Pardon me while I try and take back a cherished engineering term from the hack science fiction writers.

: To me, the former is still extrapolation into untested territory - we
: "think" it could/should do this, based on known science, so
: let's write it as though it does. The latter is more like - we
: "think" there is something that will accomplish what we want to
: write about, so let's handwave write it in.

And I think that there ought to be some attempt to recognize the difference between the two.

: Perhaps the difference is in direction of writing said 'space magic'.

I seem to recall that Jules Verne often denigrated Hugo Wells' fiction, because Hugo Wells rarely tried to make it plausible. Jules Verne often included contemporary science and engineering (even if he got it wrong!) into his stories.

Wells, on the other hand, was perfectly happy just saying "It's an engine that travels through time and lets us contemplate the horrible, horrible end that industrial classism is leading us toward."

I believe that Hugo Wells' "War of the Worlds" was an aversion, as he took pains to explain how the Heat-Rays worked and how the Martians evolved from man-like creatures. Tellingly, I liked it a lot more than his other books when I was younger.

: With regards to hard light, I was referring to the
: glowy-structure-and-material used quite abundantly in the environments and
: gameplay,

: not just (what I think you're referring to) hard light ammo and
: 'officially labeled' application or some such.

Hardlight ammo still strikes me as being either ingenious or one of the worst ideas ever to surface in Halo fiction. The fact that the weapons that fire it require physical ammunition does not help.

: From my perspective, a
: cursory look over the Halo franchise had cyan-glowy material throughout
: the entire series of games, the Forerunner 'style' that, without blatant
: description, most would just say was Forerunner use of hard light.

... So every single instance of blue Tron lines is supposed to be an example of hardlight?
I'm sorry, but I have a hard time believing that a majority of fans, prior to Halo 4, would have written off the glowy blue circuitry-like lines as the same sort of hardlight we saw used in bridges.

: The
: term was around since Halo 1 for the glowy bridge and other structural
: designs, and the glowy architecture has proliferated through each release.

Halo: CE: Bridges on the level Halo and 343 Guilty Spark
Halo 2: Bridges and energy fields. Can't remember specific levels.
Halo 3: Bridge to the Citadel.
Halo Wars: Bridges in the Relic Interior, light bridges on the level Beachhead, garrisonable walls and the gate in the final level, Escape.
Halo Reach: Nowhere.

Halo 4: Everywhere, everywhen.

So, glowy bridge and 'other structural designs'? Please. It's always been represented as glowing blue energy fields that take simple geometric designs. Do-anything Forerunner magitech is purely a 343i invention, and it is disingenuous to assert otherwise.

: It's everywhere in Halo 4, as if 343 embraced the 'concept' of FR hard
: light and began using it in more obvious applications, like ammo and
: shields and whatnot.

More like they embraced the concept of Forerunner having hardlight technology that's indistinguishable from ordinary matter.

: I would only see recreation of molecules as creating an inert entity. The
: difference between the entity being 'alive' and 'dead'.

Sure, you'd need some finagling to get the cellular activity going, but that should be simple chemistry.

: What makes the
: entity alive? Technically, when we're born, we're made of already-living
: matter, passed on through father & mother. "Aliveness" never
: begins anywhere, it's always been; well, it had a beginning somewhere,
: whether you believe in Evolution or otherwise.

Both, somewhat.
But in the case of evolution, living matter arose from organic molecules (non-living matter) at least once before in history, and likely several times afterward. It is not impossible, merely unlikely.

: Death is the end of that
: 'life'. So in cloning/creating Life, I firmly believe that it can't be
: done from lifeless matter.

Are you familiar with the concept of "God of the gaps"?
People point at the holes in our knowledge of how we came to be here, and say that only a god could have bridged those gaps. As we learn more and more, the gaps shrink, and the god becomes a tiny one indeed.

So, that's what you're defending. Gaps that will become smaller and smaller. We have already learned how to clone animals, and work is already underway to create the simplest organism possible from scratch.

: If we create molecules and atoms, we create
: molecules and atoms, not life.

Unless you wish to argue in favor of a soul, we are biology, which is applied chemistry.

: That's why so far, cloning has only used
: DNA to re-creating the birth/growth process; life from existing life.

Clarke's First Law:

: Right, which is why I love sci-fi that explores the meaning/definition of
: "life" (or 'alive'). Is it the biological definition of what
: makes something alive?

Insufficient.

: Or is it our perception of how something interacts
: with us, and how we treat it, that defines whether something is alive (or
: a life)?

Are we doomed to think that intelligence can only think like us? Some of the most precious moments will be when we reach out to a mind completely different from ours, and find them reaching back.

: Exactly :) (I must also say, I don't like sci-fi that presumes to answer said
: questions, but rather explores the ethics/morality of dealing with the
: question, letting us come to our own conclusions; that's what pushes us
: forward)

"The best science fiction asks 'what if?' The worst science fiction states 'this is how it is.'"
-Quirel Rasq'uire'laskar

: I feel like we've come to a consensus regarding mech vs power armour and its
: uses. If not, I think the subject has come to a satisfactory conclusion :)

Apparently.

: Right, I preferred the former.

The Formerunner?

: But that heads into territory of the other
: thread topic, re whether the FR remaining mystic would have served the
: Halo franchise better in the long run, or if this was a necessary
: direction to extend the life of Halo (whether you like that idea or not
: given its current state :)

And back to the other thread I go.

: heh, I don't watch anime,

Smart man.

: so this was just epic-scale machine vs monster
: combat. A wild ride. Even if the story was just a typical blockbuster
: ticket seller.

I went and watched it with a fellow engineer. We walked out of the theater talking about better (More efficient, more entertaining) ways to kill Kaiju.

-Institute a breeding program for the skin parasites, put them into hibernation, wire them with shaped charges, and drop them on a Kaiju as it comes to shore.
-Build the wall higher, line it with landmines and whatever gun that Mk III Jager was using.
-German U-Boats scaled up to 500 meters long, to interdict the Kaiju before they reach shore.

Fights were alright (we MST3Ked the physics at times) and the subplot about the scientists hunting down Kaiju organs to perform a Drift on were interesting. Whining, kvetching and moaning about whether the girl should be allowed to drift with the lead got old, fast.