Science fiction pet hate

[DWF]

Well this is a strange one then, iin 2001 the ship's interior clearly rotates to make gravity, however the model doesn't move at all.

The rotating part of the Discovery is actually inside the ship. What would make the ship "move" as a result?

Read the book the entire sphere moved to create gravity not jsut the inside.

 

[BooThePun]

^^Though with the size of the Discovery, in order to produce 1g it would have to be spinning fairly fast. The Coriolis Effect would have those guys puking their guts out unless they had cast iron stomachs.

 

[Warped9]

^Whatever the flaws with the Red Matter concept, it's still nowhere near as dumb as Project Genesis. That was just plain magic. Plus the Trek movies have also given us, let's see, flying jet boots, a Galactic center that's less than half an hour away, supernovae whose effects propagate far faster than light, the Nexus, the youthifying radiation of the Ba'ku planet, thalaron radiation... Credibility has rarely been a priority in ST motion pictures.

Folks talk of the low points of 3rd season TOS and later TAS, but many of the films are really DUH!

 

[sojourner]

Well this is a strange one then, iin 2001 the ship's interior clearly rotates to make gravity, however the model doesn't move at all.

The rotating part of the Discovery is actually inside the ship. What would make the ship "move" as a result?

Read the book the entire sphere moved to create gravity not jsut the inside.

The book does not equal the movie. The Discovery in the movie has, as previously stated, the centrifuge inside the ship.

 

[Nerys Myk]

^Whatever the flaws with the Red Matter concept, it's still nowhere near as dumb as Project Genesis. That was just plain magic. Plus the Trek movies have also given us, let's see, flying jet boots, a Galactic center that's less than half an hour away, supernovae whose effects propagate far faster than light, the Nexus, the youthifying radiation of the Ba'ku planet, thalaron radiation... Credibility has rarely been a priority in ST motion pictures.

Folks talk of the low points of 3rd season TOS and later TAS, but many of the films are really DUH!

Yep, totally different animals. Even TMP. Hell, TMP, and TWOK-NEM are not even in the same universe as TOS ( or each other)

 

[DWF]

The rotating part of the Discovery is actually inside the ship. What would make the ship "move" as a result?

Read the book the entire sphere moved to create gravity not jsut the inside.

The book does not equal the movie. The Discovery in the movie has, as previously stated, the centrifuge inside the ship.

That's not really possible, it would mean that the shuttle bay would be open for a short time while the insides and outsides matched up and that's not what happened onscreen.

The truth is that the Discovery was filmed in what's called Frame Advance meaning that it would have been impossible at that point in time to match the rotation of the sphere with the movement of the ship across the screen. And of course with CGI threre's no problem showing a moving section of ship or space station as was proven by Babylon 5.

 

[Harvey]

This is going beyond my area of expertise, but the shuttle bay wasn't in the part of the ship that rotates--that's why Dave Bowman and Frank Poole are wearing velcro-shoes whenever they're walking in it, as I recall.

 

[DarylCarpenter]

The Discovery's Command Module didn't rotate in either the movie or the book. It remained fixed in place while the centrifuge living module inside it rotated. The rest of the interior was a Zero-G environment. Besides, I imagine it's a whole lot more practical to make the living quarters an artificial gravity environment, instead of having the entire Command Module rotating independently from the rest of the ship.

I'm not sure if DWF isn't confusing the Discovery with the Leonov from 2010, which had a great big rotating section that was visible in the exterior shots, although all the interior sets had flat instead of curved floors.

 

[RedShirt]

Well this is a strange one then, iin 2001 the ship's interior clearly rotates to make gravity, however the model doesn't move at all.

The rotating part of the Discovery is actually inside the ship. What would make the ship "move" as a result?

Read the book the entire sphere moved to create gravity not jsut the inside.

Negative. I have a 1st edition paperback, copyright 1968, Polaris Productions, Inc. (451-Q3580-095)

2001: A Space Odyssey, by Arthur C. Clarke
pages 100-101:

After lunch, from 1300 to 1600 Bowman would make a slow and careful tour of the ship - or such part of it as was accessible. Discovery measured almost four hundred feet from end to end, but the little universe occupied by her crew lay entirely inside the forty-foot sphere of the pressure hull.

Here were all the life-support systems, and the Control Deck which is the operational heart of the ship. Below this was a small "space-garage" fitted with three airlocks, through which powered capsules, just large enough to hold a man, could sail out into the void if the need arose for extravehicular activity.

The equatorial region of the pressure sphere - the slice, as it were, from Capricorn to Cancer - enclosed a slowly rotating drum, thirty-five feet in diameter. As it made one revolution every ten seconds, this carousel or centrifuge produced an artificial gravity equal to that of the Moon. This was enough to prevent the physical atrophy which would result from the complete absence of weight, and it also allowed the routine functions of living to be carried out under normal - or nearly normal - conditions.

The following paragraphs go on to describe the facilities within the carousel and the overall design of the ship (which differed slightly from the movie version by the inclusion of radiators - something that nuclear powered spacecraft really, really need) but I hope the bolded part of the quotation is illuminating for you.

I'm wondering if perhaps you might be confusing the carousel's normal operation with the derelict Discovery's spinning in orbit of Io in the movie/book 2010... which was caused by the failure & stopping of the carousel after the ship was abandoned; the kinetic energy was transfered from the carousel to the mass of the entire ship, starting the spin which was then exacerbated by tidal forces between Jupiter and Io.

Cheers

 

[sojourner]

Read the book the entire sphere moved to create gravity not jsut the inside.

The book does not equal the movie. The Discovery in the movie has, as previously stated, the centrifuge inside the ship.

That's not really possible, it would mean that the shuttle bay would be open for a short time while the insides and outsides matched up and that's not what happened onscreen.

The truth is that the Discovery was filmed in what's called Frame Advance meaning that it would have been impossible at that point in time to match the rotation of the sphere with the movement of the ship across the screen. And of course with CGI threre's no problem showing a moving section of ship or space station as was proven by Babylon 5.

As others have noted. You are incorrect.

 

[scotpens]

Wing Commander. It just really got to me in that movie that during a bit where the hero spaceship is hiding from enemy spaceships, a character actually shushes someone and they all start talking in whispers, because, you know, someone could hear them.

You know even if there was air in space how could the voice carry from the interior of the goddamn spaceship to another one a few thousand miles away?

That's nothing new. They did the same “talking in hushed tones so the enemy won't hear” in the Star Trek TOS episode “Balance of Terror.” It's the old silent-running thing from dozens of World War II submarine movies.

. . . I thought it was going to be about pets as well.

I don't think I've ever even heard the term “pet hate.” If he had said “pet peeve” it would have been different.

Maybe you just don't have the term in America? Pet hate is pretty common here (and is synonymous with pet peeve).

I'm surprised that anyone would be unfamiliar with the term “pet hate.” AFAIK, it's equally common on both sides of the pond.

There's a strong tendency for aliens to have one of, well, everything: One religion, one culture, one language.

One tailor, one hairdresser.

And one hatmaker!

Planet of Hats

writers who don't know how evolution works and think we're all going to turn into glowly blob things or any other species will turn into glowy blob things. with super-powers.

Or disembodied brains, like in the Trek episode “The Gamesters of Triskelion.” How the hell can you evolve into just a farkin’ BRAIN??

I have a bug up my ass regarding stories about “speeding up” evolution, like Island of Lost Souls (the 1932 film adaptation of H.G. Wells’ The Island of Dr. Moreau) or the Outer Limits ep “The Sixth Finger.” The assumption seems to be that evolution is pre-programmed, which of course is utter nonsense.

Also, writers who casually throw around the word “intergalactic” without understanding what a galaxy is and what a planetary system is.

Agreed. Because in order to become supreme beings everyone MUST turn into globs of purple jelly!

They have to get big heads first.

And telepathic and/or telekinetic powers.

. . . Besides the fact that they have “gravity plating” (whatever that is), we have no idea how artificial gravity works in Trek. It's obviously not centrifugal (the way we'd accomplish the same thing in real life).

Since it isn't centrifugal force, artificial gravity on a spaceship must actually be some sort of energy or forcefield that duplicates the EFFECT of gravity. So it can behave according to whatever rules you want to make up.

A civilization that can travel to other stars on a scale sufficient to carry resources back has no need for said resources. Therefore there are no worthwhile targets. Therefore space war cannot exist. You might as well suggest that space aliens are coming to seize the men to dig the coal and rape the women.

Or to have us for dinner.

“It's a COOK BOOK!”

Well this is a strange one then, in 2001 the ship's interior clearly rotates to make gravity, however the model doesn't move at all.

The rotating part of the Discovery is actually inside the ship. What would make the ship “move” as a result?

. . . The truth is that the Discovery was filmed in what's called Frame Advance meaning that it would have been impossible at that point in time to match the rotation of the sphere with the movement of the ship across the screen.

That doesn't even make sense. Are you referring to stop-motion animation? If the entire sphere had been meant to rotate, it certainly could have been shown that way. The creators of 2001's effects had no problem showing the Earth-orbiting space station rotating while the camera tracked toward it.

Though with the size of the Discovery, in order to produce 1g it would have to be spinning fairly fast. The Coriolis Effect would have those guys puking their guts out unless they had cast iron stomachs.

According to Clarke's novel, the centrifuge only rotated fast enough to produce 1/6th g, equal to the moon's gravity. Of course, in the movie, the astronauts appeared to move about in normal Earth gravity, since the centrifuge was a rotating set on a soundstage. On Earth.

. . .The following paragraphs go on to describe the facilities within the carousel and the overall design of the ship (which differed slightly from the movie version by the inclusion of radiators - something that nuclear powered spacecraft really, really need)

Early preproduction sketches of the Discovery showed radiators. They were discarded because it was felt they looked too much like wings.

 

[Deckerd]

The BBC docudrama Space Odyssey had a spinning section on the ship with two pods extended on long arms for the crew living quarters. This seems like a sensible adaptation for long distance travel. I don't think the pods were at 1 g but they were sufficient to normalise the crew's bodies.

 

[stj]

stj

I agree that resources (as in mineral resources and the like) are abundant throughout the cosmos. Interstellar wars won't be fought over them.
However, these are not the only reasons one can start wars over.
Wars can be fought over ideological or religious reasons.
For example, an alien species might attack another, less advanced one, in order to eliminate a potential adversary before it becomes a threat, while it's still weak.

Way back, I explicitly said it would be insane to make space war. The above are the insane reasons. In human culture, ideology and religion are justifications, not the real reasons. The crazy ideas often mislead instead of just motivate, which is why I have to wonder: Is it really possible for a species to develop and keep the ability to engage in genuinely nonrationally motivated actions, without it being selected out?

As for the possibility some unimagined development can produce a star drive, well, yes, that's the reed supporting mountains of SF.

You little blue sky proposal is a lot of fun. I would think that a way to impose a single quantum state on a macroscopic composite object would give us teleportation and replicators. This is basically the method used in teleportation of photons nows, if I understand the reports correctly. And if you impose a quantum state for roast beef on a hunk of rock, you get roast beef, no? Of course, if we have that, we no longer have a need to go get resources.

As to the link: I am lighting a candle to Saint Fermi as we speak.

A relativistic missile is indeed indefensible which is why space fleets won't be built even if for some insane reason (like religion or ideology) one species wanted to exterminate another. Weapons of mass destruction are almost never imagined in space war. This is why when I talk of space war, I'm not even thinking of it. I hope I haven't caused confusion.

Studies of the prisoner's dilemma in repeat encounters find the optimum solutions are tit for tat, namely doing what you want the other to do. In the example, not firing a planetbuster. (The second most effective strategy is to repeat a favorable reward, even if the other opts once for the sanction. But that couldn't apply in this case.)

 

[sojourner]

Studies of the prisoner's dilemma in repeat encounters find the optimum solutions are tit for tat, namely doing what you want the other to do. In the example, not firing a planetbuster. (The second most effective strategy is to repeat a favorable reward, even if the other opts once for the sanction. But that couldn't apply in this case.)

hmmm, no. that's not exactly what the atomic rocket site is saying. From an outside observer the optimum solution is tit for tat altruism. From inside it's a no win situation of firing first.

As to the link: I am lighting a candle to Saint Fermi as we speak.

From this comment I take it that you are dismissing Atomic Rocket in it's entirety? Well, all I can say is I put more faith in the reasoning used there and the people who supplied that reasoning than I do in yours.

 

[RedShirt]

Early preproduction sketches of the Discovery showed radiators. They were discarded because it was felt they looked too much like wings.

I've only ever seen a rough napkin sketch (I have no idea if it was pre-production or made by a fan working from the description in the book) so that's pretty neat!

 

[Warped9]

Early preproduction sketches of the Discovery showed radiators. They were discarded because it was felt they looked too much like wings.

I've only ever seen a rough napkin sketch (I have no idea if it was pre-production or made by a fan working from the description in the book) so that's pretty neat!

I can't be sure, but I have some vague memory that I have indeed seen this before somewhere. Hmm...

 

[hyzmarca]

What bothers me most in sci-fi is the total lack of realism when it comes to a "bad guy's" wardrobe, or furniture... stuff like the absurdity of Shinzon's costume in NEM, or the costume of the reptilian Xindi... I mean seriously... how the frak can anything be comfortable in that crap? Number one, the whole thing would take like over two hours to get into, and then, how the hell could you go to the bathroom in such a silly getup? Is it even machine washable? The whole design process of stuff like that just shows a total ignorance of what a humanoid form would consider comfortable... ESPECIALLY for a "military" uniform, which should be totally no-nonsense, save for maybe a few little badges or decorations... but nothing so absolutely absurd as in the examples above.

Dude, If I was an evil overlord I'd so ham it up in a cool costume. What's the point of being an evil overlord if you can't ham it up?

^I can think of a whole lot more reasons to arm your ship in a setting where there are other space going nationalities (aliens) than I can for not arming your ship. Hell, even if there isn't anyone else to encounter, weapons have uses.

Better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it.

There is no such thing as an unarmed interstellar spacecraft. Remember the Kzinti Lesson.

It was James Blish, in his spindizzy series I think, who observed the greatest difficulty in space battles was getting enemy ships in range. Space is big. If for some "reason" a starfaring civilization wanted to attack another civilization, it wouldn't mess around with fleets of spaceships impossibly trying to mimic naval battles. They'd just fire a antimatter bombs or gray goo (nanotech replicators,) or redirect asteroids/comets or possibly bioweapons. A perfect anitmissile defense when the enemy missiles might mass mere kilos would be incredibly difficult for practically any tech.

Exactly. I mean, if President Bush were to attack Iraw he'd just drop a few nukes on them instead of staging a full scale ground invasion and occupation. After all, it would be silly to waste so many resources when nukes just work better.

It's just like in Afghanistan. We sure nuked their asses back to the stone age.

No, wait, Afghanistan was already in the stone age, we didn't nuke them at all. And there was a ground invasion of Iraq but no nukes at all.

I'm afraid that throwing WMDs around in every conflict is unlikely to be a viable option, politically or morally.

 

[FluffyUnbound]

This brings me to another long, long-term problem I have with most space-based sci fi. Weapons. I know it's all supposed to be dramatic tension to have someone to shoot at but it's so stupid. I can guarantee the last thing any long distance spacecraft leaving Earth has is a big gun. Of course, in the real world, the chances of bumping into someone else in a spacecraft are infinitessimal but even so. There have been a scant few intelligent secenarios where spaceships aren't armed because if ever there were MAD it's two spaceships shooting at each other.

It was James Blish, in his spindizzy series I think, who observed the greatest difficulty in space battles was getting enemy ships in range. Space is big. If for some "reason" a starfaring civilization wanted to attack another civilization, it wouldn't mess around with fleets of spaceships impossibly trying to mimic naval battles. They'd just fire a antimatter bombs or gray goo (nanotech replicators,) or redirect asteroids/comets or possibly bioweapons. A perfect anitmissile defense when the enemy missiles might mass mere kilos would be incredibly difficult for practically any tech.

(I know both SG1 and Voyager did the asteroid strike, but both were huge offenders on other counts. SG1 portrayed the go'a'uld as unable to mount security cameras in their ships, as well as being unable to detect radio waves, much less use the information they blabbed in the clear!)

Yeah, because we have nothing like anti-missile lasers at our current level of technology, never mind in the future.

The truth is that for every weapon someone thinks up, eventually someone else develops a defense for it. Escalation occurs. You start out with the lone attacks you mentioned, then someone invents a device to stop them which in turn leads to ships being sent to take out those defense which feeds back into ships being built to counter those ships, and so on and so on and so on.

True space is big, but conversely planets are easy to find and attack. Defenses and offenses will develop depth.

Just like today, warfare will take place near points of interest, not empy space.

I don't think you understand missile defense theory.

No Pentagon planner has ever pretended that perfect missile defense is possible. That's not even its purpose. Everyone acknowledges that it's much cheaper to launch a mass attack than to defend against one. The purpose of missile defense is to introduce the element of uncertainty.

In the context of the arms race on Earth, any power that launches a first strike has to defeat its enemy completely in that first strike or suffer annihilation in a return attack. The real purpose of missile defense is to create a strategic situation where your enemy can't know in advance if his attack will completely destroy you, or if you will retain enough counterstrike capability to utterly destroy him in return.

This makes sense on Earth because the location of your enemy is known, and he can't leave the planet and hide. That's not the case in a space war.

In an interstellar conflict, the only strategic options would be to get your population and your critical systems off of any planetary surface or known location and hide them, or keep them in motion. If your enemy doesn't do the same, the only sensible strategic move is to launch mass attacks designed to exterminate him. If you launch this kind of attack while you are hiding or in motion, you win. Strategic defense could delay but not change the outcome.

This is especially true because the entire Trek concept of "sensors" that can give you information about FTL opponents is completely absurd. Any FTL transport system would make all attacks surprise attacks, because infomation only travels at the speed of light. A ship moving at FTL speeds may not be teleporting, but from the perspective of defenders it may as well be. If an FTL ship attacks you, one second it's not there and there's no sign of it on the way, and the next second it's next to you shooting at you. Or, if your enemy is smart, the next second it's there and it's a nuke drone and there are a million other nuke drones lined up beside it, and they're all going off. And surrounding those million nuke drones are one hundred million decoys to confound your defenses.

 

[sojourner]

^Point to where I said missile defense was %100?

So, in the future it will be easy enough to evacuate entire planets to avoid attack?

And finally, it's possible to posit ftl drives but not ftl sensors?

 

[scotpens]

I can't be sure, but I have some vague memory that I have indeed seen this before somewhere. Hmm...

It's scanned from an article in the May 1966 issue of Esquire magazine. The same issue also had a couple of pages on the upcoming sci-fi production Fantastic Voyage.