3 ms·

Don't hold your breath on this one. I expect it to take a lot longer, but not for technical reasons. The truth is that however you do this you are developing we

Don't hold your breath on this one. I expect it to take a lot longer, but not for technical reasons. The truth is that however you do this you are developing weapons. At best, your allies will be on your side but your enemies will play this up, discussing how versions of whatever you do can be used against them. And even if exaggerated (and boy will it be), there will be grains of truth. These are the hardest lies to fight because they're half lies. The problem always lies in how you get that energy down to Earth. There's no way to do this that can't also be used in a way that can be destructive. Even this proposal at 1kW you can do some damage. They're doing IR because this is fairly transmissible through the atmosphere but it can still be damaging. These range from a directed energy weapon (likely aimed at electronics) to a more denial of service attack (you'd need higher energy than 1kW). There's another proposal about just redirecting light[0] and I think it is easier to imagine how this is a weapon. Could you imagine someone just making you, in your house (or worse, it follows you around), always live in daylight? It would drive you crazy. I know the Nords, Alaskans, Canadians, and others will tell you there's challenges to living in perpetual daylight. But you can destabilize crops, which need night, insects and wildlife, and I'll let your imagination run wild. But this is also true for IR light, you just won't see it with your eyes. That still affects many insects, snakes, fish, and other animals, not to mention plants. IR is heat, and it doesn't take much heat to disrupt things. On a different point: > told me he wants to reinvent the idea of space-based solar power beginning with a relatively small investment—likely a bit north of $10 million > That physicist is Baiju Bhatt, who co-founded the electronic trading platform Robinhood in 2013 He's asking for $10m? Why? Can someone help me with this? Forbes has him at $1.7bn net worth[1]. $10m is nothing to this guy, right? Even if he doesn't have that cash liquid it should be very easy for him to get a very low interest rate loan where the maturity is upon death that will give him access to this level of money. So why does he need the investment? What am I missing? [0] https://x.com/colecallinan/status/1826683972207661499 https://x.com/colecallinan/status/1826683972207661499 [1] https://www.forbes.com/profile/baiju-bhatt/ https://www.forbes.com/profile/baiju-bhatt/

bryanlarsen 2y ago
200 w/sqm is not a weapon. It's barely enough to keep you warm in the winter time.
- godelski 2y ago
  You're not wrong, but that doesn't mean you understood my point. It seems you aren't aware that space is not controlled by a single country. It's ruled by international agreements. Do you really think everyone sitting at that table is going to be using that power to make laws based purely on the merit of the technology and it's safety? Or do you think they're going to be bullshit arguments that are reaching at best? We both know the answer to that. Predicting what they will argue is not the same thing as saying their points will be valid. But you also can't just pretend that bullshit won't exist.
  - bryanlarsen 2y ago
    The laws of physics make Jewish space lasers impossible. Anybody willing to ignore international agreements to develop weapons can reach for the very effective nuclear, chemical or biological weapons rather than for imaginary impossible ones. Using a directed energy weapon to shoot down drones is millions of times more feasible than space lasers -- thousands of times more concentrated power, thousands of times less air dispersion, on the softest possible target. Yet using lasers to shoot down drones is so ineffective that we're not doing it. You're proposing something a billion times more difficult.
    - godelski 2y ago
      > Anybody willing to ignore international agreements to develop weapons can reach for the very effective nuclear, chemical or biological weapons rather than for imaginary impossible ones. Which, to be clear, happens quite frequently. > Yet using lasers to shoot down drones is so ineffective that we're not doing it. You're proposing something a billion times more difficult. Who said anything about shooting down drones?

bryanlarsen 2y ago

200 w/sqm is not a weapon. It's barely enough to keep you warm in the winter time.

godelski 2y ago
You're not wrong, but that doesn't mean you understood my point. It seems you aren't aware that space is not controlled by a single country. It's ruled by international agreements. Do you really think everyone sitting at that table is going to be using that power to make laws based purely on the merit of the technology and it's safety? Or do you think they're going to be bullshit arguments that are reaching at best? We both know the answer to that. Predicting what they will argue is not the same thing as saying their points will be valid. But you also can't just pretend that bullshit won't exist.
- bryanlarsen 2y ago
  The laws of physics make Jewish space lasers impossible. Anybody willing to ignore international agreements to develop weapons can reach for the very effective nuclear, chemical or biological weapons rather than for imaginary impossible ones. Using a directed energy weapon to shoot down drones is millions of times more feasible than space lasers -- thousands of times more concentrated power, thousands of times less air dispersion, on the softest possible target. Yet using lasers to shoot down drones is so ineffective that we're not doing it. You're proposing something a billion times more difficult.
  - godelski 2y ago
    > Anybody willing to ignore international agreements to develop weapons can reach for the very effective nuclear, chemical or biological weapons rather than for imaginary impossible ones. Which, to be clear, happens quite frequently. > Yet using lasers to shoot down drones is so ineffective that we're not doing it. You're proposing something a billion times more difficult. Who said anything about shooting down drones?