| > More likely just not seen yet, our furthest reaching signals are maybe 50 light years away at best This is the key. On interstellar scales, things move very, very slowly and you have to plan on time scales measured in millennia. IMHO we are doomed simply because we can barely think beyond the next election cycle. (At least that's true for Americans. The Chinese seem to think in terms of decades and, occasionally, centuries.) |
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| ▲ | jcranmer 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | > (At least that's true for Americans. The Chinese seem to think in terms of decades and, occasionally, centuries.) The Chinese political system is just as short-term-oriented as <insert democracy here> on the whole, and I don't think there has ever been a politician in history who ever thought about workable century-long impacts. | | |
| ▲ | thaumasiotes 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | > The Chinese political system is just as short-term-oriented as <insert democracy here> on the whole Well, the US political system is based on a four-year cycle. In China they're based around a five-year cycle. 25% longer. | | |
| ▲ | skirmish an hour ago | parent [-] | | Most of the effort goes into eliminating the 5-year cycle and hanging on as long as possible. |
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| ▲ | GMoromisato 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | 50,000 years ago (or so) we were a tiny species hanging out in Africa. We didn't think in terms of years, much less decades. This was before we figured out how to measure the length of the year or to predict when the winter would end. And yet, without any central planning or coordination, we left Africa and colonized Europe, then we headed out across Asia and crossed into the Americas. Plus we sailed from Asia and colonized Polynesia. Imagine someone saying, "We're doomed because people walk very slowly--it's going to take a thousand years to get to the southern tip of the Americas." And yet, we did. I think the same thing will happen with space travel and ultimately the colonization of the galaxy. | | |
| ▲ | O1111OOO 16 minutes ago | parent | next [-] | | Unrelated to the thread... but do you do any writing at all - sci-fi, short stories..? I'm enjoying your take on this. | |
| ▲ | lisper 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | > Imagine someone saying, "We're doomed because people walk very slowly I think I may not have made myself clear. The analogy here is not that "we're doomed because people walk slowly". There is nothing that happens here on earth that is even remotely analogous to the constraints that the speed of light imposes on interstellar processes. Even at a leisurely walking pace, a human can circumnavigate the planet in less time than it takes light to reach the nearest star. Human walking speed is blindingly fast (relative to the size of the planet) compared to the speed of light (relative to the distances between stars). The reason we're doomed is not that we're not walking fast enough, it's because we won't stop walking and take time to think about where we should be going. We just go. | | |
| ▲ | GMoromisato 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | But my point is, "we just go" is exactly how we conquered the Earth. We didn't think, "let's colonize the whole planet!", we just went. We walked from Africa all the way to the tip of South America. We weren't doomed then and we're not doomed now. We will colonize the solar system and eventually the galaxy.* * Assuming past performance is indicative of future performance. | | |
| ▲ | lisper an hour ago | parent [-] | | > Assuming past performance is indicative of future performance. Yeah, well, there's yer problem right there. We will not colonize the solar system, and certainly not the galaxy, because we haven't figured out how to stabilize the situation here on earth. Yes, we colonized the planet, but for most of the history our lack of planning was compensated by technological limitations and limits imposed by the laws of physics. Those are mostly gone now, and I'll be a little surprised if civilization doesn't collapse before the end of my life (and I'm in my 60s). I would be very surprised if it lasts to the end of the century, though of course I won't be around to see that. |
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