# Are scalar weapons for real? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 4, 2003, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879 "2003-08-04T12:50:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 42
**Author:** ![umop\_ap\_sdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/dbc845/32.png) [@umop\_ap\_sdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/umop_ap_sdn)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2003, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/821 "2003-10-13T03:18:11Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by MonkeyMule \* > \*\*How many times do we have to go over this? Death-Rays" are hypenated. Man that was way back on page 8 or 9 \*\* 'Scuze me! I didn’t read page 8 or 9. I just read all the other threads where “1920’s style death rays” are mentioned. 😃 Aryk29 ambles over to page 8 or 9 to read the rest of the thread. ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2003, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/822 "2003-10-13T22:41:02Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Bewildebeest \* > \*\*I don’t know the answer, but a bronze 1920’s style death ray would look mighty sweet. > > Titanium would be pretty hot too, but rather anachronistic. > > Didn’t the Russians just stamp them out of sheet metal during WWII? \*\* Anachronistic? Uh, titanium wasn’t used extensively in _anything_ until **after** WW II. Also, given that it’s a royal PITA to work with (it’s too “springy” to be stamped out using the same processes as other metals, and it can only be welded in a **non** -oxygen atmosphere to name but two issues), I can’t imagine **any** pre-WW II death rays being mass-produced out of titanium. If you (or anyone else) has ever seen one, it _has_ to be a one-off custom job and _ **not** _ something mass-produced. (Currently, the cost for titanium is something like 15X the price of steel, and that’s a historic _low_ price! Russia is also home to the world’s largest titanium reserves, however, until fairly recently, they didn’t have the technology to utilize it very much.) ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2003, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/823 "2003-10-13T22:47:42Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Bewildebeest \* > \*\*I don’t know the answer, but a bronze 1920’s style death ray would look mighty sweet. > > Titanium would be pretty hot too, but rather anachronistic. > > Didn’t the Russians just stamp them out of sheet metal during WWII? \*\* Anachronistic? Uh, titanium wasn’t used extensively in _anything_ until **after** WW II. Also, given that it’s a royal PITA to work with (it’s too “springy” to be stamped out using the same processes as other metals, and it can only be welded in a **non** -oxygen atmosphere to name but two issues), I can’t imagine **any** pre-WW II death rays being mass-produced out of titanium. If you (or anyone else) has ever seen one, it _has_ to be a one-off custom job and _ **not** _ something mass-produced. (Currently, the cost for titanium is something like 15X the price of steel, and that’s a historic _low_ price! Russia is also home to the world’s largest titanium reserves, however, until fairly recently, they didn’t have the technology to utilize it very much.) ---
**Author:** ![Bewildebeest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/779978/32.png) [@Bewildebeest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bewildebeest)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2003, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/824 "2003-10-14T02:14:19Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Tuckerfan \* > \*\*Anachronistic? Uh, titanium wasn’t used extensively in _anything_ until **after** WW II. \*\* Yes, I know that. What I meant is that a 1920’s style death ray made of titanium would be an **anachronism**. A bronze death ray would make a rather stylish gentleman’s sidearm, but as it would be rather heavy I would doubt such a thing was ever made. But then there is the legend of the gold/jewel encrusted _“Maltese Death Ray”…_ ---
**Author:** ![Wikkit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c0e974/32.png) [@Wikkit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wikkit)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2003, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/825 "2003-10-14T22:22:33Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Bewildebeest \* > **Yes, I know that. What I meant is that a 1920’s style death ray made of titanium would be an anachronism.** He challenged you because anachronism or anachronistic is generally used to imply that something belongs to an earlier time; outmoded. A guy who brings a 1920s style death ray to a 2010 style death ray duel is anachronistic. Since we don’t have the whole time travel thing down, we don’t seem to have a word for something that’s chronologically incorrent in the other direction. Hypercedent? Malapropos, or unseemly work, but aren’t that specific. ---
**Author:** ![MonkeyMule](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc348/32.png) [@MonkeyMule](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MonkeyMule)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2003, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/826 "2003-10-14T22:29:15Z")
YOu know my querry about non-metal death rays has gone unanswered. ANy body have a frickin clue around here? ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2003, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/827 "2003-10-14T22:57:32Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by MonkeyMule \* > \*\*YOu know my querry about non-metal death rays has gone unanswered. ANy body have a frickin clue around here? \*\* OOOH! OOOH! I GOTTA CLUE! I GOTTA CLUE! The word “Rache” written in blood on the wall of a tumbledown Victorian mansion. Hurry, \*\*MonkeyMule \*\* ! The game’s afoot! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![MonkeyMule](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc348/32.png) [@MonkeyMule](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MonkeyMule)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2003, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/828 "2003-10-14T23:24:29Z")
**Bosda** Quickly, we need to rush a sample to the lab. ALso take pictures, we must analize the hand writing. If I remember the Countess who owned the Mansion before yourself had a lefward tilt to her writtings… ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2003, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/829 "2003-10-15T00:35:35Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by MonkeyMule \* > \*\*Pages 4 through 9 seems like a lifetime ago. > > And since we are on metalurgy, what alloys make for the best death rays, and strickly speaking do they HAVE to be metal? Could they be constructed of hige grade polymers, or ceramics, or even ceramic metal hybrids (Cermets)? \*\* Well, for ceramics, I wouldn’t trust anything made by anyone but [these guys.](http://www.nanophase.com/) [url=“[http://63.111.59.137/archive/output.cfm?ID=588](http://63.111.59.137/archive/output.cfm?ID=588)”]This article from Dec. 1995’s _Discover_ magazine explains why: > [@](#): > > Next Siegel takes out a pill-size piece of titania, a common ceramic. At one time the sample was shaped like a miniature soup can, but now it looks as if someone stepped on it, squeezing the two ends together and mashing out the middle. Strange behavior for a ceramic. These nonmetallic substances are usually so stiff that they respond to pressure by fracturing into a thousand pieces. Drop a tin cup on the floor, and it will flex a little bit and bounce back into shape, small dents notwithstanding. Drop a ceramic cup and you’ll still be picking up bits of it next Christmas. A ceramic that mashes instead of smashes–like the one that has come out of Siegel’s forge–is as rare as a metal cup that shatters when it hits the floor. I don’t know if I’d want a wood-bodied death ray, as it’s apt to catch fire from all the heat generated, plus, it might not handle shielding you from the radiation so well. Fiber-glass is just to flimsy for the rough and tumble world of death rays, and carbon fiber _might_ work, but I’m not sure if it could handle a lot of stresses before it started cracking. ---
**Author:** ![Bewildebeest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/779978/32.png) [@Bewildebeest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bewildebeest)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2003, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/830 "2003-10-15T00:42:53Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Wikkit \* > \*\*He challenged you because anachronism or anachronistic is generally used to imply that something belongs to an earlier time; outmoded. A guy who brings a 1920s style death ray to a 2010 style death ray duel is anachronistic. > \*\* Not so! Anachronism doesn’t imply which direction. A dinosaur in a caveman movie or a transistor radio in “Titanic” would both be anachronistic. ---
**Author:** ![umop\_ap\_sdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/dbc845/32.png) [@umop\_ap\_sdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/umop_ap_sdn)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2003, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/831 "2003-10-15T01:01:35Z")
What about a caveman in a dinosaur movie? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2003, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/832 "2003-10-15T01:39:07Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by MonkeyMule \* > \*\*YOu know my querry about non-metal death rays has gone unanswered. ANy body have a frickin clue around here? \*\* A while back I had read a fascinating article about a team at MIT working on a Death Ray whose components were housed only a high strength magnetic field, similar to those used in plasma research. They were actually having some success. They’d overcome the problem of interference and were researching a power source that could maintain the field indefinitely. Haven’t heard anything in a few years though. ---
**Author:** ![Wikkit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c0e974/32.png) [@Wikkit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wikkit)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2003, 2:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/833 "2003-10-15T02:23:49Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Bewildebeest \* > \*\*Not so! Anachronism doesn’t imply which direction. A dinosaur in a caveman movie or a transistor radio in “Titanic” would both be anachronistic. \*\* So. Look it up. > [@](#): > > One that is out of its proper or chronological order, especially a person or practice that belongs to an earlier time: “A new age had plainly dawned, an age that made the institution of a segregated picnic seem an anachronism” (Henry Louis Gates, Jr.). ---
**Author:** ![MonkeyMule](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc348/32.png) [@MonkeyMule](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MonkeyMule)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2003, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/834 "2003-10-15T03:19:45Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by DocCathode \* > \*\*A while back I had read a fascinating art icle about a team at MIT working on a Death Ray whose components were housed only a high strength magnetic field, similar to those used in plasma research. > > They were actually having some success. They’d overcome the problem of interference and were researching a power source that could maintain the field indefinitely. > > Haven’t heard anything in a few years though. \*\* What is the point of such a thing? I mean mean sure, if I’m Magneto I could use my powers to construct a death ray with no moving parts, but what would be the point you know? If I had that kind of power I’m sure there are far easier ways to dispatch my foes. Death-rays are nothing if not practical weapons of mass death. ---
**Author:** ![Wikkit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c0e974/32.png) [@Wikkit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wikkit)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2003, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/835 "2003-10-15T03:30:04Z")
AH HA! The thread has finally borne fruit! **MonkeyMule** has the WMD. Get 'im, Ashcroft! Run at him, Rumsfeld! Buck fush, Bush! ---
**Author:** ![MonkeyMule](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc348/32.png) [@MonkeyMule](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MonkeyMule)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2003, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/836 "2003-10-15T03:32:59Z")
Sadly NO. See I said weapons of Weapons of Mass DEATH, not destruction. Get yer cronies back to DC damn it. ---
**Author:** ![Governor\_Quinn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d26b3c/32.png) [@Governor\_Quinn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Governor_Quinn)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2003, 3:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/837 "2003-10-15T03:38:57Z")
Besides, legally, death rays are not WMD. This could be because the death ray makers take great care to donate cash to their representatives in Washington. ---
**Author:** ![MonkeyMule](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc348/32.png) [@MonkeyMule](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MonkeyMule)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2003, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/838 "2003-10-15T03:47:04Z")
Well I thought it was more of a function of the power requirements. To produce a beam wide enough to take out an entire city would take more Joules then I care to count. Though I’m sure Ming-Mongo Inds. Have a few old floor models on the cheap ---
**Author:** ![umop\_ap\_sdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/dbc845/32.png) [@umop\_ap\_sdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/umop_ap_sdn)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2003, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/839 "2003-10-15T04:00:41Z")
All you need for that, silly, is to take a 1920s style death ray and a 1920s style cloning ray, cross the beams, and sandwich them between 2 mirrors. Infinite loop! ---
**Author:** ![MonkeyMule](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc348/32.png) [@MonkeyMule](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MonkeyMule)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2003, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879/840 "2003-10-15T04:17:15Z")
Its just crazy enough to work! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879.md?page=41) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-scalar-weapons-for-real/192879.md?page=43)