Red Nemesis
The Blind Critic
Originally posted by Jinsoku Takai
There aren't any "rocks" or particles travelling at light speed. Where did you learn your science? Also, not leaving the solar system within the "next several thousand years" is a laughable statement.
He isn't wrong, you're confuzed. Read:
i don't think deep space travel as we imagine it would be possible. what people don't seem to take into account is in the depths of space there are particles and rocks that travel at the speed of light that would not only pierce the hull of whatever vehicle may be used to space travel, but it would also therefore likely kill the inhabitants of the vehicle.
The highlighted portion is where your confusion is. In the depths of space there are particles and rocks. People don't seem to take into account that travel at the speed of light would pierce the hull of whatever vehicle may be used to space travel with those particles and rocks. The sentence is clear but the only way your reading (that Cado thinks there are rocks going c) makes any sense is if we assume that he is dumb. Understanding is increased if we do not, so I will not.
Cade, you are quite right. Running into something while going c would be devastating; hence the deflector dish in Star Trek.
Originally posted by Hewhoknowsall
Now THIS part is quite wrong. Think about how much we've improved in the last 100 years. Now think about how the technological advancement will most likely rise exponentially. Now take our 100 years of advancements, multiply it by 10,000, and then somehow include the exponential factor.
[list][*]P = principal amount (initial investment)
[*]r = annual nominal interest rate (as a decimal)
[*]n = number of times the interest is compounded per year
[*]t = number of years
[*]A = amount after time t
[/list]
If we use arbitrary units for advancement then you get an idea of how quickly this grows:
Also take into account how far we've advanced in the past million years, and take into account the fact that we didn't advance at a very rapid rate for 99.99+% of those years. Now add in 1 million years where we advance at a rate = or > our current rate. How much we can accomplish if we survive for a million years is simply unimaginable.
Poor argument. The advancement of all but the last ten thousand years or so has been negligible. You are completely right, but discussing the largely stagnant (although extremely successful) lifestyles of tribal peoples is a waste of time in terms of technological achievement. Restrain yourself to the past 10,000 years and your point holds however (for now).
Except not. There are limits to the physical capabilities of technology. It is likely that the limits (of transistors, no matter how small, for example) will be reached long before we reach Star Wars levels, let alone Star Trek. It requires a paradigm shift that simply cannot be predicted to arise before we can match them. Although I suspect that such a shift is coming we cannot predict it based on past performance.
Also, "any kind"? We're already equal on many, and close to equalling on others, such as lasers.
[b]
Elaborate. In which areas of laser application are we nearing equality?
In terms of say, infantry/vehicle weapons/armor, we can probably surpass them within the century (although it may take longer to build an AT-AT's equivalent in power), as this is the area in which we are the closest to them.
You don't seem to understand the ridiculous levels of power in walker weaponry. Stardestroyer.net calls the energy output necessary to take out Alderann "522600 times the power output of Earth's sun!" TCW ICS puts the energy in 1 shot from a Republic gunship at 5x10^9 joules per shot. That is 112,500,000,000th of the yearly electricity production in the US as of 2005. Or 1/3000th of the total human energy consumption per second. That is fantastic.
Their weapons are incredibly powerful, many orders of magnitude greater than our own: that antipersonnel turret puts out 3521126 times more energy than an AK47 bullet.
We're screwed in that area.
[b]
Star Wars has really advanced medical technology, so it might take a few centuries to surpass.
Really? Cybernetics, prosthetics and an equivalent to
bacta (the Vita-Chamber of Star Wars) are going to be equalled in the next few hundred years?
Really? Hell, the US couldn't even do stem cell research for the past 8 years. You really think we're going to integrate organs and mechanics? Think of the protests! Think of the OUTRAGE! Think of the children!
FTL speed may very well be impossible, so if so then probably never, unless if we find a way to create wormholes/bend space and time. If it is possible, then it's actually possible that it would take a few thousand years to surpass.
I read something about finding low-energy pathways (regions of space where gravity is less due to conflicting pulls) with calculus, which would save on gas usage. Another idea was "bending space" in front of the ship while leaving it normal behind it, maintaining
c internally but traveling faster relative to the outer universe. That would require wtfsad levels of power though, and as known now the speed limit is unbreakable in every circumstance.
Space ship technology can very well be passed within the millennium.
Doubtful.
1. At present there is no incentive to do so.
2. The ships shown are dangerously fragile, it is unlikely we'll ever see a functional,
utilized x-wing.
3. Energy production is a factor again.
4.
Heat dispersal
The Force is of course impossible, but it isn't technology.Lightsabers could very well be possible in a century or two.
K.
Nah. Sabers are totally broken. Plasma doesn't act like that, neither does light. Even if it did it wouldn't do the things asked of it. There is absolutely nothing real behind sabers.
Oh, and @Red Nemesis, the population of Coruscant alone is over 1 trillion.
Link
(And fun Fish game)Exponential Growth
If a population has a constant birth rate through time and is never limited by food or disease, it has what is known as exponential growth. With exponential growth the birth rate alone controls how fast (or slow) the population grows.
Population growth is seemingly limitless, as disease and famine are nearly absent (in SW) and even Earth (in your setup) is freed from those restraints. From
My Ishmael:
Let's say that six billion inhabitants represents a reasonable planetary maximum for your species (though I suspect that six billion is actually much more than a healthy maximum. You'll reach that six billion well before the end of this century. And let's say that you had instantaneous access to every habitable planet in the universe, to which you could immediately begin exporting people. At present your population is doubling every thirty five years or so, so in thirty-five years you'd fill a second planet. After seventy years four planets would be full. After a hundred and five years eight planets would be full. And so on. At this doubling rate a billion planets would be full by the year 3000 or therabouts. I know that sounds incredible, but, trust me, the arithmetic is correct. By about 3300 a hundred billion planets would be full; this is the number you could occupy in this entire galaxy if each and every star had one habitable planet. If you continued to grow at your present rate, a second galaxy would be full in another thirty-five years. Four galaxies would be full thirty-five years later, and eight would be full thirty-five years after that. By the year 4000 the planets of a million galaxies would be full. By the year 5000 the planets of a trillion galaxies would be full- in other words, every planet in the universe. All in just three thousand years...The anthropologist Marvin Harris once calculated that if the human population doubled every generation- every twenty years as opposed to every thirty-five- the entire universe would be converted into a solid mass of human protoplasm in less than two thousand years.
Bear in mind that each planet would carry 6 billion people.
It wouldn't take long at all, given that:
Humanity survives for a VERY long time
Humanity is not sent back to the stone age via some nuclear war or something like that
Humanity is not taken over by machines/aliens/etc.
Humanity continues to advance and doesn't stagnate
90% (at least) of humanity is involved in a culture that must expand its population in order to survive. Therefore these numbers actually apply instead of illustrate the ridiculousity (i know) of our patterns.
And also, even if humanity can't replicate all technologies (like FTL travel), if the other technologies have surpassed SW by a huge amount then you could conclude that overall humanity would have surpassed SW. The thread doesn't say "surpass in ALL areas".
I'd say our best bet is in robotics (Data > C3PO) and medicine (we do have stem cells, after all). Space travel is beyond the pale and they simply use magic for power output.