Hi,
John Higginbotham writes that it would be easy to detect a ship
accelerating to .1c. Well, It aien't that easy. Consider that
the attacking vessel has to make a long run toward it's target
in order to get up to speed. Well, You are going to have
to start waaaay out of the system anyway, why not move back into
interstellar space to start your run?
For one there is less junk out there. Less chance you'll hit
a stray micrometeroroid at.1c with disasterous results. Less
chance of detection. (at the distances I'm thinking of your
neutrino smoke will be totally lost in the bacground noise)
Targetting? Well, with good old TL7 equipment, we managed to
score a close encounter with Neptune... Admittedly, we had
a few mid course corrections, but there weren't that many
burns and those were for getting to the next target, not
correcting aim.
As for Conservation of energy. Steven Hawkings is pretty
much talking about what most of us would consider special
circumstances in the realm of the universe (Inside the
center of a black hole...)
Not having been inside one myself I am afraid I am
prejudiced to think that that is a special case...
Anyway, Conservation of energy holds up quite nicely
in Newtonian physics. Newton does hold up for everday
low velocities. And, (Surprise!) .1C is within the realm of
Newton. (Relativity doesn't kick in substantially till .5C)
As for mysterious stuff which somehow nullifies
the laws of physics... I don't like 'em, I won't use 'em
unless I have to. (Jump Drives, Grav Drives, Nuc Dampers,
Meson Screens, Psi{I really don't like psi})
The last I heard was that Traveller IS a Hard
Science Fiction game. (with the above exceptions) Most of
the game is based on Poul Anderson's writings which are
definitely hard science fiction.
Scott S. Kellogg
PS. I don't like the term 'hard science fiction' I preferr
'good science fiction' as opposed to 'bad science fiction'
Eight foot two,
Solid blue,
Five transistors in each shoe,
Has anybody seen my Horde?...