Re: Dumb moments in tech in ST novels

(Joseph Nebus) said:
I've seen it argued, and I forget just where, that to the
extent the Enterprise's engines had been thought about they were based
on the Dean Drive idea, where energy goes into linear momentum and if
you want to know how then shut up shut up shut up.

I have a SF universe in my head where humanity is still trapped in the solar system; FTL still being a pipe dream. The main drive method is a spacetime field distortion effect that either "straightens" or "curves" spacetime. Straighten it, and you fly away from the sun, curve it, and you fall into the sun. Everything within the field is protected from intertia along the "shut up shut up shut up" line of reasoning, and when you relax the field you just stop, with no momentum.

As you get closer to the sun, the amount of natural curvature increases to the point where you can't summon up enough energy to curve it any more. If you get out far enough, spacetime flattens to the point where you run into the same kind of problem and you can't flatten it any more. So humans can zip around *inside* the solar system nicely, but it's still centuries to Alpha Centauri.

One of these days I have to write this damn story.

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