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That's because they lacked the necessary scientific understanding. Clarke's law assumes that will always be the case. But with our current level, we've imagined

That's because they lacked the necessary scientific understanding. Clarke's law assumes that will always be the case. But with our current level, we've imagined all sorts of fantastic technologies. We've had a century full of science fiction and speculative technological ideas. A Dyson Sphere wouldn't be magical to us, it would just been a super impressive feat of engineering. Learning about warp drives and teleporters would inform us that our understanding of physics is incomplete. But it wouldn't be magical, strictly speaking. We'd have some idea of how aliens had achieved both, and what sort of updates to physics would be needed. There's talk of looking for Type 3 Kardashev galactic civilizations, so we have an idea of what that thermodynamically would look like. Only something like The Q on Star Trek would be sufficiently advanced, and there is no scientific explanation for Q. They're a god-like race that don't have to concern themselves with physical limits, because they're fictional. However sufficiently advanced any actual civilization is, they're still dealing with thermodynamics, Planck Scale limits and what not. We can already calculate maximum compute (by using a black hole). There's no reason to believe god-like aliens would be omniscient/omnipotent like Q.

garyrob 3y ago
"Only something like The Q on Star Trek would be sufficiently advanced, and there is no scientific explanation for Q." Your point of view makes the same assumption that would have been made by almost anyone in the 18th century. Anything they would have imagined would have been based on things that existed or had some theoretical basis then, and they would have said that anything else was impossible. Just as you are doing now. Or even in the 19th century: "In 1889, Charles H. Duell was the Commissioner of US patent office. He is widely quoted as having stated that the patent office would soon need to shrink in size, and eventually close, because, according to his perspective: — Everything that can be invented has been invented." [1] When I referred in my original comment to technology that may involve a deep understanding of awareness itself, phenomenon like Q may begin to come into scope. But again, we almost certainly can't even begin to imagine the things that will emerge because, today, we simply don't have any basis to make the necessary extrapolations. [1] https://www.reorbit.space/news/everything-that-can-be-invented-has-not-been-invented#:~:text=In%201889%2C%20Charles%20H.,be%20invented%20has%20been%20invented https://www.reorbit.space/news/everything-that-can-be-invent....

garyrob 3y ago

"Only something like The Q on Star Trek would be sufficiently advanced, and there is no scientific explanation for Q." Your point of view makes the same assumption that would have been made by almost anyone in the 18th century. Anything they would have imagined would have been based on things that existed or had some theoretical basis then, and they would have said that anything else was impossible. Just as you are doing now. Or even in the 19th century: "In 1889, Charles H. Duell was the Commissioner of US patent office. He is widely quoted as having stated that the patent office would soon need to shrink in size, and eventually close, because, according to his perspective: — Everything that can be invented has been invented." [1] When I referred in my original comment to technology that may involve a deep understanding of awareness itself, phenomenon like Q may begin to come into scope. But again, we almost certainly can't even begin to imagine the things that will emerge because, today, we simply don't have any basis to make the necessary extrapolations. [1] https://www.reorbit.space/news/everything-that-can-be-invented-has-not-been-invented#:~:text=In%201889%2C%20Charles%20H.,be%20invented%20has%20been%20invented https://www.reorbit.space/news/everything-that-can-be-invent....