Hello Phil Pugliese,I often feel that the discussion are like attending a seminar with a host of prominent people and having the up and down feeling.Tom RuxFrom: "Phil Pugliese (via tml list)" <xxxxxx@simplelists.com>
To: "TML" <xxxxxx@simplelists.com>
Sent: Thursday, August 31, 2017 3:15:29 AM
Subject: Re: Landing vs hovering (was Re: [TML] What class of Port is this?)
This all reminds of a college physics class I took once.The prof recommended that we attend a seminar given by a prominent visiting theoretical physicist.Being the big-time sci-fi buff that I was, I alternated, while listening to his cutting-edge speculations, between, "WOW! COOL!" & "OH, BUMMER!".--------------------------------------------
On Wed, 8/30/17, <tmr0195@comcast.net> wrote:Subject: Re: Landing vs hovering (was Re: [TML] What class of Port is this?)
To: "TML" <xxxxxx@simplelists.com>
Date: Wednesday, August 30, 2017, 2:36 PM
Hello
again,
You mean I won't be getting a
grav belt for Christmas. Boy you sure know how to ruin my
day.;-)
Tom Rux
From: "C.
Berry" <xxxxxx@gmail.com>
To:
"TML" <xxxxxx@simplelists.com>
Sent: Wednesday, August 30, 2017 2:07:59
PM
Subject: Re: Landing vs hovering
(was Re: [TML] What class of Port is this?)
We
find it relatively easy to manipulate magnets because (a)
they're dipoles, and (b) electricity and magnetism are
really just two "facets" of a single force,
electromagnetism. This means you can create magnetic fields
by moving electric fields by moving magnets (e.g. in a
generator), or create magnetic fields by moving charged
particles (e.g., in an electromagnet). Indeed, light itself
is just a self-propagating oscillation between electric and
magnetic forces, each inducing the other as it changes.
It's all qute beautiful, really; Maxwell's famous four
equationsexpress everything you need to know about
electromagnetism. In college, I had a tattered and beloved
t-shirt with the differential formulation of these equations
on it. :)
There are three
other known forces in our Universe; the strong and weak
nuclear forces, which are responsible for various very
short-range interactions between particles (e.g. binding
atomic nuclei together despite the mutual electromagnetic
repulsion of protons) and gravity. Current theories indicate
that the electromagnetic, weak, and strong forces are
actually just aspects of a single force, much like
electricity and magneticism, and that in high enough energy
regimes they "unify" -- that is, cease to be
distinct from one another. If this is correct, there are
really only two forces, EM+strong+weak and
gravity.
Gravity seems
to be very different, as it's not so much "in"
the universe as it "is" the universe. Gravity is a
manifestation of the curvature of space-time caused by
massive objects. One of the great unsolved problems in
modern physics is "Grand Unification", a single
theory that would account for all forces in a single
formulation, similar in spirit to Maxwell's equations.
Physicists know that our current understandings of General
Relativity (which explains gravity) and the Standard Model
(which explains quantum phenomena) are irreconcilable. Each
makes nonsensical predictions (or fails entirely, with the
equivalent of dividing by zero) in extreme domains of the
other. So clearly there is something fundamental we have yet
to understand. Some "Grand Unified Theory" (or
GUT, as physicists say) may one day come along that reduces
to GR or the SM in the appropriate domains, but also
accounts for the cases we currently can't handle. It
would be very cool if this happened while I'm still
alive, as I'm very eager to know the answer.
:>
If we succeed in
unifying the forces, it just may prove to be possible to
manipulate gravity via the other forces, as we currently
manipulate magnetism with electricity and vice versa. But
that's very, very, VERY speculative, and again, given
the special role gravity plays in the universe, I find it
unlikely -- however much I really, really want an air-raft
for my birthday. :>
On Wed, Aug 30, 2017 at
1:35 PM, <tmr0195@comcast.net>
wrote:
Afternoon
PDT,
I'm admitting to be very light
in understanding the Conservation Laws which means that my
view is probably totally out to lunch.
However,
we have an understanding of how to manipulate magnetic
fields which has suggested to some scientists and a great
many science fiction authors that gravity can be manipulated
using a similar approach.I probably
oversimplifying how magnetic manipulation works and
improperly transferring that understanding when trying to
imagine how gravity manipulation might be
accomplished.
Thank
you the information being provided.
Tom
Rux
From: "C. Berry"
<xxxxxx@gmail.com>
To: "TML" <xxxxxx@simplelists.com>
Sent: Wednesday, August 30, 2017
9:28:13 AM
Subject: Re: Landing vs hovering (was
Re: [TML] What class of Port is this?)
There are definitely things we don't yet know,
and technological tricks we don't yet know how to do.
The thing is, new discoveries and inventions are exceedingly
unlikely to contradict existing theories. Rather, they will
make different predictions out at the margins, in conditions
that we have not yet encountered (or that we have barely
begun to observe).
Newton
and Einstein make a good example here. Einstein's
theories replaced Newton's, in one sense. Einstein
provided a much deeper and more comprehensive description of
the universe than Newton did. But -- and this is the key --
the two systems are effectively indistinguishable at small
scales of time, velocity, gravity, and so forth. All of our
space travel to date has been executed using Newtonian
mechanics, because it's massively simpler than
Einsteinian mechanics, and for the purpose of mapping out
spacecraft trajectories, the difference in the predictions
of the two theories are so tiny as to be effectively absent.
There's exactly one case I can think of where General
Relativity actually does come into play in a practical
engineering application, and that's GPS; it depends on
timing so exquisitely precise that the GR-induced difference
in the rate of time in the satellites compared to the ground
(thanks to being at different potentials in Earth's
gravity well) has to be taken into account.
So when new physics and new tech
come along, it's exceedingly unlikely that we'll
throw out things like the main conservation laws; hence the
skepticism about the EmDrive. Rather, we'll find new
domains where our existing theories begin to diverge from
observations, and we'll work out a still more refined
model of physics that explains those observations, but
reduces to Einsteinian physics in all the domains in which
that already worked well.
On Wed, Aug 30, 2017 at
9:11 AM, <tmr0195@comcast.net>
wrote:
Morning
PDT,
Science fiction is traditionally an
extrapolation of known science.I agree that there is a lot
we do not know about gravity. Albert Einstein back in 1916
predicted the existence of gravity waves. In 2014 an article
came out stating that scientists had detected gravity waves
and there have been updates for the past two
years.
Gravity waves
have been included in a number of science fiction novels, I
think the Lensmen series has technology based on gravity
waves, unfortunately my books are stored a way in boxes so I
cannot verify my memory.
We can manipulate magnetic fields as
proven by magnetic levitation used in high speed trains.
Again a number of science fiction novels have maglev
vehicles long before we built the first one.
Extrapolating what we know about
magnetic manipulation someone applied the knowledge, pushed
by player comments without a doubt, to contra-gravity and
reactionless thrusters. The jump drive is also a guess based
on theories we have not been able to prove about other
systems like the warp drive.
Most of the science programs I watch
have commented on what new technologies have done to improve
our knowledge. Many of the new discoveries have altered what
we thought was a hard scientific fact.
In
another thread someone mentioned throwing pixie or fairy
dust, a lot of technology of today fell into that
category.
Tom Rux
From:
"C. Berry" <xxxxxx@gmail.com>
To: "TML" <xxxxxx@simplelists.com>
Sent: Tuesday, August 29, 2017
10:07:30 AM
Subject: Re: Landing vs hovering (was
Re: [TML] What class of Port is this?)
And
that's just it. CG, thruster, and jump power
requirements are determined by game-design decisions, not by
physics. None of those technologies are consistent with
physics as we understand them, so there's no way to do
any reality-based calculation that will yield a power
requirement. The Traveller design sequences were reasonably
well crafted to support the desired background without
creating glaring consistency problems in typical situations,
which is more than good enough for a game. It's similar
to the relationship between video-game physics and real
physics; if the game feels enough like reality, people can
immerse themselves in it easily, even if it fails in every
way to embody key conservation laws and the
like.
On Tue, Aug
29, 2017 at 9:56 AM, <tmr0195@comcast.net>
wrote:
Morning
PDT,
There is more than one Traveller
design sequence that requires the drive train/suspension to
have a
design power requirement.
CT
Striker Book 3 p. 8, MT Referee's Manual pp. 65-66, TNE
FF&S Chapter 10, and GURPS Traveller Starships p. 40.
I'm not sure but I believe that T4 Core Book QSDS, T4
Book 2 Starships, and T4 book D FF&S have have power
requirements.
In CT Striker Book 3 p. 8 each .02
m^3 of grav generator provides 1 ton of thrust and requires
.1 megawatts of power from the power plant. On p. 11 a grav
vehicle's requires 1G, determined by dividing the grav
generators thrust in tons by the vehicles' weight in
tons, to keep the vehicle in the air, hovering. If the
thrust is less than 1G the vehicle cannot move, I think this
means the vehicle is sitting on the ground. Any thrust in
excess of 1G is used for movement.
Tom
Rux
From:
"Tim" <xxxxxx@little-possums.net>
To: "TML" <xxxxxx@simplelists.com>
Sent: Monday, August 28, 2017
8:32:42 PM
Subject: Re: Landing vs
hovering (was Re: [TML] What class of Port is
this?)
On Mon, Aug 28, 2017 at
03:49:12PM -0500, Grimmund wrote:
> On
Thu, Aug 17, 2017 at 10:00 PM, Tim <xxxxxx@little-possums.net>
wrote:
>
>
> > Does Traveller contragrav employ a
means that requires constant power
> >
input? We don't know.
>
>
> That seems to be a
given. If it has a power requirement to operate, that
> implies that lacking such power, it will
no longer operate.
In one of the vehicle design
sequences, drivetrain/suspension has a
design power requirement also. This does not
mean that the wheels
fall off when the power
is not supplied (i.e. no longer supports the
vehicle), it just means that without power the
vehicle won't
accelerate and that there
is a limit to how much power it can handle
without breaking something.
- Tim
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