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Comment by jasonkester | Hacker News Reader

I think Banks' The Algabraist got it about right.

In fact, that whole book is crammed full of good "things we currently believe to be true about physics extrapolated as far as theoretically possible" ideas:

  "How do you navigate this thing?"
  "Point."
  "Point?"
  "Yes, point.  It's all about having enough power.
   Fiddling around with calculations about DeltaV is really
   just a sign that you don't have enough power."

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"It's all about having enough power."

That really does sound like the name of a Culture GSV.

[Correction - No Culture ship would be quite so lacking in gravitas, so I suspect a more likely name would be "Fiddling around with calculations about DeltaV"].

I would say there is a good chance that a GSV would have no gravitas and that a GCU would have very little gravitas indeed.

Let me second this recommendation that anyone with a genuine interest in this topic check out The Algebraist; it's a truly excellent book. I wouldn't say it's Hard SF but it's pretty firm and, IMO, a far more considered and imaginative vision of viable-ish space battle than the linked article manages.

I mean, the article hardly even mentions antimatter, aka the most potent energy store in the known physical universe, aka God's battery. Who's going to be frigging around with some stupid dirty fission reactor when the local Dyson Sphere is producing cheap (by military standards) AM by the kilo?

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