4SPEC

[BLADE]

Affiliation: N/A

Ownership: N/A

Intent: Open source technology for modification and commodification on the wider RP market. Also serves a possible story need by heightening the conflict between Force Users (henceforth referred to --charmingly enough-- as FUs) and Non-Force Users (who don't get an abbreviation as this
is Star Wars... naturally.)

As far as the diegetic intent, 4SPEC provides Non-Force Users with at least a limited ability to detect and track force signatures and usage.

Model/Name: 05251977

Type: Adaptable chipset and sensor array with universal architecture. Installation-compatible with any extant datapad, etc.

Power Supply: Draws power from host datapad.

Sensors: Proprietary array of laser, visible light, and gravitational sensors, dumb droid "learning" node

Size: 3.5 by 3.5 centimeter chipset and related components. Can be attached via universal port to any compatible system (written in basic coding language.) Can be attached to datapad, etc. motherboard or built into existing architectures.

Composition: Silicon, variable host metal construction (durasteel, etc.), variable conductor construction

Description: Can track active force usage from a distance of one hundred meters, as well as residual force activity with a large confidence band and acceptable to impressive precision when tracking less than three targets.

Residual activity can be traced for up to two hundred days, until decay and signal noise make readings useless or counterintuitive. Can describe the Force as a supervenient system as well as its components and related epiphenomena in waves based off of the principles enumerated from decades of research on midichlorian spread rates and mitochondrial "entanglement," field observation of Jedi and Sith techniques, extensive medical studies of FUs and their family lines, and tremendous processing power run through dozens of droid supercores and exabytes of data (however relatively scant) on all aspects of this Force, which we now know to be as real as gravity of electromagnetics.

The general readings are read in at least four dimensions (hence the name) but dozens if not hundreds of mysterious dimensions on this mysterious "Force" still exist for scientists to study.

Unknown at this time to what extent FUs can manipulate their presence in The Force (at least to non-endowed laymen), and the scanner can be a bit twitchy when handling multiple signatures or trying to separate them into discrete readings.

Continual improvements expected, assuming funding is stable (FUs are a relatively rare occurrence in the galaxy.) Theoretically possible to boost scanning power and precision, but would require time, research, effort, etc. Modifications not yet tried in the field.

 

[Andrewza]

probably is

​

so I don't see how this works since the force is every where.

 

[BLADE]

probably is

​

so I don't see how this works since the force is every where.

So is gravity and yet we can detect waves now. Also should point out it is explicitly canon that Jedi can detect da Force in doods blood.

Good point but I thought it through. Not farfetched (though I did point out the possibility of interference or false readings and ICly this would only have been tested in a controlled environment so at least the 1.0 version might be a fortiori harrier in the field) in my view but to each his own. Looking forward to Clayton et al's views.

Thanks for the feedback. Could you see your PCs using this should I be fortunate enough to have it approved?

 

[Andrewza]

So does gravity and yet we can detect waves now. Also should point out it is explicitly canon that Jedi can detect da Force in doods blood.

Good point but I thought it through. Not farfetched (though I did point out the possibility of interference or false readings and ICly this would only have been tested in a controlled environment so at least the 1.0 version might be a fortiori harrier in the field) in my view but to each his own. Looking forward to Clayton et al's views.

Thanks for the feedback. Could you see your PCs using this should I be fortunate enough to have it approved?

So does gravity and yet we can detect waves now. Also should point out it is explicitly canon that Jedi can detect da Force in doods blood.

Good point but I thought it through. Not farfetched (though I did point out the possibility of interference or false readings and ICly this would only have been tested in a controlled environment so at least the 1.0 version might be a fortiori harrier in the field) in my view but to each his own. Looking forward to Clayton et al's views.

Thanks for the feedback. Could you see your PCs using this should I be fortunate enough to have it approved?

they don't detect the force. It micro organisms they picked up.

​

All living things produce the force so you going to have a hard time using this with out the force guiding you. But then you would be able to let the force guide you with out fancy tech.

No I got 2 Jedi and a Czerka agent.



Though, it may be possible to use some tech mumbo jumbo to test if some one can use the force. That could be useful in limited cases.

 

[BLADE]

Okey-dokey. So let me see if I can unpack my response to some of the points you brought up, starting with the graphic.

1. I actually think in this case we're arguing semantics.
2. That's not a canon source, just someone's analysis. Neat background though. Very Star Wars-y.
3. I don't think it's strictly speaking necessary to get into a debate on the nature of the Force (though I think it's very promising that tech like this can perhaps help kindle that debate or spark such passionate reactions) though there is certainly evidence that midichlorians are more than just passive receptors of the force (the graphic itself notes as much in the end with the throwaway line to Anakin's conception.) I myself kind of shaded at this when I mentioned mitochondrial entanglement (a sort of neologism referent to free radicals and all kinds of cool stuff going on in your body. Your Body: It's a Wonkaesque Factory!)

With regards to your assertion, I don't think there's any proof to that. As a STEM guy myself, I can tell you that all the disciplines involve unavoidable contact and immersion into the very phenomena we study, or equate, or describe. And from an epistemological standpoint, being able to describe or detect something is not necessarily the same as being able to explain or understand its nature.

In that regard, leaving aside the battle applications of this (which will be decided by a dynamic process of whoever adopts this --should I be so fortunate as to receive that kind of endorsement-- and the staff) I think there are lots of possibilities it brings up in the laboratory so to speak of imagination and the diegetic one. One could research hereditary characteristics of Force related gene mutations and alleles. One could look at the effect of having so many mitochondria on health both mental and physical. And so on.

It would be doubly interesting because this timeline is all about the Dawn of something as opposed to a dark age of rebarbative unreasoning and ignorance. At least if you buy that narrative. 4SPEC could foster in this metanarrative understanding and reason towards Jedi/Sith/other FUs. Or it might be instrumentalized in the small and large ways we see applied to democide, genocide and ethnic cleansing. Reason and knowledge themselves are not neutral and valueless abstractions in any case, and perhaps a third option, where a sterile and supercilious understanding of the physical nature of The Force is superpositioned over an arguably more valuable metaphysical and spiritual understanding of it.

It could happen within and without the Republic. Within and without the Jedi (as spiritual as they are, all humanoids to be a bit broader in our taxonomy, have a yen for quantifying things). And so on.

I don't endorse any of those positions necessarily, but I do think they make a good story. I do think your own position has its own goods points and ICly points to perhaps a more traditionalist and resistant Jedi tradition in reaction to the emergence of technology and other social and material factors dealing with the fact that people can move shit with their minds.

In that regard I see our disagreement, such as it is, as not an intractable OOC dispute, but as potential fodder for good RP stuff.

Mind you, I think it's ultimately up to the staff, and I hope they see it my way, but good points brought up for sure. I'll be working on this and developing it further should it be approved, and as I am open source, I hope and invite others to do the same.

 

[Clayton]

This is a cool idea and all, but ultimately I have to ask myself if we want to actually quantify and graph something that's been largely portrayed as mystical and spiritual. Lucas et al tried it with midichlorians and it left sort of a sour taste like most of the extra stuff he added in.

Given that this could, with interpretation of your loose description, allow for a scientific style of education/training in force powers "to get an effective push you need least 355spec and you're averaging about 300, so you're close. Tom, your beast control needs more harmonic stability in the energy patterns..." and that would largely kill any sort of spirituality/mysticism granted to the force. So, sorry, but archived.