try to release Xenonauts final version much earlier than the new XCOM ENEMY UNKNOWN

[Max_Caine]

Eddy.

dude.

Like, instead of attaching as a pic, host it on a site like photobucket, then it. Like I do for the fanarts gallery.

[HWP]

.... Really? then by extension we don't know anything to be wrong. We may think something is wrong but we don't know anything is wrong until it is in fact proven it is not wrong, but right instead... 0.o

We do. Falsifiability means exactly that - that a statement can be conclusively proven wrong. Actually, statements that aren't falsifiable are considered meaningless.

For instance, the statement "we don't know anything to be wrong" is falsifiable: it can be proven wrong by one counterexample. We know that the statement "2+2=5 in decimal" is wrong; ergo, the statement "we don't know anything to be wrong" is also wrong.

While entertaining in it's ridiculousness it does not invalidate the possibility that we do not know enough/ if there is something crucial about the behavior of antimatter.

There certainly is a lot of crucial things about it that are yet to be discovered. But that does not in any way suggest it being used in EU12's armor.

It's like noticing that Excalibur in a movie has "STAINLES STEEL CHINA" written on it and explaining that since it's such a powerful artifact, it creates a dimensional rift through which light passes to another dimension, reflects from a knife there and then goes back to create an illusion that the sword has this inscription.

The idea that EU12 armor contains antimatter is absurd on a lot of levels:

1. There is no indication that X-Com universe Aliens even have access to stable antimatter.

On the contrary, their use of elerium generators in place of stable antimatter suggests that they don't and that stable antimatter technology is at least a tech level ahead of theirs.

2. It would be a ridiculously wasteful use of antimatter - like using a Space Shuttle to ship coal for a power plant.

1kg of antimatter contains 50 TWh of energy that is very straightforward to harvest. Even pricing it as bulk coal (and it has a lot more value!) would give it a value of $1.25 billion.

3. Now that you appreciate the amount of energy, do you really think it would be a great idea to strap this bomb to yourself as "protection"? Anything that causes even a tiny amount of that antimatter to react with matter - and a plasma blast certainly will - is going to blow you, your buddies and really the city up.

4. It's much easier to use stable antimatter as a weapon - and we don't see such weapons in the game. Only complicated and incomparably less effective elerium devices. Just nanograms of antimatter in a bullet will make for a cheat-like weapon that bypasses any protection.

And admitting the possibility of natural laws we do not understand in science fiction is down right silly... ?

There can be such laws. But there is no mention or even the slightest hint towards the proposed explanation.

So why even involve antimatter? Just say it's magic.

The good thing about magic, at least as long as you don't detail it further than that, is that such claims are non-falsifiable, making them safe from being proven wrong.

[Gorlom]

1. What if Elerium IS a stable form of antimatter compound? In fact the wikipedia article on Elerium says

In the X-COM series, .... It is used by the aliens to power their weapons and fly their UFOs on the game series.[23] It can't be found naturally on Earth and it generates anti-matter when bombarded with certain particles, while also releasing gravity waves and other types of energy (citation needed)

Elerium could be an alloy/compound just like:

kryptonite in in Superman III (1983) is said to be an alloy made up of 15.08% plutonium, 18.06% tantalum, 27.71% xenon, 24.02% promethium, 10.62% dialium, 3.94% mercury, and 0.57% of an unknown substance. A Post-Crisis story in Action Comics #591 (Aug 87) also made Kryptonite an alloy.

IT would need to be retconned, but since there are enough problems with the lore as it is I believe you can be flexible in how you perceive the nature of Elerium.

2.What if a matter-antimatter hybrid is the only way to make antimatter safe for transport and power production/generation?

3. What if a specific mater-antimatter hybrid could be made completely stable (inert?) so that it can't explode unless it goes through a process to separate the antimatter from the matter.That it won't explode even if it is involved in chemical reactions without first undergoing the separations process.

4. What if antimatter is too volatile to be handled outside of a reactor for their level of technology? Or maybe they have socially imposed moralities?

There can be such laws. But there is no mention or even the slightest hint towards the proposed explanation.

So why even involve antimatter? Just say it's magic.

It was not my suggestion that antimatter is the solution that solves any and every inconsistency . It is an example to drive through my point. I could make up new things and say we haven't discovered them yet and they wont be falsifiable but it would be even less successful getting my point across.

Just say it's magic

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." Arthur C Clarke... which is kind of what I'm trying to argue in a sense Edited January 3, 2013 by Gorlom

[GoodGuyEddy]

1. What if Elerium IS a stable form of antimatter compound? In fact the wikipedia article on Elerium says

Generating antimatter in a smal particle collider =/= being an antimatter compound. A third of the damn rock probably gets obliterated just to release a few nanograms of AM. Which is still a lot of energy but not to the extent that your trying to argue.

To put it in perspective if the aliens really can stabilize antimatter with regular matter(or something likie that). Then the invasion would be over in about a day. Earthlings massing up their armies? Just send 3 grams of antimatter in their general direction and nuke. Airforce? Nuke. Military bases? nuke XCOM? Nuke. Nukes? Just disperse antimatter particles in the air and destabilize them when the earthly nukes come close to generate a giant fireball to nuke their nukes.

"But admirall Yuah Daug we can't"

"Shut up and do it damnit! i'm not gonna arse myself to work here. These guys are like space ants"

What if a specific mater-antimatter hybrid could be made completely stable (inert?) so that it can't explode unless it goes through a process to separate the antimatter from the matter.That it won't explode even if it is involved in chemical reactions without first undergoing the separations process.

At THAT point you'll just convert antimatter to t's regular matter counterpart. Would be easyer just to start off with regular matter.

It is an example to drive through my point. I could make up new things and say we haven't discovered them yet and they wont be falsifiable but it would be even less successful getting my point across.

It really wouldn't be. Antimatter obliderates itself and regural matter and releases a lot of energy. The idea of power rangers invading the earth is far more sensible than what you tried to argue. Edited January 3, 2013 by GoodGuyEddy

[Gorlom]

Generating antimatter in a smal particle collider =/= being an antimatter compound.

Doesn't mean it isn't either. (Who mentioned a particle collider btw? wouldn't be a particular property of that material if you created anti matter through the normal process, would it?) I don't know if that is word for word the source material. I assumed it was paraphrasing and therefor a bit flexible. The word "generating" could just as easily mean that it releases. I suspect you'd have to elaborate further if you had gone with "releases" instead of "generates"

A third of the damn rock probably gets obliterated just to release a few nanograms of AM. Which is still a lot of energy but not to the extent that your trying to argue.

To put it in perspective if the aliens really can stabilize antimatter with regular matter(or something likie that). Then the invasion would be over in about a day. Earthlings massing up their armies? Just send 3 grams of antimatter in their general direction and nuke. Airforce? Nuke. Military bases? nuke XCOM? Nuke. Nukes? Just disperse antimatter particles in the air and destabilize them when the earthly nukes come close to generate a giant fireball to nuke their nukes.

"But admirall Yuah Daug we can't"

"Shut up and do it damnit! i'm not gonna arse myself to work here. These guys are like space ants"

Really you are arguing that if aliens had access to that they would do this? Seriously? what about them having access to meteorites they can crash into the earth? Cloning machines that can pump out aliens validating Zerg tactics... why are they coming at the earth one or two UFOs at a time?

Why aren't they using nuclear weapons? Surely they must have been able to grasp that concept since they are more advanced then us?

I think the pretense under which the game takes place is that they don't give a "%¤#% about their mass destruction capabilities because they are going to invade this planet one ship at a time. Since the game/story has already done away with it I hardly need to motivate why they wouldn't.

At THAT point you'll just convert antimatter to t's regular matter counterpart. Would be easyer just to start off with regular matter.

You are making an assumption you can't know to be true. You do not know what properties the antimatter (or fictive unobtanium matter if you prefer that) retain while in this matter antimatter hybrid.

It really wouldn't be. Antimatter obliderates itself and regural matter and releases a lot of energy. The idea of power rangers invading the earth is far more sensible than what you tried to argue.

Since you missed my point and focused on the example I'm pretty sure you would just focus on the made up technobabble as well claiming I made it up, making that still less successful at making my point than this example. LESS being the keyword, not successful.

At least I can argue about it this way.

[HWP]

Elerium could be an alloy/compound just like: IT would need to be retconned, but since there are enough problems with the lore as it is I believe you can be flexible in how you perceive the nature of Elerium.

Now you're not just making silly roundabout explanations to poor game art - you're suggesting to retcon known lore to fit them.

2.What if a matter-antimatter hybrid is the only way to make antimatter safe for transport and power production/generation?

Out of thin air. Nothing in the game ever mentions these "hybrids" and there are no examples of anything of the sort being used. Game lore explicitly says in what specific form antimatter is used in the game world.

My point 2 was about cost and value. It stands. Using antimatter in the way you propose not only relies on a number of assumptions that are against the general scientific consensus - it's also a ridiculously wasteful use for it. Solid gold toilets and using CPU as floor tiles are pinnacles of wisdom in comparison.

3. What if a specific mater-antimatter hybrid could be made completely stable (inert?) so that it can't explode unless it goes through a process to separate the antimatter from the matter.

Even if it could be made, this does nothing to show that it actually can be made in XCOM's world. There are no known sources of stable antimatter in that world. There is elerium. Not antimatter.

Antimatter is to elerium approximately what elerium is to firewood. Discovering stable antimatter would be far more significant and thus noteworthy than discovering elerium.

4. What if antimatter is too volatile to be handled outside of a reactor for their level of technology? Or maybe they have socially imposed moralities?

...so they make armor out of it?

This cancels out your initial idea - that antimatter can be made so stable as to serve as armor.

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." Arthur C Clarke... which is kind of what I'm trying to argue in a sense

One of the things about magic is that it can't be reverse-engineered and repurposed. You take what you get.

[GoodGuyEddy]

Really you are arguing that if aliens had access to that they would do this? Seriously?

If they could do this they would be gods. Since they do not oblidirate everything that stands in their way they don't have such extreme capabilities. Fusing matter with antimatter without it blowing the hell up would be a feat like turning off the gravitational pull of a planet or draining a star of all it's energy in seconds. Basically gods, at least compared to a civilization like ours.

You do not know what properties the antimatter (or fictive unobtanium matter if you prefer that

Actaully antimatter exists. Scientists actually generated a few particles of it. Soooo...not really unobtainium now is it?

Since you missed my point

I got your point, i used it against trashman on the topic of humans being helpless against an invasion of a FTL capable civilization. Not due to super durable materials necessary, but still there. The method you used to convey said point was...questionable, should have ended at the "arrangement of molecules" argument. Like a substance becoming tougher or weaker if you arrange the molecules in a hexagon pattern for example, makes sence. But then you went with antimatter and ruined it.

Who mentioned a particle collider btw?

and it generates anti-matter when bombarded with certain particles,

You kind of need to accelerate particles in a certain direction to bombard anything with them.

Bombardment implies colliding of hings with things right?

Edited January 3, 2013 by GoodGuyEddy

[GoodGuyEddy]

Using antimatter in the way you propose not only relies on a number of assumptions that are against the general scientific consensus - it's also a ridiculously wasteful use for it. Solid gold toilets and using CPU as floor tiles are pinnacles of wisdom in comparison.

Wut U got 'gainst my crib dawg!?!

[Gorlom]

Now you're not just making silly roundabout explanations to poor game art - you're suggesting to retcon known lore to fit them.

Are we talking about X-com94 or XCOM2012?

The lore doesn't fit anyway. The retconning I was talking about was simple rephrasing that doesn't necessarily change anything but prevents arguing about the words used. if it is releases or generating. that sort of thing.

Out of thin air. Nothing in the game ever mentions these "hybrids" and there are no examples of anything of the sort being used. Game lore explicitly says in what specific form antimatter is used in the game world.

Does that mean that they don't use antimatter anywhere else? Either way I probably need to read up on this. could you provide your source so we use the same one? Thank you

I wonder why I even started defending the hybrids presence in the XCOM universe. That is really besides the point... I thought I was arguing the possibility of armour being less volumous and having curious properties due to undiscovered principles/knowledge/laws of nature. Rather than that Antimatter solves any discrepancy in the lore.

My point 2 was about cost and value. It stands. Using antimatter in the way you propose not only relies on a number of assumptions that are against the general scientific consensus - it's also a ridiculously wasteful use for it. Solid gold toilets and using CPU as floor tiles are pinnacles of wisdom in comparison.

Cost and value? I'm sorry I didn't know you were intricly familiar with fictional aliens economy.

You are making assumptions to disprove a hypothetical scenario that I can easily argue is based on the premise that as far as the aliens know is the cheapest, easiest and safest way to store antimatter.

Even if it could be made, this does nothing to show that it actually can be made in XCOM's world. There are no known sources of stable antimatter in that world. There is elerium. Not antimatter.

Where is Elerium from then?

Antimatter is to elerium approximately what elerium is to firewood. Discovering stable antimatter would be far more significant and thus noteworthy than discovering elerium.

So you get Elerium by bombarding firewood with wood pellets? Or what does that comparison mean?

...so they make armor out of it?

This cancels out your initial idea - that antimatter can be made so stable as to serve as armor.

Wait what? I was talking about FREE antimatter not the hypothetical stable hybrid I made up. The assumption is that the hybrid isn't usable to extract energy out of without treating it in some similar manner to how it is described Elerium is treated in X-com to extract/generate antimatter. At that point (after the refinement) the antimatter wouldn't be stable anymore. It is either locked away or unstable.

If they could do this they would be gods. Since they do not oblidirate everything that stands in their way they don't have such extreme capabilities. Fusing matter with antimatter without it blowing the hell up would be a feat like turning off the gravitational pull of a planet or draining a star of all it's energy in seconds. Basically gods, at least compared to a civilization like ours.

Wonderful. I honestly don't know where to begin. with the missed point or the assumptions? I'm going to continue to argue with HWP and see if the issue resolves itself down the line.

Actaully antimatter exists. Scientists actually generated a few particles of it. Soooo...not really unobtainium now is it?

I meant as in exchange it with unobtaininum for the sake of this discussion if you are staring yourself blind on the antimatter thing. I should probably have been clearer about that.

I got your point, i used it against trashman on the topic of humans being helpless against an invasion of a FTL capable civilization. Not due to super durable materials necessary, but still there. The method you used to convey said point was...questionable, should have ended at the "arrangement of molecules" argument. Like a substance becoming tougher or weaker if you arrange the molecules in a hexagon pattern for example, makes sence. But then you went with antimatter and ruined it.

Arranged molecules did not convey the point to HWP, and I still feel like you missed it. You are focusing on the examples. My point is that we are dealing with science fiction and unknown laws of nature are not possible to prove wrong and allowed to be used by authors. They did it when they came up with Element-115.

You kind of need to accelerate particles in a certain direction to bombard anything with them.

Bombardment implies colliding of hings with things right?

Yes, but you don't need a collider for it.

Here from the wiki article on antimatter:

Positrons

Main article: Positron

Positrons were reported[18] in November 2008 to have been generated by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in larger numbers than by any previous synthetic process. A laser drove electrons through a millimeter-radius gold target's nuclei, which caused the incoming electrons to emit energy quanta that decayed into both matter and antimatter. Positrons were detected at a higher rate and in greater density than ever previously detected in a laboratory. Previous experiments made smaller quantities of positrons using lasers and paper-thin targets; however, new simulations showed that short, ultra-intense lasers and millimeter-thick gold are a far more effective source.[19]

He uses a laser to "bombard" gold with electrons. hmm... is that what you meant by collider? I assumed something massive and circular. I think I have to back off on that one if you simply meant a laser and not something like the LHC.

and it generates anti-matter when bombarded with certain particles,

Wouldn't that acctually be the same as releasing antimatter though? I mean antimatter created so far is actually created when decay occurs. Edited January 3, 2013 by Gorlom

[HWP]

Does that mean that they don't use antimatter anywhere else?

Where is Elerium from then?

http://aliens.wikia.com/wiki/Elerium-115

http://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php?title=Elerium-115

It's found on Mars.

Cost and value? I'm sorry I didn't know you were intricly familiar with fictional aliens economy.

You don't need intricate familiarity to understand that some things are extremely useful, which combined with being almost nonexistent leads to high value.

And it's human armor, not alien armor - so alien economy has nothing to do with it.

The antimatter you would need to make it light, even if antimatter could do that (the scientific consensus is it can't) would be worth at least $12.5 billion if you just "burnt" it as a coal substitute.

I won't even go into the kinds of engines you can create with it, like photon rockets, or weapons far superior to blaster missiles (for anti-ship, at least!) in extremely compact packages.

You are making assumptions to disprove a hypothetical scenario that I can easily argue is based on the premise that as far as the aliens know is the cheapest, easiest and safest way to store antimatter.

Then why do they use inferior elerium power sources?

GGE was talking about FREE antimatter not the stable hybrid. The assumption is that the hybrid isn't usable to extract energy out of without treating it in similar way to how it is described Elerium is treated in X-com.

It still says nothing of where that hybrid comes from. It would also essentially duplicate elerium.

We know elerium is not an armor material and we know it's not used in armor, because it isn't a required resource for making it.

My point is that we are dealing with science fiction and unknown laws of nature are not possible to prove wrong and allowed to be used by authors. They did it when they came up with Element-115.

In this case it wasn't even used by authors. It was your own fan fiction from scratch - and to think it was just to explain poorly done armor art.

He uses a laser to "bombard" gold with electrons. hmm... is that what you meant by collider? I assumed something massive and circular.

http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2012-03/petite-particle-accelerator-proton-gun-killing-tumors

[GoodGuyEddy]

Wonderful. I honestly don't know where to begin. with the missed point or the assumptions? I'm going to continue to argue with HWP and see if the issue resolves itself down the line.

No missed point. And i really don't think you fully understand what antimatter is. Since it is a real thing with a lot of it's core characteristics established you can't just switch it up with unobtainium or positronic polarity plasma insert more generic terms here star trek shields to try to explain sci fi tropes.

My point is that we are dealing with science fiction and unknown laws of nature are not possible to prove wrong and allowed to be used by authors. They did it when they came up with Element-115.

When someone tells me that FTL or something impossible i retaliate with "1000 years ago people didn't really operate with the ideas of thrust,fossil fuels, aerodynamics when constructing things, for them a boeing is impossible because, it is just a lot of tons of metal because of the many things not discovered back then". Which means people may transcend the limitations of old with discovery of new laws in the world and new technologies, but they do not outright negate the laws established previously. Current tech uses thrust and lifting power created in the different pressures around the wing to outpower the gravitational pull of the planet, but it does not negate gravity. Same thing with a antimatter-matter hybrid , you must turn off a few very important aspects of physics. There is no way around it. If there is a way or a technique of creating such a hybrid then it basically gives you the ability to alter physics to your liking by changing the ways molecules act. It's that big.

And before you go "hurry durr focus on the technobabbble more will ya?" i respond with - stop using terms to explain things that are in no way solvable with said terms. It's like reading an old issue of iron man where thrusters, super strong hydrowlics, and magnets strong enough to rip doors off of safes are explained by sprinkling transistors over them.

But i mean it. There is no worse hypotethical example one could use in durable material construction then antimatter. Which is the the thing that destroys matter if they contact each other, it's in the name. You only hurt your point more. It's like someone telling me that human lungs can recycle sea water just because water contains oxygen(H2O with an O being said oxygen). Does not work that way man. Just try to restructure the "arrangement of molecules" point. Antimatter is not accepable.

Try, something else.

I assumed something massive and circular.

Just replace it with "particle accelerator" then. Didn't want to use it becase it implies laser along with other possibilities. It's pretty vague. Plus you also need the devices to capture and transport energy. Which an accelerator doesn't necessary have. So i decided to go with collider to be slightly less vague.

Edited January 3, 2013 by GoodGuyEddy

[Gorlom]

No missed point. And i really don't think you fully understand what antimatter is. Since it is a real thing with a lot of it's core characteristics you can't just switch it up with unobtainium or positronic polarity plasma insert more generic terms here shields to try to explain sci fi tropes.

OFC I can, if I claim that this specific unobtainium shares a lot of the properties antimatter possesses. None of the established properties play into it since we aren't discussing them we are discussing the yet to be established ones.

When someone tells me that FTL or something impossible i retaliate with "1000 years ago people didn't really operate with the ideas of thrust,fossil fuels, aerodynamics when constructing things, for them a boeing is impossible because, it is just a lot of tons of metal because of the many things not discovered back then". Which means people may transcend the limitations of old with discovery of new laws in the world and new technologies, but they do not outright negate the laws established previously. Current tech uses thrust and lifting power created in the different pressures around the wing to outpower the gravitational pull of the planet, but it does not negate gravity. Same thing with a antimatter-matter hybrid , you must turn off a few very important aspects of physics. There is no way around it. If there is a way or a technique of creating such a hybrid then it basically gives you the ability to alter physics to your liking by changing the ways molecules act. It's that big.

I agree with what you say but I don't see your point.

And before you go "hurry durr focus on the technobabbble more will ya?" i respond with - stop using terms to explain things that are in no way solvable with said terms. It's like reading an old issue of iron man where thrusters, super strong hydrowlics, and magnets strong enough to rip doors off of safes are explained by sprinkling transistors over them.

Not argueing against this. just wanted to say it made me smile.

But i mean it. There is no worse hypotethical example one could use in durable material construction then antimatter. Which is the the thing that destroys matter if they contact each other, it's in the name. You only hurt your point more. It's like someone telling me that human lungs can recycle sea water just because water contains oxygen(H2O with an O being said oxygen). Does not work that way man. Just try to restructure the "arrangement of molecules" point. Antimatter is not accepable.

Right except I'm assuming hypothetical laws and principles which you seem to be neglecting? You are looking at antimatter based on a viewpoint from our current (incomplete) understanding of antimatter. Since we don't know enough about antimatters behaviour towards gravity we as scifi authors can define natural laws and processes etc that plays into that as we wish. We can invent a gluon equivilent or whatever to act as an intermediary to merge matter and antimatter into the same substance.

But I'm starting to see what you mean about it being a bad example. But I guess you don't see where I mean that the arrangement of molecules isn't enough. It's still too "safe" to argue my point.

Just replace it with "particle accelerator" then. Didn't want to use it becase it implies laser along with other possibilities. It's pretty vague. Plus you also need the devices to capture and transport energy. Which an accelerator doesn't necessary have. So i decided to go with collider to be slightly less vague.

ook...? Guess I'm in the wrong then if you meant that.

[Gorlom]

http://aliens.wikia.com/wiki/Elerium-115

http://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php?title=Elerium-115

It's found on Mars.

Right, I've completely missed that it is a natural occurrence. Technically one could make something up about being a remnance of something even older (where it was produces) without contradicting the lore. But I really should stop defending it.

You don't need intricate familiarity to understand that some things are extremely useful, which combined with being almost nonexistent leads to high value.

Right but making it into armour wouldn't make it unusable for repurposing later, but would fill an urgent demand of armour that works against the invaders weapons. That would be more valuable wouldn't it?

And it's human armor, not alien armor - so alien economy has nothing to do with it.

The antimatter you would need to make it light, even if antimatter could do that (the scientific consensus is it can't) would be worth at least $12.5 billion if you just "burnt" it as a coal substitute.

Ah my bad I misunderstood you.

I won't even go into the kinds of engines you can create with it, like photon rockets, or weapons far superior to blaster missiles (for anti-ship, at least!) in extremely compact packages.

If you're not reverse engineering this technology it probably takes a bit longer than they have to come up with anything useful in these departments.

Then why do they use inferior elerium power sources?

It still says nothing of where that hybrid comes from. It would also essentially duplicate elerium.

Yes that was what I was trying to sell it as. A bit of mix between assumptions and misunderstandings about the nature of elerium.

We know elerium is not an armor material and we know it's not used in armor, because it isn't a required resource for making it.

I had forgotten about that.

In this case it wasn't even used by authors. It was your own fan fiction from scratch - and to think it was just to explain poorly done armor art.

Yeah sure. But you have moved the conversation away from the possibility to make such armour towards discussing more likely usability of antimatter (and economical viability of all things). Are you more accepting of the notion there could be an explanation beyond our understanding of science (just that it hasn't been explicitly explained)? or am I reading too much into the development of this discussion? Edited January 3, 2013 by Gorlom