Current Events > Space travel is never going to be possible.

(+) Yeah! (+)

Space is huge. It's why in movies they have to make up stuff like hyperspace and shit.

https://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/31-hilariously-bad-high-tech-predictions.html

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vigorm0rtis posted...

https://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/31-hilariously-bad-high-tech-predictions.html

Lol

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vigorm0rtis posted...

https://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/31-hilariously-bad-high-tech-predictions.html

#22 and #28 aren't wrong.

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Just wait until they reverse engineer the UFOs in S4 and unlock the potential of element 115

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You mean fast interstellar travel. Slow interplanetary travel is still possible.

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ImAMarvel posted...

This.

But also, we know that nothing about traveling through space, or even relatively fast interstellar travel is impossible. We just need to develop the technologies, particularly a way to generate a shit ton of energy, in order to make it feasible. Also a way to generate and store antimatter energy, if, say, we decided to go the route of antimatter fusion-catalyzed propulsion.

Not impossible but certainly not easy either.

Antimatter is less energy than nuclear. It's not useful for anything right now except academically.

As for how to actually travel...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcubierre_drive

The main problem with that, is that we can't generate enough energy to power it with our current technology.

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ImAMarvel posted...

This.

But also, we know that nothing about traveling through space, or even relatively fast interstellar travel is impossible. We just need to develop the technologies, particularly a way to generate a shit ton of energy, in order to make it feasible. Also a way to generate and store antimatter energy, if, say, we decided to go the route of antimatter fusion-catalyzed propulsion.

Not impossible but certainly not easy either.

by the time we could have done any of that we'd have developed computers powerful enough to just upload ourselves into. and even if we didn't do that and park ourselves around the sun for the next 5billion years in a computer utopia we'd be existing in synthetic bodies that dont give a flying fuck how long it could take to fly from one galaxy to another.

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Maybe it's for the best.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D40RHPimrKk
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ImAMarvel posted...

Bro, antimatter-catalyzed fusion propulsion IS nuclear. It's just probably the most advanced nuclear option there is. And speaking of nuclear, that's an option that we really could've developed back in the 70's if we cared enough. Sadly, we didn't. But NASA IS trying to develop a nuclear thermal engine to get us to Mars in the next 5 years.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_(nuclear_propulsion)

here you go. this is absolutely feasible as long as you have unlimited resources to ferry a fuck ton of nukes into orbit for your ship and a complete lack of care about what could happen if some of them burnt up in atmosphere...

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ImAMarvel posted...

Idk, all that stuff sounds far, far more complicated and advanced than just developing a fusion rocket (fusion btw being something that we've been working on for decades now, with the world's first fusion nuclear reactor being built possibly later this decade), making it really efficient, and finding some way to store a ton of antimatter for long periods of time while keeping it safe.

Like I said, not easy but not really impossible either. Definitely something that could be achievable in the next couple of centuries.

lets ignore the fact that fusion energy is the tech that is perpetually a decade+ away.

even with fusion energy, in a size small enough to get into space and efficient enough to be worth the effort, you've still got the issue of only being able to travel at a tiny fraction of the speed of light anywhere. you'd need dyson spheres to power something like an alcubierre drive, which would end up generating a wave of distorted space strong enough to destroy the origin and end point systems anyway... and something like a wormhole or 'hyperspace' is likely impossible or functionally so.

so even with fusion energy, you're probably dealing with travel times WAY to long to be really feasible outside the system.

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PikachuMaxwell posted...

You mean fast interstellar travel. Slow interplanetary travel is still possible.

Eh... it's really not (besides like Mars. There's not a lot of other places in our system worth going to in terms of risk/reward) I have strong doubts that a generational ship could ever be built or that it would actually make it to it's destination with anyone alive left onboard.

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Tyranthraxus posted...

#28 aren't wrong.

what was the threat of Y2K?

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Ignoring the enormous distances involved, cosmic radiation would fuck up any long term space travelers.

vigorm0rtis posted...

https://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/31-hilariously-bad-high-tech-predictions.html

"Threshold of rocket mail" lmao

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Space travel is totally possible. Just, y'know, very slow, and we need a whole planet.

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ImAMarvel posted...

#22 was made back in the 60's and people aren't sure if we're going to get true AI in the next 20 years TODAY. That was absolutely a false prediction.

He didn't say we'd be done. He said it would be significantly solved and it has been (pending your definition of significantly) and kids born in 1967 worked on it.

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AsucaHayashi posted...

what was the threat of Y2K?

It was mitigated because we took it seriously.

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ImAMarvel posted...

Eh, we really have been making some headway into it in recent years.

this has been the case for decades. we're still years out from iter even beginning testing, and then another decade or two before we actually see a fusion reactor with a net gain in energy worth the effort.

ImAMarvel posted...

Not really? With antimatter-based fusion and/or laser-based solar sails, you're looking at journey times of 20-100 years. Definitely long but not really epochs either. If we could somehow make that method even more efficient, you could get there in 10 years or even less, if you were able to travel at 75% the speed of light.

you're essentially talking far off future tech with quotes of 75% speed of light...

but to even achieve that you're looking at an acceleration period that would last decades and a deceleration period of the same length, unless you want newton to fuck you during accelerating or you want to wave fondly at the target system as you zoom past.

the solar sail idea would only work for probes, which is probably how we will "colonize" the galaxy anyway.

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Who knows what we discover over time. Based on what we know today... yeah, its completely impossible.

But 50,000 years ago, traveling across oceans was impossible, let along putting a man on the moon or sending rovers to Mars. Based on how much weve grown technologically just in roughly the last 100 years, I wouldnt be shocked if we make some discoveries that change everything.

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vigorm0rtis posted...

https://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/31-hilariously-bad-high-tech-predictions.html

Rocket mail, though...

Tyranthraxus posted...

It was mitigated because we took it seriously.

at first i thought "we" meant all the people who decided to fill up their bunkers and hoard survival items etc...

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The guy that says heavier than air flying is impossible never saw a bird in his life lmao

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honestly though, this is my theory on how human civilization might survive the life of our galaxy. There will be method download data into a human infant, a spacecraft will harness a machine incubator til full birth and the data is downloaded in the human child, who stays in a crib and is fed via robot. That data downloaded is sufficient enough to help the baby human learn material like speaking and literature and pilot the spacecraft. This spacecraft was sent 1000 years ago from existing human planet to another habitable planet, they hope can survive but it doesnt really matter cause they have sent 1000000 such missions in the universe

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Someone should really tell those people currently in space that traveling to space is not possible...

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instead of focusing on moving a ship fast scientists should try moving the universe around the ship. sometimes u gotta think outside the box

vigorm0rtis posted...

https://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/31-hilariously-bad-high-tech-predictions.html

On one hand, the fact the Einstein of all people thought nuclear energy was impossible, only to be proven wrong during his own lifetime, is weirdly shocking. It make me think, wow, almost anything must be possible then.

then I see the quote about sending mail with guided missiles lmao

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AsucaHayashi posted...

at first i thought "we" meant all the people who decided to fill up their bunkers and hoard survival items etc...

That was an unwarranted overreaction. Life doesn't come to an end because computer software stops working.

That said IDK what the fuck we're going to do about the Jan 19, 2038 problem which is more serious and harder to fix.

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We'd pretty much have to make multigenerational ships that can self sustain for a very very long time with the hope of reaching a second earth eventually.
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ImAMarvel posted...

#22 was made back in the 60's and people aren't sure if we're going to get true AI in the next 20 years TODAY. That was absolutely a false prediction.

I think it ultimately depends what he meant by AI.

AsucaHayashi posted...

what was the threat of Y2K?

You... you know we worked hard to avoid problems, right?
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vigorm0rtis posted...

https://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/31-hilariously-bad-high-tech-predictions.html

What I dislike about these quotes is that a lot of them are from people who, is in their best interest, to fight against what they're arguing against. Edison was in a current war against Tesla and didn't want to lose his investments he made in DC. One of Einstein's breakthroughs is how he theorized the rule that nothing moves faster than light. Direct contradiction with quantum mechanics, specifically with quantum entanglement. Information between entangled particles transfers instantaneous no matter the distance. Of course he'll fight tooth and nail against it.

So what I'm arguing is that the title "hilariously bad high tech predictions" is misguided. While there are people who straight up aren't visionaries, a number are intentionally arguing fallaciously due to financial interests and other sources of bias. You have to keep this in mind whenever you listen to someone speak, no matter what kind of authority they may be.
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