Bay 12 Games Forum

I was thinking about that so-called temporal anomaly and after reading your thoughts and making some thought experiments of my own, I have come to a conclusion: These are not temporal anomalies. (Right now I'm wishing I had given Flint some intelligence so that he could say those things IC preferably in an auditorium with people going *gasp* at the announcement.)

First, let's look at the slow-mo zone. It took a light beam about a second to travel the distance from Flint's laser to the ground and back (let's name that distance 2x). That would mean that the speed of light in the slow-mo zone was c/(2*x) times slower then outside the slow-mo zone. However, current physics say that the speed of light is constant. So, we come to the conclusion that IF this is a temporal anomaly then time passes c/(2*x) times slower. And for x=5 meters, that means that a second inside that region would pass in about 347 days. For the more likely x=15 meters it is 1 normal second = 115 slow-mo days.

However, there are a number of problem in this hypothesis: Objects entering the field did not break apart or display other signs of damage (one explanation for this could be that the change in time-speed is gradual enough for this to not happen). The rocks could still be seen moving even though with the rate time passes they should have looked completely still (unless our suit cameras are really really good). There is no distortion of light passing through the barrier. There is no gravitational anomaly or spacetime distortion here (not that we can see anyway).

A way to prove that this isn't a temporal anomaly is by measuring the infrared emissions of an object before and after it enters the slow-mo zone. If this were a temporal anomaly then infrared light coming from the object while inside the slow-mo zone would be less intense and have a lower frequency then infrared light coming from the same object outside the zone.

So what do I believe this is? I believe this is some kind of testing area or playground or anything else an alien would use this for. It works like a vector manipulator, multiplying the vectors of all objects entering it by a constant and dividing the vectors of all objects exiting it by a constant. And not just the vectors of the objects themselves but the vectors of all the components of the objects (photons, quarks, etc). This constant could also be dependant on the object's condition (mass, speed, particle type, etc), so that we can notice rocks moving while light goes 5m/s. This also solves the break-apart problem, since it is possible for objects to not be affected by the manipulator unless they have entered the zone in its entirety. Thus, time-warp-like effects can be produced without the need for a temporal anomaly.

A way to learn more about the zone is by inserting something long halfway inside the zone and seeing how it responds. Morul's pirate eye would also be useful if he didn't go blind just by looking at it. (By the way, has Morul tried looking at the crater from afar?)

Of course, one can always throw physics out the window and say that this is an alien anomaly fueled by space magic.