NASA backed Engineers test bedding "Warp" drive technology

[tantalus]

Admittedly, these were primitive hunter-gatherers, but I think we'd be nuts to overestimate our staying powers relative to volcanos,

the evidence for the bottleneck is unclear but even if that info is accurate, I would ultimately interpret it differently to you, that even hunter gathers can survive such an event. It's not that I dont think such an event would be incredibly traumatic to mankind, but a species killer is another matter.

, asteroid impact, and the biggest, climactic catastrophe, the latter having nothing to do with global warming... more a result of another event.

Life on a snowball earth? The theory is still controversial, but the evidence is not insignificant. And there could easily be an extinction-level rock floating around out there that would drop superheated plasma all over the surface of the earth, killing everything larger than an insect outright, or worse, split the mantle deeply enough to make the earth look like it did a mere million years after the solar system formed... a glowing red molten blob. And there'd be nothing NASA or anybody else could do to stop it.

Thats another matter again. They do truly pose such a dire threat imo. I was only stating that deflection or destruction of such an impact is technologically more feasible than escape by space flight.

[Officer of Engineers]

In the long view, the human species has but two options. Space-travel or extinction.

3rd - build a big ass machine that don't care about time and send it on its way with our message to the stars.

[Chogy]

Thats another matter again. They do truly pose such a dire threat imo. I was only stating that deflection or destruction of such an impact is technologically more feasible than escape by space flight.

I don't disagree at all. The problem is, science cannot do either. We cannot escape the earth, and we cannot save ourselves from a planet-killer asteroid. We might prevent a Tunguska, but not a Chixulub. An asteroid capable of extinction is going to be too big to move. We can barely get a few humans into orbit anymore, let alone alter the path of something that masses at such an insane level.

Here's an interesting response from Yahoo Answers, which is normally junk, but it sounds like someone did some math... A six mile asteroid is consistent with the dinosaur killer. The scenario is someone is living in California when a Chixulub hits the USA Eastern seaboard.

Assumption: You're on the west coast and the 6 mile in diameter astroid impacts the eastern seaboard.

Distance from Impact: 3542.00 km = 2199.58 miles
Projectile Diameter: 9656.04 m = 31671.81 ft = 6.00 miles
Projectile Density: 3000 kg/m3
Impact Velocity: 72.00 km/s = 44.71 miles/s

Energy:
3.67 x 10^24 Joules = a nuke equivalent to 877,151,051 megatons, or 17,543,021 Tsar Bombas

Major Global Changes:
The Earth is not strongly disturbed by the impact and loses negligible mass.
The impact does not make a noticeable change in the Earth's rotation period or the tilt of its axis.
The impact does not shift the Earth's orbit noticeably.

Crater Dimensions:
Transient Crater Diameter: 117 km = 72.7 miles
Transient Crater Depth: 41.4 km = 25.7 miles

Final Crater Diameter: 219 km = 136 miles
Final Crater Depth: 1.5 km = 0.93 miles

The volume of the Earth melted or vaporized is 23000 km3 = 5530 miles3

Roughly half the melt remains in the crater , where its average thickness is 2.14 km = 1.33 miles

Thermal Radiation:
The fireball is below the horizon. There is no direct thermal radiation.

Seismic Effects:
The major seismic shaking will arrive at approximately 708 seconds.
Richter Scale Magnitude: 10.6 (This is greater than any earthquake in recorded history)

Ejecta:
The ejecta will arrive approximately 1160 seconds after the impact.
Average Ejecta Thickness: 3.77 cm = 1.48 inches
Mean Fragment Diameter: 119 micrometers = 4.67 1/1000 of an inch

Air Blast:
The air blast will arrive at approximately 10700 seconds.
Peak Overpressure: 46700 Pa = 0.467 bars = 6.64 psi
Max wind velocity: 93.1 m/s = 208 mph
Sound Intensity: 93 dB (May cause ear pain)

Damage Description:
Multistory wall-bearing buildings will collapse.
Wood frame buildings will almost completely collapse.
Glass windows will shatter.
Up to 90 percent of trees blown down; remainder stripped of branches and leaves.

That's a 6-mile wide asteroid hitting the East Coast of the USA and felt by someone in California. Let's bump the asteroid up to 24 miles in diameter. The mass of the asteroid has just jumped by 65X. I'm too lazy to do the math, but you get the idea. I'd suspect an asteroid 75 miles in diameter would kill every human on Earth.

We're tracking big rocks, but what could we do about them? All it would take is a gravital perturbation by Jupiter to send something in our direction.

[Minskaya]

We're tracking big rocks, but what could we do about them? All it would take is a gravital perturbation by Jupiter to send something in our direction.

Here's a few toys you boys can play with ;)

Down 2 Earth | Impact Simulator

Impact: Earth!

[udake]

Ha ha ha , it is ironry! The USA people brag about how they beat down the aliens who invade our planet in hollywood movie! Is is the USA brainwashing for the Earth people?
That is said:" when the Alien come from other planet invade us, the USA or the west countries will the first surrender."" oh, ,dear alien brothers , please don't kill us ,we love peace!"
The European only trust the jungle law! That is the "only strong can survive ,the weak were taken."

Of coure ,when the alien travel fast than light speed, the aliens are strong, the human are weak. They kill the human-being like kill a ant,very easy. But I don't think most alien are evil or love the war.Because a advanced civilization who had capability interstellar travel, they must ensure a peace mechanism that they won't kill each other, or they will self-destruct with nuclear weapons, before they developed travel to another star!


I know what I write maybe offense moderator ! But that is true ,before USA or west countires claim it love peace, please stop use their so-call high technology bully ,bomb and killed other people on the Earth! Because no matter any race ,we are all the children of the Earth!
I said the words sincerly！

You've brought up an interesting point.

Q. Does being extraordinarily advanced in technology automatically equate to benevolence when encountering lesser sentient species?

Two ways to look at it. The anthropomorphic model might suggest we'd get exploited badly by advanced aliens because that's what we've done in the past on Earth to ourselves. But today, right now, if scientists found a lost tribe on a remote island, the outpouring of "Leave them alone! No harm must come to them!" would be enormous. We have changed as a species along these lines in only the last 100 years.

But the other perspective is, they're aliens. We have no clue to their moral makeup. To them, exploitation, murder, cleansing of every human being from Earth may be 100% moral to them, perhaps a moral imperative. As we die, they might feel great satisfaction of having done (to them) the right thing.

All things considered, my personal opinion is that open alien contact would be a bonanza for us technologically. I think they'd be "nice aliens." But Hawking has a point.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]30221[/ATTACH]

To some alien species, this may be directions to the restaurant, and a dinner menu!

[udake]

In the independant day! The American air force use supersonic warplane fight against the light speed spaceship of aleins creatrue ? Are you kidding me ? It' like some stupid men in stone aged use clubs fight against the superpower who own the nuclear warheads!

[diablo49]

Ha ha ha , it is ironry! The USA people brag about how they beat down the aliens who invade our planet in hollywood movie! Is is the USA brainwashing for the Earth people?
That is said:" when the Alien come from other planet invade us, the USA or the west countries will the first surrender."" oh, ,dear alien brothers , please don't kill us ,we love peace!"
The European only trust the jungle law! That is the "only strong can survive ,the weak were taken."

Of coure ,when the alien travel fast than light speed, the aliens are strong, the human are weak. They kill the human-being like kill a ant,very easy. But I don't think most alien are evil or love the war.Because a advanced civilization who had capability interstellar travel, they must ensure a peace mechanism that they won't kill each other, or they will self-destruct with nuclear weapons, before they developed travel to another star!


I know what I write maybe offense moderator ! But that is true ,before USA or west countires claim it love peace, please stop use their so-call high technology bully ,bomb and killed other people on the Earth! Because no matter any race ,we are all the children of the Earth!
I said the words sincerly！

What you've said isn't particularly offensive, mostly because its so outlandish and your accusations so random and unsubstantiated.

It would be like taking offense at someone saying they truly believe the leaders of the US are reptilian and you are a brainwashed sheeple for thinking otherwise.:insane:

[Chogy]

Udake, you don't make me angry. You simply confuse me.

Its... just... a... movie. Relax. Everything is going to be OK.

[kato]

On an unrelated sidenote, nowhere in ID4 was it said that the aliens had FTL.

[tankie]

It would be like taking offense at someone saying they truly believe the leaders of the US are reptilian and you are a brainwashed sheeple for thinking otherwise.:insane:

Our Royal family are reptilians , just ask David Icke :whome:

[Monash]

Actually, the results of the team's initial experiments as discussed at the start of this thread were supposed to be available by now yet I haven't seen anything on the Web. Has anybody else got access to an update? Do we have "warp bubbles" or don't we?

[kato]

We Do.

The downside of warp drives: Annihilating whole star systems when you arrive | ExtremeTech

As usual, it's not the fall that hurts, it's the sudden stop at the end.

[Chogy]

Actually, the results of the team's initial experiments as discussed at the start of this thread were supposed to be available by now yet I haven't seen anything on the Web. Has anybody else got access to an update? Do we have "warp bubbles" or don't we?

Apparently, they are building some sort of a static model. We have incredibly sensitive instruments like gravitometers and atomic clocks that can detect ridiculous fluctuations down to 0.000,000,000,001 second or less over a short time period.

Wouldn't it be fascinating if they pumped a few thousand amps into this model and they were able to detect minute fluctuations in space-time? It could potentially verify the theory, but you'd still have the energy requirement problem.

[Monash]

We Do.

The downside of warp drives: Annihilating whole star systems when you arrive | ExtremeTech

As usual, it's not the fall that hurts, it's the sudden stop at the end.

I read the article, very interesting. A number of thoughts occur though, if the problems is the "energy release" that occurs at the end of the trip could this not be mitigated by;

(a) reducing the "strength" of the warp gradually starting some distance from the intended destination rather than suddenly upon arrival
(b) using a number of "hops" so that you don't accumulate a large energy profile at the end of the trip
(c) tap part of the energy being accumulated to power the vessel (like say running the air conditioning)
(d) Lastly you could simply put up with the inconvenience and simply abort the trip an appropriate safe distance from the destination before proceeding onwards more conventionally until you arrive. Yes having to "stop" a light year or more from your destination would be a royal pain but if the trip is say 100 L.Y. long you would still save significant time on the journey.

Also has the group doing the experiment actually announced any results yet?