Support for Indie Authors discussion
Fun
>
Random stuff you learned as an author...
date
newest »
newest »
Andreas wrote: "one can't say that a vacuum/empty space inside a particle is an empty space, Jay, as we know, quantum theory has already spoken against this. One can't also determine the absolute size of matter, to do this means to be able to determine the size of the universe itself."Actually, defining nothing [empty space] is one of the unanswered questions in particle physics and cosmology. And I'm willing to bet that the physicists working at CERN have a pretty good handle on the standard model.
Measuring the size of the universe is not that big a deal. Lawrence Krauss shows you how to do it with grade school mathematics on YouTube.
Quantum Field Theory is fascinating, but anyone who states that they have all the smallest and all the largest answers is lying. We are just beginning to formulate some of the questions!
Makes for a great discussion though.
Jay wrote: "Charles wrote: "Suppose someone has a device that can create things on a subatomic level..."Good enough. Just make sure that you don't violate the conservation of energy (first law of thermodynam..."
Yes, that is why it was such a breakthrough when someone made that tech portable. ;) By that time, the device consumes the subatomic material (crazy dense) to sustain itself, and consumes raw matter to replenish. The material is so dense that it actually blocks the passage of known subatomic particles, which creates it's own sort of weird effects. But that's the fiction part. It works in conjunction with an internal power source, much like a modern hybrid.
We're dealing with civilizations that have been capable of FTL for 10,000ish years, though it is set only 500 years ahead of our current time.
Now I'm really going into explanations that I've never given anyone for the way the tech works. Mostly because nobody would understand, not that I am educated on the subject by any means.
The mass of a dollar thing is very interesting.
Charles wrote: "The mass of a dollar thing is very interesting..."I agree. You'd think for how little they do, the warheads would be cheaper. :)
Libby wrote: "Helen wrote: "I just learned this evening that King Gustav III of Sweden did not consummate his marriage with his wife for nine years. When he finally dared to try in 1775 he could not find the "ho..."Doesn´t it?
What I wonder is how realistic it actually was given the historical time and the context of the way royals were brought up. They had help getting dressed, bathed, they wore long night gowns. It is not impossible that both partners truly did not know the anatomy of their own bodies, as well as their partners bodies.
Mod
Dwayne wrote: "That quirky fun song the Muppets do? "Mah Na Mah Na"? It was originally written for and used in an Italian film about wild sexual behavior in Sweden."Oh! I knew that! I knew that!
What? It was in a Cracked article. I wasn't looking for wild Swedish sex...
Dwayne wrote: "That quirky fun song the Muppets do? "Mah Na Mah Na"? It was originally written for and used in an Italian film about wild sexual behavior in Sweden."Another derogatory stereotype of us.
I've learned that Microsoft Word for Mac doesn't have all the neat features Windows has. When I need to do more than just type words I have to switch to Windows. Like putting in a Table of Contents. It's manual on Mac and a wizard feature on Windows.Annoying considering how much a Mac costs.
researched the specs on the last dirigibles and extrapolated what the next one should look like. Learned what the anderson limit it. And why Piedmontese cattle are desirable
Researching a Civil War novel I traveled to Charleston, S. C. and discovered the well known "total" devastation and annihilation, of the empty, and abandoned city of 1865 encompassed the southern (maybe) 60% of the peninsular city while the (maybe) 40% in the north portion carried on business as usual. Weeks of previous research online and in libraries had not revealed that.
And now deep thoughts...Writing a book is akin to pregnancy. (I have two boys btw). Right now I'm in my 3rd trimester of writing this book, and I just need this baby to get out. I will love it and nurture it once it's in the real world, when I can hold it in my arms. As for right now, I'm exhausted from the 3rd trimester fatigue-pain-anxiety-etc. This baby needs to finish baking so I don't have to share my brain power any more.
PS To answer the OP, I realized that I can't type the word, "mounting," innocently (in terms of riding a horse) without thinking the reader is going to be thinking of it in erotic connotations. Or maybe I just have a foul mind.
Quoleena wrote: "And now deep thoughts...Writing a book is akin to pregnancy. (I have two boys btw). Right now I'm in my 3rd trimester of writing this book, and I just need this baby to get out. I will love it an..."
Oh yes it is.
First, I want to get pregnant, but if I´m not yet, then I can´t write. Doesn´t matter how many people tell me that I should write something else. How could I write something that doesn´t exist?
But THEN suddenly I conceive and I feel so excited and slowly, slowly I begin to write. Then the baby starts growing a bit, I´m still unsure if it is a "boy" or a "girl" but then it grows all on it´s own and there is nothing you can do about it, it is it´s own thing.
:)
Glad I´m not the only one who gets pregnant with books.
"Pidgin" is not a bird, "pigeon" is.
Quoleena wrote: "PS To answer the OP, I realized that I can't type the word, "mounting," innocently (in terms of riding a horse) without thinking the reader is going to be thinking of it in erotic connotations. Or ..."I had that issue and ended up rewriting the sentence because I couldn't get past it. Though in my case, I know I have a foul mind. It's a gift, and curse.
Morris wrote: ""Pidgin" is not a bird, "pigeon" is."But pidgie is acceptable slang. As is city chicken and flying rat. ;)
This thread is awesome! Here goes: A medieval water bottle is called a costrel.
Broadswords are relatively fragile, made for hacking and not for fencing.
Being shot in a soft-tissue area other than the heart can cause cardiac arrest (the ripple effect from the bullet's 'punch' can bruise the heart, making it beat erratically and then stop)
A higher-up in the Russian mafia is called a Vor, pluralized Vory.
Heroin smells like vinegar, meth like cat pee.
It is very cheap to live in Detroit.
There are at least five cities called Center, and at least one of them is in Pennsylvania.
Silencers do not actually silence the sound of a gunshot, they just make it slightly less deafening.
Psychopathy and sociopathy are a lot less scary than the horror flicks make them out to be.
During the early Middle Ages, Constantinople was overrun by chariot-racing fanatics, who became so powerful that eventually they came together into two rival sects called the Greens and the Blues, and they were involved in everything from petty crime to politics. (A dancing girl from one of the gangs actually ended up marrying the emperor, and being a pretty awesome empress)
Dwayne wrote: "That quirky fun song the Muppets do? "Mah Na Mah Na"? It was originally written for and used in an Italian film about wild sexual behavior in Sweden."And the name of the film...?
Not that I'll be looking for a sordid Italian film set in Sweden ;-P
Grace; I found out a lot about shootings too. I do feel incredibly disappointed silencers don't make the pleasing "pfft" sound you hear in films. ;-(
I still laugh at my internet search history, "how to shoot people", "BDSM", "paedos"... :-O
Istanbul was Constantinople...lalalala (I'm going to be earworming now!!)
@T.L I know! That movie-silencer noise is just so cool. I'm not sure if I'm going to have 'realistic' silencers in my books or just run with artistic license and popular opinion and write about the magical, non-existent movie silencers :)
What about the ringing metal on metal noise that swords make when drawn from a scabbard on TV? Because of course you would store a sword in something that blunts the edge. Yes, I have had to look some of these up as well. How loud a silenced gunshot is. What meth smells like. How much space a million dollars takes up and what it weights...
Yes, I've always cringed at that metallic scabbard sound.Although my father posessed some long-dead relative's sabre, and that did have a metal scabbard and did make that sound. Not sure if it was a purely ornamental thing to go with a full dress uniform or whether it actually ever served as a weapon.
I lived in Houston, Texas for most of my life, but until I started researching for my time travel novel, I did not know that the government started to build a Supercollider that would have been bigger than the CERN one right under the city of Waxahachie, Texas.
Wildlife has returned to Pripyat (site of the Chernobyl disaster) and is thriving, despite the radiation levels still being at harmful levels. This actually ruined a great scene I had written.
So we can expect some atomic mutations and all those 1950s "giant-bug" movies will turn out to be true after all.
Mod
Panthers are not a kind of animal. They are a genus of animals that includes cougars, jaguars, and leopards. Black Panthers are actually the melanistic variants of cougars, jaguars, or leopards. There are also white panthers that are the leucism variants.
This is what I learned yesterday. I don't even want to get into how much I learned about music and soup for my last story.
P.D. wrote: "What about the ringing metal on metal noise that swords make when drawn from a scabbard on TV? Because of course you would store a sword in something that blunts the edge. "A couple of my swords and knives do make that type of sound when drawn from leather or wooden scabbards. It's nowhere near as pronounced and loud as it is on TV or in movies, but it's similar.
C.B. wrote: "Panthers are not a kind of animal. They are a genus of animals that includes cougars, jaguars, and leopards. Black Panthers are actually the melanistic variants of cougars, jaguars, or leopards. There are also white panthers that are the leucism variants."Panthro will be sending you his therapy bills to treat his impending identity crisis.
M. Ray Holloway Jr. wrote: "I lived in Houston, Texas for most of my life, but until I started researching for my time travel novel, I did not know that the government started to build a Supercollider that would have been big..."I knew that! But particle physics was my hobby well before I actually did any research. :D
Ken wrote: "So we can expect some atomic mutations and all those 1950s "giant-bug" movies will turn out to be true after all."
Radioactivity has become the 'curse' of modern age and highly overrated during the cold war. It's a bad word.
Did you know that during a simple flight you acquire a higher dose than working with radioactive materials in a lab or power plant in years? Or that your own environment has a background radiation that depends mostly on the rock type?
Of course you have to be aware of what you do, but you don't take 10000x overdose of a medicine either :) Bad medicine! At 10000x dose it will kill you! So does water, salt, sugar, etc.
This is exactly why in my book, Genesis, when the scientists were trying to solve the 'dearth' problem with the use of an 'anti-gravity', something happened. In which book will you discuss this, Charles?