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The biggest question is what is the point? A gram-scale probe is nice, but how is it going to return ANY useful data at all from even the nearest star system 4

by toss1 3y ago

The biggest question is what is the point? A gram-scale probe is nice, but how is it going to return ANY useful data at all from even the nearest star system 4ly distant? Skimming the paper seems to make no mention of it Also, they're saying that it is 100GW of total power and the "ground-based laser array will be need to be kilometers in scale". Say we're talking 10 square kilometers, that's 10GW/Sqkm. With 1,000,000 m^2 per km^2, that's pumping 10 kilowatts per square meter up through the atmosphere. That means a crow-sized bird, with a wingspan of ~18"/50cm x 7"/20cm is 0.1 m^2 and will absorb a kilowatt of radiant energy. Like spreading it out on top of ten 100-watt incandescent bulbs, or directing a 1000-watt hairdryer at it. It won't fry instantly, but will rapidly overheat in the few minutes they claim it will take to accelerate the craft to 0.2c. Since they're detecting atmospheric disturbances, perhaps they could route around birds by momentarily turning off beams that would be wasted anyway? Even assuming this is a cover for an array to fry satellites or incoming ICBMs, it seems kind of frivolous... I'd love to be wrong because it'd be cool to generate those kinds of speeds, but...?

aftbit 3y ago
>Accompanied by military escort vehicles and helicopters, an ambulance departed with the Fourth Wallfacer. Against the lights of New York City, Wade’s figure appeared as a black ghost, his eyes glinting with a cold light. >“We’ll send only a brain,” he said. Still too heavy by a factor of 1000 or so. Perhaps we'd be better off building this laser array in space, using self-replicating robots to assemble cables around a moon of Jupiter to siphon power from its orbit in the magnetic field. >Electricity surges through the cable loops as they slice through Jupiter's magnetosphere, slowly converting the rock's momentum into power. Small robots grovel in the orange dirt, scooping up raw material to feed to the fractionating oven. Amber's garden of machinery flourishes slowly, unpacking itself according to a schema designed by preteens at an industrial school in Poland, with barely any need for human guidance. From one of the Dark Forest books and Accelerando respectively.

by toss1 3y ago

aftbit 3y ago

>Accompanied by military escort vehicles and helicopters, an ambulance departed with the Fourth Wallfacer. Against the lights of New York City, Wade’s figure appeared as a black ghost, his eyes glinting with a cold light. >“We’ll send only a brain,” he said. Still too heavy by a factor of 1000 or so. Perhaps we'd be better off building this laser array in space, using self-replicating robots to assemble cables around a moon of Jupiter to siphon power from its orbit in the magnetic field. >Electricity surges through the cable loops as they slice through Jupiter's magnetosphere, slowly converting the rock's momentum into power. Small robots grovel in the orange dirt, scooping up raw material to feed to the fractionating oven. Amber's garden of machinery flourishes slowly, unpacking itself according to a schema designed by preteens at an industrial school in Poland, with barely any need for human guidance. From one of the Dark Forest books and Accelerando respectively.