Attack of the Ankle-Biters - Replacment player needed.

[geoschmo]

But nothing about telekinesis requires a path. It's using mental energy to manifest a force out of nothing. If we are going to accept a weapon that violates the laws of thermodynamics as it's fundamental operating principle, we don't have to say the force is created out of nothing at the point of the projector. We can simply say the force is being created out nothing at the point of the target. Either one is acceptable once we get past the initial violating assumption.

EDIT: Put it this way, if the force required a path from the mind creating it to the target it would punch a hole through their own ship on the way out. Unless the psychics are strapped to the outside of the hull.

Geoschmo

[ July 28, 2003, 01:01: Message edited by: geoschmo ]

[Pax]

Originally posted by Imperator Fyron:
Well, I was going under the assumption that he was not wanting to include magic in the mod. Anything technological or pseudo-realistic has to make some sort of travel path. Instantly warping there is absurd unless you are doing something like folding space (an absurd notion in and of itself), which is well beyond the scope of telekinesis. Even wormholes have a path of travel in realspace.

Tell me, Fyron, have you ever heard of the phenomenon called "quantum tunnelling" ... ?

Matter -- that's matter not just energy -- instantaneously jumps form point A to (say) point H ... and does not pass through points BCDEF or G. And it's a real-world current thing, not just SF.

Further, there's also the whole "quantum pair" infinite-distance instantaneous information transfer effect. Create two particles; they will have opposite spin. They will always have opposite spin. If you send particle B to the other side of the universe, uncountable billions of lightyears away while keeping particle A HERE ... and then reverse B's spin ... at the exact same moment, particle A will also reverse it's spin.

All that's required is, they both be in the same universe. (as far as we know so far, anyway; it migh even work across THOSE barriers). A forcefield wouldn't change that. Heck, fourty billion klometers of armor wouldn't change that.

So it is entirely within the realm of quantum physics to posit a mechanism, by which energy can be "created" or otherwise accumulated at some marked distance from teh generator, without effect upon or from intervening energy, matter, space, etc.

So much for your "it has to be magic" argument, hmm? I guess "everything technological or pseudo-realistic" doesn't actually HAVE to have apath of travel, now, does it?

8P

Oh, as for folding space being absurd: tell it to Einstein. He was under the (apparently absurd) notion that space IS foldable, warpable, bendable,e tc. Seems he had this crazy notion gravity does JUST that.

But, of course, that's not possible; never mind the fact that we've PROVEN gravity warps space (that bit, at least, is no longer theory).

[Slick]

*sigh*

not again...


Slick.

[Fyron]

That is all fine. It still does not have anything to do with telekinesis, which is a projection of force powered by mental (psionic) energy from the being doing the telekinesis.

[Phoenix-D]

Explain why the shields could block mental force, then. (hell, explain why they could block -any- force, aside from maybe electromagnetic)

[Jack Simth]

Originally posted by Imperator Fyron:
That is all fine. It still does not have anything to do with telekinesis, which is a projection of force powered by mental (psionic) energy from the being doing the telekinesis.

From the context, it would appear that Pax is suggesting that in his view of how the currently commonly considered imaginary field of telekenesis, the energy generated by the psis' is transmitted through a mechanism that skips distances and interviening matter/energy/whatever in a similar manner to quantum tunneling or the unknown mechanism of quantum pairings; thus skipping shields.

Likewise, from the context it would appear that you are suggesting that in your view of how the currently commonly considered imaginary field of telekenesis, the energy generated by the psis' is transmitted through a mechanism that does not skip distances and interviening matter/energy/whatever.

As the existance of telekenesis is currently open to debate, and thus the mechanism hasn't been studied (assuming that it exists in the first place in order to have a mechanisim) and is thus unknown, debating based on realism wether or not this possibly nonexistant force could get through a shield that is currently only hypothesized is laughable. Or, as Geo put it:

Originally posted by geoschmo:
Are you seriously debating telekinetic powers skipping shields, and using a realism argument? ROFL!

Geoschmo

[Pax]

Originally posted by Imperator Fyron:
That is all fine. It still does not have anything to do with telekinesis, which is a projection of force powered by mental (psionic) energy from the being doing the telekinesis.

So ... you have proof of this "fact", perhaps ... ? You can describe to us the precise energy type, the mechanics of the resultant wave form, it's mechanism of generation, and the physics and mechanics of it's propagation through matter, EM fields, and/or vacuum? Maybe even shed some light on the biological and/or technological structures neccessary to generate such effects and waveforms, complete with working schematics?

If so, then please, do tell ...

Prove to us that quantum tunelling is not as equally valid for energy as it is for matter. Then prove that the energy wave-form(s) associated with the use of telekinetic or psychokinetic events does not, and can not, utilise quantum tunnelling, or any similar phenomenon.

Of course, you can't. I've refuted your claim that only magic can allow such a thing to happen, with real-world current-technology examples of actual, hard science.

You are relying solely on newtonian physics for your argument; I am delving into the possibilities inherent in quantum physics for mine. Therein lies the downfall of your argument: quantum physics always trumps newtonian physics. The only factor they have in common would be, AFAIK, the First Law of Thermodynamics.

It is IMO entirely feasible, and scientifically possible, that the TKProjector randomly re-balances kinetic energy in the target -- taking some FROM one place, and adding it TO another place -- and that several aspects of quantum mechanics governs the means and methods by which this is acomplished.

I have therefor posited that such is the mechanism by which telekinesis works, ergo, shields are about as useful against a powerful (or in this case, artificial and/or artificially amplified) telekinetic as a papier-mache hull would be against a Shard Cannon X. Which is to say, not at all.

So, I say again -- if you dislike it this much, why not simply not play this particular mod ... ?

Originally posted by Phoenix-D:
Explain why the shields could block mental force, then. (hell, explain why they could block -any- force, aside from maybe electromagnetic)

Actually, and I'm working form half-remembered stuff here, but I remember one of the Voyager satellites had to have several course corrections after bouncing off of Jupiter's EM field. Sunward, the planets' EM fields are compressed by the constant pressure of the solar wind; my understanding is, this creates areas of exceptionally strong EM flux, in layers of "shells", around the planets.

In the case of a giant like Jupiter, these can have a very real effect on even relatively-massive physical objects. At least twice, perhaps more often, that Voyager satellite I mentioned had it's course deflected away from Jupiter, neccessitating several repeated tries to cross that point in Jupiter's EM field before the flyby could be managed.

So in the least, it's possible for an EM-based field to deflect energy and/or physical objects ... if the field is strong enough, and it's density is somehow compressed sufficiently.

Originally posted by Jack Simth:
From the context, it would appear that Pax is suggesting that in his view of how the currently commonly considered imaginary field of telekenesis, the energy generated by the psis' is transmitted through a mechanism that skips distances and interviening matter/energy/whatever in a similar manner to quantum tunneling or the unknown mechanism of quantum pairings; thus skipping shields.

Exactly, unequivocably, and precisely correct.