Science marches on and my inteleejens is insulted
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Dear God, I had a joke played on me!XD That is some pretty interesting stuff. Your own points are very valid but because I am so used to them they do not bug me as much but none the less I cannot help but notice them every freaking time they appear.Batou667 said:
Well that is my bad. I forgot to mention that humans were coming to the planet to live and work and that the environment could support them on all fronts. Basic knowledge of space and biology makes this hard for me to swallow. ^^; I am willing to believe that there are beings of energy living at the center of a sun as long as the science cannot say otherwise and until we visit the center of one ourselves but science and biology shows us that aliens living on such a planet would look nothing like us, act nothing like us, and be nothing like us.AlloAllo said:
If all aliens in the universe turn out to be hot babes/dudes then screw science, I'm going home.
And I never did say that insulted intelligence equaled the inability to still enjoy a film/movie. For that I call you a kill----... ummmmmm. Crud! I do not have a catchy comeback. Ummmmmmmmm... You suck! XD000Ronald said:
The bipedal design is not just some nice thing that only humans developed, nor are thumbs, or jointed arms, in fact one could go about arguing that at a similar evolutionary timescale other lifeforms on the evolutionary level of humans would probably be fairly human in design (probably not appearance, but this you can TvTrope to Alien Foreheads). Bipedal design simply is advantageous in many, many ways from an evolutionary, adaptive perspective when traveling is important... which is always important for any semi-intelligent life. Yes, some planets will probably have Starfish Aliens, our own planet has Starfish Aliens that few people would believe or could even imagine exist. Heck, statistically speaking, given the sheer number of planetary bodies in the universe, you'd probably have at least a few planets with denizens almost identical to humans.Saulkar said:I am willing to believe that there are beings of energy living at the center of a sun as long as the science cannot say otherwise and until we visit the center of one ourselves but science and biology shows us that aliens living on such a planet would look nothing like us, act nothing like us, and be nothing like us.
Energy beings... technically, if you go really deep into field theory aren't "impossible" but they really wouldn't be anything like a lifeform we could imagine. They'd be... localized consciousness of some group of information, and that depends on whether or not you believe consciousness is at all even a QM effect or just neuroscience. Then you start falling into dualism vs. materialism/physicalism, oy. Science has a long way to march before any of that is answered.
... then you have Copenhagen and Branching Worlds, at which point saying: This doesn't make scientific sense while truly knowing science and appreciating sci-fi, would get you slapped with a book on QM.
Jupiter probably was a failed star, the asteroid belt probably was a planet ripped apart by a fledgling Jupiter and our Sun, but Jupiter never started any reactions, and the radiation it gives off is mostly due to either being the solar system's largest particle accelerator or from magnetic reconnection and plasma effects from the dense plasma at its core.008Zulu said:
I kind of figured you were joking; I should have included an emoticon in my post to show I was too XDThe_root_of_all_evil said:Played for and gotOwyn_Merrilin said:
There's also one from 1900 that was pretty scarily accurate. It got a lot of things wrong, but it also got a lot more than usual right. <link=http://www.yorktownhistory.org/homepages/1900_predictions.htm>Here's the link. One of my favorite predictions is #9, which reads "Photographs will be telegraphed from any distance. If there be a battle in China a hundred years hence snapshots of its most striking events will be published in the newspapers an hour later. Even to-day photographs are being telegraphed over short distances. Photographs will reproduce all of Nature?s colors."Saulkar said:
That's right, they effectively predicted the internet. There's another one floating around about changes that would happen to the way telephones work, this one from I want to say the 1930's. In that case, literally everything it predicted wound up happening. It's always cool when people get this stuff right.
Loonyyy said:It's also a function of density. If the planet in question were primarily composed of heavier elements like lead and gold (I know, unlikely, but bear with me), it could be significantly smaller than the earth and still have similar gravity.Saulkar said:
The only way the Hitchhiker's Guide quote should have bothered you is if it sounded a bit on the short side to you. Rapid decompression, hollywood special effects to the contrary, does actually cause people to explode. People have even been successfully resuscitated after about 15 minutes in a vacuum. You should be more pulled out of the movie when you get the spectacular bloody pulp from decompression than when somebody survives it.Saulkar said:The_root_of_all_evil said:
Gimme that app! But none the less my younger brother can watch anything scientifically inaccurate despite being grade 11 level science in grade 9 and still enjoy it. I on the other hand cannot.
Something like the way the spaceships in Star Wars fly like they're in an atmosphere shatter some peoples suspension of belief but I do not give a damn and actually enjoy it but at the same time something like the narrator from A Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy saying that a person could survive in space for exactly thirty seconds with a lungful of air completely broke my suspension of belief for about thirty minutes.
I am just one of those people who cannot "dump the useless knowledge." ;-)
CAPTCHA: "ontityA Vanilla" OK, you cannot tell me that does not sound sexual!
Edit: Sorry about the triple post. There needs to be a way to quote someone in an edit and still give them a notification. I know I'd make a lot less double and triple posts if that feature could be implemented.
I've never had a problem suspending disbelief when an author introduces magic (or sufficiently advanced technology) and just makes their own rules for it (or even leaves it at a handwave); that's an acceptable break from reality for the sake of a story, and they never pretend that it's supposed to really work that way outside of their own fictional continuity.
I also don't really have an issue with valid assumptions made with outdated information; I have a working knowledge of how current scientific ideas gradually developed, and I can just kinda mentally regress to the same period as the writer.
I get twitchy, however, when someone with no understanding of science seizes upon some half-remembered "scientific fact" they overheard once and pretends that it's how things really work. The most common of these is probably the recent 'black hole = time travel' connection made by every hack who wants to sound like they're making an intelligent speculative fiction show instead of admitting that they're making things up. Yes, relativity says you can effectively go forward in time by going really fast, and yes you can go really fast by looping a black hole very carefully. You cannot fly straight into one and use it as a portal to last tuesday. I don't care that you saw it in a Star Trek movie.
That said, some of the screwiest (non-timetravel-based) sci-fi I've seen:
The Jetsons gets a dishonorable mention for giving the family robot servants and easy personal flight but keeping the wife in the kitchen for no discernible reason.
Nothing ever gets computer development right; most of them think that in a thousand years we'll still be working with massive mainframes that take up entire buildings and form the limiting factor on starships, while the narrow minority assumed that by about 2000 we'd have completely abandoned our physical forms in order to fly around "cyberspace".
Everything with fully sentient robots anywhere near our time frame was horribly underestimating the complexity of a human mind. We've already got more processing power in our pockets than most people can muster in their thoughts, but learning, personality, and dealing with problems that weren't specifically coded for are pretty much beyond us for the foreseeable future.
The wildly impractical future fashions are hilarious to look at. They'd definitely show up on a runway, but most real clothes are designed to be a least marginally practical and comfortable.
Rayguns completely replacing current conventional weaponry is still funny; while they're definitely better in certain situations, and as energy storage and such advance might even get to be practical for everyday use, you can do a heck of a lot more damage by propelling a little metal slug with that bundle of energy than by squirting the energy at the target directly. Even if laser pistols eventually replace slug throwers as the typical sidearm, chemical propellant weapons won't disappear or become unrecognizable; we still have swords and crossbows today and they haven't been the peak weapons for centuries.
I also don't really have an issue with valid assumptions made with outdated information; I have a working knowledge of how current scientific ideas gradually developed, and I can just kinda mentally regress to the same period as the writer.
I get twitchy, however, when someone with no understanding of science seizes upon some half-remembered "scientific fact" they overheard once and pretends that it's how things really work. The most common of these is probably the recent 'black hole = time travel' connection made by every hack who wants to sound like they're making an intelligent speculative fiction show instead of admitting that they're making things up. Yes, relativity says you can effectively go forward in time by going really fast, and yes you can go really fast by looping a black hole very carefully. You cannot fly straight into one and use it as a portal to last tuesday. I don't care that you saw it in a Star Trek movie.
That said, some of the screwiest (non-timetravel-based) sci-fi I've seen:
The Jetsons gets a dishonorable mention for giving the family robot servants and easy personal flight but keeping the wife in the kitchen for no discernible reason.
Nothing ever gets computer development right; most of them think that in a thousand years we'll still be working with massive mainframes that take up entire buildings and form the limiting factor on starships, while the narrow minority assumed that by about 2000 we'd have completely abandoned our physical forms in order to fly around "cyberspace".
Everything with fully sentient robots anywhere near our time frame was horribly underestimating the complexity of a human mind. We've already got more processing power in our pockets than most people can muster in their thoughts, but learning, personality, and dealing with problems that weren't specifically coded for are pretty much beyond us for the foreseeable future.
The wildly impractical future fashions are hilarious to look at. They'd definitely show up on a runway, but most real clothes are designed to be a least marginally practical and comfortable.
Rayguns completely replacing current conventional weaponry is still funny; while they're definitely better in certain situations, and as energy storage and such advance might even get to be practical for everyday use, you can do a heck of a lot more damage by propelling a little metal slug with that bundle of energy than by squirting the energy at the target directly. Even if laser pistols eventually replace slug throwers as the typical sidearm, chemical propellant weapons won't disappear or become unrecognizable; we still have swords and crossbows today and they haven't been the peak weapons for centuries.
Owyn_Merrilin said:Do not worry, I cannot do any better than you. ^^; The moment I try to cut down on the number/size of the quotes I ruin everything and break the code.Loonyyy said:It's also a function of density. If the planet in question were primarily composed of heavier elements like lead and gold (I know, unlikely, but bear with me), it could be significantly smaller than the earth and still have similar gravity.Saulkar said:
The only way the Hitchhiker's Guide quote should have bothered you is if it sounded a bit on the short side to you. Rapid decompression, hollywood special effects to the contrary, does actually cause people to explode. People have even been successfully resuscitated after about 15 minutes in a vacuum. You should be more pulled out of the movie when you get the spectacular bloody pulp from decompression than when somebody survives it.Saulkar said:The_root_of_all_evil said:
Gimme that app! But none the less my younger brother can watch anything scientifically inaccurate despite being grade 11 level science in grade 9 and still enjoy it. I on the other hand cannot.
Something like the way the spaceships in Star Wars fly like they're in an atmosphere shatter some peoples suspension of belief but I do not give a damn and actually enjoy it but at the same time something like the narrator from A Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy saying that a person could survive in space for exactly thirty seconds with a lungful of air completely broke my suspension of belief for about thirty minutes.
I am just one of those people who cannot "dump the useless knowledge." ;-)
CAPTCHA: "ontityA Vanilla" OK, you cannot tell me that does not sound sexual!
Edit: Sorry about the triple post. There needs to be a way to quote someone in an edit and still give them a notification. I know I'd make a lot less double and triple posts if that feature could be implemented.
The thing is that I know very well that you will not explode, your lungs will. If you were to dive 50 meters underwater with scuba gear you lungs are like the size of tennis balls because of the immense compression. Now apply that in reverse, take an empty balloon (basically filled up with air to the point that the pressure is equalized with the atmosphere) into space and the lack of air pressure will allow the present air in the balloon to expand beyond the size of a normal balloon and possibly pop it.
Saulkar said:It doesn't actually work like that, though. NASA did a bunch of experiments on the subject back in the 50's and 60's, and it turns out it's really not all that lethal, lack of breathable air aside. For example, check out <link=http://www.geoffreylandis.com/vacuum.html>this website. It looks like I was way off base on the 15 minute figure, but Adams was actually pretty darned close on the 30 second one. The only problem is that holding one's breath in a case of explosive decompression is a bad idea; paradoxically, exhaling is actually a better move.Owyn_Merrilin said:Do not worry, I cannot do any better than you. ^^; The moment I try to cut down on the number/size of the quotes I ruin everything and break the code.Loonyyy said:It's also a function of density. If the planet in question were primarily composed of heavier elements like lead and gold (I know, unlikely, but bear with me), it could be significantly smaller than the earth and still have similar gravity.Saulkar said:
The only way the Hitchhiker's Guide quote should have bothered you is if it sounded a bit on the short side to you. Rapid decompression, hollywood special effects to the contrary, does actually cause people to explode. People have even been successfully resuscitated after about 15 minutes in a vacuum. You should be more pulled out of the movie when you get the spectacular bloody pulp from decompression than when somebody survives it.Saulkar said:The_root_of_all_evil said:
Gimme that app! But none the less my younger brother can watch anything scientifically inaccurate despite being grade 11 level science in grade 9 and still enjoy it. I on the other hand cannot.
Something like the way the spaceships in Star Wars fly like they're in an atmosphere shatter some peoples suspension of belief but I do not give a damn and actually enjoy it but at the same time something like the narrator from A Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy saying that a person could survive in space for exactly thirty seconds with a lungful of air completely broke my suspension of belief for about thirty minutes.
I am just one of those people who cannot "dump the useless knowledge." ;-)
CAPTCHA: "ontityA Vanilla" OK, you cannot tell me that does not sound sexual!
Edit: Sorry about the triple post. There needs to be a way to quote someone in an edit and still give them a notification. I know I'd make a lot less double and triple posts if that feature could be implemented.
The thing is that I know very well that you will not explode, your lungs will. If you were to dive 50 meters underwater with scuba gear you lungs are like the size of tennis balls because of the immense compression. Now apply that in reverse, take an empty balloon (basically filled up with air to the point that the pressure is equalized with the atmosphere) into space and the lack of air pressure will allow the present air in the balloon to expand beyond the size of a normal balloon and possibly pop it.
Very nice. The story about a 1/8" suit puncture being accidentally patched by coagulated blood from an injury the astronaut didn't even notice was particularly interesting.Owyn_Merrilin said:
So: according to real science and experience, a human in vacuum that doesn't try to hold their breath has about ten seconds conscious, maybe 90 seconds before death. And any body parts that aren't properly pressurized will swell to double normal size, hurt like hell, and become temporarily useless, but apparently have no lasting ill effects. Temperature isn't a big issue because a vacuum is the best insulator there is, though evaporation might freeze your mouth and nose and chill your skin a bit (and in the long term heat dissipation is a puzzle).
If you attempt to hold a lungful of air like Adams suggested, you will horrifically rupture the delicate tissues that exchange oxygen into your blood, bubbles will be pushed into your bloodstream, and they will then play merry havoc with all the parts of you that really should not contain bubbles (like the brain). At best your lungs will be lacerated, at worst you're very quickly and painfully dead.
The floor is actually practical. See Eugene Cernan's EVA during Gemini IXABatou667 said:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gemini_9
You often hear that 'for every action there is an equal but opposite reaction', but normally the following part gets left out: '... which usually acts upon a third object.' The "third object" scenarios occur on the surface of the earth; where horses push against the ground to pull the cart, or a man will lean back to pull a lever (again he is using the ground for leverage). As Cernan and NASA discovered, without the reference point of the 'third object', working in zero gravity is more difficult than it sounds. so while creating "artificial gravity" somehow may sound like a waste of energy, it does have distinct benefits both for productivity and human physiology. And for TV serials its a boon because they can't afford the expense of creating a zero G environment - though that would be supremely cool.
The spaceships are on the same plane because it was cheaper to fly coach. Badumtisch.
I presume that you are referencing 'warp speed', in which case its not so much the ship moving, but the ship causes space to curve in such a way that their destination becomes much closer than it would be normally. Therefore it isn't speed in the sense of classical mechanics, but relativity. I believe Steven Hawking is the foremost authority in those matters, and its all theoretical at the moment.
I agree with an earlier post that its not too much of a stretch to think aliens will be humanoid. Evolution clearly favors at least twofold symmetry on this planet; eyes, legs, wings, ears etc. It makes sense for eyes to be at the highest point with legs between it and the ground. While we're at it there are logical reasons for the other senses to be near the eyes - that puts all the sensors near the central processor. Note that this doesn't rule out intelligent arachnids - or whelks.
And you're right about English. It is quite clear that Belgian is the most perfect language. At least to one man. His name escapes me, but there was this fellow who wrote a book in the 1960's or 1970's which concluded that Belgian was the most perfect language, and therefore must be the earliest, and most primal. [No, it wasn't. But most cultures have 'dreamers' that come up with bizarre theories about their own language. Things like homonyms (etc etc etc) having majikal powers...]
I could swear mass effect used some theory of relativity stuff...that CERN just made a mockery of! Hahaha [/poshlittlelaugh]
That's the only thing I got. And I'm pretty doubtful about that. Because I am a dumbass with all the scientific understanding of a cucumber. A plastic one.
That's the only thing I got. And I'm pretty doubtful about that. Because I am a dumbass with all the scientific understanding of a cucumber. A plastic one.