Most Misused Word in Science Fiction

[Frostmarrow]

Does anyone remember the old King short story Granting? It deals with teleportation in the shortcut through a parallell dimension sense rather than the get destroyed and reassembled way. It's very cool. It's about the father of a family who meticulously explains to his family about the history of Granting. He even mentions the you have to be sedated to go Granting else you risk witnessing the actual journey, somthing that'll drive you mad and kill you. Anyway, good story.

I once read a short story about a boy in the future who refuses to use the teleportation portals that can be found everywhere. His teachers and parents are troubled by this because you must use the portals - all normal people do. It turns out the boy once witnessed a power outage and raised the question: "What happens if you have a power outage in the middle of a teleport jump?".

 

[ddvmor]

Following up on the recurring 'quantum' issue in this thread - can someone please exoplain to me exactly what a 'quantum singularity' is, why it emits tachyons and why it's blue and swirly.

And while we're talking about blue and swirly... singularities, rifts, distortions and the like. Why are they always, always blue and swirly?

 

[Zappo]

You want me to go for the No-Prize? Sure!

Sound doesn't travel as a wave through vacuum, but physical items can still move. When you hear an explosion in a space scene, the sound is poroduced by highly accelerated debris (including simple molecules of gas) impacting the hull of the ship in which the camera sits. The fact that this results in something we imagine sounds like an explosion is happy coincidence

My theory is that what you hear isn't the sound of the engine or explosion, but the electromagnetic waves which the engine/explosion produces, through your ship's radio. Notice that Star Wars' noisiest ships in relation to size seem to be the TIE series, which have ion engines, which presumably produce a lot of electromagnetic "noise". I don't know what the other engines burn, but I bet it isn't gasoline. Most SW weapons use some sort of charged particles too. I'm a bit more at a loss in explaining explosions this way, except for the really big ones... though it is likely that shields dissipate some energy as em waves when hit. So, do I win something?

I once read a short story about a boy in the future who refuses to use the teleportation portals that can be found everywhere. His teachers and parents are troubled by this because you must use the portals - all normal people do. It turns out the boy once witnessed a power outage and raised the question: "What happens if you have a power outage in the middle of a teleport jump?".

"The UPS kicks in, that's what happens. Now go, you're late for school." Really, it isn't a word, but my greatest sci-fi pet peeve is why so many advanced civilizations have access to teleportation devices, fusion energy, quantum computers, but no UPS - or surge protectors, for that matter. I guess that safety doesn't make for a good story.

 

[Allanon]

Security. In for example Star Trek everyone seems to bypass security with easy. Even non-intelligent lifeforms are either not detected or somehow instictively now all the important subroutines to acces main ship controls. In never amazes me how a lot of science fiction series seem to feature diffenent aliens or entities with no prior knowledge to eachother existance who somehow seem to be able to bypass, disable, override or nullify every security system the other one has.

Something else that never amazes me is how hits to the shield systems or a completely different part of the ship always seem to blow out consoles and systems within the bridge section. Methinks that it would be wise to insulate or otherwise protect those systems from suddenly blowing out. I mean circuitbrakers are commenplace even in these times.

 

[Padril]

Security. In for example Star Trek everyone seems to bypass security with easy. Even non-intelligent lifeforms are either not detected or somehow instictively now all the important subroutines to acces main ship controls.

Why is it in every advanced civilisation they have all reverted to using BASIC with subroutines? It reminds me of the time I spent programming my ZX Spectrum

In the future all spaceships are run by Spectrums and Commodore 64s

 

[jonesy]

Does anyone remember the old King short story Granting? It deals with teleportation in the shortcut through a parallell dimension sense rather than the get destroyed and reassembled way. It's very cool. It's about the father of a family who meticulously explains to his family about the history of Granting. He even mentions the you have to be sedated to go Granting else you risk witnessing the actual journey, somthing that'll drive you mad and kill you. Anyway, good story.

Sounds more like travelling through the warp a la WH40K than actual teleportation.

 

[Arnwyn]

Ever watched Firefly? Space scenes feel naked.

I loved the space scenes in Firefly. Completely silent when the camera was viewing something out in space. Very cool.

For me, I'm happy with both. The "epic" feel of explosions in space for some movies, and complete silence in other movies.

 

[mojo1701]

Following up on the recurring 'quantum' issue in this thread - can someone please exoplain to me exactly what a 'quantum singularity' is, why it emits tachyons and why it's blue and swirly.

A singularity is a black hole, I believe.

 

[ledded]

Why is it in every advanced civilisation they have all reverted to using BASIC with subroutines? It reminds me of the time I spent programming my ZX Spectrum

In the future all spaceships are run by Spectrums and Commodore 64s

And don't forget those universal RS232 ports that every space-faring civilization installs in their spacecraft. I mean, how else could you hack an entire war amada with a Mac. (thank you, Independence Day). I look forward to the day when I can swat down an entire invading Alien force with nothing but a digital watch, a video cell phone, and a pair of iPod headphone jacks.

 

[Mercule]

In the future all spaceships are run by Spectrums and Commodore 64s

POKE 636, 14

Because the world is better with light blue cursors.