Fictional Science in Sci-Fi

[NSEP]

Please note that i do not want this thread to turn into a pseudoscience flamewar, keep the forum safe!

Anyways, i always thought about this topic, not pseudoscience, but just fictional science in Sci-Fi Bassicly magic, but has a sciency skin on it to fit in the setting of a Sci-Fi something.

I am sure there are examples of this, i even use it in my own Sci-Fi. In my Iconel universe. Impossible Drives are a thing in Iconel for example, even though it breaks the laws of physics.

What kind of Fi-Sci have you seen/do you put in Sci-Fi?

[HebaruSan]

In Dragon's Egg, humanity discovers magnetic monopoles and uses them to turn asteroids into maneuverable ultra-dense spheres that shield the crew of a craft from a neutron star's extreme tidal forces.

[Bill Phil]

As long as the fictional science is self consistent and follows rules like real science does, it should be fine. The problem is when it's just applied phlebotinum.

For example: FTL. As long as the fictional science involved is basically real science but the actual theories/hypotheses and laws of physics are different in the story's world, then it's fine. It needs good limitations, too, and the ramifications should be well thought out.

[ARS]

In gundam 00, the GN drive is a porable solar furnace that accoding to it's wiki:

A GN Drive is a semi-perpetual generator, scaled for installation in a mobile suit, which harnesses the byproducts of baryonic decay as an energy source. Like every other power source, a GN Drive has a limited moment-by-moment output; however due to its very nature a GN Drive will continue to supply power for a theoretically infinite period of time, so long as the GN drive is not pushed to breaking limits. Within the context of mobile suit combat, it affords a unit the benefit of an inexhaustible power supply. The non-existent heat signature of its internal processes, combined with the GN Particle emissions, give any unit with a GN Drive a potent mix of stealth and ECM characteristics; neither the GN Drive nor any thruster emissions can be seen by infrared sensors and the GN Particles scatter radar and disrupt long range communications.

Which is one of the many "minovsky physics" that you can find. Interestingly, the GN drive itself has been made into KSP mod, providing the GN engine, for when you want to be a bit "cheaty" without hyperedit

[kerbiloid]

The Ubiquitous Aether.
It's absolutely must have in any sci-fi setting. And usually is had there.

Futurist drives use it as invisible propellant which doesn''t require tanks.
It doesn't limit you in the engine type choice; you can use propellers or flitter with wings in vacuum, you can catch invisible aethereal winds with a sail and so on.

It can move power plants, rotating a windmill in vacuum.

It can concentrate in required amounts anywhere where your need a small planet with Earth gravity, consisting of regular rock. (Hi, Kerbin!)

It can explain why the simple and obvious theory doesn't work even for your own galaxy... (Hi, dark matter!)
...and beyond, (Hi, Attractor The Great!).

In fact, this substance is what we need more than anything irl.

Edited May 7, 2017 by kerbiloid

[NSEP]

6 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

The Ubiquitous Aether.
It's absolutely must have in any sci-fi setting. And usually is had there.

Futurist drives use it as invisible propellant which doesn''t require tanks.
It doesn't limit you in the engine type choice; you can use propellers or flitter with wings in vacuum, you can catch invisible aethereal winds with a sail and so on.

It can move power plants, rotating a windmill in vacuum.

It can concentrate in required amounts anywhere where your need a small planet with Earth gravity, consisting of regular rock. (Hi, Kerbin!)

It can explain why the simple and obvious theory doesn't work even for your own galaxy... (Hi, dark matter!)
...and beyond, (Hi, Attractor The Great!).

In fact, this substance is what we need more than anything irl.

Ha! It is something i notice everywhere yet i did not know the name of it.

[0111narwhalz]

From the Kerbae ad Astra wiki:

Quote

Frameshift

The frameshift drive dodges relativity by moving space instead of spaceships. Through compression and rarefaction of spacetime, a bubble of space is squirted along, carrying a ship or fleet within. Frameshift drives achieve apparent velocities of hundreds of c. The frameshift drive will move anything its distortion toroid can encircle. FSDs take power roughly proportional to the fourth power of the bubble radius. This means that operation gets expensive fast, and movement of huge objects is impractical. FSDs can be engaged at any point within gravity wells of reasonable curvature, though the extraordinary tidal forces of objects such as black holes may distort the bubble enough to cause problems with its contents. Most of the calculations necessary for engagement are done in engineering. A frameshift vessel can be almost as dumb as a rock. All the action of a FSD is contained within the toroid, so if you can power it, you can glue it onto a burrito. Ships within frameshift bubbles have a very poor view of the outside world which mostly takes the form of extraordinarily energetic particles. They cannot see other objects outside of their bubbles. However, they are easily detectable by static sensors by the fringes of their bow shocks, which manifest themselves as fountains of high-energy particles and photons. The distortion also makes them visible to gravimetric sensors. Flight is relatively gentle to the crew, unless they stray too closely to the walls. Tidal forces near the walls are violent and liable to rip ships asunder. Supply of FSDs is relatively free, as the primary challenges to manufacturing are in the active element (requiring exotic matter). However, FSDs later in later stages of development enjoy very small XM needs. Disengagement of a FSD after a long travel is highly dangerous, as the bow shock built up over the entire course of its operation is suddenly thrown free. Frameshift astrogators term this gamma-ray burst the "white flash." Skilled tacticians might make use of the white flash in assaults, though it is largely useless when defending, as the energy scales with operating duration. Frameshifting is fundamentally incompatible with continuous transfer of information or of radio. Courier ships are absolutely essential.

Polyspatial

In Kerbae ad Astra, the entire universe is but a page in a book. A hyperplane containing all of space and time forms the surface of a hypersphere. Polyspatial drives punch out of their hyperplane and dive deeply into the hypersphere. These drives can only move radially through the hypersphere. Once in a new, deeper hyperplane, movement maps differently than in "realspace." For this reason, they are often called "translation drives." Polyspatial maximum speeds are restricted by relativity and by a sort of spatial fluid present in deeper layers. Drag from the spatial fluid prevents excessive velocity at great depths, while relativity prevents excessive velocity at shallow hyperplanes. Peak travel speeds are on the order of many hundreds of c. Though very large ships can be translated, polyspatial drives don't actually move the ship in any conventional way. Reaction drives must be used to propel vessels. This means that one cannot push anything about using polyspatial drives that cannot be pushed by normal means. As polyspatial FTL requires both a translation drive and a reaction drive, there is a certain minimum size and complexity for effective operation. The smallest hull magnitude commonly able to fit both a translation drive and a practical reaction drive is a light frigate, though certain specialist vessels smaller than this are able to mount drives at the cost of efficacy in other fields. The translation event can be achieved in a number of ways, usually lumped into three generations: First generation drives must burn through the entire difference of depth. This means that first-gen translation events require huge amounts of energy proportional to depth. Second generation drives rotate the ship about a plane orthagonal to space and then allow the conventional drives to push the vessel radially. The second rotation returns the ship to its previous orientation. Second-gen translation events require constant energy, regardless of depth. Third generation drives twist space about itself and punch straight through to deeper or shallower hyperplanes. Once the hole is open, any number of vessels may push through without significant additional cost to the vessel or installation holding the wormhole open. Third-gen translation events require energy largely uncoupled from vessel mass, but roughly proportional to depth. Translation can be conducted within gravity wells with little to no ill effects, and at any given point in space. Ships can only detect other ships in similar hyperplanes. Ships have a finite thickness, and so they have causal agency in any hyperplane which includes this thickness. If the hyperplanes are sufficiently similar, they may interact as though they were in realspace. Sensors outside of these hyperplanes must rely upon extremely sensitive gravimetric sensors. Electromagnetism has difficulty penetrating hyperplanes, and is attenuated to uselessness. Adverse effects of translation depend upon the type of translation: First-gen effects occur only rarely, and are due to miscalibration of the drive. They are generally limited to minor nausea and short-term amnesia. Second-gen effects are far more common, as the occurance of two rotations often results in misalignment. Among the typical effects are nausea, vertigo, amnesia, embolism, hemorrhage, cognitive issues, and, in extreme cases, organ inversion and spontaneous nuclear fusion. Third-gen effects are almost unheard-of. Those which do occur are related to interaction with the edges of the wormhole, ranging from irradiation to vessel fragmentation. The supply of translation drives is limited by their reliance on spatiofibrin, an extremely difficult-to-obtain substance derived from the fabric of space itself. Spatiofibrin is a material which interacts strongly with both gravity and electromagnetism, and even varies its interaction with gravity based on its electromagnetic conditions. It is available in economically viable in extremes of electromagnetism and gravity. Damage to the translation drive is liable to strand a starship. For this reason, most starships carry at least two full-sized drives in reserve. Layers are enumerated by a base-two logarithm: layer 1 is twice the speed of layer 0, layer nine is 512 times the speed of layer 0, and so on. Travel at very deep layers is nearly impossible, as the pressure of spatial fluid reduces the exhaust velocity of standard drives to unusability. However, immobile message relays may take example of extraordinary depths and their tight mapping. Electromagnetism works perfectly well within a hyperplane, so conventional radio is effective with the use of relays. Courier ships are not necessary.

Spacefolder

Spacefolders are standard wormhole drives. They function by twisting space and poking a wormhole between themselves and their destination. Spacefolders achieve arbitrarily fast transit. Some might call it instantaneous. Wormholes can accommodate even the largest hulks, so long as they can push themselves through the hole. Spacefolder drives are massive machines, requiring very large amounts of energy roughly proportional to fold distance. However, they are not required on every vessel in a fleet; other ships can transit an existing wormhole without specialized equipment. While there is no hard limit as to where wormholes can be created, spacefolders can only open wormholes between locations with the same gravitational potential. Traversal of gravitational potential is only possible by conventional means. This makes areas of large tidal forces strategically and economically valuable. Spacefolding is a very complex operation, requiring large amounts of calculation on a per-case basis. The small movements of the stars over a decade invalidate previously-established folder solutions. As flight time approaches zero, sensing of vessels "in FTL flight" is meaningless. However, the massive distortion of spacetime is easily sensible by gravimetrics. Traversal of wormholes is generally painless, save for edge interaction (irradiation, fragmentation). Spacefolders require a bulk of spatiofibrin. This severely limits the number of drives which can be produced.

Stutterwarp

Stutterwarp drives pleat space before them in a regular sinusoidal wave. They then punch a hole through one of the pleats. However, they can only tunnel through half the phase, and must travel the rest of the way conventionally. Stutterwarp drives can achieve contraction factors (derived from amplitude and frequency of the wave) in the tens of thousands. They must use subluminal drives to push through this contraction. Apparent velocities in the hundreds of c are not uncommon, and with sufficiently advanced reaction drive technology, some vessels approach a thousand times the speed of light. Vessels are easier to move the smaller they are, but there is no fundamental limit to the size of vessel which may be moved. As stutterwarp is split into two components (wave generator and weaver), extremely small ships can piggyback off of larger vessels. Generation of useful waves requires huge amounts of continuous power. However, weaving is relatively cheap. Stutterwarp is engageable at any point in space regardless of gravitational characteristics. Contraction is, however, aided by the Doppler effect when working up a gradient. Stutterwarp is computationally trivial. Skilled pilots can do it with a slide rule. Ships under way are blindingly visible to both static and moving sensors. The gravitational noise is similar to a piercing pure tone, and instantly notable. Stutterwarp can cause minor nausea under the dynamic gravity. This is not an issue for most seasoned spacers. Construction of wave generators requires the ever-elusive spatiofibrin. Weavers, however, are nearly trivial to build. Clever strategists might make use of stutterwarp's curious effects when used in large groups. The interference of several wave generators is such that numerous weaver-equipped vessels could tag along without changing the noise level significantly. If an admiral makes a habit of including a certain number of tag-alongs, but changes this quantity, he could project force where there is none and slip hidden fleets under the guise of patrol groups.

If you can find the fictional science, you have at least half an eye.

[Just Jim]

Oh, I do this all the time in Emiko Station! My proudest Fi-Sci would have to be:

Magic Boulders can self-generate massive amounts of gravioli particles, which work against the fabric of space time, and by focusing these particles, the boulder can create a small, temporary wormhole, and transport itself from one end to the other.

And then there's the ability some rare Kraken have to telekenetically remove a brain without causing any physical damage, and successfully place it into a preservation canister.  

 

[NSEP]

29 minutes ago, Just Jim said:

Oh, I do this all the time in Emiko Station! My proudest Fi-Sci would have to be:

Magic Boulders can self-generate massive amounts of gravioli particles, which work against the fabric of space time, and by focusing these particles, the boulder can create a small, temporary wormhole, and transport itself from one end to the other.

And then there's the ability some rare Kraken have to telekenetically remove a brain without causing any physical damage, and successfully place it into a preservation canister.  

 

Thats some very Kerbal Fi-Sci! Awesome!

 

[StrandedonEarth]

Start reading Larry Niven's Known Universe library of books, like Ringworld, World of Ptaav's, Protector, the Neutron Star anthology, and on and on. Lots of Fi-Sci in his works.

Edited May 7, 2017 by StrandedonEarth

[Benjamin Kerman]

Always pipeting in biology, and it always takes so little time. 

Xkcd time again, as always...

[KSK]

 

On 07/05/2017 at 0:22 AM, Bill Phil said:

As long as the fictional science is self consistent and follows rules like real science does, it should be fine. The problem is when it's just applied phlebotinum.

For example: FTL. As long as the fictional science involved is basically real science but the actual theories/hypotheses and laws of physics are different in the story's world, then it's fine. It needs good limitations, too, and the ramifications should be well thought out.

One of my favourite examples of this is the Miniaturization Field in Asimov's Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain. Entirely fictional science but self consistent within the story with well thought out ramifications that drive a lot of the story. 

Sometimes though I'm just in the mood for a generous dose of Ludicrous Space Opera. All aboard for Betelgeuse and darn the technobabble!

My own fictional science tends more towards biology and ecology than physics.

Edited May 8, 2017 by KSK