The Third Age: 3,000 years of technological stagnation

[Weisshund]

@Lumpy

Of course if LotR is supposed to have actually taken place in our past, then sometime after the death of Aragorn the world regressed to the point that people used stone tools again, and it took millennia for bronze to be reinvented.

Dagor Dagorath?

“Thereafter shall the Earth be broken and remade, and the Silmarils shall be recovered out of Air and Earth and Sea; for Feanor shall surrender them willingly Yavanna will rekindle the Two Trees, and a great light shall come forth. And the mountains of Valinor shall be levelled, so that the light shall go out over all the world. In that light the Valar will grow young again, and the Elves awake and all their dead arise, and the purpose of Ilúvatar be fulfilled concerning them. But of Men in that day the prophecy of Mandos doth not speak, and no Man it names, save Túrin only, and to him a place is given among the sons of the Valar.”

[Reddy_Mercury]

I find the Shire to be wildly inconsistent, in terms of technology, from the rest of Middle Earth, in all honesty. The Shire seems to be at around a 1700s level of technology whereas the rest seems to be somewhere in the late Middle Ages.

[wintertime]

I think, two major factors have already been named: the long lifespans that reduce the rate of discovery and innovation and the actual existence of superior beings that seem to punish everyone thoroughly who is trying to innovate himself to their level.

This results in a mindset averse to technological progress among the elite; technology is intertwined with evil, leads to evil, which makes its use being discouraged within cultural norms and tradition and by pressure from the authorities and peers alike.

Middle Earth is the result of factual knowledge of a god-controlled universe.

And one of the driving forces of progress is only rudimentarily developed there: commerce. Mass production is irrelevant if your market is small and stagnant. The benefits of more advanced products are not tangible for its producer, so what incentive could they have to innovate?

[Penfeather]

@Weisshund

We are talking Middle Earth, not Hogwarts.

Most of middle earth does not possess magic, of those that do, most of it is not that kind of magic.
The only persons in middle earth that possess magic in that magnitude are not of middle earth, they are Miar or Quenya.

Gandalf, Radagast, Saruman, Sauron, Melkor,the Blue etc they are not human dwarvish or elvish nor are they of middle earth, nor are they existent in large numbers.

Sauron is here through following Melkor, no those two would not like anyone challenging their power, even Eru who could break the rules and bitch slap them
through the door of night if that was his way.
They ploy magic by main force, but that is not the norm, they are the exception.

Saruman forgets his place and becomes full of himself and dabbles a bit with it
but never makes it to full retard.

Gandalf and Radagast never use it to influence the world and aside from parlor tricks
make minimal use of it, they are even forbidden to match power for power with the corrupt Maiar.

So magic has little influence on the day to day life of middle earth.
No magic brooms or fireplaces, no spells to fix broken things and clear up messes.
And no all powerful wizards to keep everyone under boot heal.

Even Sauron must resort to raising physical armies and fighting through physical means because even his magic power has sever limits.
he can not rule middle earth using magic only by main force.

Nothing is prevented from happening due to magic.

If anything modern advances in technology don’t exist simply due to lack of need.
The people don’t perceive a need.
They are happy to plow their fields by hand, catch fish by hand etc.
Perhaps even take great pride in it.

They are perhaps a bit unrealistic as modern people go, but it is a story after all.
And it is not like it is without precedent, there have been real times and places where
the people remained mostly the same for a very long time, simply because they were happy as they were and did not feel any drive to make any great changes.

One other very important thing.
Most important thing actually.
The reader does NOT want the world to go making drastic changes.
The reader does not want middle earth to morph into a 1970 global industrial complex
That is not the story they came to read and so it is not the story Tolkien has written.

For some reason I read that entirely in Gil Scott-Heron’s voice.