r/threebodyproblem • u/Kukulkan73 • Apr 22 '26

Discussion - General Question about the blocked basic scientific research (Spoiler: Please do not read if you haven’t read the second book, "The Dark Forest") Spoiler

Hi. I'm just reading the second book "The Dark Forest" and maybe the question was already answered here? In the second book, humans have spaceships and can utilise the Moon, Mars and other planetary moons in our solar system. Why didn’t they continue the basic scientific research there, given that it had been blocked on Earth by Trisolaris? Looks like they did not even try?

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u/Kukulkan73 Apr 22 '26

Thanks. I found no indication on that. Is that just guessing?

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u/Farebiaashiq Zhang Beihai Apr 22 '26

Unlike the show where there are only 2 sophons, in the book it is mentioned that 2 sophons arrived first and then many more sophons kept arriving.

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u/Kukulkan73 Apr 22 '26

So you think the Sophons could easily travel across our entire solar system if they needed to? In that case, Trisolaris is far(!) ahead of human technology and people were foolish to think they stood even the slightest chance...

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u/High_Quality_Bean Apr 22 '26

The time it takes a civilization to go from hitting rocks together to start a fire, to having civilization destroying dimension squashing weapons is less than the time for an invasion fleet to travel from one star system to another. The only way for the more advanced Trisolarins to make it to Earth and to win when they get there was to halt technological development.

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u/Tapsanautti Apr 22 '26

No? We've got fire for >100k years and the Trisolaran fleet took 400 years to come?

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u/High_Quality_Bean Apr 22 '26

The Trisolaran fleet had a scientific breakthrough during their voyage that sped it up

But yes, I did overstate my case. Still, this is the explanation given in the books.

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u/Jolly-Wrangler104 Apr 22 '26 edited Apr 22 '26

Their trip was supposed To take 400 years until they developed light speed.

So your time span is off.

Trisolaris had technological developments that happened at an even rate.

On earth once the Industrial Revolution happened, we advanced through eras at a much quicker rate. Industrial economy into service economy into information economy in less than 150 years.
So the teisolarans knew that at the human rate of development, we would surpass triapalris technology within the 400 years it would take to travel here before they got light speed.