vates wrote:Now, if you want to observe an event, shouldn't you be going some place and time where that event in fact in layman's terms can touch you. Otherwise, what can you hope to observe?
Vates,
I understand your quandary. . .really. The gist of the cool stuff is what you've already quoted:
"we're suspended in a ten millisecond out-of-sync stasis to the current timezone"
Now. . .that might make sense in some Star Tr@k universe, but it means ABSOLUTELY NOTHING as far a known science goes. Nothing at all. Which makes it
perfect. It's like saying 'Warp Drive' or 'Jump Gates' or 'Null Space'.
It sounds like it means something, but it doesn't.
So it can mean whatever the author says it means.
In this case, it means that you can see stuff, but you're not actually there.
This is PERFECT science, as far as Sci-Fi goes. And though I agree with you that if light energy can reach you (ie:, you can
see it) other energy should be able to do so. But we don't have any idea what
ten milliseconds out-of-sync stasis means! As an author, you can explain it as goblins can get through, but centaurs can't. . . .and that's just fine.
The problem with bad science in Sci-Fi comes when you name something known. . . .like a rocket. . .and then say that you somehow exceeded the speed of light with it. It just ain't possible. But that's only because a 'rocket' has a true meaning. It shoots reaction mass out behind it at a speed considerably FASTER than the payload is flying. Call it a hyperlight drive, and you have no problem.
You reading this, Gino?
And to answer Lester's question. . . .yes. The first observers were annihilated. . . .but only once the SECOND craft tried to occupy the same -10 millisecond out-of-sync position. It's called the antiparadox.
That even when the reality changes, nobody's (that survive, that is) mind does. And it’s a fairly common plot device.
Since it's all made-up, it's all fair game.
Get it?
I hope so.
Bill
"I am Susan Ivanova. . . .I am the Right Hand of Vengence. . .I am Death Incarnate, and the last living thing that you are ever going to see. God sent me."