Military and Science Developments For Your Scifi

In the last month there have been a number of interesting articles posted that science fiction authors should heed.  Technology is really at the beginning or in the midst of a paradigm shift.  In some ways it is going to be a race between the new tech and the full impact of global warming to see how the world will change around us.  Science fiction is often predicated on technological expectations or projections and the fiction that becomes classic versus antiquated will often be sorted out in these changes.

Futuristic lighting at an LRT station.  Kind of looks like a reactor core too.

Items that scifi authors need to heed include:

• Cheap energy is the future.  Could be fusion, solar, zero point, or whatever.  The future of energy is cheap and plentiful for any science fiction written off of our current technology base.  Forget the energy crisis or any type of artificially imposed shortage crap (like Windup Girl - great story - lousy tech).
  http://venturebeat.com/2014/09/21/the-coming-era-of-unlimited-and-free-clean-energy/
  http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn26284-sunflower-solar-harvester-provides-power-and-water.html#.VDBARBZMGCg
  http://grist.org/climate-energy/how-solar-can-provide-over-half-the-planets-electricity/
  http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/Transforming-the-Power-Grid-Lessons-from-Germany-and-Japan
  The following post from Robert Jackson Bennett was pretty good at explaining a likely cheap boom in cheap and efficient solar power.  If you don't believe in cheap alternate energy your writing is going to look antiquated.  It would be like having space explorers that use slide rules instead of computers or exploring strange new worlds by candle light instead of a rich sensor sutie.
  http://robertjacksonbennett.wordpress.com/2014/08/05/rethinking-the-apocalypse/
• Ditch the rockets or even space planes for mass commercial transportation into space.  I'm a big fan of space elevators.  Rockets could be there for military use though.
  http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-09-21/japanese-construction-giants-promise-space-elevator-by-2050/575620
  http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/innovations/wp/2014/10/02/the-space-elevator-extreme-science-fiction-thats-still-a-long-way-from-science-fact/
  
  
  
  
  
• Manufacturing and the creation of many items (such as clothes, food, working machines, spare parts) is going to radically change even just with 3D printing.
  http://thenextweb.com/dd/2014/09/20/3d-printing-will-impact-future-rundown-companies-keep-eyes/
  https://gigaom.com/2014/03/20/hp-we-have-solved-3d-printings-biggest-problems-just-wait-until-june/
  http://venturebeat.com/2014/09/21/3d-printers-skintight-spacesuits-space-elevators-the-future-is-coming-to-space/
• Think about your transportation in urban areas if you are going to touch it as it could shape how your cities are designed or how you're going to do a futuristic car chase.  Is it going to be automated vehicles like Minority Report, superb train systems, flying cars, etc.
  http://www.citylab.com/commute/2014/09/the-four-transportation-systems-youll-meet-in-the-future/380904/
  I also really like Tokyo, which is a very futuristic city in many respects (I blog about Tokyo over here at Tokyo Excess).  The Guardian ran a really interesting article about how the Shinkansen bullet train allowed Tokyo to become the monster city it is today.
  http://www.theguardian.com/cities/2014/sep/30/-sp-shinkansen-bullet-train-tokyo-rail-japan-50-years
• Will your future cities be well planned or be dystopian nightmares.  Will they be slums and overpopulated dense metropolises or look like some nice city out of Star Trek.  What factors would make it this way?  And you'll need to ditch the scare resources and energy excuse.
  http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2014/09/dystopian_city_and_urban_policy_city_planners_should_read_more_sci_fi.html
• Of course, technology still isn't perfect.  This is an interesting article about how solar activity disrupted a modern battle in Afghanistan.
  http://www.science20.com/news_articles/factor_in_space_bubbles_or_the_terrorists_win-145480
• At the same time, fighter jets and missiles need to get way better to keep up with laser weapons and new tracking / interception systems.  Battles will get very interesting if point defense or area defence systems prevent artillery and missiles from being used.  Lasers would make conventional fighters obsolete too.  The Iron Dome system from the Israelis make anti-tank missiles and mortars/rockets ineffective or way less effective too.
  http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/lockheeds-new-laser-super-turret-could-change-air-comba-1635210849
  http://www.israellycool.com/2014/09/15/reader-post-iron-dome-israel-ends-the-long-battlefield-reign-of-the-missile/
• Finally, there was a great little video made about space battles and how they could work.  Hint, laser weapons are good only at relatively short ranges, not millions of miles, and vector changes are cooler than you think for maneuver.  Explosives, including nuclear weapons need contact detonation as there are limited blast effects in space, but nukes could kill you with radiation like a neutron bomb.
  
  
  

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