Solar System Vs. Galaxy

POSTED BY: MadJack
UPDATED: Tuesday, January 11, 2005 17:41
VIEWED: 40136
PAGE 6 of 14

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

GROUNDED

Monday, February 23, 2004 11:34 AM

If they were still inside our solar system do you think they'd refer to 'Earth That Was' with such mythic tones?

HANS

Monday, February 23, 2004 1:15 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by RocketJock:
Down to brass tacks, I consider Firefly Science Fiction, not fantasy. Placing scores of habitable worlds in a single solar system is fantasy. Therefore, we must assume multiple systems, which implies some kind of FTL, though not necessarily something flashy and obvious.*
(stuff cut)

That's a rather definitive statement considering the lack of evidence. Having read numerous posts on this subject I am far from convinced that a single system with that many worlds is absolutely impossible (as opposed to being very improbable). To dismiss the idea as fantasy is a little premature. For such a system to work it may require a highly advanced level of science...but maybe no more advanced then one requires to have FTL.

Hans

HANS

Monday, February 23, 2004 1:31 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Grounded:

Anyway, to the point. I was looking at the FireflyWiki site yesterday and apparently at some point in the show they mention the 'Georgia system'. That would undoubtedly point towards multiple systems and therefore (sadly, IMO) FTL.

Sorry, but that could easily mean a "planetary system" (a term I think they use in one of the episodes, but I don't have the reference on hand). In fact, the reason I'm 99% sure the show does take place in a single system is the language used in the show to describe the locations they visit. There's dozens of references to moons and planets, but not a single one to a star system, or a sun, or a solar system, something you'd think they'd mention if they were travelling over interstellar distances.

Note this very interesting piece of dialogue from "Serenity":

Dobson
"You're carrying a fugitive across
interplanetary borders..."

Interplanetary, not interstellar. By itself this is not definitive, but when piled up with all the other evidence it makes a strong case for the one system theory.

Hans

HANS

Monday, February 23, 2004 1:51 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Grounded:
Lol, am I the only one campaigning for single system, no FTL?

Hardly. To me, the evidence in favour of a single system is overwhelming. I won't go over all of it again (as it's been posted on this thread and others before) but these are the key things that nail it down for me.

Distance

Every time a distance is given on the show, it's given in thousands or millions of miles rather than light years. The kind of distances they mention are what you would expect from one point to another in a star system, but in terms of interstellar travel would be totally inconsequential.

(from War Stories)
MAL
We are about 20,000 miles from our last
drop, people, then we can take a break
and think about spending some of this
money.

(from The Train Job)
OTHER MAN
We didn't fly 86 million miles to track down
a box of bandaids, Colonel.

(A hugely convincing piece of evidence, that second one. The dialogue seems to suggest the man flew a long distance, but 86 million miles to a ship capable of FTL would be an extraordinarily short voyage).

FTL

In 14 episodes, not a single line of dialogue that indicates they are travelling faster than light. Nothing from Wash the pilot, or Kaylee the engineer that sounds like FTL talk or discussion of what drives it, and not one piece of visual on-screen evidence of FTL travel. Also, every time they encounter another ship in space (Serenity, Bushwhacked, etc) the ships always seem to be traveling at relativistic speeds. Finally, the few mentions of propulsion (in Serenity and The Message) seem to imply conventional travel - using more fuel cells or burning harder to shorten travel time sounds more like the characteristics of a conventional drive.

etc., etc.

Yes, I know we can think up reasons to cancel the above evidence. Maybe they just never talk about their FTL drive. Maybe all the mentions of light years and interstellar distances happen off screen. Maybe they conveniently slow down to sub-light speeds whenever they meet another ship (I'm sure the Reavers are grateful for that). The question is, do you think that's reasonable?

Hans

HANS

Monday, February 23, 2004 2:03 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Grounded:
If they were still inside our solar system do you think they'd refer to 'Earth That Was' with such mythic tones?

I can't speak for others, but I think most people who support the one system theory don't think it happens in our system, but another nearby one.

I presume that they used sub-light colony ships to leave Earth. So, if the other system was 15 light years away, and they managed to accelerate their ships up to 1/2 lightspeed, they'd get there in 30 years. One could imagine a rapid deterioration of the Earth in the late-21st/early-22nd centuries, followed by a period of 100 years or so when massive colony ship left the Earth for the new system (which, presumably, had many planets that were either Earth-like or viable candidates for terraforming). No need for FTL.

Hans

GROUNDED

Monday, February 23, 2004 2:55 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Hans:
Quote:
Originally posted by Grounded:

Anyway, to the point. I was looking at the FireflyWiki site yesterday and apparently at some point in the show they mention the 'Georgia system'. That would undoubtedly point towards multiple systems and therefore (sadly, IMO) FTL.

Sorry, but that could easily mean a "planetary system" (a term I think they use in one of the episodes, but I don't have the reference on hand). In fact, the reason I'm 99% sure the show does take place in a single system is the language used in the show to describe the locations they visit. There's dozens of references to moons and planets, but not a single one to a star system, or a sun, or a solar system, something you'd think they'd mention if they were travelling over interstellar distances.

Note this very interesting piece of dialogue from "Serenity":

Dobson
"You're carrying a fugitive across
interplanetary borders..."

Interplanetary, not interstellar. By itself this is not definitive, but when piled up with all the other evidence it makes a strong case for the one system theory.

Hans

A good point that hadn't occured to me :) Just to clarify my position, I'm in the 'single (not our) solar system + no FTL' camp, which would put me in complete agreement with you :)

AJ

Monday, February 23, 2004 3:55 PM

Shamefully, I hadn't given this much thought before starting on this thread (except a brief mental note regarding the reavers encounter in 'Bushwhacked', and an aesthetic appreciation of the 'naturalistic' feel of Serenity's travels).

Having got this far, though, I find myself inclined to agree with Hans and Grounded (among others) on the way of this. So, from a non-partisan viewpoint, I have a couple of issues:

Terraforming is all well and good, but it can't change the strength of the sun (or can it???) So, how do people have inhabitable worlds at liveable temperatures with (presumably) such variety of distance from said sun;

Congestion - probably just me, but there seems to be a lot of ships and people kicking around in space for just one solar system. I guess if I were out and about in our own solar system I'd feel a little differently, so okay... it is just me;

Route-planner 2517 - travel through a solar system means a lot more attention to orbits. After all, if you pick the wrong time to fly, you could end up more than tripling your journey time.

Still, maybe this new solar system's sun has a bit more oomph than our little old red dwarf (or whatever it is!) - would mean everything is further out, but might go some way to helping me feel easier about the first two.

Or I could just be rambling - who knows?

HANS

Monday, February 23, 2004 3:57 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Grounded:
A good point that hadn't occured to me :) Just to clarify my position, I'm in the 'single (not our) solar system + no FTL' camp, which would put me in complete agreement with you :)

I wasn't sure whether they had brought you over to the dark side or not with their crafty arguments. :) If we're not on the winning side of this argument, at least we know we'll be on the right one...

Hans

GROUNDED

Monday, February 23, 2004 5:01 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Hans:
Quote:
Originally posted by Grounded:
A good point that hadn't occured to me :) Just to clarify my position, I'm in the 'single (not our) solar system + no FTL' camp, which would put me in complete agreement with you :)

I wasn't sure whether they had brought you over to the dark side or not with their crafty arguments. :) If we're not on the winning side of this argument, at least we know we'll be on the right one...

Hans

:)

The trouble is, because the show is a bit scientifically vague and, in places, mildly inconsistent, I'd say there's no way to really prove either theory. My reasons for saying 1 system and no FTL are mainly aesthetic.

HANS

Monday, February 23, 2004 5:07 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by AJ:

(stuff cut)
Terraforming is all well and good, but it can't change the strength of the sun (or can it???) So, how do people have inhabitable worlds at liveable temperatures with (presumably) such variety of distance from said sun;

This is probably one of the strongest arguments against the one-system theory - the fact that the so-called "life zone" in a system may not be big enough.

Personally, I think it works something like this: there is an optimal life zone, where earth-like planets occur naturally, and there's a marginal life zone, where planets can be terraformed to be livable but are never very comfortable (e.g. desert- or arctic-like environments, depending on things like the level of greenhouse gasses and the distance from the sun). The lush, rich, Earth-like planets form the "central planets" and the marginal planets are out on the rim, leading to the core/rim split we all know and love.

Others have speculated that the Firefly system has a blue star, which as the largest star type (?) will have the biggest life zone. Blue star? Blue Sun? Hmmm...

Quote:
Originally posted by AJ:

Route-planner 2517 - travel through a solar system means a lot more attention to orbits. After all, if you pick the wrong time to fly, you could end up more than tripling your journey time.

I don't think this is an argument against the one-system theory (and maybe you don't either), it just leads to some interesting navigation problems.

On another matter:

I have a beautiful map of the Firefly system I created that will silence my opponents once and for all. :) Every time I've tried to load it to the Blue Sun Room I get an error. It seems to be the right format/size. I sent a message to Hakan about this but he hasn't gotten back to me. Anyone else having trouble loading images? Maybe it's a lcoal problem.

Hans

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