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10/30/07

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DevilsReject

DevilsReject

Cleveland, OH
February 2007

NOV 02, 2007 01:41 AM

Louis_XIV said:

SPOILERS! (Click to view)
Whereas the idea of a (visible) tank sounds like science fiction to me, the idea of an invisible tank sounds like... cheating. Where is the honor in winning a battle when you use invisible tanks? A battle between two armies on a battlefield is like a game of chess, except that it's bigger and that the pieces are living. Particularly, there are unwritten rules : Wear clearly visible uniforms. Don't wear uniforms of the enemy or civilian clothing. Don't target officers. Don't shoot on the man with the white flag. If you don't play bu the rules, you may win the battle, but you loose your honor. And i'm sure, if invisible tanks existed in my time, they would be bannished from the battlefield.

Using invisible tanks is like playing chess and suddenly saying "But what you don't know is that I have three invisible rooks on the board, they are here, here and, uh, here." Wouldn't that be cheating? Wouldn't any chess player who uses such dirty tricks be dishonored?

Without rules and honor, war becomes a slaughtery. Imagine a duel at dawn between two gentlemen who love the same lady - and one of them hides within an invisible mobile steel chest with a howitzer. Would this be a honorful duel? Certainly not. It would be against the rules. It would be murder.

It's the same with war. A battle is the same as a duel, except that there are more people involved. Particularly, you have to respect the rules, or you will be dishonored.

Then again, rules may evolve over the centuries. I understand in your time, warfare has become kind of a double-side partisan warfare. There are no more open battles where armies are positioned on the battlefield in front of each other before attacking. Soldiers use camouflage uniforms and hide in the woods. Flying machines drop explosives on soldiers and civilians. I'm pretty sure you shoot on officers. You even use strange weapons that let grow in seconds a deadly giand mushroom in the heart of a city. And now invisible tanks...

That's not war, people, that's slaughtery! Where has the warrior's honor gone?





We also have remedies for gangrene now Louis XIV. So how is that gangrene thing working out for you?

Didn't you say this to your son?:

"Do not follow the bad example which I have set you; I have often undertaken war too lightly and have sustained it for vanity.......



Don't think i haven't read about you.

FellOnEarth

FellOnEarth

Temecula, CA
April 2006

NOV 02, 2007 01:42 AM

xazapdmytinu said:

JunkyardAngel said:
Nuh-uh, dude. You are so full of....really?

FOR REAL?

Can they make President Bush invisible too?



There's a subtle but important difference between Bush being invisible and Bush disappearing. An invisible turd can still be stepped in while a turd disappearing just makes you wonder where it went.



Kindle

Kindle

Houston, TX
March 2006

NOV 02, 2007 02:07 AM

xazapdmytinu said:

JunkyardAngel said:
Nuh-uh, dude. You are so full of....really?

FOR REAL?

Can they make President Bush invisible too?



There's a subtle but important difference between Bush being invisible and Bush disappearing. An invisible turd can still be stepped in while a turd disappearing just makes you wonder where it went.


Actually, out of sight out of mind, you know? If Bush disappeared I might wonder for all of a millisecond what happened, mostly just to be sure he wasn't coming back, but beyond that, I've had seven (almost eight) years too many, of him. Wasting any more time wondering where he disappeared to is not something I would probably do. Just like turd, I don't care where it goes as long as it doesn't return.

FellOnEarth

FellOnEarth

Temecula, CA
April 2006

NOV 02, 2007 03:13 AM

Here, I fixed it:

FellOnEarth

FellOnEarth

Temecula, CA
April 2006

NOV 02, 2007 04:23 AM

Hmm, not quite right... There, perfection!

lefthandright

lefthandright

New Zealand
September 2006

NOV 02, 2007 04:56 AM

japan invented the invisible car 4 years ago..it's actually old technology..projectors on the left side of the vehicle project their direct surroundings onto the right side of the vehicle and vice versa...the problem is that it can be seen when it moves and involves very sensitive l.e.d's...so in essence, as soon as a stone flicks up and breaks one of the lights it is pretty much game over...or if you need to move the tank, it also become obvious...radar also picks it up as good as ever and it generates loads of heat

Louis_XIV

Louis_XIV

France
August 2007

NOV 02, 2007 09:58 AM

DevilsReject said:
Didn't you say this to your son?:

"Do not follow the bad example which I have set you; I have often undertaken war too lightly and have sustained it for vanity.......




Yes, I said this. I made mistakes during my reign, a lot. I tried to make wars in a honorable way, instead of trying to avoid them. But at least I'm aware of these mistakes, and I know I'll have to answer for them to the Allmighty.

Furthermore: Can you imagine a similar quote by George W. Bush?

flyonwall

flyonwall

London, ON
October 2004

NOV 02, 2007 04:00 PM

*sideways glance right*
*sideways glance left*

I would also like to add to my previous statement that I for one, welcome our new invisible overlords.

Stiles

Stiles

Oakland, CA
November 2002

NOV 02, 2007 10:03 PM

FellOnEarth said:

Stiles said:
So, tanks run in the dirt and battlefields tend to be dusty - all of which aren't good for cameras, screens or projectors. I'd be interested in seeing how well this works in a real-life filthy battlefield.


Tiny misters and windshield wipers are the solution! Actually, a phased electrical current can create an electrostatic field (another shield!) to repel finer dust, also some new nano polymer fibers may already be able to do that and be used for light projection (LED) for a projection based cloaking device... Cool, but I still like the idea of using meta materials to bend light around an object while providing kinetic shielding.



I'm also thinking of the kind of thick wet mud a 1,100hp tank flings everywhere while moving across wet ground. That would have to be a helluva electrostatic field, and it seems like it still wouldn't do anything about mud flung into the view of the cameras.

KitsunePagan

KitsunePagan

I'm lost
August 2007

NOV 02, 2007 10:04 PM

I think the next invisible thing will be "You can't see me" Armor!!!

It will be great at birthday parties biggrin

Stiles

Stiles

Oakland, CA
November 2002

NOV 02, 2007 10:04 PM



DUDE.

fountainofdreams

fountainofdreams

Batavia, IL
January 2005

NOV 02, 2007 10:33 PM

Louis_XIV said:

DevilsReject said:
Didn't you say this to your son?:

"Do not follow the bad example which I have set you; I have often undertaken war too lightly and have sustained it for vanity.......




Yes, I said this. I made mistakes during my reign, a lot. I tried to make wars in a honorable way, instead of trying to avoid them. But at least I'm aware of these mistakes, and I know I'll have to answer for them to the Allmighty.

Furthermore: Can you imagine a similar quote by George W. Bush?



No, but I can find quite a few that are the opposite in message.

"There's an old saying in Tennessee -- I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee -- that says, fool me once, shame on -- shame on you. Fool me -- you can't get fooled again."

Anybody else want His Highness to run for President this election? I can make up some bumper stickers.

FellOnEarth

FellOnEarth

Temecula, CA
April 2006

NOV 03, 2007 01:42 AM

Stiles said:



DUDE.

Thanks,

Yeah, I guess mud might be a bit of a problem if you're actually moving through it, and yes projection would be a bit of an issue once you got muddy. That's why the metamaterial idea is so much better (it doesn't project an image of the background, it bends light around it, so you actually see what is in the background). It also helps to think of it being employed in a field instead of being the actual surface of the tank (therefore, the tank can get as dirty as it wants).

But once you're moving, you still have other issues (like kicking up a dust cloud, same problem with larger ballistic weapon systems once they are fired). I imagine that new strategies would develop because of the limitations of the technology, but there may yet be other technological answers to the problems. For one, energy weapon (lasers and microwave for instance) would help keep your position from being known even while firing. The military is also already developing hybrid engines so a tank could remain quiet during stealth mode while still being able to maneuver. I think that about covers it.

That being said, I'd imagine this future tank idea will be so unbelievably expensive that they'll never be used.

Louis_XIV

Louis_XIV

France
August 2007

NOV 03, 2007 05:02 AM

This night I had a strange dream, involving towels, a shoe-shaped spaceship, a whale turning into a petunia, mice, the number 42, and dolphins. When I woke up, my first thought was "Instead of making the tank invisible, why not create an Somebody-Else's-Problem-field around it?"

I've no idea what this dream or this sentence means. I asked my court astrologer but he didn't know it either. Maybe this makes sense to one of you people?

Kindle

Kindle

Houston, TX
March 2006

NOV 03, 2007 06:14 AM

Louis_XIV said:
This night I had a strange dream, involving towels, a shoe-shaped spaceship, a whale turning into a petunia, mice, the number 42, and dolphins. When I woke up, my first thought was "Instead of making the tank invisible, why not create an Somebody-Else's-Problem-field around it?"

I've no idea what this dream or this sentence means. I asked my court astrologer but he didn't know it either. Maybe this makes sense to one of you people?


So, what you are saying, sort of, in a way, is that we should not stick our noses into other people's affairs? That's silly.

Louis_XIV

Louis_XIV

France
August 2007

NOV 03, 2007 07:27 AM

Kindle said:
So, what you are saying, sort of, in a way, is that we should not stick our noses into other people's affairs? That's silly.



No, that's not what I'm saying! Meanwhile I googled "Somebody-Else's-problem field" and found this.

Kindle

Kindle

Houston, TX
March 2006

NOV 03, 2007 07:33 AM

Louis_XIV said:

Kindle said:
So, what you are saying, sort of, in a way, is that we should not stick our noses into other people's affairs? That's silly.



No, that's not what I'm saying! Meanwhile I googled "Somebody-Else's-problem field" and found this.


Oh.

fountainofdreams

fountainofdreams

Batavia, IL
January 2005

NOV 03, 2007 07:51 AM

Louis_XIV said:

Kindle said:
So, what you are saying, sort of, in a way, is that we should not stick our noses into other people's affairs? That's silly.



No, that's not what I'm saying! Meanwhile I googled "Somebody-Else's-problem field" and found this.



Bwahahahaha!

kraasch

kraasch

Abilene, TX
August 2007

NOV 03, 2007 12:20 PM

did u know that the word gullible is not in the dictionary? this technology could easily be defeated with a paint-ball gun... or dirt, or water balloons filled with ink, or smoke bombs, or bird shit, or an EMP (electro-magnetic pulse), GOT MILK?, or....

kraasch

kraasch

Abilene, TX
August 2007

NOV 03, 2007 12:48 PM

did you know that word gullible is not in the dictionary?

This technology is useless. It could easily be defeated with a paintball gun or a water-balloon full of ink, or magnetic metal shavings sprinkled on the ground wherever a tank could get through, or bird shit, or...

how you gonna keep the tank clean enough for it to work?

What about noise? heat? the airborne dust trail from movement? the muzzle flash?

Why not spend the money for this project on feeding war refugees or alternative ways to make peace?

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