(no subject)

[mik3cap]

Currently wondering: if humanity starts colonizing space now, will there still be enough time for members of the species to get outside the radius of a theoretical supernova of our sun?

Comments

[lucasthegray.livejournal.com]

Luckily, it's not a concern. Our sun will go red giant followed by a collapse to white dwarf.

[bluegargantua]

what he said.

Also, the time-frame is, even by galactic standards, quite long. We'll either figure out some spiffy FTL trick, or discover a way to create other universes to escape into, or, more likely, be completely extinct.

later
Tom

[mikecap.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm thinking extinct is the most likely and unfortunate result here.

I guess the thing is, if there isn't an FTL trick that we can reasonably concoct given current resources, and there's no way to get outside of the radius of destruction in time, that's the ball game.

[bluegargantua]

I prefer to think of a happy extinction -- we bootstrap other intelligences that are better suited to long-range planning and survival and we get downloaded to some sort of computational matrix that lets us experience so much time, we eventually terminate our program simply because our digitized consciousnesses just run out of things to do.

blissful, really
Tom

[narnarthinks.livejournal.com]

what he said. humanity is already on such precarious ground with mundane, immediate threats like overpopulation, resource depletion, climate change and nuclear proliferation that I can scarcely contemplate distant celestial events. we've only been industrialized as a species for the blink of an eye in cosmological time. why are you sure we can sustain this experiment for long enough to greet a supernova end?

[mikecap.livejournal.com]

You and Freeman Dyson are in agreement!

I'm not sure of anything. I'm just speculating about numerical values and possible upper and lower limits. Could we, for example, even build a Dyson sphere if we wanted to? Is there enough raw material in the solar system to really accomplish that - i.e. is the energy inherent in the system enough to hit the critical mass for moving all the material to where it needs to be? Regardless of the technological innovations needed, if we don't have enough "fuel" to propel matter around, what do we do?

[narnarthinks.livejournal.com]

I'm so happy you pointed this out, beacuse that's exactly what I was thinking :)

I thought you were being just a rosy eyed futurist, and I was already planning how to articulate an intuition about resource constraints eventually limiting technological innovation at some point...I never heard of Freeman Dyson but it sounds like you're alluding to some scholarly writings on just that point.

really, delightful reply. smiling out loud. tell me more about it sometime offline.

[mikecap.livejournal.com]

Check the NYTime magazine online for Freeman Dyson info. Also, read Anathem, it's pretty awesome.

[narnarthinks.livejournal.com]

only if you promise to whisper to me about it too.

[bronzite.livejournal.com]

Its a lie! They concocted that fiction to make us complacent! The sun will nova next Thursday! Just you wait and see. Fortunately for me, I have a survival plan.

Fills bathtub with water.

[mikecap.livejournal.com]

But scientists recently witnessed a supernova from a star with a million years of hydrogen "left".

[lucasthegray.livejournal.com]

doesn't matter. the sun just doesn't have the mass necessary to go supernova by a huge margin.

[mikecap.livejournal.com]

Hm. I'm still concerned that we apparently don't know enough about stars to be able to explain things we're witnessing; that calls our notions of what "stable" means into question.

[saintentreri.livejournal.com]

Depends on the random appearance of genius. I think our sun's concern is more cooling down than exploding, something like 4 or 5 billion years. The most likely scenario would be that the loss of mass due to the change in the sun would cause it's gravitational field to at least partly lose it's grip on at least the outer planets. If we were going to stay here, it would have to be a MASSIVE chore, probably on the scale of a Dyson sphere or something, coupled with some sort of inertia manipulation. I would guess something like the precursor to Firefly would be more likely (GTFO, to say the least, find someplace else to RAPE), though it is difficult trying to figure between faster than light travel/terraforming and massive pieces of planet sized construction which is more realistic. All depends on some random future number cruncher going EUREKA, and what that eureka entails.

[kitteridge.livejournal.com]

Every day, I'm glad I watched Star Trek, so I know what something like a Dyson Sphere actually is.

[mikecap.livejournal.com]

Dyson's got a big writeup in the Times magazine coming up...

[antryg-windrose.livejournal.com]

Yea even if we are half off say sun goes piff in 2.5 billion years. We will have done what needs doing or be a distant memory. Sun not a worry.