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Seen in the referrers, some kind words said here about The Iron Concord. Ordinarily, I wouldn’t link to such things simply to flatter myself – oh, who am I kidding, of course I would – but in this case I’m doing so because in the course of checking out said
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We Are As Mayflies: What, humans? YOUR LIVES ARE MEASURED IN YEARS AND DECADES. YOU WITHER AND DIE.  WE ARE ETERNAL, THE PINNACLE OF EVOLUTION AND EXISTENCE. BEFORE US, YOU ARE NOTHING. …well, okay, awesome Sovereign quotations aside, they’re rarely that arrogant. (Unless irritable, and let’s face it,
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Weaponized Exhaust: Ah, yes – the Kzinti lesson. What can we say about the Kzinti lesson. Well, we can say that it is both entirely true and entirely useless (in actual space combat, although on the ground your mileage may differ). It’s entirely true because, as Larry Niven said, “A
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Ttto and blatantly imitating: “Uranium Fever”, by Elton Britt [1955]. Verse 1 Well I don’t know but I’ve been told Reactor fuel’s worth more than gold I sold my hab, bought an OTV With a smeltin’ stack and refineree- Chorus Uranium fever has done and got me
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Weapon of Mass Destruction: Per the Ley Accords (i.e., the Laws and Customs of War), in descending order of aargh, you’ve got star-killing weapons (nova bombs, including specifically star-targeted strangelet bombs, twist-pinch bombs, and most hypothetical causal weapons), planet-killing weapons (large/fast kinetic impacters, including asteroid drops, planet-targeted
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In light of today’s science news, incidentally, it’s probably time for me to repost Yelling at the Sky. (Because now we can hear them.) Edited to add: also, today’s xkcd seems oddly relevant —
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Actually, there’s one other thing I could append to the previous post, with regard to Earth and why it’s probably a good thing that first contact ain’t gonna happen any time soon: As has been pointed out to me, the thing that would truly make the Imperials
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What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Averted to varying degrees (and, obviously, in the naïve sense, completely averted since there are no humans at all). The standard view, in the Associated Worlds, is that described in the Universal Accord on Sophont Rights: anything that thinks and has volition (i.e., is
Imperial State Security
(Probably non-canonical, but my brain cooked it up this morning…) The theory behind RAZOR CATION is that it is a stylishly thin, ultralight, fully functional pocket slate that just happens to be equipped with a single mollyblade edge – such that you can throw it, have it accelerate through the air
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War of Earthly Aggression: Preemptively averted with the Empire’s interstellar colonies. The Thirteen Colonies (the first thirteen systems colonized) were originally colonized sublight by sleeper vessels, so while technically subordinate to the Eliéran Empire were functionally independent. When the wormhole was invented and reunification came about, they were each
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War is Glorious: The doctrine of one of the Flamic war gods: Kalasané, Laughing Warrior, Sword of Heaven, Lord of the Two Swords, the eikone of battle, courage, valor, victory through strength, and personal combat, who approaches the whole thing with a degree of enthusiasm that would impress the mythological
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Today’s accidentally found art comes via Geek & Sundry’s article: “The Future of Cosplay, Today! Felicia Day Models 3D Printed Armor” (more images and photoshoot video at the link), in which the armor in question was designed by Melissa Ng (link to her work here, and seriously, check