Exotic Physics in Orbiter along with Newtonian.

[Simonpro]

The important thing is that the laser isn't, and never was, against the laws of physics, it just required new physics to
make it possible - not the destruction of old physics. A lot of 'sci-fi' tech does require the destruction of laws of
physics, however.

[JMarcure]

Simonpro wrote:
The important thing is that the laser isn't, and never was, against the laws of physics, it just required new physics to
make it possible - not the destruction of old physics. A lot of 'sci-fi' tech does require the destruction of laws of
physics, however.

So what you are saying is that LASER physics were known at the time "War of the Worlds" was written and that
Wells new enough about them to create  a version in his novel. Cool, I must say that I never knew LASER physics
were that advanced in the late 1890s. I had always thought that it was Einstein that had proposed the basis for
LASER theory in the late 1920´s.    Well I guess it´s true that we learn something new every day.

I like your comment that "it just required new physics". It kind of negates your whole point because warp drive could be possible with the discovery of new physics but yet it´s dismissed because it appears in scifi.

Later,
Jon



Post Edited ( 12-30-06 20:34 )

[DJ Barney]

ZCohrane...

> I'm wondering: does anyone mind if I make another quick video of a five-minute trip to the moon

I really don't mind! I hav'nt got mine set up to do vids yet.

~~~

Excellent replies.

I'll have to think about my original premise....how exactly are "fringe" physics implemented in Orbiter ? I have the code
of one of the add-ons now, kindly provided by the author ... so will start there.

JMarcure...hello!

> So what you are saying is that LASER physics were known at the time "War of the Worlds" was written and that
> Wells new enough about them to create a version in his novel. Cool, I must say that I never knew LASER physics
> were that advanced in the late 1890s.

The "spectrum" of fiction to reality, eh? Continuosly inspiring us and changing the way we live.

DJBarney

[Simonpro]

Jon, you appear to be misundestanding me. Of course LASERs were not developed in the 1800's, but some of the
physics was, and the remaining physics did not require us to chuck out any of our old physics (even QM didn't require
us to remove anything, as we had nothing there to remove). Warp drives and FTL systems a-la star trek do require
changes to all our laws. I'm not saying it's not possible that we're all wrong about all the physics we know, I just
think it's highly unlikely.

[JMarcure]

Hi,

Are any fringe physics even considered in Orbiter? I would guess not but I could be wrong. From what I can see most
of the fringe stuff is being faked by leveraging the normal API functions or holes in the normal API functions.
The "warp" drive I did was just changing the position of the ship within the Orbiter universe. Which would have been
a heck of a lot easier to do if there was an API function to change the position of the ship. Right now I fake movement
by creating a new ship at a location relative to the focus ship and then attach the focus to it. If the API for
attachments was ever tighten up or changed it may blow the method right out of the water. The method I use is
really only good for a single jump and has problems with the way I use it for the warp drive. These problems are big
enough that I have decided to drop the warp drive stuff and go back to the hyper jump/folding space stuff. The main
problem is that I´m creating and destroying the dummy warp ship pretty much continuously which causes the F3 focus
list to update continuously which means you cannot change focus because the list update resets the list.

Later,
Jon

[JMarcure]

Simonpro wrote:
Jon, you appear to be misundestanding me. Of course LASERs were not developed in the 1800's, but some of the
physics was, and the remaining physics did not require us to chuck out any of our old physics (even QM didn't require
us to remove anything, as we had nothing there to remove). Warp drives and FTL systems a-la star trek do require
changes to all our laws. I'm not saying it's not possible that we're all wrong about all the physics we know, I just
think it's highly unlikely.

Hi,

No, I was yanking your chain a bit.

There is a great deal of science fiction that does not require the rewriting of physic. Some of the best comes from
Asimov and Clark who are both notable scientists. Although both dealt with science fantasy some of which is really
wild but highly respected nonetheless. Then you have people that do what is thought of as science fiction and is
really pure fantasy and  one of the best examples is the last Star Wars movie. I love CGI stuff and see a lot of movies
just for that but that movie was more magic than.  

I guess we will just have to agree to disagree as to the real world value of science fiction.
 
Later,
Jon

[Simonpro]

Yanking my chain is pointless, I refuse to get worked up about anything on the internet, unless it's a personal attack,
of course

I'll also admit that Clark is good, I've only read one of his books (Rendevous with Rama) but it was very well written.

[Urwumpe]

About warp drives... it does not neccessarily mean that we need to change the physics of our world. It depends on which
theory of the physics are correct. Just take the Heim-Dröscher quantum theory (Yes, i like it. Blame me for being a HQT fan!)
- which would allow something which is very similar to the SF concept of hyperspace travel (entering a dimension which is
parallel to our own, but allows a faster travel because of a different spacetime geometry). The good news is, that the energy
demands for entering a dimension which would allow faster-than-light travel are finite. Of course they are still pretty
high... but compared to other theories which rely on warping spacetime, this is a really cost saving way to travel.

Jon: I am not completly sure, but i think together with the Scenario Editor, a API function for setting the global position
had been added... maybe SetElements does the trick.

[JMarcure]

Urwumpe wrote:
About warp drives... it does not neccessarily mean that we need to change the physics of our world. It depends on
which
theory of the physics are correct. Just take the Heim-Dröscher quantum theory (Yes, i like it. Blame me for being a HQT
fan!)
- which would allow something which is very similar to the SF concept of hyperspace travel (entering a dimension
which is
parallel to our own, but allows a faster travel because of a different spacetime geometry). The good news is, that the
energy
demands for entering a dimension which would allow faster-than-light travel are finite. Of course they are still pretty
high... but compared to other theories which rely on warping spacetime, this is a really cost saving way to travel.

Jon: I am not completly sure, but i think together with the Scenario Editor, a API function for setting the global position
had been added... maybe SetElements does the trick.

Hi,

I was going to mention Heim as well as Alcubierre but didn't want to start a debate on the value of their theories.

I took a quick look at the API guide and you may be right about the SetElements function but it will have to wait until I
get home, as my work computer can no longer run Visual C++ or Orbiter.

I don´t know if you saw my post before the Orbiter forum went down but I made some changes to your Anim80r
export script that gives me much of what I was looking for. It´s just amazing how much time that script has saved me.
It takes me a fair amount of time to reorient and resize my models but once done it´s really easy to get them into
Orbiter.  Thanks again for it.

Later,
Jon



Post Edited ( 01-02-07 19:23 )