Subject:
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Re: Some great Space info and dicussion
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.space
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Date:
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Fri, 17 Jan 2003 02:07:36 GMT
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Viewed:
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965 times
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In lugnet.space, Frank Filz writes:
> James Brown wrote:
> >
> > In lugnet.space, Frank Filz writes:
> > > Brandon Harris wrote:
> > > > There was some physics geek who wrote this great little thing
> > > > about the effects of firing a can of ravioli at a star
> > > > destroyer at varying speeds. It's been circulating the net
> > > > for years and years - I first saw it in college. Anyways,
> > > > the sheer amount of devastation that a can of ravioli would be
> > > > able to do at even Mach 4 is pretty impressive.
> > >
> > > At an SF convention when I was in college, one fellow gave his theory of
> > > what first contact would be like:
> > >
> > > A large rock hurtling towards Earth at relativistic speeds. Boom! Flash!
> >
> > One of my favorite products from Ad Astra games (who make games that
> > actually use science) is a T-Shirt, with the front showing:
> >
> > "Give a person a relativistic rock, and they will shatter a planet today.
> > Teach them to do the math, and they will shatter planets for the rest of
> > their lives."
> >
> > The back, in much smaller print, has the math. :)
> >
> > > His theory was that once you develop the capability to easily visit
> > > other star systems, that you also easily have the capability of
> > > accelerating rocks to relativistic speeds. Since there's not much one
> > > can do to defend against such a tactic, should you find any
> > > technological society on another planet, you must pre-emptively strike.
> >
> > You can defend against it though; all you need to do is shoot a rock of your
> > own, and meet it halfway.
>
> Ahh, but that assumes you have the technology. His theory is that you
> will get blasted to oblivion before you get the technology. There's also
> the time factor. You don't have all that blasted much time to react to
> something approaching at relativistic speeds (remember, if it's
> approaching at 90% the speed of light, you only have 10% of the time it
> takes for the object to reach you). Another part of his idea was that
> perhaps SETI isn't such a good idea: "Hey fellas, we're a nascent
> technological civilization, come blast us to oblivion before we learn
> anything dangerous."
Yeah, I understand his premise, I just don't buy it. :) Even stipulating 1
possibility for a technological culture per say 10,000 stars that's still 50
million sites (half a trillion stars in our galaxy alone) you need to check.
Further assuming you know where they all are, that there isn't a possibility
of one emerging somewhere you'd evaluated as "impossible", you may regularly
visit each of those possibilities and throw a rock at any cultures that pop
up. Let's say you're very good at this, and it takes you only a hour to
poke your nose around a system, see if there are any cultures in need of
exploding, and launch your rock. We'll also assume you to have a magic
intersellar drive that is instant, unlimited in range, effectively free, and
doesn't need to go home to get more gas. 100 million hours later (or
roughly 5700 years, you've checked them all. Better go back and start over
- a technological society could arise in the 5700 years since you last
visited somewhere. And heaven forbid that someone in some other galaxy has
the nerve to start a culture.
And that's not taking into account the possibility that any of those 50
million sites evolved a culture before you did, or any of a gazillion other
factors.
And I do indeed realize the 90%/10% problem, but really, unless they're in
our solar system it's still a long time to react. Our nearest neighbor is
(Proxima) Centauri at a hint over 4 light years, which means we still have
about 5+ months to put something in the way. Remember, we'll know exactly
where the rock is going to be at any given time (once we can see it) - math
is great that way - and we need to impart very little velocity (or damage,
either will do) to change the rocks course enough to make it miss. Not to
mention the fact that this rock was fired 5 years ago, from a huge distance
away. There is a miniscule tolerance for error in that.
If they're in our solar system, they can do the job much more cheaply and
efficiently by just towing a handful of big rocks over from the asteroid
belt, dropping them from orbit and killing us with nuclear winter from the
dust clouds.
James :)
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Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: Some great Space info and dicussion
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| (...) I agree that the numbers seem staggering. On the other hand, clearly the number of interstellar civilizations is below some threshold. Of course part of the premise is also that the first civilization to make it to interstellar capability (...) (21 years ago, 17-Jan-03, to lugnet.space)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: Some great Space info and dicussion
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| (...) Ahh, but that assumes you have the technology. His theory is that you will get blasted to oblivion before you get the technology. There's also the time factor. You don't have all that blasted much time to react to something approaching at (...) (21 years ago, 16-Jan-03, to lugnet.space)
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