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Re: Silicon based life I'm not a chemist, but my understanding is that silicon is only able to form complex bonds at extremely low temperatures, like around 100 Kelvin. The popular idea is lava monsters because of our association of silicon with rock, but in reality any silicon based life would be out in the iceballs of the oort or plutoids, living very slowly.
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Dec 10, 2018 10:16
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Haystack posted:Aliens don't have interstellar civilizations for exactly the same reason humans never will: it costs way, way, waaaay too much energy, and is way too slow. A physicist on another forum I frequent broke it down like this: As others have said - this last assumption about future energy capabilities is where this line of reasoning breaks down. If we're going to to be going to another solar system, it won't be for a long time. And by that time we're going to have some pretty serious energy capabilities on our hands (not to mention that we'd probably be pretty capable of modifying our bodies or straight up going full robotic). Taking a crack at some very back of the envelope calculations with numbers scraped from google: We're generating something like 10^13 watts energy. We're nowhere near maximally utilizing all the Earth based energy available to us. The bulk of this is probably solar energy. We're probably not going to go completely hogwild covering the Earth and oceans in future tech solar panels since that would cause an ecological catastrophe due to us stealing the light from every ecosystem, but we can probably expand it massively. This is the road to the "Type 1 Civilization" on the Kardashev scale. The estimates on how much energy this could give us are probably pretty ropey, but I'm going to estimate it's around 1000 times greater than our current situation. I reckon that would actually be enough to consider making the journey at that point, although it would be pretty risky even with pretty imaginative propulsion methods. But humans aren't going to stop there. Because there's a lot, lot more energy available from the sun. Gradually we're going to build more and more platforms to harness more of the sunlight that's currently just being wasted to the rest of the universe. This would involve the building of a Dyson swarm - basically the realistic version of a Dyson sphere built up of trillions of satellites. We hopefully would build this in such a way as to not block out light to the Earth. Maybe we'd have to deconstruct a couple of planets to build this. The energy harnessed from even partial Dyson swarms is going to be immense, and gets us pretty much up to the level of a Type 2 civilization. Something around 10 trillion times what we have available to us at the moment. Even if the massive compromises and losses involved with a real world implementation would eat into that giving us just a fraction of a percent of that, we've still got an incredible amount of power now available to us. If we take the scenario shifting the ISS at 0.6c in the table, that goes from 23.73 times our energy budget, to 0.000000000002373 times our energy budget. The engineering involved is still going to be extremely difficult, but humans are clever and we're absolutely going to give it a go sooner or later.
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Dec 10, 2018 19:23
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BardoTheConsumer posted:My problem with this is that by this logic Russia or the US should have nuked the other immediately upon discovering the technology to do so. It doesnt make sense to fire a KKV at every random civilization you see just because they could theoretically do the same to you, and for proof of that look no further than the idea that our particular species (mostly) finds that idea repugnant. We've come really close, and it's only been a few decades with people we could literally pick the phone up and talk to. How's it gonna go down with things we maybe can't even begin to communicate with, who might already have have launched their kill missiles, and all we can tell from where we are is that they could do it. And that situation goes on for millions of years without anyone doing something aggressive.
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Dec 10, 2018 22:01
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I think the predator/prey stuff isn't going to be relevant to anyone capable of enough abstract thought to reach another solar system. Even some kind of implausible sentient rock is going to be capable of reasoning if something is an existential threat even if it had no evolutionary history of that.
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Jan 15, 2019 13:09
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You were talking about the psychology of other intelligent species in the previous post, don't be doing the old switcheroo.
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Jan 15, 2019 15:50
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I don't know why you would expect a hypothetical non-predator/prey species to act in some way that is more condusive to coexistence. Lichen are pretty much eaten by nothing and they poison the gently caress out of any potential competition, for example. I don't see any reason to think that space-mineral aliens would be any more or less likely to launch the Kinetic Kill Vehicles than the space-tiger aliens. All you're saying is "Neuroses" and then leaving it at that. Your whole argument is really nebulous and poorly made to be honest. VVVV Edit Ok, that's quite interesting lichen facts, but my point stands Bug Squash fucked around with this message at 23:49 on Jan 15, 2019 |
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Jan 15, 2019 23:35
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I don't know why people are just assuming they put a bunch of seeds in an unheated container and just went "for science, I guess". The thing was designed as a sealed biosphere that was meant to survive for 100 days to simulate a lunar biosphere in miniature. Engineering issues or something meant it got too hot so they terminated the experiment to save energy, which is when it froze.
Bug Squash fucked around with this message at 17:31 on Jan 17, 2019 |
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Jan 17, 2019 14:43
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Can we cut down on the black pill cynicism stuff overall. If you think space exploration isn't awesome, you're wrong. They did a gently caress ton of science on the Apollo missions, and even if they could have done it cheaper with robots we absolutely need to have engineering experience of human spaceflight in order to do it better.
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Jan 17, 2019 23:21
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Sterility is going to be a practical impossibility, but we'll absolutely need to find ways of keeping microbe populations below a certain level if Mars missions and Moon bases are to be sanitary. Naturally antiseptic materials, UV lights and a lot of vacuuming would be my best bet. Probably an occasional massive deep clean like that one episode of The Next Generation.
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Apr 9, 2019 15:06
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Penicillin is real loving common. I know jack poo poo about antibiotics but I get I could isolate a strain of it if I really needed to. Post collapse technology would absolutely be it's own unique thing. Bell's can't be unrung and all that.
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Jun 1, 2019 13:27
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It's pretty easy to imagine something with an octopus like life cycle making a go of it. Get real smart real fast, have hundreds of offspring, and have a lifespan of under ten years or so. Take big risks everyday because life is cheap. I think they would need to be incredibly good at transferring knowledge to be viable as an interplanetary species though, but that's well within the realms of speculative biology.
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Jun 3, 2019 09:49
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Unoriginal Name posted:Why? The next generation of math and science-less octopus is just going to try everything until it works. "Transferring knowledge" is literally what they cant do in this scenario. High risk lifestyle doesn't really mesh well with zero knowledge transfer. If our octo-buddies can't even look at what's gone before and build on it, then you don't really have something that will get very far as a species. Maybe one in a trillion will somehow build a car in their lifetime, but if it can't be copied then that all goes up in smoke as soon as their crappy mathless engine explodes, like most of our early engines did. Maybe they could get surprisingly far each generation, given a large enough population, but interstellar space travel? Almost certainly not.
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Jun 3, 2019 10:23
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This is kind of an irrelevant tangent, isn't it? The entire conversation is about whether it's reasonable to assume that an alien civilization would understand maths, not whether any individual in it is fluent in geometry.
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Jun 4, 2019 13:20
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This is kind of a sloppy rehash of the idea of viewing life as an entropy machine. Matter will naturally rearrange to more efficiently process a gradient of entropy. Certain mediums will allow for incredible complexity to accomplish this. This thing we call life is a system that has managed to compartmentalise itself, achieve reproduction and undergo evolution.
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Jun 7, 2019 10:28
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We can be fairly confident that physics is the same within the entire visible universe, since it looks the same in every direction we look, and the boundary between regions with different physics would probably be extremely noticable and have deeply strange things occuring. Beyond that, I think it's an immenently sensible idea not to assume that only carbon chemistry is the only thing capable of forming a complex self replicating pattern capable of evolution. I don't think that's the "artistic" view point, I think that's the basic common sense viewpoint until we can survey some of the more extreme environments in the universe and rule it out. That said, for the purposes of our current SETI efforts, it's reasonable to search assuming that what we're looking for is a lot like us. Maybe you can be a life form that's a pattern passed between the pasta matter of a neutron star, or formed out of magnetic vertexes in a star, but such a form of life is unlikely to be able to make easily detectable changes outside of it's medium. We need something that's electromagnetically very noisy, or drastically changing the chemistry of it's environment to detect it with our current technology, and that means we're looking for someone with very advanced technology, or something photo or chemo synthetic relatively nearby.
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Jul 12, 2019 12:42
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"like us" in the broad biological or psychological sense, but with access to much more powerful energy sources and basically trying to be spotted. I doubt we'd notice a perfect mirror of earth and human civilization existing even within 10 light years at the moment.
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Jul 12, 2019 16:01
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Yeah, that's fair, I was mostly thinking about the more out there ideas.
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Jul 12, 2019 16:44
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1glitch0 posted:Are you sure? With the information we know, are you sure? We've gotten to the moon. We put a few robots on Mars. We have telescopes. These are amazing accomplishments for a bunch of monkeys, but we don't understand anything going on in the entire universe. We have our best ideas. As I mentioned earlier, yes, we are very sure the laws of physics are the same as far as we can see. We can calculate what would happen if they were slightly different, and we don't see that happening. Instead we see the same standard candles and types of supernovas in every direction, all the way out. Within the visible universe, the fundamental laws appear to be identical and we have no reason to think otherwise. We might speculate that they are different in parallel universes, or parts of the universe unimaginably far away, but that's not relevant for the possibility of searching for life.
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Jul 12, 2019 20:48
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Owlofcreamcheese posted:I don't think we can calculate physics from first principles at all yet. And there is plenty of stuff we calculated that doesn't match at all and we don't know why. Like we calculated the mass of galaxies and are off by 95% and now just accept there is some sort of unknown substance that exists giving the extra weight. Or we calculated the amount of lithium in the universe and are off by 4x. Or we calculated the biggest "object" (thing shaped by interaction with other things) that the speed of expansion would allow then found objects much larger anyway. We calculated the hubble constant using supernova and by using cepheid variables and got different answers and just accept that. There's clearly a vast amount of unknown physics out there, I definitely agree with you there, but I'm very confident it's going to be the same unknown physics in every direction for many times greater than the cosmological horizon.
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Jul 12, 2019 21:28
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Unoriginal Name posted:Man, it's good to hear we finally solved physics. I don't know where people are pulling this idea that I'm saying that we've solved physics from. That's clearly untrue. What I'm saying is that yes, there's weird stuff out there, but it's the same weird stuff in every direction. The Copernican principal is one of the best supported assumptions there is in modern physics. The only seriously challenge to it is Dark Flow, and that's a pretty outside possibility. If the strong nuclear force was double in another part of the universe, we'd absolutely notice that because stars as we know them wouldn't be able to function. If another part had 10x gravity, it would look completely different to the other parts. I'm just completely unable to understand how people can think that parts of the universe can have different physics, and yet look exactly like every other part. Bug Squash fucked around with this message at 11:59 on Jul 13, 2019 |
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Jul 13, 2019 08:27
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LtStorm posted:
Like FTL or time travel, my assumption is that it'll turn out to be impossible as we'd probably be inundated with visitors if it were possible. It might function differently than it did in Sliders or Half-life though, in which case I've no idea.
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Jul 16, 2019 09:49
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Axetrain posted:Uhhh is Time Symmetry an actual thing. Pretty much, and in the few occasions it isn't charge/parity/time symmetry still hold. Basically, it seems like the past is the past only because it's the direction with lower entropy. Everything we think of as making up the "arrow of time" is a consequence of that. If the other end of time was the location with high entropy, then we would psychologically experience time in reverse (but it would appear to be normal to us). We would remember the future, but for us it would be the past. It's a headtrip, but there's some good articles on the subject.
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Jul 18, 2019 09:42
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For shifting a large mass, your biggest issue would be getting enough propellant. With a comet, congratulations, you're sitting on a ball of the stuff! A nuclear lightbulb based engine could in theory shift that bulk to wherever you need it, by accelerating the meltwater away. You'd lose a chunk of the comet, but who cares. Rigging up a system to melt ice, and feed the melt into the engine might necessitate a crew due to it being fiddly, but there's definitely no theoretical problem shifting a comet.
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Jul 19, 2019 20:33
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It'll be at least like Skara Brae on Orkney. Settlement dug into the ground, because excavation is going to be easier and building away from serious fabrication equipment.
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Jul 22, 2019 23:05
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thewalk posted:Thats stupid. They have kinetic civilization ending rocks to throw at us Good luck aiming and launching your return volley in the minutes/seconds that the iron bolide traveling at 0.9c, from an unknown location, takes to go from the edge of your detection network to resurfacing Earth. MAD worked because the superpowers knew where their rivals were, and they were approximately equal in tech level, and we could reasonably predict human behaviour. Imagine instead we found out a hive of wasps was about to develop the capability to wipe out humanity, and we had no ability to communicate with them. That's a closer analogue to interstellar diplomacy. Launching kkv at a civilization before they detect you is unfortunately a very logical conclusion game theory wise.
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Jul 24, 2019 11:35
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Owlofcreamcheese posted:What? I'd guess Kerning Chameleon had to re-reg Anyhoo... I think Dark Matter is still going strong as the best explanation of the structure of galaxies, at time of writing. It's pretty unsatisfying compared to other nice elegant theories, but when there's gravitational lensing and no apparent matter in regions of space, plus the other general assorted evidence, we're stuck with it.
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Jul 29, 2019 21:56
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BrandorKP posted:I seem to remember reading that was the case, just it was a very, very, slow change. I remember reading something like that, based on the "evidence" that our best estimates had changed over the last few hundred years. Measurement error and bias would seem more likely to me. There might be a more plausible argument for fundamental values changing that you read, but the one I read was pretty badly argued. Edit: also, it'd be pretty bad if they did change. A little tweak and every molecule become unstable and the earth literally explodes instantly. Bug Squash fucked around with this message at 16:17 on Jul 30, 2019 |
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Jul 30, 2019 16:10
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It's not leaving "nothing", it's leaving energy and other predictable particles, depending on exactly what's colliding. And we're not measuring a discrepancy that would imply some kind of dark matter "ash" is being left over. There's nothing magical about matter-antimatter reactions that would lead us to expect such an ash, in theory or practice, it's just you spit balling ideas.
Bug Squash fucked around with this message at 08:48 on Jul 31, 2019 |
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Jul 31, 2019 08:45
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I don't see Mars becoming anything other than a research base for a long long time. All the really profitable stuff like asteroid mining would be better based off the moon or space stations. Maybe Mars has some really accessable metals just under the surface making mining an attractive prospect, but I don't think there's any evidence of that yet.
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Jul 31, 2019 13:22
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There's going to be war(s) over access rights in the Arctic and Antarctic once it becomes more accessible due to global warming. There's definitely a lot of mineral wealth there that's too much of a pain to get to due to the climate, and Russia for instance is already putting down bases to capitalise on the Northern passage opening up. It's a hornet's nest that someone is going to get greedy enough to poke eventually. It might well wind up becoming the model for future conflicts over space mining.
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Jul 31, 2019 14:36
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Owlofcreamcheese posted:I wouldn't really think so. All this is true, but conflict is going to start anyway, because people go completely insane over territory, and the idea of someone getting it instead of them. If people will set themselves on fire over a tiny rock they'd never heard of a year ago, they'll do it if the rock is in space. That's not to mention the response to the economic impact on Earth. Consider how the Americans go apeshit about miners not being economical, because they're apparently the only real Americans. What'll they do if Japan or China tows a asteroid into orbit and can sell iron for practically nothing? You'll get another, even stupider Trump elected who promises to knock it outta the sky. It's stupid, yes, but that's what happens when people think their livelihood is threatened.
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Jul 31, 2019 15:31
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It was pretty well discussed that the purpose of a Mars base would be scientific research, although the engineering experience for building off world would be vital long term. Moon base and asteroids are for profit.
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Aug 1, 2019 11:20
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We ain't getting a space elevator any time soon, getting bulk down from orbit is going to require some careful thinking. In the short term the system is probably going to require sending up payloads of nothing but parachutes to bring material down. That's going to eat into profit margins. Medium term, I think wen can expect to be manufacturing the parachutes out of the material in orbit. Metal woven parachutes are obviously not as efficient as current fabric ones, but the raw material will be right there in enormous amounts, and can melted down afterwards. It's a big lump of metal so it doesn't even need to be a particularly soft landing.
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Aug 2, 2019 08:36
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Gonna advise you lay off the weed
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Aug 6, 2019 16:23
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I mean, sooner or later baseline humans will get replaced by machine forms. The big question is whether they're us, but upgraded, or a wholly separate successor species.
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Aug 7, 2019 14:37
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I'm big in favour too, but we'd be operating continuously in a ridiculously hostile environment that we have very little experience with, very far from home. We're going to discover points of failure we haven't even considered yet, and people are definitely going to die unless we're absurdly lucky. The spaceshuttle has a worse than 1 in 70 failure rate for instance, and even if we avoid all the stupid compromises and mismanagement involved with that, we should probably expect a similar fatality rate due to the nature of what we're attempting. I still say go for it, but we need to do it with open eyes.
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Aug 7, 2019 15:32
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Captain Monkey posted:Would it be any safer/easier to set up asteroid mining in Lunar orbit rather than Earth orbit? Like it's still pretty close, but if they gently caress up and hit the moon it's way less of a big deal. It's actually surprisingly hard to gently caress up asteroid tugging so hard you hit the planet, assuming my one thousand hours in Kerbal Space Program are accurate. You can put it in a stupid orbit that takes a colossal amount of energy to reach, which for profits sake is a big deal. Someone having the capability of doing it deliberately is a big concern for me though. Especially in context of our current rash of fuckwit right-wing terror attacks.
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Aug 8, 2019 23:08
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What kind of science can get done on Mars? How about absolutely all the research we do on Earth science, but on Mars? Seems kinda obvious to be, but I'm not a tendentious contrarian. Anyhoo - space elevator chat: based on the engineering numbers, I'd say it's very very robust to Earth based terrorism. The base is going to be kilometres thick, and resisting tremendous forces. The amount of energy any potential terrorist is going to be able to direct at it is going to be dwarfed by the fault tolerance of the engineering. As others have mentioned, a space elevator is under tension, not compression. If a terrorist group severs the base, they are going to watch the cable float up into the sky. A break at the counterweight is the big worry, because then that leads to the bulk of the column falls rather than rises. That seems it's safely out of reach atm, but the very existence of the space elevator is going to make it accessible. What's the effect of enormous weights of low density material falling from high orbit at orbital velocities? I have no idea. I definitely wouldn't assume it's harmless, even if it hits the ocean. Worst case scenario and you've got mega tsunamis in every ocean. Bug Squash fucked around with this message at 13:50 on Aug 13, 2019 |
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Aug 13, 2019 13:46
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FFT posted:You joke, but it is important to figure out methods of attack to prepare for them. After checking a blueprint showing the elevator falling onto the Road Runner, Wile E. Coyote saws off the elevator and just watchs, forlornly, as the whole thing floats peaceful out into space. A moment passes before Road Runner appears next to him, honks twice, and runs off.
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Aug 13, 2019 14:24
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So are those pieces hitting the ocean just splashing down, or are they gigaton impacting? Because there's a world of difference between "lol new floating snake island" and "oops every coastal city is now gone due to global megatsunamis" .
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Aug 13, 2019 15:14
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