Bel's Destiny sideblog (Posts tagged vex)

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Science Behind Sci-Fi: The Desert Perpetual (Part 1)

Introduction

While Destiny 2’s narrative is often dismissed as “space magic,” the fiction is meticulously woven into a real-world physics framework. Instead of contradicting existing science, the lore is based on the premise that we discover things in that universe which we simply haven’t discovered in real life. 

Sometimes these are things we’re extremely unlikely to discover, like paracausality. Other times, the narrative highlights things that real scientists are actively searching for– such as dark matter.

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Physicists have long been searching for GUTs and a ToE; that is, Grand Unifying Theories and a Theory of Everything. Physics is full of mysteries. Science is not truth in and of itself. 

Rather, it is a method by which we discover truth: ask a question, suggest a hypothesis, test the hypothesis via experiment, and observe the results. Sometimes the technology doesn’t yet exist to allow us to conduct a particular experiment. Sometimes we don’t know the right question to ask, or the right hypothesis to suggest. 

Classical, or Newtonian, physics best explains how things work on the scale in which we live our day-to-day lives. Quantum physics best explains how things work on the scale of atoms and subatomic particles. Relativistic physics best explains how things work on the scale of the cosmos. 

All three of these theories have been repeatedly demonstrated to be true, and have practical applications that affect human lives: medical imaging technology such as the PET scan relies on antiparticles governed by quantum physics, and our GPS satellites rely on a relation to the Earth’s speed and gravity that is governed by relativistic physics. 

However, the theories conflict with each other. In quantum physics, time is a background parameter and considered to be absolute, while in relativistic physics, time is relative, and one aspect of spacetime. At the moment, science does not have an answer as to why. Physicists are looking for a Theory of Everything: one single framework of physics that explains the entire universe. 

This document is meant to break down the references to real-world physics found throughout the Desert Perpetual raid, in the hope that an audience without a detailed knowledge of physics can see and appreciate the depth of the game's worldbuilding as much as the author does. 

For additional background on nonfictional science tied into Destiny 2’s Vex lore, see:

The Science Behind the Sci-Fi of the Vex
The CloudArk’s Relation to the Vex Network 


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destiny 2 vex the desert perpetual raid long post YAY you finally finished I'll be reading this like newspaper in the morning
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Science Behind Sci-Fi: The Desert Perpetual (Part 2)

Continued from Part 1. Click here to view!

Agraios

A feature readily noticeable when entering the Agraios - a Hobgoblin whose name is Greek for “Hunter” - encounter are the five coils, resembling the electromagnets used in a particle accelerator. 

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Two circular coils, resembling the electromagnets of a particle accelerator, seen at the center of the Agraios encounter’s battlefield. 

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A real particle accelerator, used in the Integrable Optics Test Accelerator (IOTA) at Fermilab.
Image source: Fermilab Photowalk 2025. Click on image to view larger.

Electromagnets like these are used to influence the path of the particles, keeping it away from the walls of the accelerator and headed in the direction of its intended target: a detector, another particle that it is meant to collide with, etc. These electrically-charged coils align the particles– referenced in the raid by the “Alignment Charge” buff that a player stacks as they run through each coil. 

After running through the coils, the player gains a buff called “Tachyon Alignment.” A tachyon is a type of hypothetical particle, now considered highly unlikely to exist. Its defining feature is that it travels faster than the speed of a photon in a vacuum– which would mean, from our understanding of time as a feature of relativistic physics, that it travels faster than the speed at which causality occurs. 

One might wonder: why is the speed of a photon in a vacuum the speed at which causality occurs? Do photons have some special property that dictates the experience of causality? (No, they don’t– it’s causality that dictates the speed of photons.) 

First, what is causality? It’s the physical experience that effect always follows cause, and never the other way around. A car will not spontaneously drive away before its engine has even been started. We do not age backward in time. We remember the past, and not the future. 

We only experience effect after cause. 

We know from special relativity that the passing of time is experienced relative to the observer. A fast-moving vehicle will pass a stationary vehicle faster than it passes a vehicle moving at half its speed, and it will not pass a vehicle moving beside it at the same speed. 

Without an upper limit to this relativistic experience of time, there would be no causality. At the same speed, every observer would experience every event happening simultaneously. The universe would have instantly progressed from the Big Bang to thermal equilibrium. 

The speed of a photon in a vacuum grounds this relativistic timeframe to causality because it is constant. This was first demonstrated experimentally by the Michelson-Morley Experiment, which - like Young’s Experiment - was meant to prove the existence of luminiferous aether. The experiment detected no change in the speed of light regardless of the angle of the measuring apparatus, or the movement of the source. 

If light were an object with mass, one would expect the speed of light to vary with the speed of its source. Light emitted from the headlights of a moving car, for example, would be traveling faster (relative to a stationary observer) than light emitted from the headlights of a parked car. We now know that no such change in the speed of light is observed because light is composed of photons, and photons have no mass. 

The fact that the speed of a photon in a vacuum remains constant, despite the movement (or lack thereof) of its emitter, is why it is so relevant in physically defining causality. This constant is not limited to photons; it applies to gravitational waves. It would apply to any massless particle; at present, the photon is the only massless particle which has been experimentally confirmed to exist. 

Meanwhile, if an object that has mass were to approach the speed of a photon in a vacuum, the amount of energy needed to accelerate it would approach infinity. That is why objects with mass cannot travel at the speed of a massless particle. 

The hypothetical tachyon has an imaginary mass (meaning that its mass squared is negative; therefore its mass is an imaginary number). Therefore they require energy to decelerate rather than accelerate. As a decelerating tachyon approaches the speed of a photon in a vacuum, the energy needed to decelerate it would approach infinity. Just as particles with mass cannot be accelerated to the speed of a photon in a vacuum, tachyons could not be decelerated to it. 

If a tachyon were to send a signal that traveled faster than a photon in a vacuum, in some reference frames, it would arrive before it had left its destination. This opens the door to logical paradoxes such as the “Grandfather Paradox:” If a time traveler went back in time and killed their own grandfather before one of their parents was born, how could they exist to go back in time and kill their own grandfather? 

The simplest solution is that tachyons do not exist. Perhaps they do exist, but we can never interact with them, and therefore they do not violate our experience of causality. If that is the case, we would never be able to study them scientifically. 

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destiny 2 vex the desert perpetual raid long post YIPPEE

Anonymous asked:

Honestly wondering what the mechanics are behind the Vex gaining individuality because, as far as i remember, each Vex frame contains hundreds of Vex in its radiolaria. So i wonder if it acts sort of like a hive mind, a single consciousness shared between the Vex in the fluid

I’m interested in that too! I’d like them to go into it as much as possible when we get to meet the Vex criminals in Renegades.

It’s possible that it works that way, kinda like Mass Effect’s Geth I guess. Or maybe each frame just got solidified with whatever radiolaria was present, and then created an individual from that. Could be anything honestly!

Probably my favourite thing in the lore going forward, this evolution of the Vex.

destiny 2 vex ask

ghostlyalbacore asked:

Dunno if you’ve seen the lore on the season pass stuff, but I absolutely love how the vex made it to poker. Like of course they discovered and loved gambling! It’s a great intersection of computational prowess and trusting your gut, perfect for newly independent beings

IT’S SUCH a cool lore tab!

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For people who haven’t seen it. Also on Ishtar.

A little insight into the Vex faction and how they speak. I can’t wait to meet more of them.

destiny 2 vex ask

Anonymous asked:

Still puzzles me that the hive and the vex never had any major interactions, like they're just coexisting. I don't know if I don't care for it or find what that implies terrifying

Lore-wise, they did! Very notably so:

But while Oryx traveled to observe the Deep destroy an ancient fortress world, Crota conspired with his sisters to learn their secrets. “I too will experiment with a wound,” he said. With his sword Crota cut open a new wound, into a new space. In here he thought he might obtain a secret power.
Out of this wound came machines called Vex. They invaded Oryx’s throne world.

Crota messed up and opened a portal into Vex space, which led to the Vex invading Oryx’s throne world. This led to them fighting for a long time and the Vex developing Quria, a mind designed to understand the Hive so the Vex can fight back against them. Quria was… normal for sure:

Quria captured some worm larvae and began experimenting with them. Soon Quria, Blade Transform manifested religious tactics. By directing worship at the worms, Quria learned it could alter reality with mild ontopathogenic effects. Being an efficient machine, Quria manufactured a priesthood and ordered all its subminds to believe in worship. Then it set about abducting and killing dangerous organisms so it could bootstrap itself to Hive godhood. For some Vex reason, Quria never attempted to introduce worm larvae into its mind fluid.

This also led to Oryx relocating his throne world to the Dreadnaught and to exiling Crota (which means that inadvertently, this is why most of anything in Destiny happens at all - Crota ends up on the Moon -> we kill him -> Oryx comes to the system -> we kill him, etc (and also it was Savathun who tricked Crota into opening a portal into the Vex space so in a way all of this is her fault).

Further this also led to Oryx fighting Quria again later when the Hive invaded the Harmony species, and Quria managing to simulate young Oryx, and Oryx eventually defeating Quria, taking it and gifting it to Savathun, which eventually led to Quria being a whole ass Taken menace to the Vex collectives and at the end with Savathun using it to develop the curse on the Dreaming City and to nearly destroy the Last City in Splicer.

I do think that this whole history between them is why they both kinda stay away from each other in general. The Hive almost as a rule don’t want to mess with the Vex because of how viral they are and how thoroughly they convert things. Meanwhile to the Vex, the Hive are just too strange and paracausal and impossible to fight properly. The Vex did not like Quria, especially after it was Taken, and were relieved when we killed it. As of Enigma Protocol from Echoes, there are still some Taken influences left in the Vex Network due to Quria.

Other than Savathun (and Nokris!), other Hive did not really feel the need to mess with the Vex. I think it’s largely because of the history they had with Oryx where the Hive learned that the Vex could very easily and very quickly overwhelm their throne worlds and infect everything with radiolaria, on top of learning their secrets via simulation.

They’re officially enemies with each other, but in the same way everyone is enemies with the Vex (and honestly with the Hive). I think everything with Quria sealed that deal and had the Hive stay away from interactions, to protect themselves, and the same also works for the Vex. At least for now! I’d like to see the Hive and the Vex fight it out at some point again, it’s just one of those things no matter who wins, we lose. They’re probably the only two enemy factions that could go on forever if they start messing around.

destiny 2 hive vex ask long post if you meant just in-game then i guess we could only loosely count dreaming city stuff and splicer but since there's a lot of history background between them i think it's worth noting that they've been in conflict books of sorrow are great everyone please read it

Anonymous asked:

Could you please explain if the Vex can time travel or not? I keep hearing conflicting takes, and from personal reading what my brain recalls is passages like in the Ripples book from season of the lost where a Minotaur is described as “revising its place in history.”

Had a similar question before, take a look at this post and especially the addition that goes a lot more in-depth about the Vex and all time-related shenanigans!

The Minotaur bit is super interesting to me as it’s such a cool explanation for why it teleported just as you were about to shoot it, but basically the simplest way to look at it would be that it found a different timeline where the outcome (aka me shooting it) turns out differently (I missed).

destiny 2 vex ask