20 years to get to Alpha Centauri

  • 40 Replies
  • 3974 Views
*

Wolvaccine

  • EXTRA SPICY MODE
  • 25833
20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« on: June 08, 2021, 11:29:42 AM »
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-08/canberra-anu-scientists-laser-sail-interstellar-space-discovery/100198228
Quote
What lies beyond our solar system has long fascinated not just scientists but also writers and filmmakers, so murky are its depths.

And even the two probes that have made it beyond the heliosphere and into interstellar space — Voyagers 1 and 2 — did so only after decades of exploring our own planetary system.

Now, Canberra researchers say they have cracked the code to enable us to send a spacecraft even further, and at a far greater speed, to another planetary system altogether.

The spacecraft is also so small and delicate that scientists plan to send more than one in the hope that some of them will make it to Alpha Centauri, without being destroyed by an errant piece of space dust along the way.

The achievement is "very exciting" because it could enable us to record information from those planetary bodies within our lifetime — its predicted travel time is just 20 years.

Compare that to the roughly 44 years Voyager 2 spent nosing around Uranus and Neptune before continuing into the great beyond.

The study's lead author, Australian National University astrophysicist Chathura Bandutunga, said when they discovered the solution it was a kind of "eureka moment", when they worked out how many lasers, and in what formation, they would need to propel their spacecraft far enough and fast enough to reach its goal.

"We already have several crafts — Voyager included — [in interstellar space] but it will be many human lifetimes before they reach anywhere near another star," Dr Bandutunga said.


Ideally, a spacecraft will reach Alpha Centauri, the closest star system and closest planetary system to Earth's, and record images and scientific measurements that will be broadcast back to Earth.

Scientists estimate roughly 100 million individual lasers will be needed to generate the required optical power of about 100GW.

Fellow author Paul Sibley said the devil was in the detail when it came to unscrambling the lasers.

"We use a random digital signal to scramble the measurements from each laser and unscramble each one separately in digital signal processing," he said.

“This allows us to pick out only the measurements we need from a vast jumble of information. We can then break the problem into small arrays and link them together in sections."

While these measurements may seem confounding to the average eye, what is clear is that scientists have never got this close before.

"This project is really about making that travel from our star to another star possible within a human lifetime," Dr Bandutunga said.

Yay for Canberra. More of the story at the link

Hopefully if this project ever got up and running we dont just send everything at the one candidate. We should send them to worlds that are rocky, assured an atmosphere and orbiting a stable star in its Goldilocks zone. No point investing all that time and energy to visit a hot Jupiter or lifeless barren rock. Also we should totally seed the probes. Throw a copy of some of the seeds from the Svalbard seed vault, our DNA and proteins. Maybe if the world visited was lifeless, the mission wont be totally wasted and  we can give it a chance and kickstart a process. In that way, our legacy as humans will live on even if we blow each other to bits here :)


Quote from: sokarul
what website did you use to buy your wife? Did you choose Chinese over Russian because she can't open her eyes to see you?

What animal relates to your wife?

Know your place

*

markjo

  • Content Nazi
  • The Elder Ones
  • 42529
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #1 on: June 08, 2021, 01:58:31 PM »
Why should it take 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri when all of the celestial bodies are only a few thousand miles away? ???
Science is what happens when preconception meets verification.
Quote from: Robosteve
Besides, perhaps FET is a conspiracy too.
Quote from: bullhorn
It is just the way it is, you understanding it doesn't concern me.

*

Lorddave

  • 18127
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #2 on: June 08, 2021, 02:07:54 PM »
Each laser needs to be 1 KW.  So.. why not fire off enough micro satelites into orbit and fire off the burst that way?  Or attach em to the moon?  I'd think a series of lasers on the moon would be a far better propulsion system.  Less power required to get to the solar sails.  And it would be solar powered.  I mean, 1 KW is not alot considering the ISS generates roughly 200 KW in direct sunlight.
You have been ignored for common interest of mankind.

I am a terrible person and I am a typical Blowhard Liberal for being wrong about Bom.

Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #3 on: June 08, 2021, 02:11:43 PM »
100GW!  Ha, I'd like to see that.  Not sure if we ever will though.

Sounds like they will need several billion in investment to build just the 1GW pilot they want to build by 2030.

There also might be quite a few objections to them building a death ray, if it even turns out to be at all practical and someone actually pays for the thing.  Cool idea though.
Quote from: mikeman7918
a single photon can pass through two sluts

Quote from: Chicken Fried Clucker
if Donald Trump stuck his penis in me after trying on clothes I would have that date and time burned in my head.

*

sokarul

  • 19303
  • Extra Racist
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #4 on: June 08, 2021, 02:31:40 PM »
Nothing new, solar sail ideas have been around for many years.

Also it would be quite stupid to send seeds from the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. It’s a backup. We have seeds available that aren’t in a backup which one day may have to save the human race.
Dur
ANNIHILATOR OF  SHIFTER

It's no slur if it's fact.

*

Wolvaccine

  • EXTRA SPICY MODE
  • 25833
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #5 on: June 08, 2021, 02:34:35 PM »
Nothing new, solar sail ideas have been around for many years.

Also it would be quite stupid to send seeds from the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. It’s a backup. We have seeds available that aren’t in a backup which one day may have to save the human race.
Dur

I'm sure the seed vault has a few to spare. It's nicely catalogued too.

Quote from: sokarul
what website did you use to buy your wife? Did you choose Chinese over Russian because she can't open her eyes to see you?

What animal relates to your wife?

Know your place

Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #6 on: June 08, 2021, 02:55:36 PM »
“ Scientists estimate roughly 100 million individual lasers will be needed to generate the required optical power of about 100GW.”

Oh, good grief.  I’m a big fan of space exploration within reason, but this is just preposterous.

*

Wolvaccine

  • EXTRA SPICY MODE
  • 25833
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #7 on: June 08, 2021, 03:01:03 PM »
“ Scientists estimate roughly 100 million individual lasers will be needed to generate the required optical power of about 100GW.”

Oh, good grief.  I’m a big fan of space exploration within reason, but this is just preposterous.

The other annoying thing with it is that it wont ever accomate a human crew. Just tiny probes that can get destroyed by dust

I'm sure it will stay as a neat thought experiment but hey, if they pull it off, I won't complain


Quote from: sokarul
what website did you use to buy your wife? Did you choose Chinese over Russian because she can't open her eyes to see you?

What animal relates to your wife?

Know your place

Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #8 on: June 09, 2021, 02:05:32 AM »
Each laser needs to be 1 KW.  So.. why not fire off enough micro satelites into orbit and fire off the burst that way?  Or attach em to the moon?  I'd think a series of lasers on the moon would be a far better propulsion system.  Less power required to get to the solar sails.  And it would be solar powered.  I mean, 1 KW is not alot considering the ISS generates roughly 200 KW in direct sunlight.
I would imagine there might be quite a bit of nervousness about building a laser array that could annihilate a city on earth from the moon. Would you really think China would let America do this?   Or vice versa?
Quote from: mikeman7918
a single photon can pass through two sluts

Quote from: Chicken Fried Clucker
if Donald Trump stuck his penis in me after trying on clothes I would have that date and time burned in my head.

*

Wolvaccine

  • EXTRA SPICY MODE
  • 25833
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #9 on: June 09, 2021, 02:35:40 AM »
Each laser needs to be 1 KW.  So.. why not fire off enough micro satelites into orbit and fire off the burst that way?  Or attach em to the moon?  I'd think a series of lasers on the moon would be a far better propulsion system.  Less power required to get to the solar sails.  And it would be solar powered.  I mean, 1 KW is not alot considering the ISS generates roughly 200 KW in direct sunlight.
I would imagine there might be quite a bit of nervousness about building a laser array that could annihilate a city on earth from the moon. Would you really think China would let America do this?   Or vice versa?

Good point lol. Knowing America if they had their hands on such a device, space exploration would simply be a cover or the devices secondary purpose. The primary purpose would be as a weapon!

If only humans trusted each trusted each other..... This is why we cant have nice things  :'(

Quote from: sokarul
what website did you use to buy your wife? Did you choose Chinese over Russian because she can't open her eyes to see you?

What animal relates to your wife?

Know your place

*

JJA

  • 6869
  • Math is math!
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #10 on: June 09, 2021, 04:44:38 AM »
Each laser needs to be 1 KW.  So.. why not fire off enough micro satelites into orbit and fire off the burst that way?  Or attach em to the moon?  I'd think a series of lasers on the moon would be a far better propulsion system.  Less power required to get to the solar sails.  And it would be solar powered.  I mean, 1 KW is not alot considering the ISS generates roughly 200 KW in direct sunlight.

Actually, putting them on the far side of the moon would be great because then you can't aim the giant death laser at anyone. :)

This also isn't a new idea, people have been proposing laser based micro probes for a long time. Every time it gets brought up we are a little closer to making it a reality, but it's stil sci-fi.

The biggest issue is there is no easy way to slow them down once they get to their destination, so all you can do it a flyby.  The best solution I know of is to make them cheap enough you can send a stream of them and have constant data coming back.

*

Wolvaccine

  • EXTRA SPICY MODE
  • 25833
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #11 on: June 09, 2021, 05:07:33 AM »
Each laser needs to be 1 KW.  So.. why not fire off enough micro satelites into orbit and fire off the burst that way?  Or attach em to the moon?  I'd think a series of lasers on the moon would be a far better propulsion system.  Less power required to get to the solar sails.  And it would be solar powered.  I mean, 1 KW is not alot considering the ISS generates roughly 200 KW in direct sunlight.

Actually, putting them on the far side of the moon would be great because then you can't aim the giant death laser at anyone. :)

This also isn't a new idea, people have been proposing laser based micro probes for a long time. Every time it gets brought up we are a little closer to making it a reality, but it's stil sci-fi.

The biggest issue is there is no easy way to slow them down once they get to their destination, so all you can do it a flyby.  The best solution I know of is to make them cheap enough you can send a stream of them and have constant data coming back.

The issue of cosmic dust was brought up but another issue are hydrogen atoms. If you go fast enough as you smash through countless amounts of them along your journey they will irradiate the ship. Like flying through a hail storm except the hail are atoms. Another Star Trek tech, the 'Deflector' will also need to be invented if you want to traverse through space

Although honestly I think the only way we will travel is uploading information. If humanity survives long enough to essentially download our minds into computers perhaps we can upload that information into the void. Although if there are no receivers on the other end, we will just sail for eternity. Or fragment into essentially nothing thanks to the inverse square law

Any foray into space is not going to be a single generation effort. A 'von Neumann probe' is probably how you can do it

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-replicating_spacecraft
Quote
It has been theorized[3] that a self-replicating starship utilizing relatively conventional theoretical methods of interstellar travel (i.e., no exotic faster-than-light propulsion, and speeds limited to an "average cruising speed" of 0.1c.) could spread throughout a galaxy the size of the Milky Way in as little as half a million years.

I think people will have to accept the reality that their body is not going to be traveling interstellar/galactic distances. The best biological life can do is seed other worlds to leave a legacy. Happy to be wrong and see that StarGate was based on actual fact and not fiction though :P


Quote from: sokarul
what website did you use to buy your wife? Did you choose Chinese over Russian because she can't open her eyes to see you?

What animal relates to your wife?

Know your place

*

JJA

  • 6869
  • Math is math!
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #12 on: June 09, 2021, 05:42:48 AM »
Although honestly I think the only way we will travel is uploading information. If humanity survives long enough to essentially download our minds into computers perhaps we can upload that information into the void. Although if there are no receivers on the other end, we will just sail for eternity. Or fragment into essentially nothing thanks to the inverse square law

Pretty much this.  Space travel is just too long, too expensive, and until you are harnessing the power of other stars and dismantling planets, carrying humans with life support and food and everything else is going to just be far too hard compared to sending a small and compact computer. Sending copies of human minds or pure AIs is going the be the way to go.

Of course, my belief is once we can upload into a computer, we then have the ability to easily modify our own minds to change or enhance them and it's going to take about 5 minutes before anyone uploaded into a computer isn't recognizably human anymore. Why keep human limitations if you can just press a button and get rid of all those pesky limits?

No idea if that will be a good or bad thing, but probably bad.

*

Wolvaccine

  • EXTRA SPICY MODE
  • 25833
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #13 on: June 09, 2021, 05:55:21 AM »
Although honestly I think the only way we will travel is uploading information. If humanity survives long enough to essentially download our minds into computers perhaps we can upload that information into the void. Although if there are no receivers on the other end, we will just sail for eternity. Or fragment into essentially nothing thanks to the inverse square law

Pretty much this.  Space travel is just too long, too expensive, and until you are harnessing the power of other stars and dismantling planets, carrying humans with life support and food and everything else is going to just be far too hard compared to sending a small and compact computer. Sending copies of human minds or pure AIs is going the be the way to go.

Of course, my belief is once we can upload into a computer, we then have the ability to easily modify our own minds to change or enhance them and it's going to take about 5 minutes before anyone uploaded into a computer isn't recognizably human anymore. Why keep human limitations if you can just press a button and get rid of all those pesky limits?

No idea if that will be a good or bad thing, but probably bad.

Uploading into a computer may make the care about traveling to another planet redundant. Inside a computer you can make your own universe simulator. You do not have to operate on the same laws of time. 1 second in the real world could be years of experience in a simulation. Although it means our lives are dependent on the conditions of our own planet (natural disasters damaging the infrastructure, the sun swelling into a red giant).

I imagine we'll be trying to make reality many of the 'thought experiments' we currently do. Provided we dont all blow each other up of course :)

Quote from: sokarul
what website did you use to buy your wife? Did you choose Chinese over Russian because she can't open her eyes to see you?

What animal relates to your wife?

Know your place

*

JJA

  • 6869
  • Math is math!
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #14 on: June 09, 2021, 05:57:30 AM »
Although honestly I think the only way we will travel is uploading information. If humanity survives long enough to essentially download our minds into computers perhaps we can upload that information into the void. Although if there are no receivers on the other end, we will just sail for eternity. Or fragment into essentially nothing thanks to the inverse square law

Pretty much this.  Space travel is just too long, too expensive, and until you are harnessing the power of other stars and dismantling planets, carrying humans with life support and food and everything else is going to just be far too hard compared to sending a small and compact computer. Sending copies of human minds or pure AIs is going the be the way to go.

Of course, my belief is once we can upload into a computer, we then have the ability to easily modify our own minds to change or enhance them and it's going to take about 5 minutes before anyone uploaded into a computer isn't recognizably human anymore. Why keep human limitations if you can just press a button and get rid of all those pesky limits?

No idea if that will be a good or bad thing, but probably bad.

Uploading into a computer may make the care about traveling to another planet redundant. Inside a computer you can make your own universe simulator. You do not have to operate on the same laws of time. 1 second in the real world could be years of experience in a simulation. Although it means our lives are dependent on the conditions of our own planet (natural disasters damaging the infrastructure, the sun swelling into a red giant).

I imagine we'll be trying to make reality many of the 'thought experiments' we currently do. Provided we dont all blow each other up of course :)

You don't even need to be awake. Just stop the simulations until you get there.

Then you can send a thousand probes with copies of everyone in a database and if 999 get destroyed, who cares, the one that makes it wakes up it's crew and starts exploring or tweeting back to Earth or whatever their plans will be.

Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #15 on: June 09, 2021, 06:36:30 AM »
Of course, my belief is once we can upload into a computer
If we can upload to a computer.  And if you can, whatever that is on the computer will no longer be you.
Quote from: mikeman7918
a single photon can pass through two sluts

Quote from: Chicken Fried Clucker
if Donald Trump stuck his penis in me after trying on clothes I would have that date and time burned in my head.

*

JJA

  • 6869
  • Math is math!
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #16 on: June 09, 2021, 06:41:08 AM »
Of course, my belief is once we can upload into a computer
If we can upload to a computer.  And if you can, whatever that is on the computer will no longer be you.

As far as we know, uploading into a computer is simply an engineering challenge.  Data is data, all we need to do is understand how it's encoded and processed and we can copy it. Nothing in physics prevents it, it's just too hard, for now.

I can't imagine the existential crisis caused by being uploaded is going to be any worse or different than the ones I already have so I don't see that as a downside. :)

*

markjo

  • Content Nazi
  • The Elder Ones
  • 42529
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #17 on: June 09, 2021, 06:52:41 AM »
The biggest issue is there is no easy way to slow them down once they get to their destination, so all you can do it a flyby.
Why wouldn't your solar sail work to slow you down as you approach the 3 star Cenauri system? ???
Science is what happens when preconception meets verification.
Quote from: Robosteve
Besides, perhaps FET is a conspiracy too.
Quote from: bullhorn
It is just the way it is, you understanding it doesn't concern me.

*

JJA

  • 6869
  • Math is math!
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #18 on: June 09, 2021, 08:28:22 AM »
The biggest issue is there is no easy way to slow them down once they get to their destination, so all you can do it a flyby.
Why wouldn't your solar sail work to slow you down as you approach the 3 star Cenauri system? ???

The idea is to use lasers to push probes up to speed. But lasers can only push, they can't pull to sloe them down.

There are methods that can be used but nothing that works small scale and cheaply. The 'easiest' would be to build a deceleration array in the target system once you slowboat some construction bots out there.

But frankly... once you have a remote telepresence in another system, why bother to ever send anything there again? Just build stuff there, send AIs and eventually human consciousnesses via radio link at light speed.  It will take hundreds of years to send actual human bodies there, we will likely figure out brain uploading before we can build colony ships and get them out there.

Heck, in a hundred years we should easily be able to custom build DNA strands and incubate any living creature on demand. Getting an automated factory out there is all we really need to do.

*

markjo

  • Content Nazi
  • The Elder Ones
  • 42529
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #19 on: June 09, 2021, 09:21:32 AM »
The biggest issue is there is no easy way to slow them down once they get to their destination, so all you can do it a flyby.
Why wouldn't your solar sail work to slow you down as you approach the 3 star Cenauri system? ???

The idea is to use lasers to push probes up to speed. But lasers can only push, they can't pull to sloe them down.
I understand that lasers push.  But the photons and solar wind from Centauri's 3 suns push too.  Hence the term "solar" sail.
Science is what happens when preconception meets verification.
Quote from: Robosteve
Besides, perhaps FET is a conspiracy too.
Quote from: bullhorn
It is just the way it is, you understanding it doesn't concern me.

*

JJA

  • 6869
  • Math is math!
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #20 on: June 09, 2021, 09:43:06 AM »
The biggest issue is there is no easy way to slow them down once they get to their destination, so all you can do it a flyby.
Why wouldn't your solar sail work to slow you down as you approach the 3 star Cenauri system? ???

The idea is to use lasers to push probes up to speed. But lasers can only push, they can't pull to sloe them down.
I understand that lasers push.  But the photons and solar wind from Centauri's 3 suns push too.  Hence the term "solar" sail.

Yes, but they push way less than the lasers, otherwise we would just use the Sun's push to send it on it's way and stop it at the other star.  THe hole point of the lasers is to get the probes to 20% the speed of light, which a solar sail unaided is not going to manage.

Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #21 on: June 09, 2021, 09:51:13 AM »
As far as we know, uploading into a computer is simply an engineering challenge.
As far as we know....that's the point, we don't know.

To assume the challenge lies in the same domain as making a smaller phone or faster car, may be making a fundamental error in the first place.
Quote from: mikeman7918
a single photon can pass through two sluts

Quote from: Chicken Fried Clucker
if Donald Trump stuck his penis in me after trying on clothes I would have that date and time burned in my head.

*

JJA

  • 6869
  • Math is math!
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #22 on: June 09, 2021, 09:58:02 AM »
As far as we know, uploading into a computer is simply an engineering challenge.
As far as we know....that's the point, we don't know.

To assume the challenge lies in the same domain as making a smaller phone or faster car, may be making a fundamental error in the first place.

I'm not sure what fundamental error we could be making that would cause it to be impossible.

As long as neurons are made of atoms, and we have no reason to believe otherwise, they work just like anything else in the universe and it's only a matter of being able to examine them in detail.

It might take us 50 years or 500 but there is nothing at all in physics that would make it impossible.

We could do it with some sort of extreme precision fMRI, or freeze a brain and scan it in slices, or even engineer neurons to have the ability to perform a read-out on command.

Just an engineering issue. We can already take apart a single neuron atom by atom. Just have to do it a whole bunch more. :)

*

Wolvaccine

  • EXTRA SPICY MODE
  • 25833
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #23 on: June 09, 2021, 10:02:05 AM »
As far as we know, uploading into a computer is simply an engineering challenge.
As far as we know....that's the point, we don't know.

To assume the challenge lies in the same domain as making a smaller phone or faster car, may be making a fundamental error in the first place.

I'm not sure what fundamental error we could be making that would cause it to be impossible.

As long as neurons are made of atoms, and we have no reason to believe otherwise, they work just like anything else in the universe and it's only a matter of being able to examine them in detail.

It might take us 50 years or 500 but there is nothing at all in physics that would make it impossible.

We could do it with some sort of extreme precision fMRI, or freeze a brain and scan it in slices, or even engineer neurons to have the ability to perform a read-out on command.

Just an engineering issue. We can already take apart a single neuron atom by atom. Just have to do it a whole bunch more. :)

The goal is to replicate consciousness without biology. So no neurons in the classical sense

Quote from: sokarul
what website did you use to buy your wife? Did you choose Chinese over Russian because she can't open her eyes to see you?

What animal relates to your wife?

Know your place

*

JJA

  • 6869
  • Math is math!
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #24 on: June 09, 2021, 10:06:39 AM »
As far as we know, uploading into a computer is simply an engineering challenge.
As far as we know....that's the point, we don't know.

To assume the challenge lies in the same domain as making a smaller phone or faster car, may be making a fundamental error in the first place.

I'm not sure what fundamental error we could be making that would cause it to be impossible.

As long as neurons are made of atoms, and we have no reason to believe otherwise, they work just like anything else in the universe and it's only a matter of being able to examine them in detail.

It might take us 50 years or 500 but there is nothing at all in physics that would make it impossible.

We could do it with some sort of extreme precision fMRI, or freeze a brain and scan it in slices, or even engineer neurons to have the ability to perform a read-out on command.

Just an engineering issue. We can already take apart a single neuron atom by atom. Just have to do it a whole bunch more. :)

The goal is to replicate consciousness without biology. So no neurons in the classical sense

The goal of copying a brain into a computer is to get it into the computer, the method doesn't matter. Biological, technological or magical. Anything that works is a valid solution.

*

markjo

  • Content Nazi
  • The Elder Ones
  • 42529
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #25 on: June 09, 2021, 10:10:03 AM »
The goal of copying a brain into a computer is to get it into the computer, the method doesn't matter. Biological, technological or magical. Anything that works is a valid solution.
Isn't that where Ultron went wrong?
Science is what happens when preconception meets verification.
Quote from: Robosteve
Besides, perhaps FET is a conspiracy too.
Quote from: bullhorn
It is just the way it is, you understanding it doesn't concern me.

*

JJA

  • 6869
  • Math is math!
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #26 on: June 09, 2021, 10:29:24 AM »
The goal of copying a brain into a computer is to get it into the computer, the method doesn't matter. Biological, technological or magical. Anything that works is a valid solution.
Isn't that where Ultron went wrong?

Well it WORKED, right? :)

What happens after is outside the scope of the process.

*

Wolvaccine

  • EXTRA SPICY MODE
  • 25833
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #27 on: June 09, 2021, 10:31:20 AM »
As far as we know, uploading into a computer is simply an engineering challenge.
As far as we know....that's the point, we don't know.

To assume the challenge lies in the same domain as making a smaller phone or faster car, may be making a fundamental error in the first place.

I'm not sure what fundamental error we could be making that would cause it to be impossible.

As long as neurons are made of atoms, and we have no reason to believe otherwise, they work just like anything else in the universe and it's only a matter of being able to examine them in detail.

It might take us 50 years or 500 but there is nothing at all in physics that would make it impossible.

We could do it with some sort of extreme precision fMRI, or freeze a brain and scan it in slices, or even engineer neurons to have the ability to perform a read-out on command.

Just an engineering issue. We can already take apart a single neuron atom by atom. Just have to do it a whole bunch more. :)

The goal is to replicate consciousness without biology. So no neurons in the classical sense

The goal of copying a brain into a computer is to get it into the computer, the method doesn't matter. Biological, technological or magical. Anything that works is a valid solution.

I am thinking of having a human like level of consciousness but in a system that has no biological components. Biology degrades and needs constant maintenance and fuel. A computer just needs energy which (if we are at this level of tech) should be no problem to get anything we want from the sun

Quote from: sokarul
what website did you use to buy your wife? Did you choose Chinese over Russian because she can't open her eyes to see you?

What animal relates to your wife?

Know your place

*

JJA

  • 6869
  • Math is math!
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #28 on: June 09, 2021, 10:32:35 AM »
As far as we know, uploading into a computer is simply an engineering challenge.
As far as we know....that's the point, we don't know.

To assume the challenge lies in the same domain as making a smaller phone or faster car, may be making a fundamental error in the first place.

I'm not sure what fundamental error we could be making that would cause it to be impossible.

As long as neurons are made of atoms, and we have no reason to believe otherwise, they work just like anything else in the universe and it's only a matter of being able to examine them in detail.

It might take us 50 years or 500 but there is nothing at all in physics that would make it impossible.

We could do it with some sort of extreme precision fMRI, or freeze a brain and scan it in slices, or even engineer neurons to have the ability to perform a read-out on command.

Just an engineering issue. We can already take apart a single neuron atom by atom. Just have to do it a whole bunch more. :)

The goal is to replicate consciousness without biology. So no neurons in the classical sense

The goal of copying a brain into a computer is to get it into the computer, the method doesn't matter. Biological, technological or magical. Anything that works is a valid solution.

I am thinking of having a human like level of consciousness but in a system that has no biological components. Biology degrades and needs constant maintenance and fuel. A computer just needs energy which (if we are at this level of tech) should be no problem to get anything we want from the sun

I never said the computer has to be biological, just that part of the process to get the data out of a brain could be biological.

Once you have the data, it's just data. It can run on anything you build after that.

*

NotSoSkeptical

  • 8548
  • Flat like a droplet of water.
Re: 20 years to get to Alpha Centauri
« Reply #29 on: June 09, 2021, 10:32:50 AM »
As far as we know, uploading into a computer is simply an engineering challenge.
As far as we know....that's the point, we don't know.

To assume the challenge lies in the same domain as making a smaller phone or faster car, may be making a fundamental error in the first place.

I'm not sure what fundamental error we could be making that would cause it to be impossible.

As long as neurons are made of atoms, and we have no reason to believe otherwise, they work just like anything else in the universe and it's only a matter of being able to examine them in detail.

It might take us 50 years or 500 but there is nothing at all in physics that would make it impossible.

We could do it with some sort of extreme precision fMRI, or freeze a brain and scan it in slices, or even engineer neurons to have the ability to perform a read-out on command.

Just an engineering issue. We can already take apart a single neuron atom by atom. Just have to do it a whole bunch more. :)

The goal is to replicate consciousness without biology. So no neurons in the classical sense

The goal of copying a brain into a computer is to get it into the computer, the method doesn't matter. Biological, technological or magical. Anything that works is a valid solution.

I am thinking of having a human like level of consciousness but in a system that has no biological components. Biology degrades and needs constant maintenance and fuel. A computer just needs energy which (if we are at this level of tech) should be no problem to get anything we want from the sun

Computer components fail.
Rabinoz RIP

That would put you in the same category as pedophile perverts like John Davis, NSS, robots like Stash, Shifter, and victimized kids like Alexey.