@Nzall this would require Star Wars style levitation. If that's allowed, then this is possible. Also, there are some very well established food safety temperatures. A good chef will know those safe and unsafe temperature ranges in his very soul.

@Green I mean, we already managed to make a live frog float

so not sure we need SW style magnetic levitation

@Green How about blue? Fits your avatar.

@Nzall Sure, so I guess this turns into a trade-offs question. How big a kitchen will you need to hold all that high precision-high energy equipment and have space for enough (sous)-chefs to run a restaurant large-enough and high-end-enough to be profitable.

That food better be absolutely astounding to command the kind of revenue this chef will need to keep all that levitation and laser equipment running, on top of food, labor and real estate costs.

@James @AndyD273 I realized something today: A lot of the time when I'm "ruining" someone's question by poking at loopholes, the mechanism I use is to force externalities to be internalized into whatever system the OP is describing.

hey there @Green

@Shalvenay hey!

how're things going?

@Shalvenay My brain is still working and I'm realizing new things about how I work and why I do what I do. I'm pretty happy about htat.

cool

@Shalvenay you?

@Green trying to dig the backlogged pile of worldbuilding Qs out of memory...:P

@Green Sup?

@JasonClyde hey!

@Shalvenay a worth goal. I wish you the best.

@Green I wound up deciding there wasn't much more I could learn from continuing the "everyone becomes ghosts for a week" series, since it was already obvious the answer was going to be "society is nigh-irreparably damaged."

So last night I posted a question about neglect-proofing the power grid.

I'm getting some helpful replies, though it seems that there's going to be some interesting inconveniences to factor into worldbuilding.

@JasonClyde :D Welcome to Worldbuilding!

Hahahaha

One must always make helpful assumptions about how the world works.

Been doing that for a while, but this in particular is going to be interesting.

I was working on a story once about what happens to Boston if everyone instantly disappeared. I know that there's a nuclear research reactor on MIT campus....and I conveniently ignored that fact.

Oh

No I mean more like

Things that have to be done to protect the grid will create problems it'll be fun to come up with solutions for, likely using my story's magic system.

@JasonClyde You've got my answer for how much it would cost and how to do it safest.

@Green thanks a ton!

@JasonClyde Did I answer what you were hoping for?

I just finished reading it. I might have to read again, I'm a little confused.

I appreciate providing costs though

So you're describing the costs of just bringing it back online after the solution is discovered?

@Green

@JasonClyde I'm assuming that the grid goes down for a week. The costs cited are for restarting the grid.

Yeah, I understand that. So every time it goes down, it'll take a week to turn back on, best case scenario?

If that's the case then they won't be able to turn it on at all without risking trial damage.

@Green That's not what I wanted to hear, but if it's the truth it's the truth.

@JasonClyde the first time the grid goes down, lots of bad stuff will happen. Equipment wasn't designed to be turned off and on. After the first restart and the inevitable accidents, there will be high demand for equipment that can be turned off and on. Fewer things will go wrong the second time then even fewer tunings the third time, and so on.

You get better at the things you practice. Every system is designed with assumptions. Often the designers aren't even aware of them.

Failure exposes those assumptions. The next design iteration incorporates the fixes for those failed assumptions.

I expect that as everyone gets practice with the grid going down, the time required to bring it back up will improve.

@Green How long do you think it would take before the grid can go off and on again within 24 hours?

The ideal goal is to shut it down every Saturday just in case that Saturday is a black rune week that would keep people from doing their jobs, and then bring it up as soon as possible so that the country has power for at least the majority of the week.

@JasonClyde that's a different requirement. If the grid may go down on any given weekend, then the grid will be adapted to shut itself down if no one can assist.

The same practice effect will apply though. It'll take a few events for the grid to adapt. There's also a social aspect of getting the general public to accept the costs of adapting to outages.

True.

@Green Hey, there was something else I didn't think really fit as a question on the site but which I've always wanted to run past someone. You willing to lend an ear?

@JasonClyde go for it.

@Green Awesome. So, something occurred to me. So, one day everyone just suddenly has a brand on their arm that's full of magic empowering runes.

Which made me wonder: how long is it going to take before that becomes the new reality that fiction is based from?

Like, I'm trying to imagine how long it's going to be before, say, sitcoms and soap operas have that as a plot element because it's the new real life.

@JasonClyde my answer would be: how long did it take for Twitter to show up on Saturday Night Live. Maybe a few years. If it affects everyone, probably much faster, maybe weeks.

Yeah, I was of two minds on that

There would be news programs about "This Weeks Runes! Are they right for you."

Either they wouldn't want to accept it as normal for a while and try to make sure at least fiction let people get away from it, or it would be weird to keep telling stories about people who are less interesting and more vulnerable than what is now the baseline human race.

Ah, I think I missed your original intent. Just a sec.

Humans are story driven creatures. Given all the stories written about medieval people or futuristic people.

It wouldn't be weird to talk about pre-rune humans at all.

Fair enough.

We tell stories about emotionally stunted people, super impoverished people, great triumphs, great tragedies.