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True, I suppose I should have said no reason in regards to producing energy. you can harness a profound amount of energy by building collectors around the star. in that respect there is no reason to pull anything physical from the star.

"The Machine" From the Series "Person of Interest" I feel the series did a wonderful job fleshing out the humanity in a character that almost never speaks directly. Until the very last few episodes it always communicated in directly with the characters but it was my favorite character out of...

As others have stated, building a shell or swarm around the sun would be the best way to collect the energy. There is no reason to physically collect matter from the star. If you did remove matter you would not "drain" the star, in fact you would lengthen its lifespan because you would be...

I agree with Ryan_m_b. There are plenty of logistical reasons that a probe would have a far easier time then humans. manned crafted would have to be many times more massive just to house all the air, food and water needed for the crew, not to mention radiation shielding If you are going with...

Janus said the half life was about 15 minutes so that gives you a time frame to work with. Could your character crawl 30 feet in 15 minutes? probably, so maybe make it a longer tunnel. and I would say being out of the tunnel when the first explosion happens would be a good idea because after...

The side effect of explosive e-comprresification leads to an interesting drama point in the story. The tunnel is only a meter wide by 10 meters long so it is going to take time to crawl through it. As stated however, as the effects of the ray dissipate, the original mass will begin to explode...

For practical, real life applications, this could be a night mare side effect of the device. For a story however, it is a pretty awesome side effect.

I think the implication is a severe radiation hazard.

Most of what makes up matter is pretty much space, consider an actual neutron star, it has a mass greater then our own sun, yet on average, they are only a few kilometers across. Collapsing down 300sq. meters of rock would still take up a microscopic amount of space.

Another idea is that the device could increase the matter's density, causing the molecules within the affected area to collapse together, perhaps even to neutron density. so zap a door and the door would seem to vanish, the matter the door was made of would still be there, it would just be a...

Thank you, you are correct in that is what I was looking for, I need something that would cause extreme damage to the ozone layer. I am looking for a culprit for a mass extinction. I wanted to avoid asteroids because they seem the go to for all all end of the world plots.

Though doing a sequel like this does kind of ruin the mystery of his character being a Replicant or not.

are you posting from the future? Currently Ford is still alive, at least according to my subjective present.

Thank you for the clarification.

I believe the only known mechanism to alter Time, is gravity. so if you had a situation where time was so distorted that it bent back on itself, then you would also be in the presence of a gravity well so enormous that time looping would be the least of your worries.

Ok good to know, so low in the believability department. I wanted something plausible, I didn't pick a random Super nova because I figured any star big enough to explode and yet be close enough to do us damage, we would know about it by now. I thought Betelgeuse might work because its close and...

Yep, I was. Bond's model uses an air breathing engine so it can greatly reduce the amount of O2 it has to carry into orbit.

I wasn't aware anyone had build a successful prototype yet. I know Allen Bond has been working on it for decades but I thought he was still working out the bugs.

Issac Aurthur does an Excellent series on Youtube, he is very detailed and distills the information into very easy to understand segments, its perfect fodder for sci fi writers. He recently did a multi part set on realistic near future methods of getting into space, I believe the set was called...

If you are working with current technology then you need a rocket with a large amount of fuel and multiple stages. Currently no one has figured out how to do a single stage craft that can leave the atmosphere. So you are talking a large undertaking by a significant crew of professionals and a...

I am collecting facts for an story featuring the end of the world. In this Story Betelgeuse is the culprit. I know currently its poles are not lined up with Earth so I need to describe an event that would alter its position so that when it goes, Earth is in the line of fire. Would a black...

Here is article on how they plan to mine water on the Moon. I expect similar methods would be used on Mars. http://www.space.com/7350-nasa-hopes-water-moon.html

Phind's Answer of Magic honestly wasn't far off, and the Ori, I think would appreciate it as they were a race so advanced that they wanted the inhabitants of their galaxy to worship them as Gods. Some of the only Ori tech explained in any degree was their genetic engineering of the Priors...

Agreed on all accounts, but there is at least the possibility that a few might last that long thus given room for plot fuel in the OP's story.

That is certainly one way to go, have something in orbit that eventually falls back to earth. The satellites in orbit will last practically forever barring any collisions, as their power supplies fail, their orbits will decay over a long period of time and eventually fall back to Earth. For the...

Thank you, reading it now.

Thank you very much for the clarification.

I am trying to get my head abound something and I am hoping you guys can shed some light on this for me. When discussing objects moving an relativistic speeds, its often mentioned that as an object approaches the speed of light, it gains mass. My question is: is this mass real? If you...

Just make sure your plane is in relatively the same position in the galaxy. You can move it thousands of light years but you want it to be about the same distance from the central bulge and in between the arms of the Galaxy. This is important because much like solar systems, the Galaxy also...

That is trippy. So now I need a few of these to build some heat sinks for my gaming rig.

Thanks for the nightmare fuel.

reminds me of the hydrate-able food from Back to the Future II.

Thanks Ryan.

yeah there are ways to simulate the effect but what was shown in the scene was a thin foil like material that some how managed to trap 100% of the heat of the hot coffee and keep it perfectly contained for seemingly weeks or maybe months. Also it somehow managed not to expand from the steam...

Yes, Insulation, Bloody Auto correct. Thanks for catching that. Editing now. ok well tried to edit but I guess it has been too long. oh well.

My favourite Tech would be perfect insulation. I forget what movie it was from but there is a scene where the character reaches into a cupboard and takes out a packet that is seemingly at room temperature, he opens it and pours steaming hot coffee into his cup. I remember not being very...

I read about a very similar story in the 90s, An American Tourist and Japanese Tourist, I forgot which country they were visiting but they discovered that they both spoke Klingon and communicated that way without knowing each others' native tongue.

Well there are a couple of ways you could go here: If the aliens are crossing a gap of several lights years in a relatively short period of time then it means they are moving at a very large fraction of the speed of light. that kind of energy utilisation speaks of a civilisation far removed...

I have found almost no science on the Flash that resembles actual science. The very foundation of his ability relies on something called "The Speed Force" which is apparently sentient. Beyond that, even basic physics are inconsistent in the show. For example in one episode he can move so fast...

no politics here please.

The big problem with setting up a colony on Mars is that it *would* take a staggering amount of resources to get it started, there is no real way to shoestring it. The biggest bottleneck is power. Things like building structures and 3D printers to fabricate tools and greenhouses all require...

I don't think we have to worry about anyone from Mars One dying on camera. It is extremely unlikely that this organisation will ever get anything off the ground. The plans they have proposed and the budget they outlined are not even close to realistic. You don't even need to get into the...

Just hide out at Bilbo's place. It was apparently untouched throughout the entire series.

you can never listen to marketing. The box will show you brilliant pictures of M13 but the reality is that you will never see that on the scope in question.

The really cheap telescopes are not very good at seeing dim objects because they have really small apertures and do not collect a lot of light. my first telescope cost around 100 quid and the moon was really the only thing I could easily see.

You got jokes.

While this story looks very promising, I hear it is the first in a series of side stories, the next one slotted for 2018 is a Han Solo & Chewy Origin story, for this I weep. I think with Rouge One they have a great idea, a story that has never been told that tucks neatly into the Star Wars...

When we see Luke in the last scene of the movie, he is standing over a grave. I strongly suspect that is his Wife's Grave.

Spontaneously as in did I just decide this? naw I suspected it was him from fairly on in the Movie. During her flashes as she picks up the light saber for the first time I think there was a flash of the island, there also seemed to be a flash of R2D2 (who she had not met yet) now granted this...

My money is on Luke Skywalker.