This question arose in the Space Exploration forum, by non-physicists, so it likely sounds naïve. The question involved the plausibility of using a very strong gravitational field to accelerate an astronaut at ludicrously high $G$s. A comment was made that the field would need to be uniform to prevent lethal tidal forces.

My intuition says that a uniform gravitational field has zero acceleration... that it is the curvature which defines the direction and magnitude of the acceleration. "Mass tell space how to bend, space tells mass how to move." No tide, no bend, no acceleration.

Can gravitational acceleration exist as a "uniform field"?