I changed accounts.
This is a Real Life 20 Minutes into the Future setting, right?
If you blocked international world communications we would know right away, and it would be very, very bad.
Also, a satellite has to orbit Earth to transmit anything in a reasonable amount of time. We can detect a satellite orbiting Earth. It's not like it can hide. We have what are called "kinetic kill vehicles." Basically, it's like a missile, but instead of a warhead, it just sends a big block of metal at the satellite, which rams it, destroying it and sending it out of orbit. This has been tested in real life, by the US (delivered via F-15 Eagle fighter jets, if I recall correctly) and, I think, China and Russia...
I am now known as Flyboy.
Awesome Lightning Mantra
Oh, the rest of the world does know about the interference (obviously. I don't know how I made you believe I didn't know that). What they don't know about is the revolution.
How does that work, exactly? What are the necessary tools for detecting a satellite in this case?
edited 27th Aug '11 10:02:30 AM by Teraus
"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."
I changed accounts.
Not sure. I believe you can look up with a telescope and find the damn thing, but I would bet they use some form of radar to track them. After all, I'm pretty sure we (in the US, anyhow) keep track of all the satellites up there at all times, for obvious reasons...
Hell, how would he launch the thing? I mean... a rocket launch is kind of obvious. I suppose he could get it into space with the portals, but...
Edit: You said "without alarming the rest of the world." Yeah, there would be no lagtime there. If you could somehow block all international communication, it would go very bad, very fast...
edited 27th Aug '11 10:05:04 AM by USAF713
I am now known as Flyboy.
Awesome Lightning Mantra
He launched it before the revolution, in a deserted isle.
Doesn't a radar rely on electromagnetic waves, too? Also, looking for it with a telescope seems kinda difficult and time consuming.
Edit: I meant without alarming the rest of the world about an specific region being invaded.
edited 27th Aug '11 10:09:24 AM by Teraus
"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."
I changed accounts.
...how do you launch a satellite in a deserted island...?
Hm. Radar does. So we don't get any detection of that type? You'd have a really hard to shooting it down with a laser, then. You wouldn't be able to account for light-lag.
As for finding it, well, you can always just search around with a telescope, but that would be tedious and make it difficult to differentiate between satellites...
I am now known as Flyboy.
See ALL the stars!
Relativistic Doppler effect only really works at high fractions of c, unfortunately. The shifting caused by a velocity difference of whatever LEO velocity is will be negligible for any but the largest frequencies of light.
Fortunately,
edited 27th Aug '11 10:15:28 AM by Yej
Da Rules excuse all the inaccuracy in the world. Listen to them, not me.
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![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
Ugh, he has access to plenty of technology. He had also contacted and converted several important military leaders around the world months before the revolution. The rest of the world might have noticed about the satellite being launched, but, when they did, it was obviously too late (also, the portals could have been active some time before the rocket was launched.)
They don't even know how the satellite looks like, either...
I did mention that the precision of the program Mike developed was pretty good. What would be the necessary precision, in your opinion?
edited 27th Aug '11 10:18:00 AM by Teraus
"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."
I changed accounts.
If we noticed a satellite being launched from a deserted island, and none of the major countries took credit for it (they wouldn't), we'd shoot it down.
Unless you actually have to eye-ball the shot...
I am now known as Flyboy.
Awesome Lightning Mantra
Would they still notice it if the portals were active some time before the launch? Also, like I said, important military leaders had been convinced to work with the revolution at this point. Perhaps one ot the major countries did take account for it. Is that acceptable?
edited 27th Aug '11 10:24:58 AM by Teraus
"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."
I changed accounts.
OH, oh, ok...
I thought it was the satellite active in orbit doing the interference.
Hm...
I should think these portals would have to be pretty big and obvious to totally black out international communications. Wouldn't we notice that?
I am now known as Flyboy.
Awesome Lightning Mantra
Why would they have to be big? Nobody here has a reference of an interdimensional portal and how big it's supposed to be to emit a certain ammount of energy...
I don't know. If I came up with something like "Hey! look, Adam! There's the satellite in the sky! Shoot it down!" it would seem pretty ridiculous, I guess.
Edit: I forgot to mention something important. I didn't make it up for this moment, either. Not everyone can see the portals or the monsters. To most people, monsters are either invisible or transparent, glassy looking. Only a few people like Adam can see them clearly (or people who have been exposed to the otherworldly matter for enough time).
edited 27th Aug '11 11:19:59 AM by Teraus
"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."
I changed accounts.
Well, the rule, rather than the exception, in fiction, is that the more of an effect something has on the world, the bigger it is...
I am now known as Flyboy.
Awesome Lightning Mantra
Well, I did take some liberties to make solving the conflict a more difficult task, including making the portals not huge and invisible to most people.
Now, like the other poster said, there's probably an issue with using Doppler effect at low speeds. I don't know if it would be acceptable to have a device with enough precision to notice the difference at, say, 100 km/h. Adam has a lot of precision in his calculations, but Adam is not an antenna...
edited 27th Aug '11 10:41:02 AM by Teraus
"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."
I changed accounts.
Well, you could say they recalibrate their communications to whatever wavelength(s) the portal doesn't interfere with. In fact, if we could do that (I don't know for sure if this is possible, but it seems... plausible), that might make this whole plan come apart at the seems, because then targettable weaponry comes back into play, and KKV strikes take that satellite out like the paper tiger it is...
I am now known as Flyboy.
Awesome Lightning Mantra
Yes... They could do that. In fact, Mike does that earlier in the story, to send encoded messages to other people. (silly me)
So, they recalibrate a radar to the frequency that's not being affected and use it to locate the satellite... Well, it only makes me sad that I won't be able to show Adam's new abilities in this case. I could use the excuse that they don't have all the necessary materials, but that would unlikely, considering they have captured a revolutionary and they certainly have access to radars.
edited 27th Aug '11 10:46:49 AM by Teraus
"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."
I changed accounts.
Well, this brings up the question of, if Mike can do it, why doesn't he, you know, tell the US Government about it? (This is Real Life, right?) Cause, you know, we have the big ass military and the KKV capability and whatnot, and then we can get it to Europe and them, etc...
I am now known as Flyboy.
Awesome Lightning Mantra
The problem is: whatever message Mike sends, the revolutionaries will also receive. The code he uses for his messages was specifically created by one of the Resistance members. The US may have a big ass military power, but the portals can destroy anything in their way. (and don't forget the converted military leaders... USA is no exception)
edited 27th Aug '11 10:55:10 AM by Teraus
"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."
I changed accounts.
So how does Mike expect to destroy this portal if the US Military, most powerful army/navy/air force on Planet Earth, can't do it...?
I am now known as Flyboy.
Awesome Lightning Mantra
The difference is that the resistance knows about the portals and the revolution. The rest of the world doesn't.
They don't even know who can be trusted in the rest of the world. Also, the military on Noah's side is pretty powerful.
If he sends a message at this point, even if the other countries receive it, they will not be able to quickly organize themselves (there's still a major interference, after all). If the interference ends, however, and the rest of the world is informed, it's a whole different story.
edited 27th Aug '11 11:02:25 AM by Teraus
"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."
I changed accounts.
So, if you can't destroy the portal, how do you expect to...
Ugh. This is confusing, screw it, back to the satellite.
If you're using the same frequency as the enemy, they can hear you, but they can't jam you. Thus, it would be most efficient to use that frequency to get some radar, so you can actually aim a weapon at the damn thing and shoot it down...
I am now known as Flyboy.
Awesome Lightning Mantra
Yeah, I know. I already confirmed that.
You can't destroy a portal by shooting at it or something, but portals naturally dissipate when they're not being energized. That's why destroying the satellite is enough to end the interference. The satellite has many portals. Hundreds or thousands.
If there are too many complications, i'll just abandon the satellite idea and think of something else.
edited 27th Aug '11 11:10:01 AM by Teraus
"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."
I changed accounts.
So, wait, if the portal needs the satellite to be active, how was it active before the satellite was launched...?
I am now known as Flyboy.
Awesome Lightning Mantra
...
It doesn't need the satellite to be activated. It only needs an energy source if it's supposed to be kept for more than a few minutes. Most explanations about the portal technology are in the book.
One of Noah's objectives is creating a definitive portal, but he fails.
edited 27th Aug '11 11:13:50 AM by Teraus
"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."
I changed accounts.
Right, confusing portals...
Well, I guess you have your answer otherwise, though...
I am now known as Flyboy.
"What satellite?", you ask.
Let me explain: as some of you know, I'm writing a Sci-Fi series. During most of the first book (in the year 2042), there's a revolution going on. The mastermind behind the revolution has access to several neat tools that makes world domination significantly easier for him to achieve:
The interference is what I'm dealing with right now. He uses it to block most of the communication in the world, allowing only a select few frequency ranges to remain unblocked (which he uses to communicate with his robots and helpers). That allows him to dominate specific regions without alarming the rest of the world about the invasion (not quickly, at least).
The portals specifically created to generate this interference are now in a satellite orbiting the earth. Originally (in older versions of the book), they were on the ground, but that made no sense as it was stated that the revolutionary had access to satellites, and it was (relatively) too easy for the main characters to invade the place and end the interference.
Now, according to some of the main characters, the revolution is a bad thing. They get to know about it a few months before it actually happens and prepare a resistance. Stuff happens and, near the end of the book, they capture one of the revolutionaries and interrogate him about the interference.
The captured revolutionary tells them that he doesn't know the exact location of the satellite, because Noah Cartwright (the revolutionary leader) didn't trust him enough to give him that information. He does know about the location of a computer that (supposedly) allows the user to manipulate the portals in the satellite.
He also knows about a big laser weapon that can be used to destroy the satellite, if that's necessary.
They prepare a raid, fight lots of robots and monsters and find the computer, but nobody knows the password. Mike Wisener (a member of the resistance who is also a skilled hacker) tries to hack it, but fails when Olivia (an Ax-Crazy minion of Noah) finds about it and blows up the computer and almost kills the good guys (yes, she is that crazy and inconsequential).
They're pretty hopeless now. Ending the interference would make defeating the revolutionaries so much easier... But then, Adam (the protagonist) has an idea. The problem is... His idea depends on the outcome of this thread (maybe).
My idea is something like this:
It's not possible to actually detect a wave emitted by the satellite. It's only possible to detect the waves within the ranges that are not affected by the interference, and the emitting sources are mostly the robots all around the world, so...
Adam (who knows the Mystery of Time and Space by now, but more on that later) will use a program developed by Mike that shows the frequency ranges that are not affected by the interference (with a good precision). Mike had developed this program a few weeks earlier.
According to the Doppler Effect, if they're approaching the satellite, the wavelength of the emitted waves will seem shorter, and the displayed frequency range will be slightly greater. If they're distancing themselves from the satellite, however, the displayed frequency will have smaller borderline frequency values.
Adam will then take several measures and will estimate the exact relative position and speed of the satellite, and will then aim the laser at it and shoot. With the satellite destroyed, the portals will gradually dissipate and the interference will end.
How the heck does Adam do that?
Well, they could try to use a computer, but it is easier at this point to rely on Adam's awesome spatial notion obtained with the First Mystery. He is not actually calculating all the numbers normally, he is more or less "feeling" them. Sort of like how you feel the speed of a car when you are crossing a street and determine whether or not it's possible to proceed.
The problem is, I'm not sure if this Doppler Effect method will come up with a single solution (and I'm being lazy right now, so I'd rather make this thread than actually make the calculations).
Can anyone give me suggestions? Is it necessary to improve this method or is there an alternative method that could also work?
edited 27th Aug '11 10:30:48 PM by Teraus
"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."