Real Life or Star Wars?

[Farnan]

Sci-fi like weapons being developed (poor language)

http://www.cracked.com/article_16477...-building.html

[Sher Khan]

That 'Rods from God' weapon sounds infinitely cool.

[Exarch]

That 'Rods from God' weapon sounds infinitely cool.

and most plausible
just like in red alert 3

[Da Skinna]

The railgun's the most worked on so far, but it breaks the cannon or something as much as its target...


They're all really cool, but a weapon is dangerous even to its owner, and in this case, maker.

[Farnan]

The ATL was just recently tested and proven to work. The Air Force however said that they are going to go a different direction to find a lighter version. I'd like to believe they are doing it just to throw people off.

[Frédéric Chopin]

As cool as all of those are I was still hoping for a lightsabre.

[MrMofo]

the rods from god are a very old idea. See Larry Niven's book Footfall.

In fact they were just little arm sized objects with shape recognition software. See the shape of a moving tank, plummet, kablooie.

[Farnan]

the rods from god are a very old idea. See Larry Niven's book Footfall.

In fact they were just little arm sized objects with shape recognition software. See the shape of a moving tank, plummet, kablooie.

Its a well known fact that a good deal of military technology is inspired by Sci Fi novels and movies.

Starship Troopers is actually said to be an inspiration for parts of the Future Force program.

[Viking Prince]

Its a well known fact that a good deal of military technology is inspired by Sci Fi novels and movies.

Starship Troopers is actually said to be an inspiration for parts of the Future Force program.

More likely that writers are a creative lot and can also anticipate how something will develope if at all possible. Taje all of the stuff from Star Trek such as a handheld wireless device to communicate with the ship versus wireless cell phones using satelite gps location tech. Good anticipation and not scientists looking to fiction for inspiration. I seriously doubt the scientists are really ever looking to the fiction for inspiration.

[Hounf of Culan]

More likely that writers are a creative lot and can also anticipate how something will develope if at all possible. Taje all of the stuff from Star Trek such as a handheld wireless device to communicate with the ship versus wireless cell phones using satelite gps location tech. Good anticipation and not scientists looking to fiction for inspiration. I seriously doubt the scientists are really ever looking to the fiction for inspiration.

Actually there was a program on the History Channel a while ago that was all about the effects Star Trek had on the scientific community. There were a whole range of PHD holding scientists/astronomers etc who were on the program claiming that watching Star Trek as a child was one of the main inspirations for them getting into their field of work.

[jsktrogdor]

Actually there was a program on the History Channel a while ago that was all about the effects Star Trek had on the scientific community. There were a whole range of PHD holding scientists/astronomers etc who were on the program claiming that watching Star Trek as a child was one of the main inspirations for them getting into their field of work.

I saw that as well, and in fact specificly the man who invented the cell phone as we know it was interviewed and said that he got the idea while watching star trek lol.

[Ishoss]

Rods from God... :O

They should've been in commision in '01, imagine Osama's surprise as he was taken out by a "meteorite"...

[jsktrogdor]

Boeing can spend billions building a gigantic laser shooting aircraft but they cant afford a 3D design team whose out of highschool...



LOOK AT THE REALISM!!! GASP

[Frédéric Chopin]

See Larry Niven's book Footfall.

Not entirely on topic, but that was a very interesting book.

[Viking Prince]

Well you guys may indeed be correct, but I am not convinced.

Regarding cell phone technology -- predates Star Trek by a few years (1947):

Dr Martin Cooper, a former general manager for the systems division at Motorola, is considered the inventor of the first portable handset and the first person to make a call on a portable cell phone in April 1973. The first call he made was to his rival, Joel Engel, Bell Labs head of research.

AT&T's research arm, Bell Laboratories, introduced the idea of cellular communications in 1947. But Motorola and Bell Labs in the sixties and early seventies were in a race to incorporate the technology into portable devices.

Cooper, now 70, wanted people to be able to carry their phones with them anywhere.

While he was a project manager at Motorola in 1973, Cooper set up a base station in New York with the first working prototype of a cellular telephone, the Motorola Dyna-Tac. After some initial testing in Washington for the F.C.C., Mr. Cooper and Motorola took the phone technology to New York to show the public.

http://www.cellular.co.za/cellphone_inventor.htm

[Darth Ravenous]

I recommend people watch the History Channels view on Star Wars Tech. We are developing cold fusion to use for a shield(uses millions of $$$). We already have the T.I.E tech aka(twin ion engine) which we use on long distant space voyages. But for scope the Death star *example* took 20 years to build using about 6 million people and a cost of just over 15 trillion dollars, the space station in orbit right now cost about 6 billion and has been in space for about the same time and has been worked on by only a small group at a time.

[Simetrical]

I recommend people watch the History Channels view on Star Wars Tech. We are developing cold fusion to use for a shield(uses millions of $$$). We already have the T.I.E tech aka(twin ion engine) which we use on long distant space voyages.

That doesn't mean that Star Wars invented those ideas first. (Edit: Although I guess you didn't actually say you thought they did.)

But for scope the Death star *example* took 20 years to build using about 6 million people and a cost of just over 15 trillion dollars, the space station in orbit right now cost about 6 billion and has been in space for about the same time and has been worked on by only a small group at a time.

The Death Star is ludicrously larger than the ISS. The Death Star is a sphere 120+ km across, therefore with a volume in excess of 7,000,000,000,000,000 cubic meters. The ISS is apparently 73×93×27.4 m, so its volume is less (probably much less) than 190,000 cubic meters. That's a difference of more than ten orders of magnitude. For a difference in price of three orders of magnitude? Not a chance. We likely couldn't even harvest enough raw materials to make the Death Star in the foreseaable future (although eventually it would be possible).

[Darth Ravenous]

See you just proved my point it is NOT even close to possible now but will be in time. As I see it star wars is reachable possibility even in our life time. You are also correct I did not say they invented those technologies I was proving the point that we have them now and can duplicate them in time as our T.I.E is not fast and manuverable like the tie fighter.

[Captain Jin]

That's definitely some scary stuff. I know about the laser technology. They were testing some of that stuff on our boys at my old base, basically they'd have you run then they'd put the laser on you. It was for less than lethal weapons, and it burned like hell from what I heard. Everyone they hit with it dropped like a rock, but they didn't have any burns. They just said it burned really bad, but there was no sign of anything on their skin. Weird.

[Darth Ravenous]

That's cause it doesn't cause a skin burn [flame removed] it burns under the skin on a celluar level. If they stood there for about 10 minutes their arm would burned like a fire log.