Comments on Rocketpunk Manifesto: A Place to Call Home

Yes, I have noticed that. Unless the thread is abo...

2012-02-25T17:13:11.280-08:00

Yes, I have noticed that. Unless the thread is about space warfare in the first place, in which case it merely accumulates outsized comment traffic.

ORION is, in a sense, nuke thermal on steroids, while 'elegant' self-sustaining fusion is nuke electric on (a different kind of) steroids.

ORION drive is not at all well suited to laser stars - if you have an onboard reactor it will need big radiator wings, one more thing that will have to be braced against that bumpy ORION ride.

A fusion drive probably has some electric generating capability ... if you're willing go sacrifice some or all acceleration while zapping. But if you have a torch level drive generating terawatt-level thrust power, you might be able to draw off a mere gigawatt or two with no effect on thrust performance.

Of course, then the question is how long ships last in an environment of gigawatt beams and hundred km/s kinetics.

Notice how any thread that goes on long enough bec...

2012-02-22T18:10:57.320-08:00

Notice how any thread that goes on long enough becomes one about space warfare? ;)

Any useful space warship (or any ship which aspires to the sort of performance seen on TV shows) needs to combine high thrust with high ISP. The only known drive that can do this is nuclear pulse drives (AKA ORION), or putative pulsed fusion drives (possibly laser or electron beams imploding D2 fuel pellets).

ORION drives have power self contained in the pulse units, so would either be missile carriers or have separate monster reactors for the laser, while pulsed fusion drives with magnetic thrust chambers could use induction to power beam weapons so long as the drive was active.

Yes - if you want laserstars you can still have th...

2012-02-18T09:47:39.608-08:00

Yes - if you want laserstars you can still have them. But nuke electric propulsion particularly favors laserstars, due to the combination of lots of electric power supply and sluggish thrust performance.

It occures to me that if you need a fission reacto...

2012-02-15T18:14:38.928-08:00

It occures to me that if you need a fission reactor to power your engine, then it should be relitively easy to increase the size of the reactor to provide enough electricity to power a BAL for your Laserstar. The greater mass would affect your ship's performance, but would be a way to rationalize laser heavy combat.

Ferrell

Not even then, unless fusion adds only a fairly mo...

2012-02-13T19:24:54.604-08:00

Not even then, unless fusion adds only a fairly modest increase to total drive power.

The key predicate for a laserstar is an onboard electric power supply in the tens or hundreds of megawatts. (It is the electricity that matters - nuke-thermal propulsion is irrelevant to powering a laser.)

If a fusion drive needs only a small fission reactor to spark-plug the fusion reaction, it won't be enough for uber-powerful zaps. (Which are the whole point of the laserstar.)

On the other hand, even if you have a big badass fission reactor, but the fusion drive boosts this into gigawatts of thrust power, you start to get some real maneuverability, which can make throwing kinetics even better than laying down zaps.

Everything here depends on the balance of things.

@Tony Hmmmpphh.... I'll have to check my date...

2012-02-13T19:10:59.547-08:00

@Tony

Hmmmpphh.... I'll have to check my dates more carefully next time. I'm just asking that you keep an open mind- but not so open your brain falls out.

I was referring to the noted British physicist Lord Kelvin, founder of the Kelvin scale. He stated that heavier than air flight was impossible, X-rays would prove to be a hoax, and that radio would have no practical use. I probably got the wrong date from something associated with Michio Kaku- he's really bad with checking his information.

Sorry!!!!

Some rather prominent scientists said rockets wouldn't work in space, and the New York Timesclaimed that Robert Goddard lacked the "knowledge daily ladled out in high school".

That's enough to get anyone depressed. Robert Goddard actually had to test small rockets in a vacuum chamber- like someone trying to prove the Bifeld-Brown asymmetric capacitor produces thrust in a vacuum- to convince other scientists that rocket thrust wouldn't drop off in the vacuum. Read the Wikipedia article.

What about Mark Millis do you not find credible? He hasn't claimed to invent an antigravity drive. All he's done is start a workshop at NASA to explore concepts like field drives and FTL travel from a scientific standpoint. Or do you think you should be able to tell every scientist what he/she should do with their time?

I never said FTL travel was real- I said that modern physicists are exploring some ideas like space warps and wormholes that might be used for FTL travel. The most likely result of this research is that these ideas, if they are possible, will be rather difficult to put into practice. Don't tell me you don't see physicists speculating on FTL travel every now and then.

What's "marginally possible"? Something is either possible, or it isn't. If you meant impractical, say "Laser weapons are probably impractical." To be honest, I was talking about handheld ray-guns had heavy laser cannons, not near-future weapons.

The way lasers will be used in the near future does not resemble the near instantaneous incinerations caused by heat beams or the instantly fatal death rays of pulp SF. The actual uses of lasers on the battlefield include dazzling and blinding sensors and some point defense applications. That's the near future, though. In the farther future- the possibility of having a high power laser weapon you could hold in your hand is very real. It probably won't supplant projectile weapons for decades after its invention, though- ordinary weapons are just too common and simple.

Real "ray-gun" weapons are going to be somewhat messier than Hollywood shows. Laser beams generally heat what they hit- imagine having some sort of beam burning a hole through your body and vaporizing portions of your internal organs!! It is also possible that laser wounds will be as bloody as knife wounds if expanding steam rips surrounding flesh. A microwave beam could cook a human soldier from the inside until he exploded. Lasers in the infrared frequency are invisible- so you might not even see the beam that kills your companion, or its origin point. One thing is clear- real blasters will be a heck of lot more messy than SF's ridiculously clean "disintegrators".

Rick said:"Flip side, a viable fusion drive m...

2012-02-12T21:45:52.968-08:00

Rick said:"Flip side, a viable fusion drive might ruin it for laser stars if most of the drive power goes directly to thrust, producing little electric power. And/or the drive produces enough oompf that you want to scoot and shoot at the same time."

Only if your fusion drive doesn't need a fission reactor to power it...;)

Ferrell

Rick: "A fusion drive (of some sort) may ...

2012-02-12T21:43:07.884-08:00
Rick:

"A fusion drive (of some sort) may be more viable than fusion power production, because as noted having the plasma escape is a feature, not a bug. At least if it escapes in the right conditions. And it doesn't have to produce electric power efficiently, let alone cost-effectively."

It doesn't even have to produce a positive current flow. If it requires supplemental fission or solar power, well, we weren't trying to generate house current with the thing anyway.

"My interest in laser stars is tied substantially to nuclear-electric propulsion, which a) implies a LOT of plug power available, and b) has such sluggish acceleration that diverting drive power to the beam is no real disability."

The difficulty is that it also implies standing pat and shooting it out with all comers. That's never worked out too well in practice. It has the same built-in handicaps that fixed fortifications do -- all of which tend to inspire finding means of maneuver rather than direct confrontation. Without considerable flank support, these kinds of things turn into embarassing white elefants.

"Flip side, a viable fusion drive might ruin it for laser stars if most of the drive power goes directly to thrust, producing little electric power. And/or the drive produces enough oompf that you want to scoot and shoot at the same time."

Funny thing -- that much "oompf", as you put it, actually makes high power beam weapons more viable, because extra power generation might just be a marginal increase to payload. requirements. Of course, the same argument applies to truly pornographic amounts of kinetics. Which just goes to show...the more power you have, the more options you enjoy.

Belatedly catching up with this thread! A fusion ...

2012-02-12T18:05:09.535-08:00
Belatedly catching up with this thread!

A fusion drive (of some sort) may be more viable than fusion power production, because as noted having the plasma escape is a feature, not a bug. At least if it escapes in the right conditions. And it doesn't have to produce electric power efficiently, let alone cost-effectively.

Lasers probably won't supplant projectiles for most applications, especially terrestrial ones.

My interest in laser stars is tied substantially to nuclear-electric propulsion, which a) implies a LOT of plug power available, and b) has such sluggish acceleration that diverting drive power to the beam is no real disability.

Flip side, a viable fusion drive might ruin it for laser stars if most of the drive power goes directly to thrust, producing little electric power. And/or the drive produces enough oompf that you want to scoot and shoot at the same time.

Christopher Phoenix: "A lot of hate and d...

2012-02-12T11:32:21.177-08:00
Christopher Phoenix:

"A lot of hate and disapproval for anyone who mentions Michio Kaku, I see."

Noting an irony is "hate"? I'll have to make a note...

"On the other hand, I don't really agree with people who keep throwing around the words "fantasy', "Impossible!!", or (my favorite) "scientific heretic". According to the established scientists a century ago, x-rays were not real, radio had no practical use, heavier-than-air flying machines were impossible, rockets could not move in outer space, need I go on?"

A century ago? That would be 1912, right?

The first medical X-ray image was made in 1896.

In 1912, news of the Titanic was radioed from the ship itself, using the new international distress signal SOS. I would say that was a practical use.

Heavier-than-air-craft were maybe not an everyday commonplace, but they were certainly real enough in 1912.

Some scientists said that rockets wouldn't work in space. More weren't so silly.

"I prefer the ruler NASA's 'Warp Drive When' website..."

I guess you'll have to put me down as a double-hater, because I don't find Marc Millis very credible.

"Starships"

Not theoretically impossible, in the abstract. In practical terms, it may not be possible for humans. Or, if it is pactically possible, not until we develop a lot more energetic technology than we currently possess.

"Faster-than-light Travel"

At this point, magitech, Miguel Alcubierre notwithstanding. I'd like to see it be possible, but for now it's just an SF plot device.

"Laser Cannons and Ray Guns"

Laser weapons are marginally possible, but I have a hard time seeing them being particularly more useful than guns or missiles of equal impact energy.

Fusion's a bit funny. It's actually fairl...

2012-02-11T11:27:47.845-08:00
Fusion's a bit funny. It's actually fairly easy to do; you can build tabletop fusors. Plus of course fusion bombs didn't take that long to develop. Developing fusion *reactors*, that generate electricity, is a whole other story, what with plasma's strong desire to leak out.

But Longshot doesn't depend on a fusion reactor, as Daedalus did; it uses a fission reactor to make fusion pulses, in a rocket where plasma blasting out is exactly what's wanted, not a bug. I figure in the worst case, most of the energy is coming from the fission-driven lasers, but the fusion gives the desired exhaust velocity, as a crazy ion drive; in the best case, the fusion adds significant energy to the fuel, so that it approaches being a fusion rocket.

It's a lot simpler and isn't moving at 4% c, but Voyager's lasted 35 years without being designed for it. So yeah, Longshot takes some assumptions, but they seem weaker than a lot of other options. Robust and redundant design isn't obviously the sort of thing that takes centuries.

Project Longshot is making some huge assumptions, ...

2012-02-11T11:12:06.637-08:00
Project Longshot is making some huge assumptions, starting with the unproven (we can make 3He aneutronic fusion work) to the very difficult (high tech components can last for a century in a hostile environment).

A one way "fire and forget" mission may be possible, but with current technology and knowledge, the ship would have to remain functional for over 1000 years just to mak it to the nearest star...

=Milo= Christopher Phoenix: "We have n...

2012-02-11T10:41:30.574-08:00
=Milo=

Christopher Phoenix:

"We have no idea how to disassemble in object, beam the information needed to reassemble it across space, and reassemble it at the other end. The amount of information required to describe the quantum state, location, and velocity of every single atom in a human body is mind-bogglingly enormous."

I put no stock whatsoever in the feasibility into disassemble-and-reassemble-atom-by-atom type teleportation, and I wouldn't trust such a device even if it existed.

Microscopic teleportation could be useful as a means of communication, but not transport of people or goods. The latter will require macroscopic teleportation of the entire cargo in one piece, probably using wormholes.

(I might, however, use the beamed-information-reassemblor for COPYING things, like an advanced fax machine. But I note that nobody ever seriously suggested that all faxed documents should be destroyed immediately after faxing, even though that would make faxes work more like the preexisting postal system people were familiar with.

I might also resort to brain-uploading as a hedge against death, however this is simply picking the less unpleasant option. Even with the ability to reassemble my brain atom by atom if necessary, I'll still try to not die if it can at all be helped.)

Starships: maybe I'm naive, but http://en.wiki...

2012-02-10T22:09:24.506-08:00
Starships: maybe I'm naive, but http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Longshot seems like something we'd have a good chance of building today, modulo high cost. Hardest bit of the propulsion unit is the He3, but we can make that via tritium without having to go mine Saturn. Hardest part of the ship is probably something that'll work for 100 years, and sending humans with any fate other than "look around then die" would be a whole other thing.

Transporters and Teleportation Devices- The...

2012-02-10T15:50:25.785-08:00
Transporters and Teleportation Devices- These are firmly in the Speculation portion of the NASA ruler. We have no idea how to disassemble in object, beam the information needed to reassemble it across space, and reassemble it at the other end. The amount of information required to describe the quantum state, location, and velocity of every single atom in a human body is mind-bogglingly enormous. The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle tells us that we cannot measure an object without changing its quantum state, so we can't scan a human and locate every single atom and molecule precisely. Sending all that data in a few seconds is impossible with current day computer rates. We don't know how we could rebuild someone out of raw atoms once the data arrived.

Regrowing an object from digital instructions would take a very long time. Even the smallest objects contain trillions of atoms. Shortcuts might be found, but they would be fatal for organic material. Information would be lost- information that specifies the location of the cells the make up your body!!

Enterprise transporter room. Redshirt materializes on transporter pad- and promptly collapses in a liquified puddle on the floor.

McCoy: "He's dead, Jim!!"

Kirk: "Scotty, what the hell happened!?"

Scotty: "Computer error- the transporter applied bulk transport bit compression when it was supposed to be set to quantum resolution scan. Oh, the poor lad!!

McCoy: "Every atom in his body was scrambled and reassembled in the wrong order!! Humans aren't meant to have their atoms scattered across the galaxy by that molecule-mashing monstrosity of a machine!!"

That's my take on several classic SF inventions.

Force Fields- It is probably impossible to ...

2012-02-10T15:02:17.673-08:00
Force Fields- It is probably impossible to create the kinds of forcefields we see on SF stories. In SF, forcefields are an impenetrable barrier that can block physical objects and deflect/absorb blasts from energy weapons like lasers.

The concept of a forcefield seems to be a tightly bounded field of significant magnitude that objects affected by the particular force associated with the field are unable to pass through the field and reach the other side. Unfortunately, none of the four fundamental forces we know of- gravity, electromagnetism, and the strong and weak nuclear forces- are suitable for constructing a forcefield.

The strong and weak nuclear forces only act over subatomic distances in the nuclei of atoms. Electromagnetic fields can only repel charged objects and obey the inverse square law, so we can't confine them into a "wall" of force. Gravity is the weakest force, always attracts objects, and obeys the inverse square law as well. For this reason, I place classic E.E. Doc Smith-style forcefields on the Conjecture portion of NASA's ruler. We know want we would like to do, but we have no idea how to do it.

That said, I can imagine how we might build a "perimeter defense system" that would function as an almost impenetrable barrier. First, I would place a laser-based active protection system around whatever I want to protect. A layer of cold plasma to absorb EMP's would go up next, followed by a layer of hot plasma to vaporize enemy soldiers or projectiles, followed by yet another layer of cold plasma. In this way, I would build up my defensive system in layers- perhaps another layer could protect from biological attacks and poison gas. Not quite a forcefield, but certainly a defensive system that behaves a bit like one.

Laser Cannons and Ray Guns- These are definitely on the Science segment of the scale, with some examples on the Technology segment that are trying to be finally applied on the battlefield. Powerful lasers can blast through steel, and the military is trying to deploy laser weapons to dazzle enemy sensors and shoot down planes.

What about death rays and portable ray-guns? There are two main problems with laser guns. Current lasers are far to bulky, inefficient, and unstable to be used as death rays. Put to much power through them, and the laser overheats, the mirrors crack, the tube melts. The power source is the other big issue. No portable battery pack or generator can supply the intense bursts of power a laser weapon requires- at least not one that doesn't require a truck for transport.

A laser powerful enough to kill a human will fit in a back of a large vehicle, not a holster- and the U.S. already built one. The Mobile Test Unit was a 30Kw electrically excited CO2 laser that was housed in a Marine Corps LVTP-7 tracked landing vehicle. I have read that one of the technicians bragged that "it will go right through you with no trouble". I wouldn't be surprised- 30Kw is more than enough to do real harm to a human.

There is nothing in the laws of physics that says that a ray-gun is impossible. Powerful, efficient laser generators and portable power packs that contain large amounts of energy are required- but that is an engineering problem, not a physics problem. Dr. John Schilling suggests that a pulsed laser beam can incapacitate a human with a kilojoule of output energy.

Continued...

Tony... A lot of hate and disapproval for anyone ...

2012-02-10T13:58:42.578-08:00
Tony...

A lot of hate and disapproval for anyone who mentions Michio Kaku, I see. It's probably warranted for Michio- even though he does make an appealing television personality- but must everyone jump on my neck just because I made a passing reference? I don't agree with everything the man says.

I haven't read Physics of the Future. I was rather unimpressed with Physics of the Impossible, so I didn't read any more of Michio's popular books. He jumps from topic to topic without really explaining much of anything. One moment we are discussing powerful lasers, and then he jumps to tokamaks, and then we are on to the next chapter.

On the other hand, I don't really agree with people who keep throwing around the words "fantasy', "Impossible!!", or (my favorite) "scientific heretic". According to the established scientists a century ago, x-rays were not real, radio had no practical use, heavier-than-air flying machines were impossible, rockets could not move in outer space, need I go on?

I prefer the ruler NASA's "Warp Drive When" website uses to gauge inventions. You can find it at this web address- http://www.nasa.gov/centers/glenn/technology/warp/inspinv.html. It places concepts on a scale ranging from Conjecture to Application. In an attempt to avoid provoking further Michio-bashing attacks in the future, I shall rank various SF inventions on NASA's ruler.

Starships- Nothing in the laws of physics proves that travel between stars is impossible, although certain academics delight in "disproving" the idea of star travel with horribly simplistic back-of-the-envolope calculations. All these noisy naysayers succeed in proving is that numbers can be arbitrarily chosen to give the appearance of extreme difficulty.

Star travel could certainly become a reality in the next few centuries, although it's certainly likely to not be as fast as we would prefer. If we build propulsion systems to travel at 5% to 10% the speed of light, we could reach nearby stars on a travel time of tens of decades to a century or so. Attaining a significant fraction of light-speed would cut down voyages to "mere" decades- so travel to other stars within a human lifetime is consistent with relativity. Seriously, though, concepts for star travel abound and some people spend much of their time researching these ideas- go read the some of the scholarly papers on star travel yourself.

Faster-than-light Travel- Believe it or not, speculation on FTL travel has crept into mainstream physics, placing it at the realm of Speculation on NASA's ruler of advancement. We will need a quantum theory of gravity to find out if we can actually create stable wormholes for interstellar travel or space warps. I'm sure most of you have heard of the speculation on FTL travel- or arguments against it- so I'll move on now.

Continued...

Whew... It is indeed ironic that somebody stumpin...

2012-02-09T11:32:52.685-08:00
Whew...

It is indeed ironic that somebody stumping for "real" science in SF would invoke Michio Kaku, perhaps one of the biggest fantasists (see Physics of the Future) among public science commentators.

As for the rest, there is truly no new plot or character to be discovered. So the criteria always has to be how good and believable is the human story presnted? And, no, there would be nothing new in STL technology to write about. It's all been done numerous times and in numerous ways. If you don't think so, you simply haven't read enough. Authors who are good starting points have already been named.

Both Tolkein and C.S. Lewis were devout Christians...

2012-02-08T17:40:52.342-08:00
Both Tolkein and C.S. Lewis were devout Christians, and I think a better way to approach their works is as Christian allegories rather than SF, Fantasy or some other genre.

While I am not qualified to render a judgement on their works, I would suggest one reading of LOTR or Perelandra to highlight the Christian doctrine of salvation through Faith rather than Work. Science and Technology are manifestly examples of Work, so salvation from evil, ruin or the will of God will not come from those means, in fact they may become the cause of your demise.

Jollyreaper: "If the writer is desperatel...

2012-02-06T00:07:53.655-08:00
Jollyreaper:

"If the writer is desperately seeking our attention while having nothing worth saying, was the effort ever warranted?"

No. If a writer doesn't have anything interesting to say, than they shouldn't be writing. Sounds harsh, I know- but still true.

I have found one thing on which C.S. Lewis and me both agree. Speculative fiction, rather than being "silly" and "not good literature" as the intelligentsia often claim, matters much more than "realistic" novels that don't explore any new ideas.

It is a strange comment on our age that such a book [Childhood's End, Arthur C. Clarke] lies hid in a hideous paper-backed edition, wholly unnoticed by the cognoscenti, while any 'realistic' drivel about some neurotic in a London flat--something that needs no real invention at all, something that any educated man could write if he chose, may get seriously reviewed and mentioned in serious books - as if it really mattered. I wonder how long this tyranny will last? Twenty years ago I felt no doubt that I should live to see it all break up and great literature return: but here I am, losing teeth and hair, and still no break in the clouds. ~C.S. Lewis, Collected Letters of C.S. Lewis: Volume III, Letter to Joy Gresham, Dec 22, 1953

Damien Sullivan:

"As for Tolkien showing technology as evil, that', uh, a simplistic reading. The hobbits had a watermill (and umbrellas). Both dwarves and Noldor (the non-wood elves we see) are knowledgable and skilled, so skilled it looks like magic. And the orcs aren't really industrialized. Sauron and Saruman are sort of industrial, but that's them, not the orcs, and the sin there is not the industry but the deforestation and pollution (and attempts to conquer and kill people)."

Tolkien had strong anti-technology and anti-science beliefs, as well as a desire to return to the "simple life" as exemplified by the hobbit village. Obviously even hobbits need simple technologies, but Tolkien didn't portray advanced technology in a favorable light. I don't think that human technology is quite the same as what the dwarves and Noldor were using.

The comment about splitting light, and the fact that he portrayed an evil, mind-controlling Sir Isaac Newton with rape camps shows that Tolkien distrusted scientific learning. Sir Isaac Newton was one of the greatest scientists in human history, and Tolkien made a not-so-subtle reference to him as being the seed of evil.

I must make a concession, though. Tolkien experienced the horrors of WW1 first-hand. Science provided deadly new weapons- smokeless gunpowder, automatic weapons, poison gas, etc.- that made WW1 one of the deadliest and most wasteful wars in history. Tolkien also saw industrialization destroy the English countryside. He didn't distinguish between technology and the misuse of technology, and he thought the technology was rapidly filling the world with horror and pollution. That view was not so silly after what he experienced.

The original Star Trek has the opposite view. Star Trek's future society is a (relatively!!) peaceful Kardashev Type-2 civilization. It is made quite clear that humans had to learn to use their increasingly advanced technology in a mature manner, not misuse it for destruction. Science is portrayed as an uplifting, unifying force that opens the door to space- but first we had to overcome our baser instincts, fears, and prejudices. It is this message that ensured Star Trek's enduring popularity.

Damien Sullivan: Niven did have STL travel- but h...

2012-02-05T21:43:45.675-08:00
Damien Sullivan:

Niven did have STL travel- but he did have hyperdrives supersede ramjets in Known Space, which is probably enough for Sten to regard Niven's books as not particularly realistic. When Sten says "long duration" space travel, he probably means generation ships traveling at a very low fraction of C.

FTL communication is just as bad as FTL travel from a physics standpoint. I think what Sten wants is a writer who doesn't use any form of FTL ever- a lot of writers seem to assume that some form of FTL travel or communication will be invented someday.

As for nearly-as-fast-as-light drives, those are what Michio Kaku would refer too as a Type-1 Impossibility. We can't build one today, but there is nothing in the laws of physics that says it couldn't be done. Travel at close to optical velocity requires incredibly advanced technology, but it doesn't violate any laws of physics- protons in the LHC travel just below the speed of light, after all.

In fact, all forms of sub-optical star travel, ranging from generation ships to NAFAL ships, are Type-1 Impossibilities. Great engineering challenges, sure, but I see nothing to convince me of the true "impossibility" of these concepts.

You are quite right that you don't want to get into the nitty-gritty of how things are done. You don't want your story to be like the old SF story that predicted telephones that could record conversations and play them back and then showed a character changing the wax cylinder in the phone! Unless you are referencing a specific technology, it is best to not explain Captain Pike's phaser pistol battery works. It just does. ; )

I find research into wormholes fascinating, and if a writer wants to use one for a story, that's ok. Personally, I would probably explore STL travel with all its limitations and glories.

One idea I've always found fascinating are reactionless field drives. Even though these don't seem to be as common today- although I'm sure there are exceptions- some scientists are seriously exploring the idea of a space drive that can produce acceleration without expelling reaction mass. Check out this link. Fundamental breakthroughs in physics are required for breakthrough concepts like space drives.

As Sir Arthur C. Clarke said, the only way to find the limits of the possible is to venture past them into the impossible.

As for Tolkien showing technology as evil, that...

2012-02-05T17:35:03.302-08:00
As for Tolkien showing technology as evil, that', uh, a simplistic reading. The hobbits had a watermill (and umbrellas). Both dwarves and Noldor (the non-wood elves we see) are knowledgable and skilled, so skilled it looks like magic. And the orcs aren't really industrialized. Sauron and Saruman are sort of industrial, but that's them, not the orcs, and the sin there is not the industry but the deforestation and pollution (and attempts to conquer and kill people). The value here is "befouling the English countryside so you can have more weapons and unnecessary goods is not a plus".

It's not just industry; the Numenoreans wiped out the huge coastal forests and created wasteland, just for timber for ships. Not their high point. Just as 1950 was not a high mark of industrial environmental responsibility.

The light line was always a bit odd, but you have to remember the context. This is a mind-controlling polluting traitor Isaac Newton who probably runs rape camps to make his soldiers, who say "he gives us man-flesh to eat".

I'm not attacking the novel as an artform. I m...

2012-02-05T17:32:28.562-08:00
I'm not attacking the novel as an artform. I meant it in as a singular example. A novel that's a direct rip-off of other prior works without adding anything new isn't very novel.

Someone who decides to write a rebuttal to the Lord of the Rings by using all of the same tropes with a twist is doing a valid piece of work.

Where I'm saying there's a failing is if someone does exactly what came before without adding anything to it. Westerns have been done time after time. So someone tries to do a new western. Well, are there any interesting characters? Something we haven't seen before? Is it just really good writing, really good action, an excellent and stellar example of the genre? Was there any point or purpose to the undertaking?

If the writer is desperately seeking our attention while having nothing worth saying, was the effort ever warranted?

I was referring to Odenwald's e-mail, to let h...

2012-02-05T17:25:42.379-08:00
I was referring to Odenwald's e-mail, to let him know stuff had been written since 50 years ago.

Niven has technology change in his setting. Later on you have hyperdrive and teleportation and other exotics, but the famous human colonies were all settled by STL. The Kzinti were STL when they attacked, too, though they had magic like gravity drives. Of course, he also had weak psionics, thank you John Campbell. _Protector_ was dueling Bussard ramjets.

He also had non-Known Space: World Out Of Time, Integral Trees.

And yeah, ansibles are magic FTL; being info only they might be regarded as slightly less magic. Certainly different from Star Trek. (near) lightspeed drives are also magic in terms of known physics, but they no longer violate relativity/causality, so big step up there. Plus, for SF you don't always want to get into nitty gritty details which will likely be wrong; assuming we can somehow get from A to B as fast as physically possible is legitimate, more so than simply ignoring Einstein.

(I'd originally assumed Le Guin's NAFAL ships were Bussard ramjets, that being the most physically grounded way to get such speeds, so I didn't mind the speeds, but wondered about the civilization energy budget...)

Yeah, I'm skeptical of wormholes being practical or even possible. But they are things you can get physicists talking about as coming out of general relativity if you squint right, as opposed to completely made up for the convenience of the story, and there seems to have been a big shift to them in written SF; if you're going to have FTL, do it that way.

And you've still got Egan, Vinge, Vinge, Reynolds, Watts, maybe others. Not a lot, but hard SF has always been a tiny niche taste.

Oh, Robert Forward, he wrote after Odenwald's cutoff. Stross, _Saturn's Children_ (not counting stuff so near-future there's no space activity at all.)

As for good new SF, Haikasoru is bringing some solid stuff over from Japan.

Jollyreaper: As you are the most recent in a long...

2012-02-05T14:40:31.747-08:00
Jollyreaper:

As you are the most recent in a long line of cynics who claim "The novel is dead!!", I give you no credence whatsoever. ; )

I was referring to SF tech issues rather than derivative stories. I don't have any desire to copy any writer who has come before me- none of them. Even if a writer wrote well, I very often disagree with their outlook and conclusions.

I would never write something "like" Lord of the Rings because I disagree with Tolkien's beliefs and views- very strongly I might add. Tolkien uses his tale to express his belief that knowledge is corrupting and technology is evil. He even shows Gandalf chastising the evil wizard for using a prism to split white light into many colors!! I never knew Sir Isaac Newton was an evil dark wizard. Tolkien made sure to show that technology was evil by showing the industrialized Orks.

Science, the engine of prosperity, is seen as an evil, corrupting influence by Tolkien. The search for knowledge is condemned, and Tolkien instead glorifies utter ignorance as superior. My fantasy story would present the opposite view- ignorance and suppression of learning are the evil.

However, this is all ignoring the fact that Tolkien wasn't exactly original himself. Lord of the Rings is a blatant rip-off of Norse mythology. Sure, Tolkien may have added his own elements, but he didn't pull the setting out of his @#$.

However, Tolkien was not a major figure in my library. I read all of C.S. Lewis's Narnia books. However, while I like C.S. Lewis's books- especially The Horse and His Boy , I don't agree with C.S. Lewis much either- especially his views on space travel. He believed space travel was evil, since humans are corrupt and have no business in space until we are saved, and he expressed his views in his space trilogy. He even called rocket pioneers "very wicked people".

C.S. Lewis's anti-space travel beliefs were very strong. His writing was full of attacks on scientists and on astronauts in particular- which roused the ire of Arthur C. Clarke, especially the passage in "Peleranda" that referred to "little Interplanetary Societies and rocket clubs".

My relationship with the greats of fantasy is not a desire to emulate them, but instead a need to give them a black eye. I love violent analogies. : )

People who write stories with evil people take over the world, dwarves, and elves just liked Lord of the Rings and want more of the same. I think that they missed the point- Tolkien was expressing his views through a fantasy setting, not revealing the wonders of being a dwarf. Setting is just that, setting. The basic values and principles of whoever writes the story shape it much more.

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