Category talk:Physics

This seems like a good place to say something about the SI-units.

All the units used should be from the International System of Units.

That is meters, kilometers, centimeters, etc. instead of feet, inches and mails. Galactic distances are probably best indicated as light years/minutes/seconds/etc.

Speed as meters per second (m/s) or (km/s).

Acceleration as meters per second squared (m/s²) or (km/s²).

Mass as kilograms (kg) or grams (g) or tonns (t).

Temperature can be either Kelvins (K) or Celcius (°C). Although when it comes to suns and possibly planets I'd recommend Kelvins. Room temperature can be indicated as Celcius although Kelvins ain't so bad. 273.15 Kelvins is 0 °C. Just don't use Fahrenheit.

Pressure I'd recommend indicating as Pascals (Pa), however, with blood pressure you can use mmHG too, although I'd still recommend Pascals as that's something that today's medicine is going forward to.

Energy should be Joules, even energy from food should be Joules, not calories. kJ (1k) and MJ (1000k) should be used when needed. With small energies I also recommend Joules, although electron volts (eV) is OK too, not that there probably is ever need for those.

Radiation absorption should be in Grays (Gy), so no rads.

Desibells are probably best for sounds although watts per meter squared (W/m²) is OK too.

Volume should be either cubic meters (m³) or liters (l or dm³) depending on the size of the object. Ship cargo should be marked in cubic meters except for small ships.

In case you need to convert units I recommend the one in FMI's website http://www.fmi.fi/saa/paikalli.html

MAOL and other similar books also have conversion tables in case you have any.

--Mad Gigerdi 2 15:01, 22 Jul 2009 (EEST)

anthropocentric units

I've actually given a lot of thought to this when creating articles and I've consistently tried to remove all units that have human names (Joule, Pascal, etc. etc.) and tried to replace them with ambiguous "standard units" or "galactic scales" or something like that. Since the PSE isn't written from a human perspective (merely 'translated' into human through a Universal Translator presumably from some unseen source), it's unlikely contemporary physics terms were used ... especially since half of the physics involved are non-existent. so yeah, in sci-fi physics, more ambiguity with units is better. allows for more flexibility when the physics inevitably don't work out

Another problem is the standard 1 Sol (or 1 Jupiter) used for mass measurements of stellar/planetary objects in astronomy, because from a galactic perspective Sol/Jupiter are specks of dust with no particular significance to measurement. I've replaced these with more ambigious "average main sequence star", although this is not very precise a definition either

I've used km/lightyear although these also are obvously anthropocentric, but at least they don't reference anyone by name or planet (directly).

another concession I made is allowing the temperature unit "K", which is obviously Kelvin, but I never reference it by name and since it's based on physics directly, it would be somewhat universal.

coincidentally I've also removed all human names from physical occurrences like Lagrange points (now called "gravitational equilibrium points"), Hawking radiation, the Higgs Boson (now called the "M boson") etc. for precisely that reason. can you imagine two aliens discussing the Higgs boson or navigating to a Lagrange point using Joules and Pascals for measurement? it doesn't make any sense.

so yeah, I actually have already figured this thing out to some degree

Shok 45 22:49, 20 Aug 2009 (EEST)

I think that units like (smaller) length, (smaller) time and (smaller) mass should be in Human units. Human units should probably stay around since that's something everyone can understand.

Don't think the latter thing you mentioned will be a problem though. I don't think, in terms of physics, there will be anything beyond the basic ones. Pascals, Joules and Kelvins (Celcius?) will probably be featured though so I guess something could be done with them. I guess each race can use their own versions. During the PS most of them haven't been around with each other much ('cept UCP and GF), so it makes sense for everyone to use their own ones. GF and UCP might be either using the Human or Gigerdian ones then.

There are a lot of Human names in use here after all. All the galaxies for example. I wouldn't mind making up different names for the various galaxies, solar systems and nebulas though.

Anyway, I guess the best way would be to have each race use their own versions, UCP using the Human versions and GF either using their own or Human versions, depending on whether good ones can be made for all. At the time of the Peace Station though, I doubt there will be any galactic ones in use as something like that is not easy to do. The wiki could use anything though, as long as they can be converted to Human ones.

--Mad Gigerdi 2 17:11, 21 Aug 2009 (EEST)

anthropocentric galaxies

this is true re: names of galaxies, nebulae, etc. I've actually made up some Hemmoian names for extragalactic cosmological structures (Tileek Corridor etc.) but yeah most galaxies etc. that are visible to other species probably have native names so go hog wild if you come up with a good name for something. Early Orcish astronomers referred to the Andromeda Galaxy as the Disk of Clay etc. Human names for objects have probably also changed in hundreds of years, you probably wouldn't keep calling your home "Episilon Indi II B" but rather give it your own name like a home town. again if you think of a good name go for it, just mention "historically known as this and this before space travel"

Shok 46 15:06, 22 Aug 2009 (EEST)

OK, I'll start figuring out some names once I finish all the history and agenda-stuff.

--Mad Gigerdi 2 18:51, 23 Aug 2009 (EEST)