Quote:
Originally Posted by sir_pudding
A Dyson swarm is a type of stellar engine, and Type II civilizations aren't completely lossless (Kardeshev wasn't proposing a violation of the 2nd Law); they are very nearly collecting all the energy of their star, regardless. Death is in some ways a problem of resources, and they have vastly more resources now than they evolved to use. Turning that wealth into more life, if that is something they are into, is likely to be successful.
|
How does throwing lots of resources at the problem of death work in detail? If aging is all about DNA damage, injecting someone with cloned stem cells that you've gone to great effort to remove all damage from might work. Or maybe you could extensively re-engineer the human body to stop aging entirely. But I'm not sure we understand aging well enough to state with confidence that these things are possible.
Quote:
|
Besides, they have a million year old civilization that hasn't collapsed from war and they have a very conservative approach to new technology, that says "really old people" to me; they definitely have something that endures and gives them a long view.
|
To be clear, I'm not assuming the species' technological limits are self-imposed, a la the Vilani from
Traveller. I'm trying to make pessimistic assumptions about what is physically possible, and see what we get.
Quote:
|
They built a Class B stellar engine, Class A engines are actually easier. If they build a statite Shkadov thruster, or even better convert their swarm into a Dyson bubble, they'll have a Class C engine that collects energy and generates thrust. It may not be, but it still may be something that they might be interested in doing.
|
Is this right? What are the materials engineering requirements to make the statite Shkadov thruster work? Is it within the realm of near-future solar sail designs, or does it require significant advances in materials engineering?