Astronomy and space exploration
- Thread starter eloic
- Start date
cheapchips
Veteran
Well, they might miss the 2024 synod, but it's hard to see them not achieving rapid reuse in the next couple of years. Once it's cheap to reach orbit we're off on our way to being a space faring / multiplanetary species and all sorts of cool stuff.
They seem to have spent the last year working out their manufacturing. If over the next year we see some spectacular crashes it shouldn't matter too much. They'll always be another Starship waiting in the wings. (They've almost finished SN09 and are half way through SN10).
Warp engines seem to be way too exotic right now (even though there may be some research projects), but a more feasible approach with current nuclear tech could improve travel time a lot.
cheapchips
Veteran
Warp engines seem to be way too exotic right now (even though there may be some research projects), but a more feasible approach with current nuclear tech could improve travel time a lot.
If we're actually out in the solar system properly then antimatter harvesting can be a thing. That's all known physics and there's at least good ideas on how utilise anti matter propulsion.
(If we want antimatter as fuel it would ultimately be cheaper to make it. Our current anti matter comes from colliders that aren't very efficient antimatter factories. Without a market for antimatter, no one's going to invest in a production facility)
Automatically my mind went like "to get antimatter, it's as simple as combining 25 chromatic metal units with 20 condensed carbon units". Blame No Man's Sky. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Is it really that simple though. Seems to me that containing antimatter is a challenge, at least on an industrial scale. Not dissimilar to nuclear fusion in some senses.
Physicist: "Nuclear fusion is really pretty straightforward. All we need to do is figure out how to contain a plasma at 100M Kelvin in a vessel without it touching the sides. Once we've cracked that we're golden. Shouldn't take more than a decade or so."
Physics: "Hold my beer."
Physicist: "Nuclear fusion is really pretty straightforward. All we need to do is figure out how to contain a plasma at 100M Kelvin in a vessel without it touching the sides. Once we've cracked that we're golden. Shouldn't take more than a decade or so."
Physics: "Hold my beer."
cheapchips
Veteran
Yeah. Antimatter is definitely near fusion on the techtree.
I was throwing it in there as contrast against warp drive as a possible step after nuclear propulsion. Warp drive's not on the known physics side of the fence.
There was a great The Space Show episode where a guest was running through all the steps that would be needed to achieve antimatter production/propulsion system. Wish I could remember the episode #.
We’re 20 years away from fusion, they said, 20 years ago.
https://www.space.com/nasa-moon-discovery-sofia-announcement-webcast
* insert "I'm not saying it's aliens, but it's aliens" meme. *
Nah, probably the exciting news is they found a few pockets of water or something like that...
The 3rd belt is temporary
ps: about the phoshine, Brian Greene talks about another group that used the same approach and they noted the method used throws up spurious results they looked for molecules including those that are known not to exist and found them
about 3 mins in
This has been the subject of quite some debate in the community. The paper I linked above is just the first, followed by
https://arxiv.org/abs/2010.14305
(the original abstract on astro-ph has been edited, you can see the original by clicking the 'v1' link in the top left).
the tone of the original post upset a few people and led to this:
A lot of this hinges on how you regard the statistical chances of finding something you're looking for in the place you expect to find it, even if you also find a pile of other stuff which you know for sure isn't real.
https://arxiv.org/abs/2010.14305
(the original abstract on astro-ph has been edited, you can see the original by clicking the 'v1' link in the top left).
the tone of the original post upset a few people and led to this:
A lot of this hinges on how you regard the statistical chances of finding something you're looking for in the place you expect to find it, even if you also find a pile of other stuff which you know for sure isn't real.
