How are these calcs? (Stargate)

[The Reaper]

CMEs are not unidirectional. They expand outwards from the surface of the star along the lines of magnetic force, as I understand it, and the ship is going to get hit by a hell of a lot less than the full force of the blast.

That calculation might be right in principle if they're doing something drastic such as enveloping the star in a force field to shield the solar system from it, I wouldn't raise an eyebrow at that kind of a performance from a TARDIS or a GSV, but if it's just a matter of individual survival then you need to divide the cross-sectional area of the flare as it passes the target ship by the cross sectional area of the ship to get the fraction of the energy of the flare that hits the ship and is taken on the shields; I wouldn't be at all surprised if you lost six orders of magnitude, more, in that.

In addition to the five, closing in on six, orders of magnitude the calculation is actually already wrong by.

V-squared comes out at 2.39E11, M is 1.6E12, so you're actually looking at 1.9E23 J, forty-five teratons.

Again, cross section- depending on where the ship was, how much of the blast it ate; I mean it's a yield figure, and probably quite a respectable one if it was in that close, but Sol's a million kilometres in diameter (not an accurate figure) and CME's don't emanate from a point source; from patches on the surface of the sun yes, of large area. Even flying on the surface of the star there's no way to get the ship to eat the entire energy of the burst.

Since I can't get him to come here his reply was this.

Sci-fi. Note the fi, standing for fiction. The authors can make a solar flare however thin they feel like. Just because a normal solar flare does not act like that does not mean this one did not act like that. Mckay stated it would start small, for whatever reason, and then expand to engulf the planet which is why the ship intercepted it close to the star while it was still small. To take that logic you used further would be to say that in fact Sg ships can not use hyperspace, because it does not exist or that Destiny’s real space FTL is impossible due to the knowledge of current relativity. This is science fiction, word of god said the solar flare was concentrated enough to be taken on the shields, therefore that solar flare was concentrated enough to be taken on the shields. There is simply no two ways about that.

The CME clearly didn't push the ship backwards when it impacted. That puts some pretty hefty constraints how much of the CME it could have absorbed. IF that weren't enough, we see that the CME gets deflected to either side of the ship, so it wasn't absorbing all the energy to begin with - if it had the CME would have slowed to a stop rather than being diverted. That calc is such an incredibly generous upper limit its basically unusuable in any serious sense.

And to this he said.

yes, I saw that, and due to the law that every action has an equal and opposite reaction, in order for the ship to maintain its possition and not be swept along with the solar flare it would have to be producing power equal to the KE of the solar flare to resist being moved. He obviously did not think that arguement through.

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

Words almost fail me...although as a description of this postmodernist cheesehead, "subliterate moron" does come to mind. That is a concession- resorting to special pleading and word of god, which serves to prove that the authors didn't know what they were talking about either.

The idea that it's all right to have "science" in science fiction that is just technobabble asspulling that tries to shit on reality (which fortunately does not care), this is what ruined Trek and means we deserve everything the SyFy channel can do to us. Do we really have to resort to magic painted blue to tell good stories? Is "Meh" an answer now?

Yes, we can- have to- postulate changes in the laws of physics for most science fiction. Nine times out of ten, when it's all played through and the meaning of it is understood, what the change does does is tell us why reality doesn't actually work that way. Yes, Destiny's drive is impossible. Suppose for the sake of argument that it wasn't, then what else is possible?

There can be such a thing as good fictional science- scientists turned writers tend to be a lot better at this- a small change thoroughly explored, on and through the human element. Star Wars left so much unexplained that we can all have a go figuing out what and why, squirrelling about the background- Trek tried to explain too much and contradicted itself cripplingly in the process.

Suspension of disbelief is a quality that each of us has in varying proportion, and some part of the writer's job is to measure it out, decide how much stress to put on it, challenge it- and every step loses some of the audience, keeps the rest- until the next act of egregious bullshit. If you want to be God of your own universe where the laws are what you say they are, you'd better have a damned good tale to tell to get many people to buy into it;

and if your laws are different, if your up is my RA+8.34, what price buy in? Revealing that the cosmos is powered by bullshittium is an insult to the audience, in addition to bad literary craftsmanship. Fail as sci, fail as fi. If it's not a CME, don't call it one.

[Connor MacLeod]

yeah I like how he keeps hopping back and fort between in and out of universe when it suits his purposes. One minute its calcable and science applies, the next minute it doesn't to save his ass.

yes, I saw that, and due to the law that every action has an equal and opposite reaction, in order for the ship to maintain its possition and not be swept along with the solar flare it would have to be producing power equal to the KE of the solar flare to resist being moved. He obviously did not think that arguement through.

Except that the ship, as I recall was pretty much out in space, with nothign to act against. That means using its engines, and if that were the case we'd see an indicator of engines firing. Hell, we actually see the ship backing up at some later date, so its not getting shoved back dramatically.

Even if the engines did fire or they had some magical means of "forces" acting on them, the fact the CME was deflected without being totally slowed means that the shields could not have absorbed 100% of the total energy. We in fact dont really know the percentage, except that by the visuals the CME stream was not noticably slowed relative to the ship.

If one really wanted to be an ass, one could point out the complications introduced by mass lightening technology WRT starship travel. as I recal lthat's one reason they pull the insane accelerations they do.

[Murazor]

If one really wanted to be an ass, one could point out the complications introduced by mass lightening technology WRT starship travel. as I recal lthat's one reason they pull the insane accelerations they do.

My memory might be failing me in my old age, but mass lightening technology being used in Stargate is 100% news to me.

[Batman]

For starters Ancient Puddle Jumpers are explicitly mentioned to be able to use their inertial dampeners to alter their mass in both directions ('The Storm pt2' comes to mind) and IIRC Major Carter said something about the C-302's doing mass reduction in s6e2 Redemption pt2, but as I can't find the quote right now that's from memory.

[Darth Hoth]

It was established already well before Atlantis that Goa'uld technology uses mass-lightening (inertial dampening) for its spaceships, and probably other stuff as well. NecronLord, Connor and various other people discussed it in this thread many years ago.

[DrStrangelove]

The calcs are unapologetically high end, and make some optimistic assumptions.

This doesnt look like 9.7 teratons to me, since unprotected humans in line of sight havent been incinerated


Here is an Asuran weapon that was going to drain Atlantis' shields in a day or two. Note how it hasn't instantly obliterated a ~150m asteroid


Here is the explosion; most likely megaton range, that fooled the Wraith and their "teraton" weapons into thinking Atlantis was destroyed. Definitely not a teraton explosion, considering it was able to form a mushroom cloud within a presumably Earthlike atmosphere.


And here is the infamous CME. Which in order to be a "normal" CME means the Daedalus is thousands of Km across.

Personally, I think the evidence considered in its entirety supports kiloton- megaton weapons, and the occasional gigaton range nahquadah enhanced weapons for Stargate.

[Murazor]

IIRC Major Carter said something about the C-302's doing mass reduction in s6e2 Redemption pt2, but as I can't find the quote right now that's from memory.

Well, I'll be damned...

O'NEILL
Is there anything else I should know?

CARTER
Well, there's some concern that the 302s may not have the fuel capacity to exit the atmosphere carrying the weight of the stargate.

O'NEILL
How is that possible?

CARTER
The engines were designed for a craft with an alien inertial dampening system that effectively reduced its overall mass.

O'NEILL
Yes, and…?

CARTER
Well, you'll be carrying a very heavy load.

O'NEILL
How heavy?

CARTER
The Gate ways 64,000 pounds, Sir.

The Earth built craft doesn't have it, but the Goa'uld death glider they pretty much copied the design from does have mass ligthening. Well, that was instructive.

And here is the infamous CME. Which in order to be a "normal" CME means the Daedalus is thousands of Km across.

Explicitly stated in-episode to be far more intense and nothing like the CMEs in our sun. Total nonsense with its turbolaser-like behaviour and all that, but those are the facts we are given to work with.

[Darth Hoth]

Note that inertial dampening and mass lightening are not the same thing.

I think Sam specifically said something about mass lightening one time so it prolly does apply here, but one word doesn't necessarily imply the other.

What would be the difference? Both technologies effectively magic away either some or all of a ship's inertial mass, from what I understand of it.

Then there are, of course, "inertial dampeners" in other sci-fi that are more akin to what Star Wars calls "acceleration compensators," but those would be less relevant in a Stargate context.

[The Reaper]

His response to Eleventh Century Remnant was this.

He can bitch all he likes it does not change the facts. It was stated to be a CME that dwarfed anything our sun had emitted and it was shown to be, visually and by the plot, to be narrow enough to be deflected by the shields. That is the canon, his belief, or lack thereof has no bearing upon it.

His response to Connor was this.

Do me a favour. I assume you can get your hands on some marbles. Hold them above your desk and drop them. By your logic when they hit they should be perfectly stationary as the KE is stopped by the desk. They probably won’t be, but that doesn’t matter much due to some extra factors. Now take a second handful and drop it on the first. What happens to the first? They get displaced by the second handful. The same thing applies to the particles in the CME. Even assuming they stop dead, the following particles will force them out of the way. So the CME will not stop dead when it strikes an unmoving and impenetrable barrier.
I also mentioned nothing of the engines firing as I find it rather unlikely that they had anything to do with it. Though they may have, it doesn’t seem to be depicted. The shields in SG seem to create an opposing KE when struck by KE in order to deflect it, otherwise the ships should be pushed to the side when impacted by other ships on their shields from transference of momentum. Or the shield generator should be ripped from its housing. Neither happens upon impacts as is demonstrated on the occasions that Gua’uld Ha’tak’s ram Ori motherships when there is no shown transference of momentum and even when Atlantis is struck by the tidal wave which should have resulted on a very significant amount of tilt on the city.
Additionally, those calculations only take into account the KE inherent in a CME, they do not account for the masses of other energy types existent in a CME that the shields would also have had to withstand. Protecting the crew from the numerous types of lethal radiation and the massive amount of heat (though some thermal bleed through occurred due to Asgard shield propensity to attenuate under fire). If those were taken into account, the number would be greatly increased.
Lastly, the CME incident is a standalone calculation from which none of the others are derived; specifying only ZPM powered Asgard shields.

[DrStrangelove]

Explicitly stated in-episode to be far more intense and nothing like the CMEs in our sun. Total nonsense with its turbolaser-like behaviour and all that, but those are the facts we are given to work with.

Kind of my point. Using data from a normal CME, to calc the one in the episode which appears to have nothing in common with a real CME other than name, is stupid and/or dishonest. I've pointed these issues out to the guy who did them, but factpile is full of fanboi morons.

[The Reaper]

Also in response to DrStrangeLove's pics he said.

Pic one: He doesnt understand how energy beams work. It isnt a nuke.
Pic two: Plot. Any energy beam that can travel from orbit and hit the ocean floor would have obliterated that asteroid unless it was made of wolverine’s adamantium. Additionly, no heating of the asteroid from a weapon shown boiling away the water in its path, no thermal fractures, and only fails at the last possible second to allow it to glance strike weir only provide more proof for it to be a plot element.
Pic three: Once again fails to understand energy weapons. Wraith energy bolts are not nukes. The explosion atlantis detonated blanked the wraith sensors while Atlantis put the cloak up. It was meant to convince the wraith that the humans had blown up Atlantis to stop the wraith capturing it. there is no reason a terraton explosion would have been expected.
Pic four: was dealt by another on that thread.

[Batman]

Note that inertial dampening and mass lightening are not the same thing.
I think Sam specifically said something about mass lightening one time so it prolly does apply here, but one word doesn't necessarily imply the other.

What would be the difference? Both technologies effectively magic away either some or all of a ship's inertial mass, from what I understand of it.

Um-no? Both technologies effectively magic away some or all of the effects of the ship's acceleration. You can reduce the ship's mass as much as you want, if it's accelerating at 1000gs, the crew is a greasy smear on the rear wall of whatever compartment they were in.
Mass lightening makes it easier to achieve those kinds of acceleration, it doesn't make the effects of that kind of acceleration go away.

Then there are, of course, "inertial dampeners" in other sci-fi that are more akin to what Star Wars calls "acceleration compensators," but those would be less relevant in a Stargate context.

Actually Stargate inertial dampeners apparently do exactly that on top of mass manipulation.

[DrStrangelove]

Pic one: He doesnt understand how energy beams work. It isnt a nuke.

He is an idiot. A nuclear weapon releases all its energy as....photons(X-rays and Gamma) It is the interaction between the individual photons and environment that creates all the secondary effect commonly associated with nuclear weapons(fireball, mushroom cloud, etc). Anything that releases a similar amount of energy into the same environment will have a similar effect on the environment.

Pic two: Plot. Any energy beam that can travel from orbit and hit the ocean floor would have obliterated that asteroid unless it was made of wolverine’s adamantium. Additionly, no heating of the asteroid from a weapon shown boiling away the water in its path, no thermal fractures, and only fails at the last possible second to allow it to glance strike weir only provide more proof for it to be a plot element.

Plot isn't a valid excuse, it's a red herring. Adhering to occam's razor my position is superior as it requires no rationalization. It's pretty sad when logical fallacies form an integral part of one's argument. And he really needs to provide evidence why an energy beam needs to act the way he claims it does. Perhaps they are teaching some new form of physics I am unaware of.

Pic three: Once again fails to understand energy weapons. Wraith energy bolts are not nukes. The explosion atlantis detonated blanked the wraith sensors while Atlantis put the cloak up. It was meant to convince the wraith that the humans had blown up Atlantis to stop the wraith capturing it. there is no reason a terraton explosion would have been expected.

And he once again demonstrates a lack of knowledge of basic physics. The energy released into the environment has to go somewhere, and act upon it. Energy doesnt magically disappear because its contained in an energy weapon. If he really thinks this is the case, he should volunteer to stand next to the target the next time someone conducts a megajoule laser experiment.

Pic four: was dealt by another on that thread.

I just want to see the logic he uses in justifying using data from something that not only doesnt resemble what is seen onscreen, and is stated to be different as well. Really, I want to see how an unbiased logical observer justifies using data from something stated and shown to be different from the object you are attempting to quantify, to quantify the unknown. I could use that kind of logic to assume the event demonstrates something with the net output of a very large hairdryer.

He really needs to come here if he really wants to defend his assumptions. Not that it matters, since the average poster on factpile appears to be approximately 13 and suffers from various forms of mild retardation

edit: fixed quote tag

[The Reaper]

His response, DrStrangeLove

To your comment on Pic 1:

I do have to wonder if he even bothered to reread what he just said. According to him, lightening (At 500megajoules) should have the same effect on the environment as detonating 236 sticks of dynamite. What we have in Sg weapons is focused, unidirectional beams of energy. Beams that are often depicted maintaining coherency even AFTER striking a target; on several occasions punching clean through. These beams do not act in the same manner as a nuclear detonation, this should be obvious. Nor is there any indication that these beams use X or Gamma rays; indeed one is specifically mentioned as using Plasma, and another Ions. He is, put most simply, wrong.

On Pic 2:

Very poor attempt at discrediting my argument. Even basic logic comparisons between various Sg technologies would indicate the instant destruction of that rock such as the weakest of the naquadah bombs, at 1GT and their woeful effect on the weakest shields in SG. His position is based purely on ignoring that the rock does not react, in any meaningful way, to the beam striking it. The beam manages to dig out a small trench across the surface of the asteroid as the asteroid passes. There is no momentum transferred to the asteroid, as it does not begin to spin. There is no thermal energy applied as the rock is not seen to heat, and yet this beam can fire from high orbit, through an ocean, and hit a shield on the ocean floor? With the levels of energy indicated by it’s strike of the asteroid, it shouldn’t even be able to hit Atlantis. On top of that the weapon almost totally knocked out Asgard shields in seconds just slightly prior to that. Asgard shields are superior to goa’uld shields, which in turn took a 1GT hit with no problem. That puts the beams power output at above 1GT, at it’s weakest. A standard nickel-iron asteroid of those dimensions could not have survived a beam of that intensity.

Pic 3:

Yes, it acts upon the structure. It does not act upon everything within a couple of kilometres as you seem to suggest. Even then, Sg weapons have shown to be highly contained, much more so then current lasers, as proven by the destruction of Anubis’s mothership when shots struck and punched clean through to strike buildings beneath. This shows clearly that the weapons maintain their coherency even after contact which massively reduces the energy splash to the surrounding area.

Pic 4:

A good example of insulting and ignoring without any useful points.

[Darth Hoth]

My mistake, then; sorry.

[Xon]

The energy released into the environment has to go somewhere, and act upon it. Energy doesnt magically disappear because its contained in an energy weapon. If he really thinks this is the case, he should volunteer to stand next to the target the next time someone conducts a megajoule laser experiment.

I'ld like to point out the very plot point of 48 hours is that the Stargate is radiating away Teal'c mass-energy at a rate of megatons per day. Given the complete lack of SGC evaporating in a nuclear fireball, I think it is safe to conclude that Stargate has some wierd make energy-go-elsewhere technology.

[Connor MacLeod]

I'ld like to point out the very plot point of 48 hours is that the Stargate is radiating away Teal'c mass-energy at a rate of megatons per day. Given the complete lack of SGC evaporating in a nuclear fireball, I think it is safe to conclude that Stargate has some wierd make energy-go-elsewhere technology.

Or it's just speaking in terms of equivalents to megatons or whatever. I wouldn't really assume they have some sort of exotic means of radiating/dissipating away large amounts of energy simply on the basis of a stated rate of "mass-energy" without knowing what form it takes and how it is being radiated away.

[Xon]

This is the same setting with "freeze lighting" from Brain storm and utterly impossible heatsinks which where are capable of pulling the temperature down of a large facility to almost sub-zero temperatures inside an hour.

The same setting with really wonky inertia manipulation which can function as both mass lightning and increasing something's effective mass. A setting packed full of non-local effects, and outright energy leeching fields which drain power away.

[Xon]

getto edit: Non-local power transfer isn't that unusual in stargate. They have energy draining fields and fields which dump more energy into stuff.

The battery recharger on Destiny, the Attero device are both examples of non-local power transmission. The scale is kinda wonky with a battery recharger to something which makes stargates explode across a dwarf galaxy.