XPost: rec.arts.sf.written, rec.arts.sf.science   
   From: jclarkeusenet@cox.net   
      
   In article ,   
   JRStern@foobar.invalid says...   
   >   
   > On Thu, 23 Jan 2014 11:05:58 -0600, Doc O'Leary   
   >  wrote:   
   >   
   > >In article ,   
   > > Greg Goss  wrote:   
   > >   
   > >> Modern North Americans just cannot fathom the scale of a horse-based   
   > >> society.   
   > >   
   > >s/horse-based/sustainable   
   > >   
   > >And, sadly, the problem isn't just limited to North American.  The   
   > >majority of sci-fi hand waves abundant energy into the future, but the   
   > >reality is that, so far, that appears to be the hardest hurdle we have   
   > >facing us.   
   >   
   > It is hard, even (!) fusion has proved way more difficult than   
   > anticipated and maybe we'd better assume that ground-based fusion (as   
   > opposed to gathering the fusion power of the sun) will never be a   
   > practical fuel source.   
      
   Why?  Unless something goes badly wrong with the next interation of   
   fusion research in the EU the major technical hurdles will have been   
   solved.   
      
   > But then, what choice does scifi have, the energy to move a starship   
   > around at sub-light speeds, the unknown energy required to move it at   
   > super-light speeds, and you have to store it all in a couple of D-cell   
   > containers? Y'know, in the real universe it may just never happen that   
   > way, and what are we gonna do, burn all the old scifi stories?   
   >   
   > I therefore salute how Stargate uses ZPM's - except that I doubt that   
   > should a ZPM exist it could be zapped around through the stargate, as   
   > the ZPM is usually portrayed as holding a lot of energy, not just   
   > being a clever device to access it from another dimension or whatever.   
   > Well whatever, just a quibble I sometimes have when watching.   
   >   
   > J.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)