3 ms·

Does anyone else get just a little bit sad that we will not be around to see actual practical advances made with wormholes? I wonder if this is what people in

Does anyone else get just a little bit sad that we will not be around to see actual practical advances made with wormholes? I wonder if this is what people in earlier centuries felt, a bit of melancholy at the dream that hundreds of years from now someone may be able to walk on the then newly-discovered moon, and knowing they would not be around to see it happen.

capableweb 5y ago
> Does anyone else get just a little bit sad that we will not be around to see actual practical advances made with wormholes? Thing is, I felt sad when I heard about IP the first time, and some people said we were gonna have a huge network everyone can talk with each other, across borders. Because I thought we'd never achieve that in my lifetime. But here we are, things move a lot faster (sometimes) than what you think. Maybe because of the inviting incentive of basically teleportation, research on wormholes will be faster.
- Ansil849 5y ago
  I don't think a new networking protocol is remotely comparable to an entire new form of matter.
  - capableweb 5y ago
    I'm not comparing them, I'm comparing the feeling of "This will be so far in the future that I will never experience it" that I got from IP and international networks, since someone else felt the same way about wormholes.
Normille 5y ago
>I wonder if this is what people in the 17th century felt, a bit of melancholy at the dream that hundreds of years from now someone may be able to walk on the then newly-discovered moon... I'm no historian. But I'm pretty sure people had discovered The Moon a wee while before the C17th.
- gremlinsinc 5y ago
  Wasn't it discovered by Galileo in the 1500s? /s
amayne 5y ago
> I wonder if this is what people in the 17th century felt, a bit of melancholy at the dream that hundreds of years from now someone may be able to walk on the then newly-discovered moon, and knowing they would not be around to see it happen. Could you elaborate on this newly-discovered moon you’re speaking of?
- ithkuil 5y ago
  Clearly humanity saw and knew about the Moon since forever, and somebody likely did think of walking on it or whatnot. At some point in the 17th century our technology allows us to have a better view of the Moon and even led to this https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/17th-century-astronomer-who-made-first-atlas-moon-180971103/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/17th-century-a... I think this may count as a new "discovery" phase of our relationship with the familiar celestial object, and may have indeed prompted an uptake in fantasies about perhaps one day walking in it.
sva_ 5y ago
Whenever somebody mentions melancholy, I immediately think about this engraving: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melencolia_I#/media/File:Albrecht_D%C3%BCrer_-_Melencolia_I_-_Google_Art_Project_(_AGDdr3EHmNGyA).jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melencolia_I#/media/File:Albre... (Sorry for relative offtopic)
daseiner1 5y ago
i’m pleased to inform that the moon is quite visible to the naked eye.
jorvi 5y ago
> Does anyone else get just a little bit sad that we will not be around to see actual practical advances made with wormholes? Depending on your age, you will. With the massive progress quantum computing and further advances in AI will bring. I have a feeling we will be able to 'back up' people their brain within a few decades. Regrowing a body or producing a sufficiently advanced (and cheap) robotical surrogate may be further away, but technical immortality might be very achievable.
grishka 5y ago
> Does anyone else get just a little bit sad that we will not be around to see actual practical advances made with wormholes? Speaking of other things that feel like science fiction, there's a good chance that we cure aging in the coming decades.
awillen 5y ago
Unless medical science and biology enable us to extend the human lifespan meaningfully in our lifetimes. Sounds crazy, but if you described most of medical science today to someone fifty years ago, it all would've sounded crazy.

capableweb 5y ago

> Does anyone else get just a little bit sad that we will not be around to see actual practical advances made with wormholes? Thing is, I felt sad when I heard about IP the first time, and some people said we were gonna have a huge network everyone can talk with each other, across borders. Because I thought we'd never achieve that in my lifetime. But here we are, things move a lot faster (sometimes) than what you think. Maybe because of the inviting incentive of basically teleportation, research on wormholes will be faster.

Ansil849 5y ago
I don't think a new networking protocol is remotely comparable to an entire new form of matter.
- capableweb 5y ago
  I'm not comparing them, I'm comparing the feeling of "This will be so far in the future that I will never experience it" that I got from IP and international networks, since someone else felt the same way about wormholes.

Normille 5y ago

>I wonder if this is what people in the 17th century felt, a bit of melancholy at the dream that hundreds of years from now someone may be able to walk on the then newly-discovered moon... I'm no historian. But I'm pretty sure people had discovered The Moon a wee while before the C17th.

gremlinsinc 5y ago
Wasn't it discovered by Galileo in the 1500s? /s

amayne 5y ago

> I wonder if this is what people in the 17th century felt, a bit of melancholy at the dream that hundreds of years from now someone may be able to walk on the then newly-discovered moon, and knowing they would not be around to see it happen. Could you elaborate on this newly-discovered moon you’re speaking of?

ithkuil 5y ago
Clearly humanity saw and knew about the Moon since forever, and somebody likely did think of walking on it or whatnot. At some point in the 17th century our technology allows us to have a better view of the Moon and even led to this https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/17th-century-astronomer-who-made-first-atlas-moon-180971103/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/17th-century-a... I think this may count as a new "discovery" phase of our relationship with the familiar celestial object, and may have indeed prompted an uptake in fantasies about perhaps one day walking in it.

sva_ 5y ago

Whenever somebody mentions melancholy, I immediately think about this engraving: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melencolia_I#/media/File:Albrecht_D%C3%BCrer_-_Melencolia_I_-_Google_Art_Project_(_AGDdr3EHmNGyA).jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melencolia_I#/media/File:Albre... (Sorry for relative offtopic)

daseiner1 5y ago

i’m pleased to inform that the moon is quite visible to the naked eye.

jorvi 5y ago

> Does anyone else get just a little bit sad that we will not be around to see actual practical advances made with wormholes? Depending on your age, you will. With the massive progress quantum computing and further advances in AI will bring. I have a feeling we will be able to 'back up' people their brain within a few decades. Regrowing a body or producing a sufficiently advanced (and cheap) robotical surrogate may be further away, but technical immortality might be very achievable.

grishka 5y ago

> Does anyone else get just a little bit sad that we will not be around to see actual practical advances made with wormholes? Speaking of other things that feel like science fiction, there's a good chance that we cure aging in the coming decades.

awillen 5y ago

Unless medical science and biology enable us to extend the human lifespan meaningfully in our lifetimes. Sounds crazy, but if you described most of medical science today to someone fifty years ago, it all would've sounded crazy.