Space Opera vs Hard Sci-Fi, personal vs realistic

[vierasmarius]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

General relativity does not negate FTL, just makes it harder. I just meant that impossible is impossible is impossible. Technically possible by not technically breaking laws of physics does not make something possible. It's technically possible for everyone to wake up tomorrow and give me all their money. But that ain't gonna' happen.

Not to be pedantic, but as we discussed in earlier posts "impossible" is a very hard claim to make. We're instead debating various degrees of implausibility.

General relativity gives no mechanism by which solid matter can accelerate to the speed of light, and the only mechanisms that can bypass that either require a type of matter that has never been observed to exist, or energy concentrations equivalent to hundreds or thousands of stars. Compared to that, the engineering concerns of a World Arc are relatively small. I basically agree that it's (almost certainly) never going to happen, but that's more a matter of political and technological focus than because it's superscience. A sleeper ship seems far more plausible and efficient, but I still don't expect humans to ever manage to complete such a project.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by JCurwen3

...
The most implausible idea in sci-fi to me is that we'll go out in the stars, or even the planets, made of fragile flesh and blood. So much easier with more robust forms.

If THS style uploading is possible, then that would be the way to travel as it would be so many orders of magnitude easier and cheaper than fragile meat bags. Keep a whole suite of viable tissues as a nod to bio-interests... even if populating another star's space would have no need or use for say amazonian tree frogs.

[vierasmarius]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

If THS style uploading is possible, then that would be the way to travel as it would be so many orders of magnitude easier and cheaper than fragile meat bags. Keep a whole suite of viable tissues as a nod to bio-interests... even if populating another star's space would have no need or use for say amazonian tree frogs.

We can definitely agree on that account. Charles Stross's novel Accelerando features just such an interstellar journey, using a laser-powered lightsail to make the trip. The book isn't hard sci-fi (it includes questionable things like wormholes and consciousness uploading) but for the most part sticks to what's plausible.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by vierasmarius

..A sleeper ship seems far more plausible and efficient, but I still don't expect humans to ever manage to complete such a project.

Impossible because of realistic human psychology is just as impossible due to physics violations is my point. If all we are is discussing technically plausible for gaming and money and engineering is no object, then ok. I'll adjust my tactics.

Antimatter engines and nanostasis "corpsecicles" packed like cordwood overseen by a few autonomous but sturdy as possible A.I.s and little to no wasteful luggage seems the fastest way for my money.

[JCurwen3]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Nope, you're right. Democracy's greatest strength is that everyone gets a vote. Democracy's greatest weakness is that EVERYONE gets a vote. :)
Seriously though, it would take a dictatorship to force through the huge expenditures needed to send a viable probe interstellar distances... for the foreseeable future at least.

I agree about the need of the dictatorship, but I don't think you'd need one for long. The ideal would be a benevolent dictatorship that, for two or three generations, separated children from their parents, and encouraged and educated different, more hopeful, forward-thinking, dissociative, individualistic, skeptical values, in such a way that the infectious cultural hangovers and baggage of the past didn't get passed on and on and on. Then, set up a constitution in a constrained version of the language (whatever language) that prevents most ambiguities and has more laws about what kinds of laws can't be passed and what government and law enforcement can never do, even in emergencies, taking into account that society owes its citizens for the basic freedoms they sacrifice to be a part of it, rather than an backwards "ask what you can do for your country" ideology, including a certain reasonable minimum standard of life and life quality. And I believe such a culture would take to the stars and find ways to do it cheaply and without leaning on large institutions. Of course that's my dream and opinion.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by vierasmarius

We can definitely agree on that account. Charles Stross's novel Accelerando features just such an interstellar journey, using a laser-powered lightsail to make the trip. The book isn't hard sci-fi (it includes questionable things like wormholes and consciousness uploading) but for the most part sticks to what's plausible.

Wormholes are just physics way of trolling scientists. "Hey, holes that connect distant points of space are real.... Ha, ha, but collapse if any matter or signal tries to pass through."
The issue with laser powered interplanetary, let alone interstellar travel, is that you first need a laser big enough to obliterate anything man made at interplanetary distances. And even if everyone trusts you, what does it do after it's relatively short job of accelerating your super ship away?
It's starts looking like a very nice weapon since it's already there and usable.

[vierasmarius]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Impossible because of realistic human psychology is just as impossible due to physics violations is my point. If all we are is discussing technically plausible for gaming and money and engineering is no object, then ok. I'll adjust my tactics.

Well, human psychology is far more mutable than the laws of physics, and even moreso is a cultural or political zeitgeist. I could imagine a future society that gets some close miss by an extinction-level event, and freaks out enough to focus their efforts towards an (impractical, but impressive) engineering feat.

Antimatter engines and nanostasis "corpsecicles" packed like cordwood overseen by a few autonomous but sturdy as possible A.I.s and little to no wasteful luggage seems the fastest way for my money.

Absolutely. That would even be relatively gameable, if the humans are stored in a manner that preserves their memories. It would almost certainly be a one-way trip, of course.

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

The issue with laser powered interplanetary, let alone interstellar travel, is that you first need a laser big enough to obliterate anything man made at interplanetary distances. And even if everyone trusts you, what does it do after it's relatively short job of accelerating your super ship away?
It's starts looking like a very nice weapon since it's already there and usable.

The laser was massive, and powered by sapping the orbital energy of one of the smaller moons of Jupiter; by the time the ship returned (a matter of no more than a couple hundred years, IIRC) the moon's orbit had decayed to the point of instability. Not sure about the legal concerns with it. Apparently in that setting such energy expenditures were not considered extraordinary, just a bit extravagent.

I do think the book went off the deep end after that, as the digital intelligences that dominated civilization decided to dismantle the solar system and build a Matrioshka Brain. >_<

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by JCurwen3

...And I believe such a culture would take to the stars and find ways to do it cheaply and without leaning on large institutions. Of course that's my dream and opinion.

I agree that only such a government could gather the necessary resources and choice to do it. But benevolent dictatorship is impossible almost by definition, especially for more than a couple of years.

[JCurwen3]

Originally Posted by vierasmarius

We can definitely agree on that account. Charles Stross's novel Accelerando features just such an interstellar journey, using a laser-powered lightsail to make the trip. The book isn't hard sci-fi (it includes questionable things like wormholes and consciousness uploading) but for the most part sticks to what's plausible.

I'm not sure how consciousness uploading can be considered questionable... at least from a purely materialistic perspective. We know (again, purely materialism here) that a purely physical, albeit complex, system generates what we seem to experience as what we call consciousness. Why wouldn't it be possible, even very likely, to be able to create an alternative and more robust piece of software that did the same?

Uploading an existing consciousness might pose problems, but to my mind only due to the psychological hang ups involved in the possibly meaningless question "but will it still be me?". Get over that, and you're gold.

[vierasmarius]

Originally Posted by JCurwen3

Uploading an existing consciousness might pose problems, but to my mind only due to the psychological hang ups involved in the possibly meaningless question "but will it still be me?". Get over that, and you're gold.

Yeah, that's basically my only concern with it. I have no problem accepting memory uploading, but have no expectations that it would be anything but a copy. It's no way to cheat death. It just allows a lineage of individuals, all with the same memory and identity.