The RDA can't do physics

[Clarke]

Originally Posted by Human No More

Bull****.
I've already pointed out the fallacy of that. The amount of energy is impossible today, but such shifts HAVE happened and will never be the last. If you keep restating tired already-rebutted points, I'm going to consider this thread as having finished because it feels like groundhog day in here.

We're still talking about ion engines, right? Because the best part of 1 (edit: ) 100 grams of fuel per atom of payload is pretty unworkable no matter how much technology you have. For one thing, your fuel eventually tries to form its own planetary body.

We have no idea how much energy is available.

If we want to be excessively realistic about this, food isn't an issue if you have such huge quantities of energy avaliable. Hydroponics aren't used ATM because it's cheaper to actually farm things. That's not true when you have so many exawatts avaliable for cheap.

And everything works. Everything is possible.

Sort of. The plot doesn't follow from the world completely.

Your original point was that it was.
Also, no, chromosomes can not be transferred neurochemically.

I think I know what I originally meant to say. And if you mean in general, then there's no reason they couldn't be transmitted electrically. A cell is basically a Von Neumann universal constructor, after all.

Even if a human had never seen any scifi, and they met a humanoid alien with only minor differences (shorter, skin colour) and demonstrating speech patterns that, while not instantly understandable, were still recognisable as a developed language, they'd have the right idea.

There is no Na'vi H.G. Wells. They aren't shown to have any concept of astronomy. How could they possibly arrive at anything approximating the right idea?

...the exact reason why sending spess mehren robots is a stupid idea.

See earlier. Non-Pandoran "creatures" are probably going to confuse them equally, regardless of whether they're humanoid or not.

A computer applied purely can't do anything, it wouldn't make unobtainium obsolete.

Some sci-fi authors have suggested that sufficiently powerful computers could be used to launch attacks against reality itself.

Anyway, this point was originally about onsite manufacturing - using a fictional material to illustrate your point only makes it even less likely that could ever happen.

Computronium is only "fictional" to the extent we don't know what it is ATM. Thre has to be some configuration of matter for optimum processing power.

At a completely arbitrary cost per kg, yes, especially when we have no idea what the generating capacity is like.

Well, we do have a floor for how cheap it is: 2.20GJ/cent. (49kgc^2/$20m)

1. Nonhumanoid vs humanoid. Idiot.

Allegedly, some of the Mexican peoples confused Cortez's men with centaurs, to the point where they were ordered to sleep and eat on their horses to not spoil the facade. I don't know how true that actually is, but it's a lot more understandable when there are actual aliens involved.

2. It wouldn't be, because they know the Na'vi are there when specifically making contact. That means leaving the idiots on the ship.

I thought this was in the case you randomly came across a Na'vi? If you're speciifically meeting them, you use an Avatar.

I thought you didn't want any humans on Pandora

I don't, but I don't know enough to jury-rig the FTL to do that.

In all seriousness, it makes no sense to when humans can survive there, especially when humans are far more likely to be easily accepted and trusted (after some time, obviously) by being far more similar.

Humans can't survive there unprotected.

Yet again: That does not mean everyone has one. that does not mean it is anything but extremely rare and expensive. It does not mean the marines are going to have cutting edge military hardware for an operation where they are supposed to not be doing damage.
Are you incapable of understanding this point?

They have Scorpians, which you mentioned earlier were penultimate generation hardware. Since energy weapons are part of RL research, that'd seem to imply laser guns are older than Scorpians, therefore almost certainly more avaliable. Also, you don't need the latest and greatest laser weapons, just usable ones.

Take it up with the UN in Avatar, not me.
Anyway, it's very likely the initial number was smaller and they were trying to build up more thanks to people like Quaritch.
Anyway, remember your earlier point about a weapon: It doesn't have to be one to be used that way. They weren't intended for mass attacks, only for things like basic security around hell's gate.

If it isn't supposed to be used that way, why not use a civilian helicopter instead? Or take out the anti-tank rockets? It seems somewhat excessive when your "basic security" can take down a tree 300m tall.

You were talking about the modern day.
Wanting a petawatt power supply in any kind of portable form just belies the true depths of your ignorance of physics.

Except I know enough physics to take advantage of the loophole in the definition of power. If you can deliver 1J fast enough, the power output will technically be measured in pe****ts. (Though you will never need 1PW except for silly physics experiments. 1GW will do fine as a weapon.)

Also, boom.

My point was that they actually aren't past your 'faraday cages on everything lol', which belongs on trollscience.com

Not sure what you mean. Did you mean that EMP weapons are effective?

It depends on your frequency range. Also, again, there's no need if there are internal connections to the body.

Avoiding connections to the othermost layer of the body seems fairly easy to integrate into the design. (And if you have to, you can put in air/optics gaps if it's important, or just let it fry if it isn't.)

An aircraft which could be built today with only a few refinements necessary, and has been proven to actually be airworthy.

...Really? I have absolutely no idea how you could know that.

Just about every other aspect of them, such as accuracy, consistency, and maintenance.

I don't really understand how they'd be more accurate, and consistency depends on the engineering involved. Though for all I know, electromagnets are easier to make precisly than explosive mixtures. Arguably, they're less maintanable, since as you mentioned earlier, normal guns are manufacturable in any metalworking shop. Electromagnets are harder.

Will you get this into your limited mental capacity?
They are not there to invade. They are not there to scare. They are supposed to be avoiding causing damage.
Again, if you want 'spess mehrens kill everyone', watch something else.

They are there to defend the mining... things. Intimidating the Na'vi does that. They don't need to fire a shot at the Na'vi.

No, it isn't. Such a design is fully possible now. A laser is not in a practical form. Anyway, it's not done by cutoff year, but by appropriateness, not to mention availability, if any pre-Samson/Scorpion designs were unavailable.

A laser is just as appropriate as a gun, and the earlier models will be easier to get than modern firearms. (Why would less advanced models be harder to make?)

Doesn't work if there's a connection (e.g. electrical) to any of them.

So make sure the cage is electrically insulated from everything inside the craft?

I'm sure you haven't read the survival guide.
"Hundreds of orbiting factories on Earth's moon, Mars, and the asteroid belt were in operation just a few decades after it formed"
"THese rights were granted to the RDA in perpetuity by the Interplanetary Commerce Adminstration with the stipulation that they abide by a treaty that prohibits weapons of mass destruction and limits military power in space"

Well, no, I've seen the film. It's not really a good idea to hide background-critical detail in the manual.

Try watching the film for once!
There are six in the shuttle and six in Quaritch's. There are never more than 4, maybe 5, on screen at once after that scene.
You have clearly not watched Avatar.

As I said, I did, close to a year ago now. I don't remember the number of mechs precisly.

Actually, no. Again, watch the film.
It's called Selfridge being a spineless idiot, not him taking an order.

They're not exactly distinguishable. The end result is that Selfridge does as Quaritch says, paper chain of command be damned.

Essentially infinite.

Well, since the concept of superconductivity has been around less than 100 years, I think it's far faster than that.

Actually, we don't.

...Yes, we (they) do? They have evidence of a superconducting substance on Pandora, ergo it exists?

It's still sufficient.

What, to make an arbtararily-sized fusion reactor? Engineering doesn't work that way.

Yes.
Could humans plausibly engineer a feature in an entire species?
There are numerous examples of designs taken directly from evolution-directed features, which is even the entire concept of genetic algorithms.

...Yes? I mean, if you give us 140 years of biology research, we'll definitely get somewhere. And that was my point originally: you don't implant alien organisms wholesale, you just steal the interesting bits you find and integrate them into your own custom-made oraganisms.