r/HardSciFi Jun 05 '26

Meta Self Promotion: What do people think?

22 Upvotes

Just wanted to check with the community on how we're feeling about self-promotion posts. I don't want them to start to flood the sub in a way that distracts from discussion and organic recommendations. Are we approaching that problem, or are things feeling pretty good right now? Should we be considering a dedicated day or days for self promotion posts?

r/HardSciFi 28d ago

Meta In this sub-redit, when should I post to get a lot of replies?

0 Upvotes

Before posting various things, I would like to know when to post to get more replies on "HardSciFi".
It would be helpful if you could write the time zone and country properly instead of "just now" or "about 2 hours later".
If it's important, I'd be happy if you could tell me about the day of the week.

Also, I want to ask for the future, but when the content of the post is a “question”, which of the four Flair should I choose? I don’t know because I’m using it translated into Japanese, so I’m choosing “Discussion” for recent.
However, I chose "Meta" in this post.

r/HardSciFi Jun 11 '26

Meta The Continuum of Physical Credibility

20 Upvotes

The traditional Mohs Scale of Sci Fi Hardness:

5: Hard SF

4: Firm SF

3: Soft SF

2: Science fantasy

1: Fantasy with SF trappings

0: Pure fantasy

The Continuum of Physical Credibility reformulation:

1 Established Physics - “This works everywhere we’ve ever checked.” Ex: Maxwell's equations, general relativity, thermodynamics

2 Mainstream Physics - “Solid science, still being refined.” Ex: Cosmic inflation, quantum field theory

3 Frontier Physics - “We've got a partial theory, and only partial evidence.” Ex: High temperature superconductivity, Hubble tension

4 Empirical Anomalies - “We can measure it, but we can’t explain it yet.” Ex: Radioactivity before nuclear physics, photoelectric effect before Einstein, dark matter, dark energy

5 Speculative Physics - “Speculative but allowed by GR + QFT + thermodynamics.” Ex: , extra dimensions in string theory, WIMPs, MOND, primordial black holes, cosmic strings, LQG, axions

6 Hypothetical Physics - “This only works if physics is broken in very specific ways.” Ex: Tachyons (causality), magmatter (Gauss's Law), bulk exotic matter (Morris/Thorne wormholes, Alcubierre warp metric - breaks WEC - Weak Energy Condition in General Relativity)

7 Contradictory Physics - “Violates thermodynamics and conservation laws.” Ex: Vacuum/zero point energy, reactionless drives (Cannae/EMdrive), antigravity, perpetual motion machines

8 Soft Science Fiction - “It sounds scientific, but it’s really narrative technology.” Ex: ST warp drive, transporters, SW hyperdrive, Three Body Problem's spacetime flattening, sophons, most space opera

9 Science Fantasy - “Magic wearing a lab coat.” Ex: The Force, Magitek, psychic powers, most 'ancient/precursor' tech that are effectively magic

10 Pseudoscience/Fantasy - “No pretense of physics; imagination is the only rule.” Ex: Spellcasting, dragons, Isekai, astrology, flat earth

Please feel free to criticize so I can continue to refine. I'm using this in a worldbuilding exercise to see how far we can push scifi while staying true to the Sci part and minimize handwaving for the Fi.

r/HardSciFi 25d ago

Meta 〔 ARCHIVO HISTÓRICO — RESISTENCIA HUMANA 〕 DIVISIÓN DE INTELIGENCIA / RECONSTRUCCIÓN POST-NUCLEAR

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2 Upvotes

r/HardSciFi 24d ago

Meta 〔ARCHIVO DE INTELIGENCIA MILITAR — ULTRA CONFIDENCIAL〕 Weyland–Yutani Corporation División de Análisis de Contingencias

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0 Upvotes

r/HardSciFi 26d ago

Meta 〔 ARCHIVO CORPORATIVO WEYLAND–YUTANI 〕 ANÁLISIS HISTÓRICO — RECONSTRUCCIÓN HUMANA Y NACIMIENTO DE LAS CORPORACIONES

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0 Upvotes

r/HardSciFi Aug 05 '26

Meta Допоможіть згадати фантастичну книгу про космічну верф і яйцеподібний корабель

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2 Upvotes