Skip to main content

Does The Culture possess FTL communication?


Iain M. Banks's Culture has the ability to travel faster than light (up to 233,000 c) with infraspace engines built from exotic nanomatter, but can it also transmit communication supraluminally?



Edit to be clearer: I realize that they can communicate by messengers/couriers, but what I want to know is if they can transmit massless data, such as electromagnetic waves or indeed light, faster than light. Due to the nature of their physical hyperdrives that can move matter faster than light, it's not clear that they can do the same with something without mass, or even if they can propel mass that doesn't have its own drive attached to it.



Answer



Yes, although the speed of communication is ill-defined it appears to be very fast indeed, many multiples the speed of light and capable of being sent ahead of ships moving at very rapid velocities.


There's a good, if somewhat flowery, analogy provided in Surface Detail



The only reality-based restriction the galactic house modelled accurately was that produced by the deeply annoying fact that even hyperspacial light did not travel with infinite speed. To carry on a normal conversation with another Mind, one had to be in the same room and reasonably close to it. Even two Minds being within the same vast room but on opposite sides created a noticeable delay as they shouted back and forth.


Being any further away meant sending messages. These usually showed up as gently glowing symbols flickering disembodied in the air in front of the recipient, but – subject to the witheringly prodigious imaginations of Minds in general and the particular and quite possibly highly eccentric predilections of the sender in particular – could show up as almost anything. Swift-moving ballets consisting of multiply-limbed aliens, on fire and throwing shapes which just happened briefly to resemble Marain symbols (for example) were by no means unknown.



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

harry potter - Do the Kwikspell courses work?

In Harry Potter we are introduced to Kwikspell course in The Chamber of Secrets (and never hear about it again). We see Filch taking courses, presumably by mail. The descriptions of Kwikspell make me think it is for people who are weak in magic (kind of like how Neville was supposed to be when he was younger), but had magic in them nonetheless. However, Ron's comments later in the chapter make it sound like it is mainly for Squibs to learn magic. However, it is strongly implied through out all the books that Squibs are essentially Muggles, and will never be able to do magic. How then is a Kwikspell course supposed to work? Do we have any information to know if it works at all? Is it a scam? An answer from any level of canon is welcome. Answer Kwikspell courses are (probably) useful to some wizards, but not to squibs. The Kwikspell course literature comes with two testimonials. Madam Z. Nettles of Topsham writes: ‘I had no memory for incantations and my potions were a family joke...
Post a Comment
Read more

futurama - How much time is lost in 'Time Keeps on Slippin''

In time Keeps on Slippin' , Farnsworth creates a basketball team which he matures by abusing Chronitons. This leads to time skipping forward by random, but ever increasing amounts. How much time was skipped in this way? Answer Unfortunately, I don't think a good estimate can be made for this, for two reasons: Many of the time skips move forward by an indeterminate amount of time. At one point, the Professor mentions localized regions of space skipping forward much more than others. We then see two young boys on the street below complaining about having to pay social security, only to suddenly become senior citizens and start complaining about wanting their money. Thus, each individual could have experienced a different amount of time skippage.
Post a Comment
Read more

Was the "pure soul" of Harry's what had really hurt Voldemort?

In the Order of the Phoenix, Voldemort possesses Harry, and it hurts. Greatly. I think that Dumbledore explained that it was because Voldemort's rotten soul was incapable of assimilating Harry's pure soul, that Voldemort didn't understand the love and friendship etc that Harry has in his heart. But, I think it was a lie. Remember that in Deathly Hallows, while looking for information regarding Horcruxes, it is discovered that it is in fact possible to merge a soul fragment back, but that the process was extremely painful. Now then, if Voldemort tried to possess Harry, and Harry had a fragment of Voldemort's soul, I think that it could have been the true cause of Voldemort's pain: the fact of having his soul so close of another fragment. I think that Dumbledore knew that fact, but had to lie to Harry because it was inappropriate to let him know that he had one of Voldemort's soul fragments at the moment. Is that right? Or was it truly the pure soul of Harry's...
Post a Comment
Read more

languages - Do we ever see written English in the Star Wars films?

In Empire Strikes Back , we see a transcription of what R2's beeps and bloops mean, but it's not English (sorry for the low quality, it's from the 2004 DVDs): I'd assume it's what Basic looks like when written, but is there some point in the the Star Wars films we see written English instead? (This sort of spun off from a discussion in How do people understand astromech droids? .) Answer At one point there was English but it has been phased out in subsequent versions of the films. Chris Gould at DVD Active did a comparison of all versions of each of the Star Wars films, and in his comparison of Episode 4 , there are a couple of screenshots showing how the power gauge for the Death Star tractor beam was changed. I imagine there are probably more to be found in his other comparisons but I haven't got around to reading those yet.
Post a Comment
Read more