Some quick ideas...

Have a space battle where the crew TURN OFF the artifical gravity, put on space suits and remove the ships air, so they can't be vented into space or damaged so easily by impacts!

A space battle that's more like "Das Boot" than the wild west.

If medicine conquers aging and your lifespan (barring accidents and murder) was infinite then you'd probably be very very wary about taking any risks that could kill you but completely blase about those that couldn't.

Telepathy enabling Brain implants spread as fast as mobile phones, someone infects one with a virus and enslaves the world!

Have a "hyper space" where the further "up" you travel in the hyperspace dimension the higher the speed of light is.

A technology is invented can make an almost indestructable material by weaving thin sheets out of quarks and leptons, instead of them forming atoms. Nukes are as pointless as firing 9mm bullets at a tank.

In 2050 nanodiamond is THE material, and everything important is made out of it. This would be a really cool look for a film.

From what little I understand about coilguns, wouldn't it be easier (take less energy) to build armor (especially in heavy metallic objects like tanks) to stop such a projectile than it would to propel it?

The magnetic pull would have to be pretty massive to get that thing launched at any decent velocity. But to drive/repell it away or slow it down considerably, you would just need a big flat magnetic layer with minimal power capacity.[/quote}
Yes you could build a tank with such massive armour that you couldn't penetrate it, but then why don't they do that today (a tank with 1 metre thick armour could be made)?

The reason they don't is that that tank has to be able to move. If the armour is too heavy/thick then that tanks could not move (also know as a bunker). Just call in an air strike with a bunker buster missile and your problem is solved...

As for magnetic deflection:

You run into the problem if the inverse square law. That is the strength of the magnetic field is relative to the inverse square of the distance. So if you double the distance, it is four time as weak.

A coil gun might have the magnets a few millimetres from the projectile. Where as the tank's magnetic armour might need to be effective at a range of around 10 metres or so. That is an order of 1000 time the distance which means the magnetic field (to be an equal strength) would need to be 1,000,000 times as powerful. So it would actually take far, far, far more energy to have a magnetic deflection shield/armour for a tank than it would to fire a round with a coil gun.

Also a coil gun uses an alternating magnetic field to induce an electric current in the projectile. This electric current in the projectile creates a magnetic field that opposes the inducing field (from the launcher). This is what pushes the projectile and launches it from the coil gun. If you were using this in a shield, it would also induce a current in anything metallic on the tank, from the armour to the electronics and so on. This would scramble all communication and any computer equipment on board (these would be needed for aiming any weapons you had on board).

So although it might be possible to construct a magnetic shield for a tank, it would be completely impractical.

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Original post by ROBERTREAD1 Some quick ideas... Have a space battle where the crew TURN OFF the artifical gravity, put on space suits and remove the ships air, so they can't be vented into space or damaged so easily by impacts! A space battle that's more like "Das Boot" than the wild west.

This is a nice idea. I've been planning somethign like this. I read The Risen empire By Scott Westerfield, and realized that putting life support and a pilot's chair in a small spacefighter was patently ridiculous. Of course, lightspeed causes delays when your operating at a significant portion of an AU, which makes the "piloting" a diferent experience altogether. I also like the idea of sand. Dropping cases and cases of diamonds to vaporize someone traveling at 3% c. There were so many creative ideas in that book, this discussion makes me want to read it again. Laurent Zai's warship is the best example I can think of forhow space warfare should eb done.

It makes me want to consider invisibility in a space game: You have to balance your telescope's resolving power against it's coverage. You have to balance high delta V against a bright engine trail. I makes me want to include th posiblity of deliberately dropping off parts of your ship, as decoys, or just ot be annoying.

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If medicine conquers aging and your lifespan (barring accidents and murder) was infinite then you'd probably be very very wary about taking any risks that could kill you but completely blase about those that couldn't. Telepathy enabling Brain implants spread as fast as mobile phones, someone infects one with a virus and enslaves the world! Have a "hyper space" where the further "up" you travel in the hyperspace dimension the higher the speed of light is. A technology is invented can make an almost indestructable material by weaving thin sheets out of quarks and leptons, instead of them forming atoms. Nukes are as pointless as firing 9mm bullets at a tank. In 2050 nanodiamond is THE material, and everything important is made out of it. This would be a really cool look for a film.

What's nanodiamond? how are they different from regular synthetic diamonds?

A nanodiamond is the technology to make a pure diamond bonded carbon object of an arbitrary shape.

i.e. Imagine the space shuttle hull as one solid diamond instead of all those blocks.

One bit of future technology I plan to include in my space game is a "situational sound generator".

With the "situational sound generator" switched off you get the 2001 space sound (i.e. you can hear yourself breathe)

With the "situational sound generator" switched on your can "hear" the ships around you.

It's a gimmick to explain noise in space.

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Original post by ROBERTREAD1 A nanodiamond is the technology to make a pure diamond bonded carbon object of an arbitrary shape. i.e. Imagine the space shuttle hull as one solid diamond instead of all those blocks.

How is this different from generating large diamonds, and welding them together under intense heat and pressure, or machining them abrasively?

Rather, what I'm asking is this: what makes them "nano"?

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Original post by ROBERTREAD1 One bit of future technology I plan to include in my space game is a "situational sound generator". With the "situational sound generator" switched off you get the 2001 space sound (i.e. you can hear yourself breathe) With the "situational sound generator" switched on your can "hear" the ships around you. It's a gimmick to explain noise in space.

I like this. I'm going to steal it if you don't mind :p

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Original post by The Shadow Nose Imagine a cyborg who has perhaps one electronic eye. That 'eye' is really just an input device that feeds images to his brain. He could easily view things in front of him (like from a camera placed where his human eye would be) from a remote location (like he has a network of security cameras around a building and he can instantly switch his view from any one of those cameras) from a specific tool (installing a camera onto a guns scope so that no matter what position he holds his gun, he can see exactly where it is aiming) or it could just function as a cumputer monitor (he can surf the internet with one eye... potentially reading Wikipedia or Mapquest whenever he wants if he needs information fast)

I have toyed with this idea for some time. The only problem is that when the person is using the remote viewing, the human eye is still seeing what is directly infront of them. This can cause many problems as the human brain cannot process this kind of mixed information. both views would be mixed together causing confusion of vision. The only way to counter this is for the person to close the human eye and thus loosing perspective of what is in front of them.

ON to space battles. Yes they would shut down life support and don spacesuits. It would be the only safe thing to do. What I would like to see more is space battles that take place on a 3d feild rather than a 2d plane. Some shows and movies work this way but many do not. In space there is no "up" so when you are goind head on towards an enemy, he has buddies coming from your beneath and above. Which leads me to another problem with space battles, the front and rear shields. With battle happening on a 3d feild, you will need top, bottom and side sheilds as well.

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Original post by Anonymous Poster Haven't you ever used a camcorder viewfinder before? Seeing different things in each eye really is not that bad....

A camcorder is slightly different. When you are looking at a viewfinder it is part of the big picture. What a remote eye would do is meld two different pictures into one. Like placing two pictures on top of one another in photoshop and blending them. The result is not pretty. It can get confuing to see that in life.

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Original post by Anonymous Poster Quote: Original post by ezacharyk Quote: Original post by The Shadow Nose Imagine a cyborg who has perhaps one electronic eye. That 'eye' is really just an input device that feeds images to his brain. He could easily view things in front of him (like from a camera placed where his human eye would be) from a remote location (like he has a network of security cameras around a building and he can instantly switch his view from any one of those cameras) from a specific tool (installing a camera onto a guns scope so that no matter what position he holds his gun, he can see exactly where it is aiming) or it could just function as a cumputer monitor (he can surf the internet with one eye... potentially reading Wikipedia or Mapquest whenever he wants if he needs information fast) I have toyed with this idea for some time. The only problem is that when the person is using the remote viewing, the human eye is still seeing what is directly infront of them. This can cause many problems as the human brain cannot process this kind of mixed information. both views would be mixed together causing confusion of vision. The only way to counter this is for the person to close the human eye and thus loosing perspective of what is in front of them. Haven't you ever used a camcorder viewfinder before? Seeing different things in each eye really is not that bad....

I agree, it's not an issue. Your brain can focus to one side or the other, and it's mostly automatic. When you shift all of your focus to one side, the other side can at most see blury colors. But that's enough to keep you from running into walls.

Go ahead and try it. Divide your sight with your hand and focus on something on one side that only one eye can see. The other side becomes mostly irrelavant. Even though you're seeing just as clearly with both eyes, the unfocused eye is not as important, so you (and your brain) turn it's importance-opacity down when it layers them together, making the unimportant view less distractive. But you can still use it even as you focus on the other. This is almost the same brain-skill as playing a handheld gaming system as you walk down a hallway. Our brains are pretty good at this stuff.

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I agree, it's not an issue. Your brain can focus to one side or the other, and it's mostly automatic. When you shift all of your focus to one side, the other side can at most see blury colors. But that's enough to keep you from running into walls. Go ahead and try it. Divide your sight with your hand and focus on something on one side that only one eye can see. The other side becomes mostly irrelavant. Even though you're seeing just as clearly with both eyes, the unfocused eye is not as important, so you (and your brain) turn it's importance-opacity down when it layers them together, making the unimportant view less distractive. But you can still use it even as you focus on the other. This is almost the same brain-skill as playing a handheld gaming system as you walk down a hallway. Our brains are pretty good at this stuff.

From what I remember about the physiology of sight, the brain does not give equal importance to both eyes at the same time. This means that if you are concentrating on what is in your left eye field of vision, you are ignoring what is in your right eye field of vision. You brain swaps between them very fast (an interesting fact is that people with bipolar disorder switch much slower than people without it). So if you had a "Roving Eye" then you would switch consciousness between the roving eye and the normal one. It might be confusing at first, but your brain would adapt to this (I'd say it would take around a day or so) and then it would seem normal and no confusion would result (usually).

It might even be possible to have a "Third Eye". Various experiments have shown that other sensory systems in the body can be used to deliver "Vision". One experiment I have heard of was where they put a device on the tounge that electrically stimulated the touch receptors on it in a grid pattern. They hooked this device up to a camera so that it transmitted a black and white "image" to the device (it would stimulate the areas on the grid that were white in the camera's image). It took around 20 minutes for the people to be able to "see" well enough to catch a rolling ball (even though the subjects were blind).

So it might be possible, in the near future, to have a device that stimulated neurones directly in the visual cortex of the brain and fed in information that represented a completely different (and possibly even artificial) view point.