IRC log for #cyrannus on 20160908

00:41.43Wormy_https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0fa7jeiHiM
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08:01.58Liquid_InkHello
08:04.21GhelaeHello.
08:07.20Liquid_InkHow are you?
08:08.25GhelaeI'm okay; how about you?
08:09.15Liquid_InkYeah, pretty good
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10:10.52Liquid_InkI was thinking about a nanosuit like the kind the Nauceans use, and I've come across the issue of how those nanomachines would be powered
10:11.44Liquid_InkFrom what I've read, energy puts limitations on the uses of nanobots
10:12.16GhelaeYes; there's both the power source and overheating to contend with.
10:12.58Liquid_InkOverheating hadn't occurred to me
10:13.56GhelaeOverheating is the problem with so much sci-fi tech that so often gets ignored.
10:14.59GhelaeThe second skin nanobots aren't too extreme, though: they can shapeshift and act as powered armour.
10:15.22GhelaeThe former shouldn't be too energy-intensive, and the latter makes it much like any powered armour.
10:15.58Liquid_InkWait, what's "the former" and "the latter" referring to here?
10:16.39Ghelae"the former" = shapeshifting, "the latter" = acting as powered armour
10:17.47Liquid_InkYou said they aren't too extreme?
10:19.19GhelaeYes. It's not like they're behaving as replicators and making bullets out of thin air or anything like that.
10:20.04Liquid_InkSo how would they be powered?
10:20.25GhelaeHow would you power anything?
10:20.49GhelaeThey won't need their own power source if they're all connected to each other.
10:21.13GhelaeAs in, each individual nanobot won't need its own individual source.
10:21.24Liquid_InkI figured that.
10:21.46GhelaeSo it's just one generator/reactory/battery/fuel cell for the whole suit.
10:22.13Liquid_InkAny recommendations?
10:22.41GhelaeDepends on what physics is available. What kind of setting of this for?
10:24.11GhelaeIf you want diamond-hard sci-fi, you're going to have to look into current cutting-edge battery technology and see how it's likely to end up.
10:24.15Liquid_InkWell, obviously, they have nanomachines. Although that's implied to be a new development.
10:24.30Liquid_InkAlso, the planet has mostly be taken over by a robot uprising.
10:25.01Liquid_InkVery similar to the Naucean thing, as I said, though I still insist I developed this idea independently.
10:25.08GhelaeSo only a few decades in advance of modern-day Earth, then.
10:25.14Liquid_InkMaybe I was subconciously influenced?
10:27.19GhelaeStill, the hardness of the sci-fi will tell you what power sources you can use. More speculatively, you could have small fusion reactors. Go straight into comic-book territory and you could power them with arc reactors.
10:28.02Liquid_InkI'd like to avoid blatant rip-offs.
10:28.05GhelaePower beamed from a larger, less mobile, generator is more plausible, but more of a logistical challenge when the suits struggle to function independently, although combine that with batteries and you may have something better than either on its own.
10:28.44Liquid_InkI did have an idea for a solar collecting satelilite beaming power to the suit, but I thought it may have been overkill
10:29.39GhelaeIf the nanobots are inside microbots, i.e. they're basically artificial cells, a rich supply of some chemical fuel might be sufficient, although it'll need something to get the fluid around quickly like a circulatory system.
10:31.07GhelaeGiven that it can shapeshift, a load of tiny hearts shouldn't be much trouble.
10:33.49Liquid_InkThat sounds awefully complicated
10:35.32GhelaeSmall pumps sound complicated?
10:35.56Liquid_InkThe nanobots being inside microbots
10:37.25GhelaePerhaps not inside an actual mechanism, but like a cell in which the molecules are surrounded by membrane, which also has other molecules attached to it.
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10:42.59Liquid_InkI'm not understanding what this does
10:52.31GhelaeIt means you can have nanobots that convert the stable chemical fuel, something analogous to glucose, into something that the other nanobots can use more readily, analogous to ATP.
10:54.08GhelaeHolding it inside a membrane is simply because you're dealing with a liquid to supply the fuel.
10:55.39Liquid_InkHow long would that last?
10:57.33GhelaeHow long does food last inside a person?
10:58.47Liquid_InkI wouldn't actually know
10:58.53GhelaeIt's going to depend on how much fuel you have, what fuel it is, and how much activity you're putting the suit through.
10:59.25GhelaeBut you could guesstimate it as the time between eating a meal and feeling hungry, which is probably a few hours.
11:00.49GhelaePerhaps if you actually did make the nanobots run on glucose and ATP, you could connect the suit up to the user's own bloodstream and use their own nutrients.
11:01.06Liquid_InkTHen they'd have to eat a lot
11:01.16GhelaeThey'd have to eat *more*.
11:01.35Liquid_InkMaybe I should clarify this more: the suit is a military suit meant to fight the robot uprising
11:01.41Liquid_InkIn a guerilla capacity.
11:02.54GhelaeSo that's likely to be high activity for much of the time. But again, all it's doing is moving around (shapeshifting) and exerting lots of force (powered armour).
11:03.04GhelaeSo these shouldn't be unreasonable energy demands.
11:04.13GhelaeI wouldn't even know how to go about calculating it, but I'd suggest something like the calorific requirements of elite endurance athletes. Whether this is consumed by the soldier or attached to the nanosuit in a fuel packet.
11:05.50GhelaeAs for heat loss, a shapeshifting nanosuit should easily be able to increase its surface area by making its surface bumpy, spiny or fractal-ly.
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11:11.12Liquid_InkHey Wormy
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11:18.35Wormy_hi
11:23.47Liquid_InkI've been talking with Ghelae about nanosuits
11:24.15Liquid_Ink...
11:24.24Liquid_InkMy new computer doesn't have pastie in its history
11:24.27Liquid_InkPlease link me
11:26.07Liquid_InkWormy_
11:26.40Wormy_I didn't see it
11:27.00Liquid_InkPardon?
11:27.09Wormy_Oh
11:27.20Wormy_http://pastie.org/
11:27.31Wormy_Keep in mind Pastue hasn't been working recently
11:27.54Liquid_InkOh dear
11:28.09Liquid_InkI'll find a way around this
11:28.11Wormy_they're upgrading servers or something so it hardly works
11:28.22GhelaeYou could always copy+paste it into a titanpad.
11:28.29Liquid_InkOkay
11:28.44Wormy_There'a also pastebin
11:29.06GhelaeThat's probably better.
11:29.29Liquid_Inkhttps://titanpad.com/Of3CRJiGHy Yeah well I already did Titanpad
11:34.51Wormy_When Ghelaway gets back later I'd like to discuss spatial anomalies in SporeWikiverse that aren't traversal wormholes or black holes, or topological defects.
11:35.24Wormy_I wonder if we can be a bit creative with hyperspatial physics
11:43.17Liquid_InkIf powered by an external generator, could the nanoskin be able to produce food to adequately feed the wearer?
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11:49.50Liquid_Ink_I wouldn't have seen any answer, sorry
11:55.39GhelawayLiquid_Ink_: It would also require a suitable supply of matter, and it both requires additional complexity (more nanobots to catalyse the correct chemical reactions) and adds additional waste heat.
11:56.55Liquid_Ink_I'm concerned as to what my protagonist would eat while fighting a guerilla war against robots.
11:58.04GhelawayYou could have the food synthesiser as a seperate piece of nanotech-based equipment, although if it's sufficiently small it could presumably be attached to (and concealed within) the suit if necessary.
11:59.28GhelawayWormy_: A proper definition of "spatial anomaly" would be required to figure out that. :P
12:00.44GhelawayMy first thought would be a region of non-Minkowski (or, on an intergalactic scale, non-FLRW) geometry, but any gravitational field also fits that description.
12:02.08GhelawayAnd as far as geometry is concerned, the only difference between a star and a black hole is whether or not the radius is greater than the Schwarzschild radius. So you need a definition that makes a star not an anomaly.
12:07.56Wormy_Hm
12:10.32Wormy_I guess that is because Minkowski geometry is flat, so anything with a gravitational field that bends it is like an anomaly.  Still, black holes and stars bend space in the same kind of way, just at different extremes
12:11.12Wormy_Presumably so would have massive spatial anomaly
12:11.44Wormy_(of the type I'm thinking of, like a massive *unusual* disturbance to spacetime)
12:14.15Wormy_One could invoke different vacuum states, or states where spacetime is different,  But they would not coexist nicely with spacetime and either be converted, or convert normal spacetime at the speed of light depending which has the lower energy state
12:29.34GhelawayThe ambiguity in the word "unusual" is the problem. We could define "spatial anomaly" by a list of things that it's not - so not Minkowski *and* not R<r_s Schwarzschild-style metrics - otherwise... for example, would the space around a neutron star count as a "spatial anomaly"?
12:31.14Wormy_"Spatial anomaly" defined as unusual regions of space could also count as too many things, not necessarily alien metrics, like a nebula of transuranic elements such as andasium
12:31.43Wormy_But they might not be "unusual" to the Gigaquadrant now
12:32.06GhelawayBlack holes and wormholes are hardly unusual to the Gigaquadrant either.
12:33.29GhelawayAbout the only similarity between black holes and wormholes that isn't shared by stars is how they change the motion of something moving within it.
12:33.43Wormy_I'm thinking these alien metrics usually only manifest when ships are engaged at warp or hyperspace
12:34.11GhelawayThe motion of a massive object around a star could be simulated, at least qualitatively, with other forces, but you can't accelerate an object to FTL speeds without exotic metrics.
12:34.22Wormy_yeah
12:36.13GhelawayMore specifically, both wormholes and black holes tilt light cones so that, relative to a distant observer, they appear to point in spacelike directions. If we limit the definition of "spatial anomaly" to this, we're basically limited to black holes, FTL drives, and time machines.
12:37.20GhelawayI'm not sure how the concept could be generalised without removing the principle that it adds forces that can't be simulated otherwise.
12:37.47GhelawayPerhaps wormholes to other universes, but that's not really different from other wormholes.
12:38.39GhelawayHave you already looked through lists of sci-fi "spatial anomalies" e.g. on Memory Alpha and concluded there's nothing new there?
12:40.21Wormy_Indeed, most either fall into these kinds:  wormhole-type anomalies;  regions of space hard to travel at warp (like our hyperspace fog); or poorly defined regions where spacetime m=geometry changes or folds into hyperspace
12:40.53Wormy_And some just silly things like graviton ellipses
12:43.06Wormy_Some of them have unusual effects though, like closed timelike loops, the shrinking of objects, or duplication of matter, or phantom spaces where universes get entangled
12:43.29Wormy_or traps, a bit like black holes but without singularities
12:45.05Wormy_We might be better off thinking about the physics of these effects, but most of those are already highly fantastical.  I know that shrinking makes no physical sense, duplication defies physics, and quantum universe entanglement is very complicated (but essential to one theory about how true quantum computers would work)
12:45.15GhelawayTimelike curves we've already mentioned. Traps sound a bit like reverse nightshades.
12:45.42Gheli.e. stopping things from leaving rather than stopping them from entering.
12:46.05Wormy_That's true, like a naturally forming metric shield?
12:46.09GhelYeah.
12:47.27GhelPerhaps we could define a spatial anomaly as being something that doesn't (at least qualitatively) match with the gravitoelectromagnetic approximation, and if necessary we could say a second type (with a lot of overlap with the first) is ones that violate the averaged null energy condition.
12:48.52GhelSince gravitoelectromagnetism treats gravity as a vector force rather than curved spacetime, we get things like Newtonian gravity and frame-dragging but not black holes and topology changes.
12:49.12GhelHence black holes and wormholes are spatial anomalies, but regular and compact stars are not.
12:50.06GhelI don't know whether this would exclude metric shields, but if it does, that's where the additional category of ANEC violations comes in.
13:03.38GhelSome of the Star Trek anomalies seem to violate the Gauss and Ampere laws in that they're regions of spatial distortion without an apparent source. That could well be simulated by dark matter hyperspace fog.
13:05.41GhelOtherwise, yeah, the majority of them are either topology changes or nonsense stuff.
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14:14.25Wormy_Sorry someone unexpectedly visited, and my laptop went to sleep
14:14.40Wormy_But I saw all your comments up to 14:05
14:15.59Wormy_anyway, that is a fair assessment
14:31.05GhelawayFortunately I made no comments after that.
14:40.37Wormy_It seems like there's nothing new to be made in SporeWikiverse physics
14:40.49Wormy_In terms of these anomalies
14:43.06GhelawayNot in terms of fundamental physics, but you were talking about coming up with new types of anomaly.
14:52.44Wormy_Yes, if we can think of new consequences hyperspace physics, we might think of naturally occurring phenomena that might give rise to them too
14:53.14Wormy_BUt Star Trek is obviously a bad basis, since we know some of those effect makes no sense at all
15:01.29Wormy_G2g
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21:08.18GhelawayWormy_: We didn't look at any consequences of hyperspace - or other - physics. We just built up a definition of "spatial anomaly" so we can tell whether or not something we come up with is one.
21:22.22Wormy_To be honest I was less interested in it being an "anomaly", or just a disturbance in spacetime that isn't star, collapsed into its Swartzchild horizon or otherwise
21:22.42Wormy_*just a disturbance
21:22.53Wormy_As we've seen, we hven't got many options
21:24.39GhelawayThat's because we haven't thought about it much.
21:24.59Wormy_Indeed
21:25.57GhelawayI don't think we can do a sort of classification-by-exhaustion on this. If you gave the equations of gravitoelectromagnetism to a physicist in the early 20th century and told them to come up with phenomena that would violate them, would they have thought of wormholes?
21:27.33Wormy_Probably not, things like that are often unexpected
21:28.13Wormy_Well, I don't know how obvious wormhole solutions would be too be fair
21:28.20GhelawayExactly. The idea of changing the topology of space isn't remotely like a vector force.
21:31.12GhelawaySo we have possibly four categories so far: "dark matter" (i.e. any gravitational effects without a visible source), nontrivial topology (e.g. FTL and time travel), black holes, and the entirely fictional metric shields.
21:31.20GhelawayThere could well be more.
21:37.21Wormy_Is it reasonable to suppose there is a boundary between regions of normal and exotic metrics, like a ship crossing the folds of hyperspace?
21:37.53Wormy_Or is that just the event horizon, which according to GR, isn't special for the observer crossing it
21:50.44Wormy_test
22:03.58GhelawayIt would depend. In general, the equivalence principle would say no, but that's still a matter of scale: you'll notice if part of you passes through the event horizon of a black hole a metre across.
22:07.33CyrannianWormy_: want to meet up in STO? https://www.arcgames.com/en/games/star-trek-online/news/detail/10153362 there's a giveaway
22:08.43Wormy_Hm, not tonight.  I'm away from home and my laptop will need to patch a year's worth of data
22:08.47Wormy_but thanks
22:09.25Cyrannianno problemo
22:10.33GhelawayAlthough not typically a part of general relativity, there might still be discontinuities in the metric. Like you'll also notice if you run into a cosmic string.
22:13.35Wormy_A conical singularity must do wonders to your health!
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