http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/index.html
What the title says. A truely fascinating SF page of the diamond hard variety. Only the section aptly named 'Common misconceptions' would be enough to justify a visit.
A short list of those misconceptions:
Space Is Not An Ocean
Space Is Three Dimensional
Rockets Are Not Boats
Rockets Are Not Fighter Planes
Rockets Are Not Arrows
.
.
.
And very specially There Ain't No Stealth In Space!!!!!
Fighter plane spaceships in particular anger me to no end.
Damn, Looks like I don't know shit. I didn't think space was an ocean or that rockets were in fact boats. Looks like I was suffering under a common misconception.
The guy left out one common misconception that he appears to be unaware of:
"The purpose of science fiction is entertainment, not education, and the "facts" in it serve the fiction element not the science element."
I enjoy watching/reading writers who work diligently to accommodate the laws of physics in their fiction as much as anyone, but to chastise shows and writers for using common conventions (even when wrong) when it serves their story purposes better is to put the cart in front of the horse. Sure, shows could have their spaceships travel around upside down relative to one another, but that doesn't serve the purposes of the story because the audiences wouldn't like it.
So, that's the pysicists' version of the guys who nitpick ahistoric details in movies like The Patriot or A Bridge Too Far?
Quote from: Syt on June 22, 2009, 10:31:28 AM
So, that's the pysicists' version of the guys who nitpick ahistoric details in movies like The Patriot or A Bridge Too Far?
I really liked a Bridge To far.
Where is Far?
Quote from: grumbler on June 22, 2009, 10:25:45 AM
The guy left out one common misconception that he appears to be unaware of:
"The purpose of science fiction is entertainment, not education, and the "facts" in it serve the fiction element not the science element."
I enjoy watching/reading writers who work diligently to accommodate the laws of physics in their fiction as much as anyone, but to chastise shows and writers for using common conventions (even when wrong) when it serves their story purposes better is to put the cart in front of the horse. Sure, shows could have their spaceships travel around upside down relative to one another, but that doesn't serve the purposes of the story because the audiences wouldn't like it.
That's one thing, but the 'airplanes in space' complete with roaring engines that get noisier when approaching and then vanish gradually in the distance, is quite another.... 2001 shows it can be done well (even 2001 included several simplifications; they didn't include heat radiators or fuel depots in the Discovery, for example... but they weren't ridiculous mistakes)
Quote from: Alatriste on June 24, 2009, 07:29:41 AM
Quote from: grumbler on June 22, 2009, 10:25:45 AM
The guy left out one common misconception that he appears to be unaware of:
"The purpose of science fiction is entertainment, not education, and the "facts" in it serve the fiction element not the science element."
I enjoy watching/reading writers who work diligently to accommodate the laws of physics in their fiction as much as anyone, but to chastise shows and writers for using common conventions (even when wrong) when it serves their story purposes better is to put the cart in front of the horse. Sure, shows could have their spaceships travel around upside down relative to one another, but that doesn't serve the purposes of the story because the audiences wouldn't like it.
That's one thing, but the 'airplanes in space' complete with roaring engines that get noisier when approaching and then vanish gradually in the distance, is quite another.... 2001 shows it can be done well (even 2001 included several simplifications; they didn't include heat radiators or fuel depots in the Discovery, for example... but they weren't ridiculous mistakes)
2001 was also about as slow as molasses on a Vermont winter morning. I like space battles and explosions and the USS Reliant blowing up the Enterprise. The hard sci-fi version of that would take weeks (relative) and involve sloooow turns and info dumps of the variety that make Dave Weber look concise.