1. Hello! You are currently viewing our community as a guest. Register today and apply to be a member of one of the longest standing gaming communities around. Once you have registered learn about our team and how to apply!

Worried about 7bn people?

Discussion in 'General Open/Public Discussion' started by Sarxis, 1 Nov 2011.


  1. Don't worry about overpopulation of the Earth now that we've "officially" reached a global pop of 7 billion - there are still 200 to 400 billion other stars in our own galaxy out there. ;)

    (Not to mention all the other galaxies floating around.)
     
  2. Brokentusk

    Brokentusk DragonWolf

    7 bill are just more zombies for the apocalypse.
     
  3. Tbeast

    Tbeast Recruitment Officer Officer Elder

    Officer
    need more bullets
     
  4. symen

    symen DragonWolf

    In order to get to the next solar system over, we would have to break down most of the matter in this solar system for fuel (the laws of thermodynamics are a harsh mistress). This assumes an antimatter rocket or something of similar efficiency to propel our spaceship there, which we don't currently have the technology to build. We can bring about 200 people, who would have to be willing to breed with each other in a proscribed way, and be carefully selected to maximize genetic diversity, because the trip will take several thousand years. Keeping that mini-civilization stable in a space the size of a couple of trailers for that long sounds pretty challenging to me. Also, this is all assuming that there's even anything interesting in the Proxima Centauri system, which we're currently not sure of.

    Basically, we're stuck here -- the laws of physics effectively dictate that traveling among the stars will remain the domain of science fiction. It's too bad, really -- it would be really cool to be able to see more of the universe than our tiny little corner. At the height of the space race, when we were nationally obsessed with getting into space before the Russians, we managed to get a couple of people two light-seconds from the planet. We might be able to colonize the Moon or Mars someday, though.

    I'm not worried about 7 billion people. Current trends have world population starting to decline around mid-century anyway -- as developing countries become first-world countries, their birthrate declines. In every measure, we keep improving our technologies to allow more and more people to live on the planet -- fundamentally, that's what economies do. Right now, we produce 2.5 million calories of food per person per day worldwide, a thousand times as much as we need. People don't starve because there isn't enough to eat, they starve because other people seek power over them. In my opinion, authoritarianism and certainty are among the most destructive forces throughout history.
     
  5. Manitou

    Manitou Old War Horse DragonWolf

    Again, Symen brings the logic. Great post, man. So that evidently means getting along with our neighbor would seem to be a good goal. ;)
     
  6. Hamma

    Hamma Commanding Officer Officer

    Officer
    Speak for yourselves! I am posting this from Andromeda II
     
  7. GraniteRok

    GraniteRok Executive Officer Officer

    Officer
    With thanks to the Cheech & Chong Miicro Bus Interstellar Shuttle or Timothy Leary's Magic Carpet! ;)

     
  8. Manitou

    Manitou Old War Horse DragonWolf

    Take a trip and never leave the farm.
     
  9. Heading back to Mars when I'm done with this puny planet. :p
     
  10. Calling Earth 'puny' in the face of Mars.. pfft. That little 'red-ball' could take a bath in one of our oceans!

    Ok.. exagerating.. but still...
     
  11. Y'know following that annocement, Japan have said that if another natural disaster happens, they plan to build a "Backup City" 300 miles away and further inland for 250,000 people...

    I have an anti-psunami, floating city concept that doubles that living space and still maintains infrastructure easily. We should be thinking more about building cities on the ocean than filling every square metre of land that would be better spent for agriculture.
     
  12. symen

    symen DragonWolf

    I'd love to live in a floating city. I want one of the houses below surface level -- imagine being able to look out your living room window and see underwater. No more mowing the lawn or shoveling snow, either!
     
  13. Ground Chuk

    Ground Chuk BANNED

    Don't know if I've posted this before, but this is a great example of how big our solar system is. I've done this before and it is incredible!

    The beginning is a lecture, but if you scroll down a bit to where it starts out at "This Peppercorn Is The Earth We Live On" is where it gets real interesting, and then the demonstration begins.

    Reading it is pretty amazing, actually doing it makes it more real and almost incomprehensible....

    http://www.noao.edu/education/peppercorn/pcmain.html
     
  14. symen

    symen DragonWolf

    Cool link! If you take this sort of model to the galactic scale, and use a grain of salt to represent the sun, then the next grain of salt (representing Proxima Centauri) would be eight miles away.
     
  15. Brokentusk

    Brokentusk DragonWolf

    When I was in high-school a quarter century ago my science teacher was railing against the space program. She made the same argument about how it would take the energy from everything in the solar system to leave the solar system.

    I thought about that for a moment and told her that made zero sense. She started writing a formula on the board to prove she was right. I told her the math doesn't matter. She smugly turned around to ask me why I would think the math wouldn't matter.

    "It's the wrong math. We've been to the moon. However if you were to ask a scientist in 1850 how to get to the moon, the method he would describe would be so ludicrous it wouldn't work. He would describe sailing ships with sails the size of cities. He would talk cannons that would blast you to the moon. Think about it, if you were to talk to a 10th century fisherman about crossing the Pacific, you might get a method that involves enslaving a giant on a rowboat to row you over. So, obviously the reason it takes so much energy is because we are using the wrong technology. When we have the right technology our methods now will seem ridiculous."
     
    Last edited: 14 Nov 2011
  16. Exactly what I was thinking when I started this thread! Thank you Brokentusk!

    I am not looking at this from a 'beginning of the 21st century' standpoint, because obviously nobody here is heading to Proxima Centauri tomorrow (at least, not in their mortal body by conventional rocket booster).

    But we just do not know what the future holds for our space-faring abilities. When will/could all this happen? Only Kirk knows.
     

Share This Page