#technobabble or science?

[captain-starskull]

Computer mice don’t have tails anymore. We shouldn’t call them mice we should call them hamsters.

[quarks-pussy]

Idec anymore, I'll say it. I like technobabble. Adore it actually! It sets the atmosphere well and I like when they try to have it make internal sense and I can see the worldbuilding. Maybe I'm just a professional tech nerd but I truly, genuinely enjoy technobabble and in fact I think most franchises could use a little more of it. Fight me

[nulfaga]

Btw where are the humanities on the enterprise. Why no historians and sociologists on the front lines. The universal translator was a devastating move for linguistic plot points (except I suppose the darmok and jalad episodes). But also: you are a warship staffed exclusively with graduates of the federation's military academy and you whine when other planetary govts don't take you at your word when you say "we're just here to explore we prommy"? Why even send a warship to presumably make first contact with potentially hundreds of new species. I can't believe i'm saying this but i need to read some econ/public admin papers talking about the nuts and bolts of the star trek universe. i'm dissatisfied

[mushroom-through-the-stargate]

bestieeeeeeeeee i would like some Info Dumping about the asteroid field scene in sga pls and thank yooooooooooooou gimme all the Fun Facts

omg ok ok ok SO im gonna go full mckay here alright so just keep that in mind just listen listen asteroid fields? not that densely packed. at all. theyre so far apart from each other theyre barely in each others gravity fields theyre just atlantis was not in peril in that way the big asteroids can't- its not physically possible for them to be that close together the gravity would cause them to collide with each other please cinema stop making densely packed asteroid fields you're making my heart sad

HOWEVER

the micro asteroids are entirely accurate everything in space is moving incredibly fast and speed equals kinetic energy and we all know e=mc² tiny amount of mass incredible amount of energy those teeny tiny asteroids WOULD be like bullets same devastating effect same or faster speeds why couldnt THAT be the entire peril those little whizzing space pebbles couldve knocked out systems it happens all the time on the iss AND to top it all off the tiny ones ARE that densely packed so they could be knocking out systems left and right they could be breaking windows cracking crystals severing wires you name it theyd break it

matter of fact, John's predictable solution of blowing up the big asteroids in their way was actually possibly making matters worse because ✨️shrapnel✨️ while yes you can shoot a bazooka at a chair and it'll get out of your way, there will be splinters in everything in a 50 foot (or more) radius thats just how explosives work

[silveragelovechild]

You may have noticed, I post about Star Trek regularly but rarely post about Star Wars.

While all the movies aren’t great, Star Trek tells a variety of stories with a variety of villains.

Meanwhile Star Wars seems to tell the same story about mostly the same character over and over. After the Empire was defended by the Rebels in “Return of the Jedi” (1983), Lucas could have told new stories in the Star Wars Universe. But nope! In the sequels starting with “The Force Awakens” (2015) the Empire returns and defeats the former Rebels who become rebels again. They even brought back the emperor who died in 1983.

Another issue is fantasy versus science fiction. Star Trek is set in a science fiction universe, with at least an attempt to explain how things they work (with the resulting technobable). But Star Wars is pure fantasy with a princess that need saving, wizards, and sword fights. Sure Lucas tried to introduce Midicorians to explain how the Force works - but that must be the most reviled concept in the entire Star Wars lore.

Neatly all the ancillary Star Wars movies look to the past… the origin of Han Solo. Did we really need to know how he got his last name? And how the rebels stole those plans Leia needed in A New Hope!

Perhaps the worse sins are Darth Vader and Kylo Ren. Vader is perhaps the greatest cinematic villain ever (especially because of his voice by James Earl Jones). But in Lucas’ prequels we learned he was actually a whiny teenage boy. WTF?!?

And Kylo Ren, Vader’s successor? Another fucking crybaby. My gawd! Is this suppose to be compelling fiction?

I had Disney+ for a few months but I realized I wasn’t interesting in watching any of the Star Wars show. So I canceled the service.

I do have Paramount+ and I like serval of its Star Trek show. Yes, Strange New Worlds looks to the past, but at least it has new characters. (Although I am not a fan of Discovery.)

[splicejunction]

affirmation of the day: it’s ok to reblog a post that mentions silicon-based life forms without talking about the thermodynamics of silicon oxidation & reduction in the tags. Nobody cares that Si=O bonds are vastly more stable than Si—H meaning that interconversion of different silicon species is energetically much more frustrated than say interconversion between the same types of bonds but with carbon in place of silicon. I can let people enjoy things

[aquamonstra]

How does one become a science consultant on a sci-fi series?

Like do you HAVE to be a real scientist first?

I have ZERO science on my resume but I KNOW I would be so good at this like come on man PUT ME IN COACH.

[sluttyquarantinetheory]

I think part of why I'm not as big of a fan of fantasy is that there's not a lot of technobabble. Like occasionally you get some wizard type that goes off explaining how the magic crystalized cryptocorpse enhancer uses rainbow energy to hang life and death in the inbetween of reality or some shit, but most of the time it's just like "well I drew a circle and spoke some latin"

[technicallywrite]

I am terrified delighted to share the first chapter of my first fic in 20+ years. There will be more, and yes that's a threat.

[therottenkingsreckoning]

[hesgomorrah]

okay maybe asking for help is good sometimes. i just mentioned to a friend where i had gotten stuck on a fic i was working on and they gave me the exact answer i was looking for in a single message, saving me from hours of aimless googling

[powerfulkicks]

remembering how much i love science fiction

[spinfoamgames]

A set of new random generators are now available on The Merry Manticore, all related to science fiction settings: Technobabble, Fictional Particles, and Fictional Elements!

As usual, here's a handful of samples:

Close the hydrogen waveguide

Tinstrium

Psi Axinoior

Orient the fermion joiner

Xennethorium

Theta Anti-nerptatron

Invert the graviton intermixer

Verbonide

Weak Charadron

Oh, and some other update news: items that you mark as favorites should now be saved to your browser so they won't be reset from one visit to the next any more!

[sluttyquarantinetheory]

Nothing beats good quality technobabble, but nothing sticks in my brain like the worst technobabble on earth. My brother in law a decade on still make fun of shitty technobabble we read in a pear review assignment in college a decade ago.

[robotsprinkles]

trying to figure out the mechanics of energon for Encyclopedia Cybertronia and the (still unnamed) tf fanfic

(I'm going to need to do so much editing. this reads like ass)

I was originally going to make energon some sort of stored plasma medium (and I still might) but the "plasma as power/energy source" thing felt too. I don't know. standard? easy? "plasma as the generic sci-fi go-to for [insert worldbuilding/technology requirement here]". but then again antimatter's pretty well used in sci fi as well so.

also I wanted to have a thing with the different weapon types being clearly differentiated (plasma primarily melts/burns and producing emps, only doing significant kinetic/explosive damage when fired fast enough, laser weaponry being the highest precision type with basically no kinetic impact and also being. y'know. lightspeed travel time. energon weaponry having the highest explosive damage (excluding nukes), etc)

[comicaurora]

With much technobabble and mad science, I grab an evil bearded vending machine from the Mirror Universe and place it before the vending machine.

you receive a tube of eyeliner and a slightly sluttier outfit