Possible warp drive may allow Alpha Centauri to be reached "in a mere two weeks"

[El_Machinae]

Fermi's paradox is pretty compelling, mainly because of what can happen with compounding returns (or accelerating progress). Even if humans are the result of fairly many 'lucky' coincidences, such that life could form on Earth much earlier than elsewhere (on average), a mere million year headstart could make a drastic difference when it comes to interstellar colonisation. I don't feel confident predicting humanity's progress for more than a few centuries, but if current trends hold, we should be at least considering interstellar travel by 2300. If the people of 2300 have their 'wishes' fulfilled, then in a million years the galaxy would be in the process of being greened with our life.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Fermi's paradox is pretty compelling, mainly because of what can happen with compounding returns (or accelerating progress). Even if humans are the result of fairly many 'lucky' coincidences, such that life could form on Earth much earlier than elsewhere (on average), a mere million year headstart could make a drastic difference when it comes to interstellar colonisation. I don't feel confident predicting humanity's progress for more than a few centuries, but if current trends hold, we should be at least considering interstellar travel by 2300. If the people of 2300 have their 'wishes' fulfilled, then in a million years the galaxy would be in the process of being greened with our life.

I completely concur with this.

 

[Leoreth]

i would not take things as before, after or causality too seriously, and yep universe could be a much weirder place than we thought. As the great profesor Farnsworth teach us "quantum physics means anything can happen at any time for no reason".

First of all, before/after and causality are two different things. If events are unable to influence each other, you can already choose two different reference frames in which one happened before the other and vice versa. But as soon as they are able to influence each other, this becomes impossible, apparently "preserving" causality. It's very curious that the laws of physics according to our current understanding work out like that.

And Futurama is funny, but not to be taken too seriously.

That's what I said about global environmental/resource problems, but then there's a significant section of people (even posters here) who always point to innovation and "human ingenuity" to quash my "alarmism".

Well, imo it's not completely comparable, because there people ignore social/economic instead of physical realities, but I see and agree with your point.

In my opinion, the Fermi paradox is one of the best arguments against the feasibility of interstellar travel.

Why? The "paradox" depends on assumptions that may or may not be true.

 

[peter grimes]

The searches we've done to date are unfortunately pitiful when compared to the scale of the problem we are trying to solve.

Indeed. But we can still say something positive about the question - that's all I was trying to point out.

We don't have a unifying theory yet and up till now, the more we learn about the details of the how the universe works, the farther away from such a theory we've gone.

Very true. "uniting" was a poor choice of words on my part

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Indeed. But we can still say something positive about the question - that's all I was trying to point out.

Gotcha

Very true. "uniting" was a poor choice of words on my part

Well, we are searching for a unifying theory of the funamental physical forces, which will go a long way toward showing how everything works. It's just that our hunt has actually shown us we are farther from a unifying theory than we thought we were when we started looking for it.

I didn't mean to nitpick you or anything.

 

[Thedrin]

It's possible the universe was created a few thousand years ago, and was made to look like it was billions of years old. But believing the latter is the more sensible thing to do in this situation.

I don't agree with this statement. Conceivably, a sensible person could believe the former, but would also believe that in X years time the Universe's apparent age would have increased by X years, assuming no further actions from extra-Universal forces.

In other words, it wouldn't particularly bother me if someone thought that God created the Universe a few thousand years ago and deliberately made it look like it was a few billion years old, as long as that person also thought that the combined logical reasonings, empirical observations, and derived laws of the physical Universe that allowed humanity to estimate the age of the Universe at a few billion years should be the basis for making predictions about the future.

Edit: this assumes the person believes in some form of "benevolent" God. If the person believes in a trickster God, that would deceive humanity for no good reason, then it doesn't hold.

 

[Zelig]

I'm still haunted by Fermi's question. If the odds of life and intelligence arising are so great, then the galaxy should be swarming with alien cultures. But we have seen precisely zero. So, well, where are they?

The Fermi equation is essentially worthless, it has several variables where our guesses have no precision, to many orders of magnitude. (I know, only somewhat related to the Fermi paradox, I just wanted to make sure that was out there.)

 

[Thedrin]

The Fermi equation is essentially worthless, it has several variables where our guesses have no precision, to many orders of magnitude. (I know, only somewhat related to the Fermi paradox, I just wanted to make sure that was out there.)

Drake equation?

If so, I agree.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

The Fermi equation is essentially worthless, it has several variables where our guesses have no precision, to many orders of magnitude. (I know, only somewhat related to the Fermi paradox, I just wanted to make sure that was out there.)

It's not worthless when you consider that we are in the process of actually measuring some of those variables (like how often planets form and of what type). It may prove to be off entirely as we learn more, but it isn't worthless. It's a decent enough guide to how frequent ET pops up in the universe. The downside is that obviously we do not know the values of all the variables, but that is and will change with time and better observations.

Edit: yeah it's Drake's equation

 

[Leoreth]

It's not worthless when you consider that we are in the process of actually measuring some of those variables (like how often planets form and of what type). It may prove to be off entirely as we learn more, but it isn't worthless. It's a decent enough guide to how frequent ET pops up in the universe. The downside is that obviously we do not know the values of all the variables, but that is and will change with time and better observations.

Edit: yeah it's Drake's equation

The problem is that the best way to determine these variables is to observe what the Drake equation is there to predict.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

The problem is that the best way to determine these variables is to observe what the Drake equation is there to predict.

Excellent point.

 

[Zelig]

Drake equation?

Edit: yeah it's Drake's equation

Er yeah, that's what I meant.

 

[PlutonianEmpire]

Edit: this assumes the person believes in some form of "benevolent" God. If the person believes in a trickster God, that would deceive humanity for no good reason, then it doesn't hold.

I don't call him the Almighty Douche for nothing, kiddo.

 

[uppi]

You mean *any* form of interstellar travel?

The regular interstellar travel that would be required for a species to keep expanding across the galaxy. Something more than Apollo type missions of going there a few times.

Why? The "paradox" depends on assumptions that may or may not be true.

Sure, that's why it is an argument and not a proof. If you believe that the probability of intelligent life arising more than once across our galaxy is high, then you can conclude that there is something that prevents the aliens from reaching us.

Of course, if you think that the probability of life arising is extremely small, you can easily dismiss the argument.

 

[Thorgalaeg]

First of all, before/after and causality are two different things. If events are unable to influence each other, you can already choose two different reference frames in which one happened before the other and vice versa. But as soon as they are able to influence each other, this becomes impossible, apparently "preserving" causality. It's very curious that the laws of physics according to our current understanding work out like that.

And Futurama is funny, but not to be taken too seriously.

Mmm... did i say they were the same thing? it was you who related causality with before/after. But yes, causality is very related with before/after time direction, the other way around being usually called retrocausality or backward-causality, which btw have been experimentally proved using quantum entangled particles, implying that quantum effects goes someway backwards in time, future events affecting past events.

And yes futurama (at least the good episodes) should be taken very seriously.

 

[LamaGT]

Of course, if you think that the probability of life arising is extremely small, you can easily dismiss the argument.

I think exactly that. There are SO many variables to the creation of complex life, even more variables to the creation of sentient life, other variables to the creation of sentient and intelligent life to actually care about this stuff, and some few other variables to have a civilization that invests enough resources to develop and use interstellar travel.

For example, (I think) the Chinese had pretty much all the resources needed to discover and colonize the Americas, and yet they've never felt the need to, and so today the most spoken language of the USA is English

 

[Crezth]

For example, (I think) the Chinese had pretty much all the resources needed to discover and colonize the Americas, and yet they've never felt the need to, and so today the most spoken language of the USA is English

What the heck

 

[LamaGT]

What the heck

It's hard to find anything on the subject, it could be a myth, but in general I think the (late) Chinese empires are excellent examples of wasted opportunities of dominating the world

 

[El_Machinae]

I remembering hearing that China was functionally about twice as far from the Americas as Europe is, with regards to how the boats worked, etc.

 

[aelf]

Well, imo it's not completely comparable, because there people ignore social/economic instead of physical realities, but I see and agree with your point.

There's a big physical part to it too! We're, after all, talking about physical things like resources or the Earth's capacity to regulate its temperature.