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Comment by andreasklinger | Hacker News Reader

I love that the ships look more like "skyscrapers in space" then airplane like spaceships we usually see in tv shows/movies.

This is most likely (according to multiple hard scifi authors) a much more realistic depiction of how spaceships are going to look like.

Example given: The Expanse - "Flip and Burn" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4EiW1bHwsQ

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I love that the ships look more like "skyscrapers in space" then airplane like spaceships

(than!)

To be really realistic, the planes of the floors should be oriented perpendicular to the axis, or there should be a centrifuge incorporated. If ships are going to float around like ocean going ships floating on top of an invisible ocean, with all of the ship floors somehow aligned, then this is the "space is an ocean" trope.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SpaceIsAnOcean

yes i meant the floors are like the floors in skyscrapers. the thrust/acceleration creates the "artificial gravity".

See Mistake 6 at http://www.dedoimedo.com/physics/sci-fi-mistakes.html

Mistake 7 also hints about the possible shape when there are no preferred orientations.

Also interesting

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/11/24/spaceship_design/

Since you linked these pages, you and others also might find this interesting:

http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/misconceptions....

In my opinion Atomic Rocket contains the most accurate discussion of hard science fiction I've ever encountered.

I just spent the last 6 hours reading a fraction of the pages on that site. Thanks for the link!

I don't get his complaint against windows given that current space ships have windows. Admittedly, many ships overdo them in scifi, but you wouldn't even need to go back a hundred years to find people who would have said that there was no way to produce glass sheets strong and large enough for its current use in skyscrapers. Windows are only a problem for near-future hard scifi, and then only when they're particularly large or prevalent.

Some of the designs remind me of the Earthforce ships from Babylon 5, a few of the carriers in the Wing Commander games, or some of them in Sins of a Solar Empire.

The very first picture, the first thing I thought of was the Agamemnon from Babylon 5. Some of the extreme examples remind me of Shadow ships.

Excellent show, and an even better series of hard sci-fi books to back it. I've never read a sci-fi book/series that depicts realistic high-g travel before The Expanse.

To me, "skyscrapers in space" feels like an attempt to capture the majesty of World War I and II battleships. Which is to say, not much better justified than the aerodynamic spaceship. I don't see why a hard-SF spaceship really needs to be big when it would still be quite fragile (given the energy of an orbital-velocity collision).

That is, unless you design your future weapons and FTL drive principles so they really do reward "bigger is better" (I'm on to you, David Weber.)

Same here, love the look.

Some of those generated ships gave me serious 'Event Horizon' vibes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eiE-NB-kxh8

I like http://www.rifters.com/echopraxia/enceladus.jpg

It'd be more realistic as well! As space is a vacuum we don't need to apply aerodynamics to the ships and they can be any which design!

True, but then Endurance from Seveneves had to evolve rather 'aero'dynamic (oblong) shape to protect from space debris by the huge piece of metal in the nose. If I interpret the text correctly, of course.

You still have the problem that heat from the sun accumulates differently in each part of your ship causing stress on the hull.

For some reason I completely missed that show, it looks great. Thanks!

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