BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: GUEST,Kim C no cookie
Date: 17 Jul 02 - 04:40 PM

Sinsull! What about back in the old days, they used to tell you to change your oil every 5000-7000 miles, and now they tell you every 3000? Mister says it's probably because the smaller engines need more frequent maintenance than the older, larger engines. But I dunno...

And once, a long time ago, I had a great pair of Adidas. I wore them for YEARS, and they never fully wore out, but they looked pretty crappy. Anyway, I went to buy another pair, and they had stopped making that style. The pair I bought wore out in a year. :-(

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: Naemanson
Date: 17 Jul 02 - 06:53 PM

Ah, planned obsolecence. Gotta keep 'em buying!

Nothing is as good as it was!

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 17 Jul 02 - 07:32 PM

Kim C - ???

According to my old maintenance manuals, in the "olden days" the normal recommendation was to change oil every 500 miles, if you were operating in "city traffic." Pre 1950s, they might say it was "permissible" to go 3,000 if you operated only on "long trips."

The automakers finally realized that everyone was saying "3 blocks to the supermarket" is pretty long, so they quit pressing the difference, and just settled on "every 1,000" during the 60s and 70s.

Compare the 3,000 mile interval now with the 1,000 mile interval in the 60s or 500-600 miles in the 50s and before. That is progress.

Note: Even though 10-W40 is the only grade sold a lot of places, no auto manufacturer in the US has ever listed it as an "approved" grade. Oil company marketing clout prevents them from saying "don't use it," but in personal communications with GM Research, I've been told - in private - "don't use it." Check your own book.

John

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: GUEST,Just Amy
Date: 17 Jul 02 - 08:43 PM

Kim C no cookie,

I know how TV, radio and computers work. It is magic. Science is just a way to try to explain magic. Don't buy into it. It is magic. Believe in the magic.

Amy

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: CarolC
Date: 17 Jul 02 - 10:36 PM

I know how TV, radio and computers work. It is magic. Science is just a way to try to explain magic. Don't buy into it. It is magic. Believe in the magic.

Sounds good to me.

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 17 Jul 02 - 10:40 PM

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. Larry Niven

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: Celtic Soul
Date: 17 Jul 02 - 11:24 PM

Hey Fibula, that gesture stuff was used in the film "Johnny Pnemonic" with (cough) Keanu Reaves awhile back as well.

How about the Dick Tracy wrist TV/communicators. I hear they exist as well.

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: GUEST,ozmacca
Date: 17 Jul 02 - 11:50 PM

Ladies and gentlemen, presenting for your amazement and edification, the Astounding Einstein, assisted by the lovely Doris, who will, here and now, before your very eyes, demonstrate the Thoery or Relativity, while simultaneously sawing the lady in half at the speed of light.........

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 18 Jul 02 - 04:49 AM

Jack The Sailor: If Niven actually did say that, he was cribbing from Arthur C Clarke "Any sufficiently advanced science is indistinguishable from magic".
A search on the first 4 words will throw up dozens of slight variations on this, but all attributed to Clarke.
Of course, I've always thought that there should be a corollary:
"Any sufficiently codified system of magic is indistinguishable from science"

Nigel

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: GUEST,Kim C no cookie
Date: 18 Jul 02 - 04:13 PM

John, I mean the 70s and early 80s, when warranties were longer too. Mister told me all his cars he drove in the 70s had recommendations of 5-7,000 miles for oil changes, and I remember seeing it on motor oil commercials.

Maybe I dreamed it all. :-)

I get that Durablend stuff they sell at Valvoline.

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: MMario
Date: 18 Jul 02 - 04:23 PM

nope - kim that was what my cars during that era reccomended as well. 5 to 7 thousand miles.

During the early 70's you could get kits that would transform smaller cars into airplanes. They weren't LEGAL but they flew.

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: GUEST,Kim C no cookie
Date: 18 Jul 02 - 04:40 PM

What about the Amphicar, or whatever it was called? The one you could drive on water.

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 18 Jul 02 - 06:45 PM

Actually Nigel, I should have attributed the quote to Louis Wu in "Ringworld" thats the first place I read it.

Of course this name had to come up sooner or later. But there was a Canadian produced series of William Shatner's TEKWAR that was doing those hand gestures for computer navigation long before Johnny Moronic.

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: MMario
Date: 18 Jul 02 - 06:48 PM

and others used the device long before TEKWAR - I beleive Niven among others.

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: GUEST,Just Amy
Date: 18 Jul 02 - 06:51 PM

Nigel, very funny and probably true.

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 18 Jul 02 - 11:03 PM

Nope MMario, not Niven. I've read everything he's written. His human/computer interface of choice is a communications chip in the brain.

But long before Tekwar I saw hand gesture navigation demonstrated at computer trade show VR displays.

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: Grab
Date: 19 Jul 02 - 08:30 AM

Nigel and Jack, there's a corollary to Clarke's saying, which is:-

"If it's not indistinguishable from magic, then it's not really advanced."

In other words, a 1920s Model T which requires hand-cranking, manual spark advance and frequent skilled repairs isn't magic. But a modern car which starts at the press of a button, has all the advance/retard and fuelling programmed into its control system, and mostly only requires infrequent ritual offerings of oil and spark plugs - now that's magic!

Bill D, your Asimov story is "The Naked Sun". "Robots of Dawn" is the following book in the series.

My problem with all this is that the most interesting and memorable sci-fi stories are those that just use the different environment to explore "what-if" questions about our own world or to run thought experiments - 1984, Brave New World, Asimov's "robot" stories, Logan's Run, even The Running Man. Take a point of reference from today's world, extrapolate it to its logical conclusion, invent some kind of McGuffin framework to go round it, and see what happens. The ones that go for hard sci-fi inventions (the ones that see the McGuffin as the whole purpose of the story) are mostly deathly boring - I'd submit "Rama" (and damn near every other Clarke novel) as the prime example here.

Back to the original thread, check out a book called "The worlds of Robert Heinlein". There's an essay in that where he makes a bunch of predictions (in about 1950), and a followup to that essay to see what went right and wrong. Even things which he got wrong time-wise have often come true. Things which went wrong have mostly been due to cultural or political factors - for example, he predicted that we would have settled the Moon and be on the way to Mars, as maybe we could have been if Apollo-level funding had carried on at NASA (and if NASA knew their arse from their collective elbow!) Another prediction was that houses would be prefabricated and assembled on-site in a matter of hours - this is now entirely possible, but it turns out that ppl prefer the look of traditional-style houses so it's never really made it. I can dig it out and type up what he predicted, if anyone's interested.

Graham.

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: Wolfgang
Date: 19 Jul 02 - 10:09 AM

Speaking about Clarke and his third law, may I just for a moment quote his 69th law and then disappear from this thread:

Reading computer manuals without the hardware is as frustrating as reading sex manuals without the software.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: Micca
Date: 19 Jul 02 - 12:13 PM

The Clarke calculation for geo stationary sattelites that give the result 22,500 miles is a real piece of genius, and is called teh "Clarke band" or orbit!!( as mentioned above) it is where all the geostationary communcations satelites are!
One of my lecturers at college, many years ago, did a complete lecture on the Physics of Superheroes, it included much wonderful info such as,
How Supermans X-ray vision would cook his brain, because of the heat generated(assuming the very high voltages didnt electrocute him) and
A certain TV show had a motorbike with a particle beam wepon on it, only to get the energy needed(and he calculated this in class)the bike would need to be more than 3 miles long!!!!. It was a very entertaining lecture and made us all think about Physics and the way it really works.
He ended with an Article, using "facts" directly from the Bible that "proves" that Heaven is hotter than Hell!!! I will post it when I have time to type it in!!

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: MMario
Date: 19 Jul 02 - 12:19 PM

pre-fab housing was available in the early '50's. My grandparents house was put up in a matter of hours once the foundation was in. The modules were trucked in and dropped onto the foundation. another day or so was occupied with doing the hookups and then they did decide to cover it with cedar shakes - but that was cosmetic.

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: GUEST,open mike
Date: 19 Jul 02 - 02:46 PM

the medical analysis thingy which clips on your finger is called a pulse oximeter-it reads the data thru infra-red light being bounced into the bloodstream in your finger and back.It measures the amounts of oxygen and CO2 in your blood. On another note:: I saw a show recently on teh discovdry channel about scientifically measuring the electro magnetic waves in places where ghosts and spirits are seen, felt and heard. the waves are measurable, and this gives a scientific credence to subjects formerly not proveable~! subjective/objective evidence~~ these modern "ghost busters" also were able to record ultra (low? high?) frequency sounds in zones where spirits have been known to frequent.

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 19 Jul 02 - 05:37 PM

I had a Colonoscopy done yesterday, talk about high tech! I had some electodes and one of those finger clip things. Heart rate, respiration in a realtime graph, periodic readings of Blood pressure. Bones McCoy would have been proud. Except on TV its the Aliens that stick the probes up your ass. ;)

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: Micca
Date: 19 Jul 02 - 06:31 PM

As promised earlier..
Heaven is hotter than Hell

The temperature of Heaven can be rather accurately computed from available data. Our authority is the Bible: Isaiah 30:26 reads "Moreover the light of the Moon shall be as the light of the Sun and the light of the Sun shall be sevenfold, as the light of seven days" Thus Heaven receives from the Moon as much radiation as we do from the sun and in addition seven times seven(forty nine times) as much as the Earth does from the Sun, or Fifty times in all The light we receive from the moon is a ten-thousandth of the light from the Sun, so we can ignore that. With this data we can compute the temperature of Heaven. The radiation falling on Heaven will heat it to the point where the heat lost by radiation is just equal to the heat received by radiation.. In other words, Heaven loses fifty times as much heat as the Earth by radiation. Using the Stefan-Boltzmann fourth-power law for radiation.

                (H/E)^4 +50,
Where E s the absolute temperature of the Earth-300K
This gives H as 798K (525 degrees Celsius)
The exact temperature of Hell cannot be computed but it must be less than 444.6 degrees Celsius, the temperature at which brimstone or sulphur changes from a liquid to a gas. Revelations 21:8 "But the fearful and unbelieving… shall have their part in the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone. A lake of Molten brimstone means that its temperature must be below the boiling point which is 44.6 degrees C( above this temperature it would be a vapour not a lake
We have ,then,
the temperature of Heaven 525 degrees Celsius
The temperature of Hell    445 degrees Celsius
Therefore, Heaven is hotter than Hell
From " a Random walk in Science"

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: CarolC
Date: 19 Jul 02 - 07:25 PM

Pobrecito, Jack the Sailor.

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: robomatic
Date: 19 Jul 02 - 07:33 PM

You made me think of starting a thread called: Science Fiction Folk Songs, but to stay on topic:

H. G. Wells pretty much created the idea that became known as the tank in a short story of his preceding the First World War. He predicted the atomic bomb in a book written shortly after the First World War. The guy who patented the idea of a nuclear chain reaction attributed a lot of his inspiration to Wells, who lived to see both these items put to use.

Jules Verne, in the book "A Voyage to the Moon and a Trip Around it," in which he imagined post Civil War Americans having a lot of ammunition and propellant around and nothing to do with it, idly discussing whether or not to conquer Great Britain, and then deciding to go to the moon instead. He introduced the scientific concept of escape velocity, I beleive with the help of his brother who was a mathematician.

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: BK
Date: 19 Jul 02 - 11:48 PM

The world IS run by fat old farts (rich farts, anyway), and quite ruthlessly..

Our NEWEST 2 cars ('94 & '98)- all fuel injected, etc, & all Japanese brands, reccomend 7,00 mi oil changes, all my older ones did not, ever. (I change at abt 3-4k anyway & have used ONLY full synthetic oil since fully synth Mobile-1 was available; Our '87 626 had 189k on it, used near no oil & still cruised well above any limit, flawlessly, & got >30 mpg)

Since many sci-fi authors have been engineers or scientists, sci-fi has always had a significant element of predicting, both science & technology, and social trends.

Cheers, BK (the original BK; apparently there is another? I haven't been very active at mudcat lately..)

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: Blackcatter
Date: 20 Jul 02 - 02:30 AM

Three things I would like to see in reality from the minds of SF:

First is the "Beanstalks" Heinlein talks about in "Friday" - slender, flexible structures many miles long that stick out from various places in the work into the edges of our atmosphere. There would be stations at the tips and shuttles could ferry people and products from one to another easily. High speed elevators would take people and things back and forth from the surface to the tip of the beanstalk.

Second is the wall in the nursery of Bradbury's story "The Veldt" To some extent that could be an whopping big flat screen, but it'd still be really cool. I don't think you could do it with a jumbo-tron type of TV - resolution for those are designed for viewing hundreds of feet away, besides all the stuff you'd need would fill the room.

Third is the Universal Translator used in all the Star Trek series ("Enterprise" is in the process of developing it). What I love about it beyond the fact that it translates thousands of languages immediately, is that it makes the speakers lips move as if they were speaking your language and that it does not translate many "cuss" words. A Klingon cussing in English (Federation Basic) would loose so much fierceness. I do like the fact that the censor's let Picard say Merde once even though he'd never be allowed to say the English equivalent.

but I digress...

I think that little reference was made to the Internet is SF because there wasn't really a lot of need - People in most stories communicate through a telecommunication media. Having a video hook-up to your PC and talking to someone on the internet isn't all that much different than doing it through Ma Bell. Information retrival was talked about and definately networks, and isn't the Internet just a big ole network?

pax yall

Subject: RE: BS: Science Fiction : Science Fact
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 20 Jul 02 - 07:06 AM

Yeah, the thing is the internet is not this big magical monolithic thing. It's just a bit of convergence whose time has come. In 2002 networking has moved way beyond the simple internet paradigm and it is bound to go much further. It will become, super computing at the finger tip like Asimov's Multivac. And the instant, multimedia communications tool described in so many stories. All it takes is bandwidth. If we are not careful it may even become Big Brother.