Semi-OT: A General Tech Question Thread for me :)

[Wolfman77]

I never said I could explain it. Only that "there are not any commonly accepted theories that prohibit it from functioning (well none that I'm aware of anyway)."

Currently, it is generally accepted that gravity is mediated by a particle called a graviton. I admit, there is no solid proof of its existence, but then science has relatively few proofs when compared to theories. If we assume the graviton does exist, then it is not that much of a stretch to think that with 2000 years more science, that someone might figure out how to control it without needing all that mass.

If you have proof that the graviton does not exist, then please share this information with the rest of the scientific community so they can spend their time on other theories.

If you do not believe that science will ever explain anything not already known, or pose new questions never thought of, then you will always nit-pick science fiction, and never gain anything from it.

Just as a note: Newtonian gravity works OK on large scale, but breaks down at smaller scales. It does work for your example, however, because with newtonian gravity that is considered large scale. Small scale is considered less than the width of an atom. But then, I'm just being nit-picky.

[Hunpecked]

What strikes me most about this thread, with its frequent emphasis on what's "really" possible, is that once you assume "warp" space travel (i.e. as in the SE IV game), 21st Century science goes out the window. Perhaps it would be more productive* to speculate how the "warp" travel already built into the game can explain other game features. Example: For in-system travel, why not replace Newtonian acceleration/deceleration, with its inconvenient mass/energy/velocity/fuel limitations, by a continuous "micro-warp" drive with constant velocity (very convenient) and whatever limitations you like? BTW, this is somewhat similar to the "stutterwarp" in the Traveller role-playing game, which is based on, yes, REAL science, i.e. [begin handwaving] quantum tunneling [end handwaving].

Or take the "Alderson Drive" in the Niven/Pournelle novel "The Mote in God's Eye". The "warp points" in this fictional universe arise from an as-yet-undiscovered "fifth force". Presumably the discovery of this new force would lead to a whole new branch of physics and many practical applications, but to my knowledge the authors made no use of this technology beyond interstellar travel. If so, then I'd say they missed a good opportunity.

Back to SE IV. You want "shields"? No problem! Apply the same game technology used for interstellar travel to generate a "warp field" around your ship that "warps" incoming matter/energy harmlessly AROUND the vessel! Now for game/story purposes you may want limits on how much "incoming" can be deflected (leaky shields) or you may want "incoming" to "use up" shield/warp energy (consumable shields). Your weapons can be modified shield projectors that create a long thin warp field (as opposed to a short fat shield) along which you can fling projectiles, photons, anti-protons, etc. toward enemy vessels. Since warp fields defy "conventional" physics your "beams" don't scatter and efficiency is so amazingly high that minimal cooling is required.

Just as the first lasers led to multiple practical applications in telecom, weaponry, medicine, computers, chemistry, physics, etc. I would expect a fictional scientific breakthrough to affect many aspects of a scifi story.


*by the phrase "be more productive" I mean "waste time more efficiently"

[El_Phil]

Well hunpecked the thing is if 'warp points' are just wormholes then your still probably OK in modern science. As long as you dont go FTL locally during your trip through the warp point your OK it's 'just' a distorion in the local spacetime.

Still its a nifty theory.

Are Gravitons really generally accepted? There was me thinking it was just part of the attempt at transfering quantum mechanics to gravity. There are many other quantum theories of gravity that involve no gravitons. I'm not saying they don't exist, similar quantum theories work in many other fields. But existing quantum graviton theorys are nastily convuluted, contrvied and internally inconsistent at the moment. Of course they could straighten out, or the correct theory could be that convoluted.

Still with gravity being mass, momentum and energy, taking Einstein's theory of gravitation as right of course, it doesn't matter what particle does the work, you still need those three to get gravity. Just because you can put a name to something does mean you can create it easier.

Why is this? Gravitons are just messenger particles, they don't create the force they just pass it on. So to create the gravitons you have to create the force, so you have to create that much gravity which is no real net gain. Or that is my understanding anyway.

[Suicide Junkie]

Energy loss via gravitational waves can be seen in binary pulsars like PSR 1913+16

Gravitons are to gravity waves as Photons are to light waves.

[dogscoff]

because they didn't increase kill they just burned horribly and crippled people in ways that are just not settling thinking about.

But exploding people doesn't bother you..?

How to solve that? Computer controled constant correction...
Weapons however are tricky,

Sounds to me like a good excuse for fighter combat.

[Starhawk]

dogscoff said:

Yeah of course exploding people in RL bothers me because it's still terrible but at least when you explode you ain't hurting much and it's a LOT better then feeling parts of your body melting LITERALLY inch by inch ain't it? I'd rather not see anyone die of any kind of bullet though.

Sounds to me like a good excuse for fighter combat.

Good point about fighter combat assuming they'd have weapons powerful enough to hurt a capital ship's shields/armor or whatever.

[kerensky]

Hey Starhawk, remember my Deliverance class system defense fighter bases? The ability to launck two hundred, 40kt, corvette cals fighters in one combat turn is definently enough to hurt a capital ship, or two, or three.....

[Starhawk]

LOL yeah those uber fighter stations of yours they'd probobly help destroy a few cappys thats for sure.

I designed a "carrier" flag monitor that can launch 58 75kt fighters at a time, and 5 of them are capable of destroying a Superdreadonught, and oh yeah the flag monitor carries 189 so that's 37.8 SDs dead if I could get all my gunships there unschathed

[Hunpecked]

El_Phil writes: "Well hunpecked the thing is if 'warp points' are just wormholes then your still probably OK in modern science."

I lack even a layman's understanding of "wormholes". From the Wikipedia I gather that it's all theory so far and usable wormholes may or may not be possible. In other words it's still sci fi, though with a possible but not solid theoretical basis.

Personally I doubt that wormholes, if they even exist, are usable for FTL travel, for the simple reason that no ET species has to our knowledge taken over the entire universe. Yeah, yeah, we could be alone, we could be in an interstellar "wildlife preserve," etc. But I get the distinct impression that our universe is just not very friendly to many of our cherished sci fi concepts.

[Starhawk]

Or generally speaking the universe is really freaking huge and what are the odds of an interstellar empire just happening to bump into us?

I mean for all we know our universe is a war torn hell hole, or a rather "earthlike" concept of nations empires and yadda yadda that are sometimes at peace and some times at war.

Either way I doubt they'd need to pay much attention to us just yet anyway, now if and when we ever get space ships we may bump into a few of them and either get squashed or just get out there and form our own little nation states.

Yah never know but I also doubt that every species out there except us is unified like we see in Sci-fi either.