Category Archives: science

“The Physics of Space Battles”

Kotaku concept art from the Ninja Magic Web site

There’s an interesting article on Gizmodo.com by PhD candidate Joseph Shoer about the physics of would-be battles in space that’s worth reading.  From the article:

First, let me point out something that Ender’s Game got right and something it got wrong. What it got right is the essentially three-dimensional nature of space combat, and how that would be fundamentally different from land, sea, and air combat. In principle, yes, your enemy could come at you from any direction at all. In practice, though, the Buggers are going to do no such thing. At least, not until someone invents an FTL drive, and we can actually pop our battle fleets into existence anywhere near our enemies.