical testing is a part of daily life and security. Most people have a general health exam including blood work every six month from childhood. For those in more dangerous professions such as relic recoverers, Cryptodivers, or the Military, it can be monthly.

Alchemy

Alchemy, the art of combining magic and chemistry, has led to many useful treatments over the aeons. Common alchemical treatments are sold with moderate regulation.

Alchemical treatments are restricted in their larger use and common use for two reasons:

  1. Users of magic and those with related magical abilities like Revenauts may find such treatments cause unusual side effects.
  2. Continuous use of magical treatments has medical risks, especially when used for healing.

Surgery

Surgery is an obviously common treatment as it is in our world. Magic is often kept out of surgery except in limited extends. Vast exchanged of surgical knowledge are held among medical professionals, and recovered knowledge is propigated quickly.

Magic

Magic is used careful in medicine due to its ability to affect other magic users and the fact that using magic on living systems has side effects. Common uses of magic are:

Healing Acceleration: Healing Acceleration accelerates the bodies own processes. However overuse of it has a risk of cancer or weaker healing simply because one is accelerating cell division. Safe amounts have been worked out mathematically.

Sealing And Repairing: More common in medical magic is the ability to seal a would or re-knit bones with existing materials. Such first-aid magic is quite effective and less risky.

Transplant Connection: In the case of transplants, magic is a powerful way to quickly re-bond organs despite any risk.

Divine Power

Gods often provide healing Aspects to their Clerics or the Touched. This varies with the god, the individual, and their need and is not always reliable. Such healing usually has no side effects.

There are a variety of Medical gods with no actual leaders among them. The noteworthy ones are

  • Sybella – The general medical goddess, The Lady Of Health. She’s considered patron of most general practitioners and good habits. She is portrayed as a woman whose age changes to fit the individual praying.
  • Romolak – Our Lord of the Red Shield. Romolak is the god of vaccines and preventative medicine. He is portrayed as a warrior dressed in red, and is noted for switching between being dead serious and having a wacky sense of humor.
  • Mavina – The Uncutting Knife. Mavina is a genderless god who is the patron of surgery. Portrayed as a tall person with dark skin and white hair, wearing robes within which are a variety of tools. Mavina is calm, clever, and thoughtful, and maintains good relations with both the technology god Xomanthu and the magic god Ivonau.
  • Yavolox – The Lord of Development. Yavolox is a god of exercise as well as good cooking. The brother and at times rival of Romolak. Yavolox maintains a cheery attitude at all times, and is often portrayed as an Easterner with curly hair and a powerful but limber build.

– Steve

A Bridge To The Quiet Planet: Souls And More

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(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com and Steve’s Tumblr.  Find out more at my newsletter.)

Let’s get to know more about the setting of my upcoming novel, A Bridge To The Quiet Planet.  It’s out late this fall but you can find out about the world now . . .

Souls And More

The cycle of birth, death, reincarnation, souls, and hauntings by annoying relatives is of great interest to the humans whose worlds circle the star Avenoth. After all, since death isn’t the end (or the beginning for that matter), it helps to keep up on everything outside the entire body-of-flesh thing so many people live. Also it pays pretty well as a profession.

To explain the voluminous writings, theories, and mad drug-fueled rantings about the nature of the human soul and the like would be impossible. This presents a quick summary of what is known about the cycle of human life, reincarnations, and the poorly-named “Afterlife.”

Souls

Souls are self-referential, self-conscious collections of information that can exist independent of a body. Possessing no actual substance, they are best thought of as “engraved into the world” by the actions of thinking and cognition. Souls seem to form by conscious thought and activity, and if a human is not reincarnated, the soul seems to be fully formed by 2-4 years of ages.

Only humans have souls proper, but various animals may have “soul-like” qualities, and human souls have been known to attach to various animals in a form of reincarnation (see below).

Souls are not solid, permanent objects but are ever-changing collections of information, growing in complexity life-to-life. They may in some cases degenerate, and very weak souls may disintegrate entirely, bringing madness and insanity to the human whose soul fragments that cannot be cured. This soullessness is not always easy to diagnose by non-professionals, and sadly many horrible dictators and criminals who had gone soulless were not detected in time.

Echoes

Echoes are “soul-fragments” or “soul-leavings” created by heightened emotions, often negative ones. They exist as “vibes” in areas where they were formed, burned into the spiritual structure of that part of the world. Places rich in echoes give people “vibes,” visions, flashbacks of memories not their own, and many other unpleasant experiences. Many places scarred during the war, such as the South or the bombed areas of the North are rich in echoes.

Echoes may latch onto an existing soul and influence it for good or ill.

Echoes are usually caused by traumatic and stressful events, but may also occur due to soul-disintegration brought on by madness or degeneration.

Echoes are fed upon by demons, who use them to construct personalities. Strong enough echoes can be used as seeds to spawn conscious demons.

Ghosts

Ghosts are full souls latched onto a given area, thing, person, family, etc. Ghosts may or may not be conscious of what they’re doing depending on their intention and state of death.

Many ghosts haunt with full knowledge of what they’re doing, at least as far as they are able. However even well-intentioned haunting tend to stay around longer than needed, which may require an exorcist.

Most ghosts can be unhooked from their anchor in the physical world with the right spells, negotiation with the ghost, or a good old-fashioned exorcism. Exorcism, however, is rarely subtle except for some gods – it’s more akin to turning hairspray into a flamethrower, re-purposing one’s connection to the gods to “shock” supernatural phenomena.

Ghosts are not afforded civil protections unless people affected by the specific ghost lobby for such protection.

Reincarnation

Reincarnation is an accepted phenomena on the worlds of Avenoth since it happens to a lot of people. Doctors, clerics, therapriests, and the like will explain, often at length, that it’s not quite the romanticized version people expect. Sometimes people listen.

Reincarnation occurs when an existing soul without a body latches onto a developing soul – usually two months before to six months after birth. The reincarnated soul and the forming soul merge into one, though the reason for reincarnations vary wildly from borderline haunting (a soul trying to incarnate for a reason) to accidental “latching on” to a body. Many gods take a hand in reincarnation, since souls are part of their business.

However, having access to the memories, skills, and such of a past life – or indeed lives, is a complex process. Because the soul has to deal with a forming brain, with it’s own experiences, reincarnation is not really “someone waking up in a new body.” Instead the old soul’s past life or lives becomes accessible to the new personality that is forming.

Evolutionary theologists argue it’s the best of all worlds – information and knowledge can be passed on, but it doesn’t overwhelm the formation of a healthy personality.

Reincarnation is often left alone to run its course, but doctors, teachers, and therapists stand ready to help reincarnates manage their past lives. Children may have to deal with new memories, unexpected inclinations, and unexpected deficits or fears. Sensitive management is the key.

The Afterlife

The “Afterlife” is a general description of where souls go when they aren’t or don’t want to reincarnate. There is a huge, complex series of heavens, hells, and purgatories next to and part of the Godsrealm to deal with human souls.

Heavens – Are general terms for places where souls with similar ideas cluster for positive reasons, many times built and maintained by a god of similar inclinations. Here they may partake in their own societies, politics, and activities, at times beyond human understanding. The gods themselves have great benefit from Heavens, as they are creatures of concept, and souls that participate in those concepts, those archtetypes, enrich the life of a god.

Staying in a Heaven too long usually mean a human soul evolves into something non-human, usually an agent of a god, part of the complex divine bureaucracy, or even a very minor god themselves. Some who had a connection to a god in human life, become saints, agents of the god that may also appear in the flesh.

Hells – Hells are for confining dangerous souls or those riven with pathology and self-hatred. Hells are places of purging, a kind of spiritual flagellation, usually self-inflicted. Souls rarely stay in hells more than a few decades, and usually reincarnate after that.

Some Hells are rumored to house horrible people, dangerous maniacs, and perhaps even Lost Gods.

Purgatories – A general term for “holding pens” for souls that may be established for various reasons, such as the souls having escaped traumatic experiences, or being unsure of where to go.

Moving On

Some souls – and even gods – eventually evolve into a state where they do not reincarnate nor do they stay in the Afterlife or the godsrealm. They are said to have Moved On, and they pass into a state beyond knowing. The Eight Sage religion treats Moving On as an appropriate goal, that to cling too long to the cycle of life is to limit oneself and reinforce misery. Others consider Moving On as an inevitable thing to happen.

– Steve

A Bridge To The Quiet Planet: Economics

by

(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com and Steve’s Tumblr.  Find out more at my newsletter.)

Let’s get to know more about the setting of my upcoming novel, A Bridge To The Quiet Planet.  It’s out late this fall but you can find out about the world now . . .

Economics

Economics isn’t the dismal science on the worlds of Avenoth; it’s taken quite seriously. When you’ve got sorcery, super-science, and the gods running around it really helps to know what won’t destabilize your economy.

Economics is considered a science similar to statistics, analysis, and forensics – it is about understanding how things work for the sake of improvement. Economics tend to be very workaday, often specialized, and very dedicated – it is not a “sexy” profession.

The major goal of economics is seen as better understanding of how things work and making it better. Many an economist with ambition will pitch a plan to a town, ward, district, or even a Great City to try and implement. Some will succeed – though few seem to go into politics, preferring to be more of an advisory role. Considering the often verbal politics of the Government that’s probably wise.

There are no real economic philosophies as we would think of them in our world – many points of culture and civilization are considered not up for debate. For instance, regulation of toxic substances or the need for strong economic representation of professionals int the forms of guilds and unions is considered normal. What does exist is hundreds if not thousands of proposals, ideas and theories to tweak this or that.

It’s a lot like diet – people know the general outline of what’s healthy, but there are debates over the best food, proportions, and the like.

A few universal elements of the economy of the human worlds of Avenoth:

Marks: Marks are the common currency, maintained by The Government. The term is a shortened version of the term “Mark Of Trade,” an old way people would mark the value of items in different currency. Marks usually come in waterproof paper bills, with coins for single Marks, and fractions of them (half-Mark, Quarter-mark, and Decimark). A thousand Marks is usually called a Kilomark or K-mark.

A Mark would be roughly equivalent to just under two dollars in America 2018, though prices are hard to translate.

City Wealth Funds: Each Great City maintains a Wealth Fund, a large pool of money used to promote economic wellbeing. This can take the form of everything from zero-interest or no-payback loans, grants to promising students, and investment seeking payback in other businesses. The Great Cities also invest in each other’s cities, businesses, colleges, and other ways to seek benefits for their citizens – and this opens up yet another route for complex politics.

Guilds, Unions, and Professional Associations: Almost anyone who has a profession is part of one or more professional group. These groups, recognized by ancient charter and slow-but-inevitably-evolving laws, provide support for various professionals with both social bonding, training, and economic support. They also act as power brokers, giving people economic leverage, which is both accepted, but is yet another area of complex politics that citizens navigate.

Guilds and Unions, especially, provide retirement and economic benefits to their members. The Great Cities appreciate this since it ensures people are taken care of.

Benefits: Citizens of Avenoth who are under The Government (which is about 60-80% of them) are provided with certain benefits as citizens:

  • A public education up to and including college. An educated population is a cornerstone of civilization.
  • Health benefits. Obviously a healthy population is a stable one – and considering the amount of biological weapons unleashed during the War, and new diseases from other worlds, it’s needed for survival.
  • Welfare. The society in general provides a lot of welfare benefits, but they vary from Great City to City and planet to planet. For instance on Gellitar food and housing is free.
  • Retirement benefits. Though retirement is a nebulous term in the culture, it is generally figured that past a certain age it is desirable to slow down. Plans are provided by a mixture of The Government, The Great Cities, and professional associations – usually meaning a financial advisor needs to get involved.
  • Maintenance of the Network. Cities work hard to maintain a good part of the network and public access is free to all. Some people pay for boosters or additional security.

Taxes and Fees: Taxation is part of Avenoth and is seen as one paying to support their social structures. People often pay government taxes, City taxes, Ward or district taxes, and there are membership feels to guilds or unions. There is no single tax filing day – taxes are reviewed quarterly. Obviously this keeps many an accountant in business.

Electronic Commerce: Electronic commerce has been known for over five decades, and in piecemeal ways before that. Its best to say it’s been secure for a decade. However, people have adjusted to it slowly and there are those who refuse to use it in any form to this day. Some electronic commerce is thus paid for upon delivery or done by other means.

Forensic Accountants: The term Forensic Accountant refers to people who unriddle financial and economic issues, often after disasters, crimes, and historical discoveries.

Banks: Each Great City has its own Bank, and many Unions, Guilds, and the like run smaller Banks or Credit unions. Banking is highly regulated because of the potential for abuse, thus this arrangement is generally considered a positive. There are only two “non-localized” Banks that operate broadly and they are watched with great suspicion as banking is seen as being open to abuse.

Banks are considered more like a public service than a business venture.

– Steve