We have broken speed of light

[Perd Hapley]

Tyme, you think a lowly patent clerk is going to make some kind of mind-blowing scientific discovery?  That would never happen.   

[AJ Dual]

Beyond the weirdness of General and Special Relativity, and Quantum Mechanics, is that every time we find a "loophole", like quantum entanglement, there's some other compensating factor that suggests that the loophole can never be exploited in any meaningful way. It's like the Ten Commandments are written into something far more permanent than stone, the fabric of existence itself for us to find.

I can imagine someone a few hundred years ago making just such a claim about finding a loophole that would enable a metal shell with hundreds of people to fly over the oceans.

Just because everything we've seen so far indicates that current theories of relativity and QM are fairly solid, that doesn't mean some crazy physicist or patent clerk won't put a metaphorical propeller on a metaphorical wing and blow those theories to pieces.

It upsets me greatly whenever someone like you alludes to some ultimate truth as the reason why physics hasn't advanced in some area.  What is the use of that kind of thinking, besides discouraging people from pursuing research in those areas?  Even if we've hit the wall, we can never know that for sure, and unless people constantly try to push the wall, we don't have even a modest assurance that our current physical theories are sound.

I can only conclude you missed the parts where I mentioned hoping I was wrong about that more than once. 

So please stop trying to lump me in with Luddites of 100 years ago. I would love nothing better than for there to be a "trick" to FTL communication, much less travel. Growing up as a hard-core SF fan and seeing visions of our future slip away as I learned more and more about physics and relativity was at best, dissapointing, and at worst, heartbreaking.

The Western Civilization mindset that perhaps has some of the needed vision, and the best chance to develop the needed technology unfortunately has a hard time thinking (By "thinking", I mean politically and meaningfully as a group, not just individual dreamers and pundits) more than a decade in advance. And the Eastern mindsets that can think in terms of the centuries only seem to do so with a view towards blood-feuds and religious zealotry.

When we can't even plan for 50 years into the future, journeys of hundreds, if not thousands, of years are unthinkable, whether or not we develop the technology. No one may bother. So I sincerely hope there are loopholes in the fundamental laws of the universe that will give us goals that are attainable in both time and space, otherwise I suspect mankind will go extinct.

I am simply commenting that as we do discover potential loopholes, to date there seems to be a chilling symmetry with very good fundamental constraints on why we can't use them in any meaningful way.

 

[drewtam]

I would love nothing better than for there to be a "trick" to FTL communication, much less travel. Growing up as a hard-core SF fan and seeing visions of our future slip away as I learned more and more about physics and relativity was at best, dissapointing, and at worst, heartbreaking.

My sentiments, exactly put.

My hopes lie in greater exploration and understanding of the graviton (if it exists) and its properties and how we can control it (if possible).

Drew

[Perd Hapley]

Why do we need deep-space travel?  Not that I'm against it, but why would we need to go anywhere? 

[Tallpine]

Why do we need deep-space travel?  Not that I'm against it, but why would we need to go anywhere?

1) overpopulation

2) old Sol is going to burn out in another couple billion years

3) Why not?  We found and settled the New World, and explored the Polar regions.  What else is there to do between crops?

[tyme]

I am simply commenting that as we do discover potential loopholes, to date there seems to be a chilling symmetry with very good fundamental constraints on why we can't use them in any meaningful way.

I am simply saying that that line of thinking dismisses a long history of technological plateaus and cliffs, after which humans have climbed up higher than before.  Do you think people who questioned the ability of heaving things to fly didn't feel exactly the same way about it that we feel about holes in GR or QM?  I doubt it.  Just because we have made tremendous technological advancements recently doesn't mean we're any better equipped to judge when our working theories are more than an approximation that ceases to hold if someone merely comes up with the right trick to get around them.

[AJ Dual]

Why do we need deep-space travel?  Not that I'm against it, but why would we need to go anywhere?

1) overpopulation

2) old Sol is going to burn out in another couple billion years

3) Why not?  We found and settled the New World, and explored the Polar regions.  What else is there to do between crops?

1. We'd never be able to export population off the planet fast enough to solve overpopulation that way. Plus even if we could, there's the issues of who would go, and who stays. (Easier, I suppose if Earth were so miserable the decision to leave was a no-brainer.)  However, space resources (Asteroid metals, Geostationary solar power, moving "dirty" industries off-planet, etc.)  could provide a first-world standard of living to everyone on Earth, which seems to be the only proven way to stem population growth we've seen to date.

2. If we should survive until the sun leaves the main sequence, and there is some continuity of humanity that still survives until that time, we'll probably either possess the engineering prowess to deal with it, or we'll be so far evolved that such things won't harm us. One could argue a cyclical civilization, and "falls" or dark ages, but if that happens humanity will eventually succumb to climate change, disease, supervolcanisim, asteroid/comet impact, technological "oopses", or war long before then, well within a million years, or less. So if we survive until the sun itself starts changing, humanity (or what passes for it by then) by default will be able to deal with it.

3. Very true, some of the best success stories in our history are when we were challenged with "somewhere to go" and something to do. And unlike the Earth, we're much less likely to repeat the tragedies that accompanied the era of exploration. (i.e. "native populations") Space is huge, other sentient species, even if common, are still widely separated in both space and time. There is plenty of "elsewhere" to go to. And assuming we've mastered robust at-will interstellar travel, from a technological standpoint there is very little we couldn't produce ourselves or synthesize after only minor sampling and study. So even if our morality did not evolve, simple economics makes the Universe a very unlikely place for either conflict or exploitive colonization.

I disagree with some of the details, but in the general thrust of his arguments, Tallpine is right. If we don't expand off of Earth, humanity will go extinct. It's possible we could develop sufficient technology AND social organization to live on Earth indefinitely in peace and safety, but the historical record on the human scale does not make me very confident, and neither does the natural disaster record on the geological scale.

We are not "special". Forces beyond our control could remove humanity in an eye-blink. The mitochondrial DNA record of humanity's maternal line already indicates that humanity has already faced extinction several times, we've been winnowed down to a mere 20 or 30 fertile females in the past more than once.

As long as we are on Earth, and only Earth, all of our eggs metaphorically, and literally, are in one basket.

[Manedwolf]

As long as we are on Earth, and only Earth, all of our eggs metaphorically, and literally, are in one basket.

And nature proves that no animal that just sits in its birth-nest and soils it will survive for long.

At some point, you need to leave the nest and head outwards.

[Tallpine]

We'd never be able to export population off the planet fast enough to solve overpopulation that way.

Sure we can - we just "beam" them out to the extra-stellar colonies or wherever.

Or don't you think that by the time we figure out beaming(wormhole/FTL/whatever) that we couldn't build a machine that did more than one person at a time? 



Not for me though ... I'd just as soon spend my remaining years among the pines, rimrocks, and prairies.
(We will stay where the rivers run through the range and the sky, buckskin and blue ...)

[Manedwolf]

One of the possible planets they've discovered around a nearby star is seemingly hot enough, and has a probable atmospheric composition such that it might well have clouds of superheated metal vapor and rain drops of molten iron.

Now, THAT is a place that's worthy of the name Vulcan or Hephaestus...and that'd be something I'd want to see in person.

While well-insulated, of course.

[Tallpine]

One of the possible planets they've discovered around a nearby star is seemingly hot enough, and has a probable atmospheric composition such that it might well have clouds of superheated metal vapor and rain drops of molten iron.

Global warming caused by SUVs no doubt ...

[Balog]

We could strip mine all the useless planets, terra-form the better ones.

Best. Plan. Ever.

[drewtam]

1. I disagree with the overpopulation worry. Contemporary trends show that overpopulation is not a likely problem.
Read here for a more indepth explanation.
http://www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/progress/population.html

2. Who cares what happens in a billion years (literally, a billion years).

3. Its nice to travel. It is a romantic notion to "walk among the stars" (name that tv series)

Another good reason:
4. Theres gold in them hills. With a few million planets in our galaxy, I'm sure we could all become wealthy from the natural resources.

5. Personal freedom. If there is enough room for all of us to have our own continent, what reason would there be for crime or police or governments? How would government survive. If they try to oppress you, leave well beyond the borders of where they can find you.

Drew

[Manedwolf]

If they try to oppress you, leave well beyond the borders of where they can find you.
Drew

Take my love, take my land
Take me where I cannot stand
I don't care, I'm still free
You can't take the sky from me
Take me out to the black
Tell them I ain't comin' back
Burn the land and boil the sea
You can't take the sky from me

[Harold Tuttle]

May I pass along my congratulations for your great interdimensional breakthrough.
I am sure, in the miserable annals of the Earth, you will be duly enshrined.

[Gewehr98]

That's right, Monkey-Boy! 

(Gawd, I love that movie!) 

[CAnnoneer]

If there are any disappointments, they do not come from divine premeditation or the sly underhandedness of nature. Physical laws do not care about human feelings or expectations. Nature just is. So, I do not think that there is a clever ploy to keep us technologically or fundamentally dead-ended.

What is necessary is creativity and innovative inquisitive thinking. Incrementalism would not produce revolutionary breakthroughs, because it is inherently based on old conceptions of how the world works.

For example, there are very good-looking arguments that could have been (and probably were) made before the steam engine, to the effect that transportation speed and capacity are ultimately limited by horsepower. Since it is not practical to yoke 500 horses to the same cart, cargo size is limited. More horses would also still travel at best at the maximal speed of any horse, and therefore any landbased transportation is inherently limited by the speed of the fastest horse. Such arguments are literally right, but their broader conclusions are based on the underlying assumption is that there are no other physical means of harnessing energy and generating mechanical work. The steam engine and later the internal combustion engines broke both cargo and speed limitations without violating the fundamental physical laws. Moreover, the study of electromagnetism provided yet other means of locomotion, among many other things.

In the same way, we should continue fundamental experimentation to look for "loopholes" if you will, filling gaps and discovering breaches of our current understanding, as well as innovative engineering solutions to harness what is already known in the fundamental physical perspective.

If there is a difference with respect to the past, it is that in most areas of experimental science, it seems it is no longer possible for a loner in a basement to discover something hugely significant by himself, because the equipment necessary for the measurements is generally far more elaborate and expensive, and takes many more manyears to design, build, assemble, test, and use. But all of that are funding, cultural, and organization issues, rather than fundamental science limitations.

One of the examples I can think of is controlled fusion. The field has been around for many decades now, but it is not aggressively funded and a lot of their time and effort is based on incrementalism in small improvements to existing techniques and geometries. That is why they appear stuck with being unable to sustain and control the fusion reaction, and so they end up investing more energy than they get out due to fusion. The obvious solution to me is completely new ideas about ignition, containment, scales, and materials involved, rather than crawling incrementally to no visible advantage. Moreover, we know that fusion works (we see it every day), so there isn't even a fundamental physical secret to uncover; instead the problems seems mostly an engineering one.

[S. Williamson]

I agree, but...

...did it really take you a month to write that? 


 

[Mabs2]

Well then beam me up, Scotty! 
Although this part makes me a bit nervous:

For instance, an astronaut moving faster than it would theoretically arrive at a destination before leaving.

Yea, I really don't understand this stuff.
With all the distances involved in space, light seems pretty darn slow...
Wtf goes on that makes this crazy stuff happen? D:

[Nick1911]

CAnnoneer, posts like yours are why I read APS.

 

[Mabs2]

I come here for the humor.
Old guys are funny.

[CAnnoneer]

CAnnoneer, posts like yours are why I read APS.

 

Thanks, I appreciate it. I share the sentiment and motivation.

[tyme]

Moreover, we know that fusion works (we see it every day), so there isn't even a fundamental physical secret to uncover; instead the problems seems mostly an engineering one.

The kind of fusion we see every day is not the same fusion reaction attempted in terrestrial fusion reactors, nor are there the same fuel constraints as there are on Earth.  Notably, hydrogen-burning stars use fusion reactions that are more difficult to achieve; we have to look for easy fusion reactions, which at the moment means deuterium-tritium.  Unfortunately, tritium has to be produced by fission of lithium-6.  Not only is fission is here to stay, but lithium-6 is quite expensive.
Here's what hydrogen-burning stars do: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proton-proton_chain_reaction

So we have to manufacture tritium (from lithium-6) ourselves (at least for deuterium-tritium fusion used in JET and planned for ITER and the far-future DEMO reactor).

A success with ITER will not address the costs of maintaining/fueling a real fusion power plant, nor the cost or energy requirements for fueling enough fusion plants to supply most of the world's electricity.

http://math.temple.edu/~wds/homepage/fusion.boondog

Based on that very detailed analysis, D-T fusion, even if it works, is not economical, and suffers from more resource constraints (supply of lithium-6) than fission.  We should be funding more general nuclear, particle, and QM physics research in an effort to make D-D or ideally B-H fusion feasible.

[LadySmith]

Tyme, you lost me after "The kind of..."
I'm looking forward to the day that I can go back to make sure I unplugged the iron before I even leave home.

[AJ Dual]

Moreover, we know that fusion works (we see it every day), so there isn't even a fundamental physical secret to uncover; instead the problems seems mostly an engineering one.

http://math.temple.edu/~wds/homepage/fusion.boondog

Based on that very detailed analysis, D-T fusion, even if it works, is not economical, and suffers from more resource constraints (supply of lithium-6) than fission.  We should be funding more general nuclear, particle, and QM physics research in an effort to make D-D or ideally B-H fusion feasible.

I agree, or perhaps He3 fusion using He3 extracted from the lunar regolith. (which would also have the advantage of jump-starting space infrastructure industry in general..)

I've sen some stuff on the net about B-H "garage fusion", but everything I saw had the stink of the "perpetual motion guys" on it.  Any semi laman links to serious B-H fusion research?