brainstorming from the science fiction hardware doods requested!

[Stella_Omega]

Okay, so I have an alternate earth on which War is Waged. Some people have managed to find a <handwave> tunnel through time and space, which leads them to this earth. The tunnel has several outlets, one seems to be somewhere in Korea, one is in Louisiana, maybe one in South America.

This is a known fact on the Alternate earth, that people can get here safely--
but i really don't want lots of two way traffic, i want my guys to be stranded for life on this earth once the reach it.(besides who'd want to go back to the other one? It's all war machines and evil juntas and nastinessess anyway)

So, does anyone have ideas on how to explain this-- good transmission one way, poor transmission the other way, but just enough to be useful?

Some people who get here are equipped with the means for making a ton of wealth. This must mean that the Other Earth knows what would be valuable here, right?
And what kinds of things would be wealth-producing here, besides gold bars? Patentable knowlege? any suggestions?

There might be a god-in-a-box that opens the tunnel both ways in the climax.

 

[Darkniciad]

You could have this earth as a sort of nexus for all the connected earths, probably because of the presence of the "god box" and things associated with it. It's easier to get here than anywhere else when you step in the portal, but not a sure thing by any means. Study has provided timing that makes it even more likely that you'll get to this advantageous earth, rather than one of the other connected worlds.

Going the other way, it's a crapshoot that could land you on an alternate earth where the atmosphere has evaporated, or one that's frozen, or a volcano hell, or full of dinosaurs, etc.

ETA: They could discover upon getting here that all the signs that they looked for to make the journey are completely different from the other side. They have absolutely no way of figuring out the proper timing without the lifetimes of study and technology on their world.

Or maybe some of their tech critical for puzzling out the timing doesn't work here. Or the tech to access the portal just doesn't work.

Better yet, have the portal open up here on the edge of a cliff because a huge chunk of rock ( or glacier, if you want to throw a little GW reference in there ) that has always been there isn't any more. They can manage to break the necessary equipment in the fall or dunking.

 

[SixtyMinuteMan]

Make the transmitters fixed devices that they can't bring with them. They need a power source or they're simply big, or whatever.

The travelers might not be aware that some vital piece of technology hasn't been invented here or that maybe some critical element hasn't yet been discovered or simply doesn't exist on this earth:

"Okay, now I just need a couple ounces of Unobtanium to complete the device and I can open a portal home."

"Unobtanium? What's that?"

"You know, that stuff they found when they started mining on the moon."

"Mining on the moon? Dude, what are you talking about?"

"Oh, shit."

So they're figuring on building a new device when it's time to go back, but once they're here they find themselves unable to complete it. And should there come a day when you want someone to get home, oh look! Trace amounts of Unobtanium have been discovered!

 

[TE999]

You could have the travelers realize that the war machines have found the portal and are prepared to invade. They destroy the entrances on Earth end to prevent this. They could later be recreated by a God Box or other such entity.

In re: accumulating wealth; discovering or having the apparatus to find precious metals, diamonds, rubies, emeralds, etc. could be a way. There is a huge worldwide black market in such things to avoid taxes and tariffs, so disposing of their hoard to obtain various world currencies would pose no problem.

 

[voluptuary_manque]

You could have the travelers realize that the war machines have found the portal and are prepared to invade. They destroy the entrances on Earth end to prevent this. They could later be recreated by a God Box or other such entity.

In re: accumulating wealth; discovering or having the apparatus to find precious metals, diamonds, rubies, emeralds, etc. could be a way. There is a huge worldwide black market in such things to avoid taxes and tariffs, so disposing of their hoard to obtain various world currencies would pose no problem.

I like that. That way they don't have to sell unexplainable technology to get money and give themselves away. Of course, with the current explosion in gem grade laboratory stones, they might not be as valuable as they once were.

 

[LitRiter]

I don't know that one-way travel will work for you, or else they wouldn't have gotten word back that this was a good place to go. I like the large mechanism that is too hard to reproduce here, but it may be simpler to say that the people with the knowledge to build it don't come along.

We use stereos, but how many could build one from scratch?

 

[TE999]

I like that. That way they don't have to sell unexplainable technology to get money and give themselves away. Of course, with the current explosion in gem grade laboratory stones, they might not be as valuable as they once were.

True dealers and collectors want and know the real stones from the lab creations, quite a few can tell the difference without a loupe.

They would need to be careful not to saturate the market, as that would reduce values and/or call attention to themselves.

 

[Weird Harold]

This is a known fact on the Alternate earth, that people can get here safely--
but i really don't want lots of two way traffic, i want my guys to be stranded for life on this earth once the reach it.(besides who'd want to go back to the other one? It's all war machines and evil juntas and nastinessess anyway)

Picture a water tube slide -- easy to go down, but nearly impossible to go up, but...

You can shout into the tube and be heard at the top, so people at the top can know you're all right and possibly even send down a float with useful things if you ask nicely.

How do you plan to keep the nastinesses and war machines from using your escape slide?

 

[Stella_Omega]

I don't know that one-way travel will work for you, or else they wouldn't have gotten word back that this was a good place to go. I like the large mechanism that is too hard to reproduce here, but it may be simpler to say that the people with the knowledge to build it don't come along.

We use stereos, but how many could build one from scratch?

yes, and the Wierd One elucidates further;

Picture a water tube slide -- easy to go down, but nearly impossible to go up, but...

You can shout into the tube and be heard at the top, so people at the top can know you're all right and possibly even send down a float with useful things if you ask nicely.

How do you plan to keep the nastinesses and war machines from using your escape slide?

Ah, well that's a problem, isn't it?

 

[Stella_Omega]

True dealers and collectors want and know the real stones from the lab creations, quite a few can tell the difference without a loupe.

They would need to be careful not to saturate the market, as that would reduce values and/or call attention to themselves.

And we can't have other-worldly isotopes or nothing...

 

[LitRiter]

And we can't have other-worldly isotopes or nothing...

War machines are a great way to advance technology. I'm sure they would have the ability to create certain objects, or even just find a niche market, a new kind of microwave that *we* haven't thought of yet. Nothing spectacular - like a better flat-screen video.

Of course, that means they'd have some technically minded people, and you're back to a problem not being able to build a return device.

Back and forth travel should be possible, but not easy? You could have each trip cause minor damage, so that multiple trips'll kill ya. Or at least mess you up some.

Fear of that will keep most from trying it, and it could make someone making a return trip for some important reason seem more heroic...

 

[Stella_Omega]

I got a suggestion from one friend that my financier-type refugees simply know how to work with money-- but they have to start with something, right?

 

[JackLuis]

or, when the War Machines do beak thru to Earth 'bountiful' they loose the microwave link to the Hive mind and revert to "garrison" mentality and become the producers of the "Wealth" by the secretions from their fuel processing or something?

 

[dr_mabeuse]

You could have them use a wormhole, the core of a mini-black hole in which matter disappears from one place in the universe and is spewed out in another (a white hole)

Some scientist has found away to use dark energy to allow matter to survive this transition, but only he knows how, or only he can use his equipment, or there are a limited number of devices that can do this, or there are only certain times when the white holes are located on earth, or...etc. etc.

 

[slyc_willie]

You could have them use a wormhole, the core of a mini-black hole in which matter disappears from one place in the universe and is spewed out in another (a white hole)

Some scientist has found away to use dark energy to allow matter to survive this transition, but only he knows how, or only he can use his equipment, or there are a limited number of devices that can do this, or there are only certain times when the white holes are located on earth, or...etc. etc.

One-way wormholes are a staple of science fiction. The Stargate series is the most notable recent example.

Dark matter is one of those wonderful things you can play with, since no one knows exactly what it is, but quantum physics insists it must be there. The conventional estimate is that 90-95% of matter in the universe is actually dark matter. But no one has yet to identify it, so you can pretty much say it behaves however you wish.

 

[Stella_Omega]

People come out of the tunnel pretty wrecked, starving and in ketosis and if they get found by the right agency, they get nursed back to health. Their memories are pretty solidly scrambled.
Those are the lucky ones...

 

[slyc_willie]

People come out of the tunnel pretty wrecked, starving and in ketosis and if they get found by the right agency, they get nursed back to health. Their memories are pretty solidly scrambled.
Those are the lucky ones...

So maybe you can say that traveling through the <whatever> is so hazardous that the risk of permanent damage -- including death -- increases exponentially with each instance of travel.

Who'd want to chance more than one trip if it could very well kill them?

ETA: at the same time, there are those who have returned, but not many. So that accounts for the knowledge some first-time travelers may have.

 

[Weird Harold]

People come out of the tunnel pretty wrecked, starving and in ketosis and if they get found by the right agency, they get nursed back to health. Their memories are pretty solidly scrambled.
Those are the lucky ones...

Perhaps that is the reason warmachines don't pass through -- their electonic memories can't unscramble like meat memories can? Or perhaps the passage time is such that no warmachine has the energy reserves to survive transit; they arrive with dead, unrechargable, unreplaceable batteries.

You can also limit the size and or composition of materials that can pass through the escape tunnel(s) -- i.e. human sized and waterproof only; technology corrodes as if it was submerged for a long period and nothing bigger than a human will fit.

That would let your travelers arrive with a significant amount of precious metals to invest, but without working -- dangerous -- technology.

 

[LitRiter]

So maybe you can say that traveling through the <whatever> is so hazardous that the risk of permanent damage -- including death -- increases exponentially with each instance of travel.

Who'd want to chance more than one trip if it could very well kill them?

Brilliant!

 

[Liar]

Energy.

You can beam stuff across the universe all you like, but it just takes a helluvalot of energy to do so. The receptor is just that, a device that catches you on the other side. The transmitter though, is what has to give the push, and for that you'll have to harness the power of a small star. Not an easy task, and nothing that can be done from Earth.

Information weighs less than people. You could either envision that borrowing a nuke plant for an hour or so would be enough energy to get an email across, or you could use something like quantum communication.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

One-way wormholes are a staple of science fiction. The Stargate series is the most notable recent example.

Dark matter is one of those wonderful things you can play with, since no one knows exactly what it is, but quantum physics insists it must be there. The conventional estimate is that 90-95% of matter in the universe is actually dark matter. But no one has yet to identify it, so you can pretty much say it behaves however you wish.

Yes, but one of the cool things known about dark energy--the reason it's believed to exist--is that is has anti-gravitational properties. It's believed to be one of the forces that's pushing the galaxies apart and making the universe expand.

Such properties could be quite useful in entering the event horizon of a black hole, to counteract the crushing gravity.

 

[Jenny_Jackson]

An alternative is to allow the tunnel to open on this earth anyplace, but you need a transmitter machine on this end to get back. That way they can be making money and building th e machine here so God Box can have it in the end of the story.

 

[xssve]

I'm not a physicist, but traveling via wormhole into the future is theoretically possible, while traveling backwards in time is more problematic.

Given a scenario of multiple dimensions, time can be conceived of as the key - in a sense, time is the thing that defines the difference between different realities: if you walk across the street at a given moment, you'll be hit by a car, a few seconds either way and you don't - different realities.

Traveling in time almost guarantees you'll end up in a different reality/dimension - from a reality where you don't exist to one where you do, and the very act of traveling will alter both realities.

Without getting too complicated, in interdimensional travel, one might not need to travel very far to reach another dimension, all that is required is to shift the time reference: i.e., more of a lateral shift, to a reality where Hitler tripped over a rock and broke his neck, or one where Einstein got hit in the head and ended up in a coma, allowing the Germans to develop the atomic bomb first, etc.

In short, it doesn't necessarily take a whole lot to alter the entire course of a given timeline, leading to a situation where due to the uncertainty principle, going back to a previous timeline is much more difficult, perhaps impossible, as the very act of traveling between timelines has irrevocably altered those timelines.

i.e., in some sense, the dimension/timeline you came from doesn't really exist anymore, it's a different timeline, a dimension in which you no longer exist; your existence in that dimension is the past, and you'd have to travel backwards to get to the exact point of departure in order to maintain the integrity of that timeline - otherwise you simply end up in yet another dimension.

If that makes any sense somebody tell me.

 

[ketalia]

How paranoid/controlling are the Drivers of the War Machine? Knowlege is power so they would be trying to control the flow of information. I'm thinking that maybe the War Machine found the gates and didn't want the knowlege freely available in order to prevent a mass exodus of the local population. So they garrison a few units (make it a punishment detail for slackers) at the door to prevent travel. A lucky few can escape through, but coming back is a bitch because of the "shoot to kill" orders.

One way to keep the WarMongers from coming through to our side is to give it a size window. Nothing larger than average sized humanoid can come through. So bigger things like tanks and such can't. Or make the trip rough enough on the traveler and their possessions that no one in their right minds would carry weapons. I just hate it when all my hand grenades 'splode in transit. Especially when they're in my pocket.

I also think that info could be more valuable than portables, especially if some of your escapees were scientists or doctors. For example, what if they've managed to cure the common cold over there? So your military biologist who doesn't want to make biological weapons comes through and manages to collect the Nobel for Science... Or something like that.

Hope this makes sense, the coffee isn't done yet here.

 

[SimonBrooke]

Okay, so I have an alternate earth on which War is Waged. Some people have managed to find a <handwave> tunnel through time and space, which leads them to this earth. The tunnel has several outlets, one seems to be somewhere in Korea, one is in Louisiana, maybe one in South America.

This is a known fact on the Alternate earth, that people can get here safely--
but i really don't want lots of two way traffic, i want my guys to be stranded for life on this earth once the reach it.(besides who'd want to go back to the other one? It's all war machines and evil juntas and nastinessess anyway)

So, does anyone have ideas on how to explain this-- good transmission one way, poor transmission the other way, but just enough to be useful?

Some people who get here are equipped with the means for making a ton of wealth. This must mean that the Other Earth knows what would be valuable here, right?
And what kinds of things would be wealth-producing here, besides gold bars? Patentable knowlege? any suggestions?

There might be a god-in-a-box that opens the tunnel both ways in the climax.

My solution is political not technical. The ruling powers in alternate Earth are so paranoid of rumours of what our Earth is like would do if loose in the population that they immediately kill anyone who returns. Or else they believe that our Earth has infectious diseases which would wipe out anyone the other side.