Does anybody know of an ongoing blog that covers speculative tech every week. I’m tired of watching Isaac Arthur and John Michael Godier videos. I want something I can read.

@Mithrandir24601 Or just start calling them Doc all the time as a nickname...

@AndyD273 ... Remind me to never tell people in here if/when I pass my PhD...

@Mithrandir24601 I'll probably forget to remind you

Oh, I know! let me know when you pass so I can remind you not to tell the others

@Shalvenay Rytsas! A bit up and down really - more up than down today, more down than up yesterday, but upwards overall :) Currently watching some skating while reading over a friend's thesis chapter, so not so bad :)

@AndyD273 Yeesssss... I'll do exactly that... Sure...

What are you going for your PhD in?

@AndyD273 physics/quantum engineering - the theory side of simulations of 'non-Hermitian' quantum systems, using quantum photonics

So, yes, I'm a theoretical quantum engineer :)

@Mithrandir24601 Are there quantum photons that are hermits?

@AndyD273 Getting photons to interact is notoriously difficult, so yes, pretty much all of them

Is what you're working on related to photonic matter?

@AndyD273 Nope - it's done (or mostly done) on silicon, same as standard computer chips, only we (or well, not me :P ) etch waveguides into it instead of putting some form of 'wire' for electrical signals to pass through

the photons then 'travel' through these waveguides, if that's not obvious

why is travel in quotes?

So for developing photonic transistors then?

@AndyD273 because photons are weird and it's more like the quantum EM field propagates through the waveguide, which gets detected as photons, so I mean 'travel' in the sense of QFT, relativistic sense of 'travel', not that we ever care of worry about that, although there seems to be something annoyingly fundamental in my understanding of what's going on that I'm missing (to do with the similarities of creating photons using a strong laser and accelerating at relativistic speeds)

@AndyD273 Mmm, yeah, photonic transistors would be amazing, although it's not exactly what I do

Sounds pretty interesting. I've always been drawn toward quantum theory, but then the math starts and my brain decides to go do something else for a while

holy hell is magic army design annoying

I have more problems :/

navy

so, one of big changes magic brings to table is wood refining

magic allows magic civilizations to densify woods similarly to this: sciencedirect.com/topics/engineering/densified-wood

process isn't well understood, so quality isn't as good (like if you compare 1890's steel with 14th century steel)

but it's still improvement over classical wood

@AndyD273 Yeah... The maths is... Insane sometimes. Like, I have equations of which a single line takes up an entire page

now I need to understand how much does that change

@FailusMaximus Change in what regard?

change in cannon-resistance

@Mithrandir24601 "simplify!"

I certainly don't want to make the ships as cannon-proof as ironclads

@Mithrandir24601 At least you haven't gotten to the ones that take up the entire wall sized blackboard

@Mithrandir24601 I find crossing out any symbols that look similar makes equations much shorter.

the wood hardening is necessary for other things, but problem is, does that make the ship able to resist age-of-sail 36 pounders?

@Bellerophon Yes, but I want to publish stuff and get a PhD :P

and even bigger problem is that the enemy can't really use 36 pounder correctly, as they have to use stone balls instead of steel and lead ball

so projectile isn't even 36 pounder

@AndyD273 Oh, that's only because I'm looking at the simple version, don't worry ;)

@FailusMaximus So it would be a bit similar to having a thicker wooden hull, right?

yeah, I guess

because if even large cannons don't penetrate the ship hull, there's no way such a fleet would be built

You know how a weapons race goes, right? Something like "criminals start using guns->cops get bullet proof vests->criminals get bigger guns->cops get thicker vests" and so on.

So ships get thicker hulls, cannons get longer/thicker barrels so they can hold more powder and have more punching power.

Or, magic projectiles?

Maybe hollow balls filled with wood eating acid?

Or filled with super termites?

I'm trying to remember how your magic works... do they have a way to magically heat things?

Take the stone ball and heat the center into a molten slag, which splatters and burns the wood?

Or ignore the hull, and instead figure out new weapons that take out the sails/rigging?

yeah, they could heat the centre

So lava shot then...

bigger guns = less guns on a ship

or magma shot

@AndyD273 If it's above ground it's lava. So lava shot.

that's what I thought.

But you could call it magma shot just to get enemy geologists upset, giving you a possible tactical advantage.

Unless you simply anger them making them even more determined to defeat you.

you see my problem is that I have two very different armies/navies that are going to fight

and I have to make it so that both navies make sense in their historical context, and in the magic rules

Mornin peeps

morning James

@James Morning!

meanwhile Free City of Leigh has small but elite navy that they developed for their self-defence, and while their magic development is greatly behind, they build ships of line with one magic cannon on front deck, and broadside of 20-40 large wooden blackpowder cannons

they have put some development in cannon-making over last 100 years, and thus their navy came up with ship of the line concept

Astriad empire however is much more annoying, because it actually is a well-developed superpower, unlike Free City of Leigh.

They have skyships (200-400 ton warships that can hover ~ 40 m above the water surface), they have aerial corps flying on drakes, etc, while Leigh has no aerial forces

Leigh is going to have to develop cannon that can fire upward

But you don't think they'll figure out that having more cannon on the sides is better and shift them around, if that makes sense?

Leigh mass produced and improved wooden cannon

other countries in the setting find the wooden cannon near useless

Having to always be pointing toward the enemy is kind of a pain... unless you also have a ramming bit on the front

and Astriad Empire didn't pay those weapons any attention

I think I got those two mixed up

they developed magic cannons, which are far better (fast reload, slightly better muzzle velocity), but which are pain in ass to make

Astriad might not need much in the way of cannon with the flying ships and rapid fire cannon on the front... '

yeah, they're destined to steamroll the Free City of Leigh

I'm just thinking about making a cool last stand battle of Leigh's navy

and so I need to do some estimates about how much their navy can really do

@FailusMaximus Can they tilt the cannons far enough to fire upwards?

So the ability to aim upward is really important.

Something like grapeshot for the drakes

and if they had something like a mortar that fired straight upward they could sail under the flying ships and knock holes in the keel, maybe some kind of exploding shot

Granted, then you have a 400 ton ship that will shortly be falling on you... so not great

But might make for a desperation move

yeah, I guess I should put some grapeshoting 12 pounders on the deck

Do the flying ships tend to fight by flying at maximum altitude or would the be more likely to hover lower down?

they'd usually lift them as high as possible to serve as better platform for magic flamethrowing and archers

flying burns magic energy, so the ships are designed to sail in water and only fly when they need to

again - flying ships, like magic cannon, require magic cores, which are pain in ass to produce, so most of the navy is actually made of non-flying ships

Here's a strategy I can kinda see developing. The Astriad ships, because of the magic cannon on the front, tend to strafe their targets. Come in from the side at maximum height, firing fast, raining fire and arrows down on the enemy deck, and maybe something to cut and tear the rigging as they go over. So Leigh develops cannon that can fire at a 90 degree angle, and try to hull the other ships as they go overhead, so that when they land they'll start taking on water.

If it was a lava shot made of granite, so that it is very hard and can penetrate before starting a fire, it would be hard to patch the hole before the ship runs out of magic juice.

And even with toughened hulls, 50-60 cannon are going to cause some damage, so I don't think the compressed wood is going to cause that much trouble really

yeah, I guess so

that is decent idea, I'll probably do it my own way, but you gave me push in right direction

thanks

Yup

I obviously don't know your world and all the rules

Mostly going off as if it was a writing prompt: "Navy battle where one side has flying ships."

You can also tailor that to the fight you want. It could be a hopeless, desperate tactic where the weapons barely break through and the Leigh ships are getting destroyed, maybe having the Leigh managing to bring down one of the skyships which dramatically plunges into the sea. Alternatively it can be a really close battle with the Leigh taking down loads of Drake and taking out the Astriad ships with their clever tactics and skilled sailing before finally being overwhelmed by sheer numbers.

Right

The nice thing about Canadian winters is when you walk back from the grocery store, your frozen things stay frozen. The not so nice thing about Canadian winters is I still can't feel my hands.

Our refrigerator decided to stop being cold on the inside, and the replacement won't be delivered for a week. Luckily we have a giant walk out fridge. It's big enough to park the car in.

@AndyD273 Watch out for mice lol

That is one super handy thing around the holidays in the winter. Not enough room in the fridge? Cool just throw it in the garage.

Yup

I'm thinking I'll put the fridge out in the garage and leave the door open overnight to cool it down, then I won't have to worry about furry critters as much

I've got a general question for all the more sciency people in the chat. So I'm studying for finals, looking over my physics notes, and I noticed that the equation for Doppler shifts in waves has separate variables for the velocities of the emitter and the receiver. This makes sense because those are velocities relative to the medium the waves are traveling through. But for light, there is no medium, and there's no objective reference point to measure these variables from.

Is there a different equation for Doppler shifts in light waves, or is there something I'm missing here?

I think you measure the velocity of the source and assume the receiver is at rest.

The equation I've found is fobs = fsource sqrt[(1−v/c)/(1+v/c)] but I don't know if that is correct.

The vs are the relative velocity of the source compared to the observer.