Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

The visible light frequency changes in the field would be screened by the fiber cladding, just like visible light.

Luke

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

Crackpottery? LOL! Indeed, I'm nothing if not a crackpot, holding forth on things about which I know precious little! Good thing there are such level heads to set me straight.


And that's distinct from metaphysics in what way?

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

It sounds like you understand the basics.

Luke

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

Yeah, I think lwcamp's prohibitive factors trump yours ... antenna size needn't be vehicular, it simply limits the effective distance (although Van Eck Phreaking works over "large distances," according to Van Eck's testing. (How large, exactly? Not sure....)

Assuming that your computer must be more complex (and larger) than the target only limits you to scanning smaller computers... it doesn't mean that it's impossible.

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

Hooray! Okay, now I'm ready for the 201 version.... :)

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

Heh. I wasn't actually thinking about this thread, more about people freaking about orbital mind control lasers and wearing tinfoil hats. Which, come to think of it, is quite similar to what people were discussing in this thread.

Hmm, I'm not entirely sure. Is metaphysics about ways of intuiting the physical world so you can verify it by physical means? Usually when I try to make sense of metaphysical philosophy, it seems like they are talking in circles without actually saying anything of substance, so I tend not to pay much attention to it.

Luke

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

There was some tinfoil hattery in this thread, no doubt.... shooting "hackers" on sight, because they might BSOD your brain? Yow.


While I'm no expert on either metaphysics or QM interpretations, they seem more-or-less identical to me....

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

If you're talking about using a high-performance cyberdeck to hack an pocket calculator at contact ranges, I drop my objections. But that seems like moving the goalposts a very, very long way.

Van Eck, it seems, wasn't using spatial resolution. So not so much need for a big antenna.
Not sure how that's tinfoil hattery if they can BSOD your brain. In the usual sense. It might result in wearing tinfoil hats as a preventative measure, but when they actually have mind control lasers that's not so crazy.

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

I certainly wasn't talking about so trivial a task at the time, but it sounds like that's about as far as our present understanding of physics can take it. In light of a detailed explanation of exactly why it's problematic at our current TL, I'd agree to this being filed as (what was it?) "marginal superscience."

EDIT: Although, hacking a smartgun with a high-performance cyberdeck at tactical combat ranges is only slightly more cinematic than "pocket calculator at contact ranges," and that was the initial case under discussion....


Well, but I interpreted lwcamp as saying that the limitations on time relation were essentially the same as those on spatial relation -- a resolution problem based on wavelength vs. component size.

(And, stripped of layman's fumbling, my initial "though experiment" was a time-relation reading -- capturing and comparing bit-states over time, and using them to derive the architecture.)


1. How do you tell a hacker from a non-hacker "on sight?"

2. How can you tell "on sight" whether a given hacker has the ability to BSOD your brain? Do you assume that every hacker can?

3. Shooting any broad category of person "on sight" -- or burning them at the stake, etc -- strikes me as being a bit 'round the bend.

Maybe "tinfoil hattery" isn't the right term; maybe "naked psychosis?" ;)

(Note: I'm not calling anyone a naked psycho; I realize it was said in the context of a very hypothetical situation. It just struck me as a pretty reactionary argument: "This idea scares me! It makes me want to kill!")

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

You can't capture bit-states in the first place without the spatial resolution. The signal is generated by electrical currents, not bits.
I'd interpret it as being more like what happens when someone turns up in a civilian environment armed to the teeth with lethal weapons. Only not just lethal weapons, lethal and horrifying weapons.

So imagine the likely response to someone who wanders around a city carrying a flamethrower, several large and nasty looking blades, and hand grenades.

Now make it worse, because all of that nasty hardware is concealable.