Where does Firefly take place?

POSTED BY: Hans
UPDATED: Sunday, July 2, 2006 05:23
VIEWED: 62435
PAGE 4 of 18

PREV PAGE 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 NEXT PAGE

FRANCO

Thursday, October 16, 2003 10:03 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by LuxLucre:
I think it resonable that they are talking about a single star system, and would go further in postulating that the sun may likely be a blue star, since they are the hottest and consequently have the largest habitable zone for planets.

However, this promising scenario is spoiled by the fact that massive, bright stars are much more short-lived than their smaller, dimmer cousins. In the case of the giant O stars and B stars, these very massive objects race through their life-cycles in only a few tens of millions of years-too quickly to allow even primitive life-forms to emerge.
========================================
The last speculation is moot in any case, seeing as we are actively terraforming planets, not waiting for them to develop life on their own. I seems to me that the habitable zone around a hot white or blue (O or B) sun would give us plenty of space to establish hundreds of planets that would support life, with no fear of their orbits crashing into each other.

But where is the home planet? Since no life (much less intelligent life) can evolve in the life span of a rare type O (or the other hot classes)
you would need to assume that there was interstellar travel to get them in the neighborhood. You would also need to assume that they would choose to colonize a hot star with a lot of hot radiated rocks over the G classes with the possibility of more advanced ecosystems.

I would like to have definitive answers on the Firefly propulsion systems but it goes without saying that any civilization with the ability to terraform worlds in less than hundreds of years may have also solved the problems of FTL

Franco

LUXLUCRE

Thursday, October 16, 2003 11:04 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by franco:
But where is the home planet? Since no life (much less intelligent life) can evolve in the life span of a rare type O (or the other hot classes)
you would need to assume that there was interstellar travel to get them in the neighborhood. You would also need to assume that they would choose to colonize a hot star with a lot of hot radiated rocks over the G classes with the possibility of more advanced ecosystems.

I would like to have definitive answers on the Firefly propulsion systems but it goes without saying that any civilization with the ability to terraform worlds in less than hundreds of years may have also solved the problems of FTL

Franco

Yes, to get from Earth WOULD take colony ships, either FTL or multi-generation sub-light ships.

Sirius is about 23 times as bright as our sun, 2.35 times its mass and 1.8 times our sun's diameter. The star is a brilliant white with a definite tinge of blue in color. Only 8.7 light years from the Earth, Sirius is the fifth nearest star to us.

Half light speed would get us there in less than 20 years.

CPTBUCK25

Friday, October 17, 2003 6:47 AM

Do the keplerian math for planets in a multi star system, even in the centautri system, the gravitational forces are much too irregular to allow for any kind of stable orbit. Any rocky planet found in such a star system would almost certainly be a captured planet, and in any case wouldn't stay there long. Multi-start systems don't have planets for long, gravity doesn't let them.

CPTBUCK25

Friday, October 17, 2003 6:48 AM

Also, look at data from Galileo and you'll see that more heat is emitted from gas giants than is reflected, and that isn't near enough to support surface life of the type we see in FF

FRANCO

Friday, October 17, 2003 6:52 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by LuxLucre:
Quote:
Originally posted by franco:
But where is the home planet? Since no life (much less intelligent life) can evolve in the life span of a rare type O (or the other hot classes)
you would need to assume that there was interstellar travel to get them in the neighborhood. You would also need to assume that they would choose to colonize a hot star with a lot of hot radiated rocks over the G classes with the possibility of more advanced ecosystems.

I would like to have definitive answers on the Firefly propulsion systems but it goes without saying that any civilization with the ability to terraform worlds in less than hundreds of years may have also solved the problems of FTL

Franco

Yes, to get from Earth WOULD take colony ships, either FTL or multi-generation sub-light ships.

Sirius is about 23 times as bright as our sun, 2.35 times its mass and 1.8 times our sun's diameter. The star is a brilliant white with a definite tinge of blue in color. Only 8.7 light years from the Earth, Sirius is the fifth nearest star to us.

Half light speed would get us there in less than 20 years.

That makes sense and by the references to "Earth That Was", they didn't have a lot of choice about leaving Earth, it was toast. Sirius would be an obvious sub-C destination.

The series database also mentions 2 large planets and lots of little Planets (moons). That sounds like it could be a single system.

I would be a bit troubled (but not deterred) by the fast terraforming and gravity management by a civilization that had not solved FTL.

But then, there is this from the series database

Quote:
On Serenity, crew and passengers live together in close quarters as they shuttle between the Alliance-governed galaxy and the border planets that delineate the new frontier. The crew undertakes almost any job -- legal or not -- to stay afloat and put bread on the table. Each of the passengers has his or her own motivation for being on board - some honorable, some more questionable. All have unique pasts and different reasons for wanting to get to their destination.

That might seem to clinch it for #2 but the possibility remains that we know more about space than the writers and when they said galaxy they meant something else. :) Based on some of the interviews with the writers it seems to be something they hadn't given a lot of thought.

Franco

DRAKON

Friday, October 17, 2003 9:43 AM

Ya know, in a separate thread, someone is selling their press kit. He mentions a star chart, which would answer all our questions pretty quick.

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

DRAKON

Friday, October 17, 2003 9:56 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by CptBuck25:
Do the keplerian math for planets in a multi star system, even in the centautri system, the gravitational forces are much too irregular to allow for any kind of stable orbit. Any rocky planet found in such a star system would almost certainly be a captured planet, and in any case wouldn't stay there long. Multi-start systems don't have planets for long, gravity doesn't let them.

Actually, this has lately been shown to be false. Benest and others have studied the orbital characteristics of binary star systems, Alpha Centauri in particular. You CAN have stable near circular long term (billions of years) orbits inside the habitablity zones of BOTH Alpha A and Alpha B.

Alpha Centauri may be a unique case, their closest separation is about 11 AUs. There is a zone of instable orbits dependent on the minimum separation of the stars. In a zone of about 0.23 to about 3 AUs minimum separation, stable orbits don't exist. At least not inside the habitable zone which is all we care about anyway. (See Heacox and Gathright, Astron J. Sept. 1994)

Granted we are talking computer simulations, but as the force of gravity and cestial mechanics is pretty well understood, this looks right.

So, in other words, it is highly possible for Alpha Centauri A and B to hold habitable planets.

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

ZAPHODB

Wednesday, October 22, 2003 6:14 AM

Somebody posted pics of the contents of the Firefly Press Kit recently (Thanks Dockingbay97!). One of the items in the kit is an Alliance starmap which prominently features a planetary nebula with the designation of NGC (New General Catelogue) 3242. It is also known as "The Ghost of Jupiter". It lies approximately 1400 light years from Earth. A picture of it can be found here:
http://apod.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap970331.html

Anyways, so my take on this is that humans have expanded outward from Earth at least 1400 light years in distance by the year 2517 (Date given in the opening credits). I don't know if it was all in one direction, or in all directions. It does make for a strong argument that FTL travel (or wormhole travel) exists in the Firefly 'verse because at near lightspeed velocities, ships would take to damn long to get anywhere that far, let alone in 500 years time.

Of course your mileage may vary.

BRTICK

Wednesday, October 22, 2003 6:50 AM

space. firefly takes place in space.

Keep Flying!

SOUTHERNMERC

Wednesday, October 22, 2003 7:34 AM

Just took a look at the star map photo that guy is selling in his press kit. That there is a galaxy my friend.

Oh, my 2cents. If a civilization has mastered artificial gravity, anti-gravity, and complete terraforming, I find it hard to believe that civilization hasn't found FTL.

Could it be one star system? Sure, there is more to this 'verse than I have seen, certainly. Is it very likely? I'd have to say no.

Jayne: "How big a room?"

PREV PAGE 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 NEXT PAGE