Okay, so here is an idea to get this whole system set up...
1) Send materials up into orbit, assemble 2 of the "stations" there, with nuclear reactors, plenty of fuel, and a plasma generator on both ends 2) Use the engines to move these stations out of earth orbit, put them in a stable orbit around the sun but near the earth 3) Use 1 station with both engines on to push the other to Mars while maintaining its own position 4) The station en route to Mars slows itself down 5) Now, you have 2 stations in position and travel may commence.
Figure it would take 10 times as long to send a whole station out via this method as it would to send the ship later, and you are looking at, what, maybe a year or two to get it to Mars, on top of a few months to a year to get the stations safely away from the Earth where the plasma wouldn't be a danger, plus several years for design and construction, plus a lot of money both for that and for sending the parts into orbit - it would take a decade or two and several billion dollars, but the payoff to having a stable (relatively) and reusable system could be enormous...
My wife had a Dell laptop, Inspirion 4150 I think, that died mysteriously when she plugged it in to the AC adaptor one day. I wonder if the adapter, which appears to fall under this recall, could have caused it? It was a few months over a year old, and so just out-of-warranty, but she is still stuck making payments on it to Dell. I took it apart since their tech support said it would cost something on the order of $800-900 to fix it (it would need a new MB, plus the standard repair fee). It seemed to have some burnt smell originating from near the adaptor socket, but I couldn't get it all the way apart to verify any physical damage. If Dell were to admit that these were faulty adaptors, then would they replace her whole laptop rather than just the AC adaptor (which is still working)?
Either the universe exists, or it does not. If it does not, then everything you see and read (including this!) are simply figments of your imagination. If that is the case, there is not only no purpose to further discussion, but also no foundational basis on which to discuss. Therefore, we will assume, for the purposes of this writing, that the universe does in fact exist. You exist. I exist. This document exists (if only in digitized form). So, there are two possibilities: the universe (or some form of it) has always existed, or it was, at some point in time, created. If it was created, then its creator(s) either had always existed, or were in turn created by something (or someone) else. Again, either way, there would have to have been a being (person, mind, intelligence, etc.) that had "always existed". So we have those two choices: either a matter-and-energy mixture has always existed, and from it has sprung intelligent life (us humans at least, if you want to call us intelligent) or an intelligence (or group thereof) of some form has always existed and it created the universe. So, the question now becomes: which of these two is more logical and/or more likely? Well, to answer that question we should think a little bit more about the properties of the two possible existants. The second, an intelligence of some form, is rather vauge: all that can really be known for sure is that it (I will use singular forms of pronouns from now on for convienence sake, though keep in mind that there is no limit as to the quantity or quality of creators, if it/they exist, or at least none has been established yet) would have a level of what we would call "mental" ability far beyond anything we can imagine. It is even possible that this "mental" power would be enough to create the universe, since this being would not neccessarily be bound by any physical laws (these are, after all, a part of the universe, and it is concievable - in fact, essential - that these would have been created too in this case). The universe, however, is fairly well known to us. It contains a fixed amount of matter and energy. We can observe that it contains, at a minimum, thousands of galaxies each with billions upon billions of stars, many with the potential to house a planetary system. Our Solar System is one, with a myriad of planets and other orbiting debris, and with at least one planet which contains (intelligent?) life. We also know that the universe is governed by physical laws, like the law of gravity. These laws govern how the matter and energy work. There is even a law that covers how the matter can be converted to energy and vica-versa (I know, there is debate about Relativity Theory, but even if the law as we know it is incorrect then there is a correct one we simply have not discovered yet).
So, again, which is more logical and likely: a self-existant intelligence of incredible (infinite?) power, or a massive, complex, self-existant matter-energy universe with laws governing the actions that take place within it? That I am going to leave up to our wonderful/. discussion... at least for now:)
Slashdot Mirror
Wow, like a Total War game but on a bit larger scale. It just mde it to the top of my wishlist :)
Okay, so here is an idea to get this whole system set up...
1) Send materials up into orbit, assemble 2 of the "stations" there, with nuclear reactors, plenty of fuel, and a plasma generator on both ends
2) Use the engines to move these stations out of earth orbit, put them in a stable orbit around the sun but near the earth
3) Use 1 station with both engines on to push the other to Mars while maintaining its own position
4) The station en route to Mars slows itself down
5) Now, you have 2 stations in position and travel may commence.
Figure it would take 10 times as long to send a whole station out via this method as it would to send the ship later, and you are looking at, what, maybe a year or two to get it to Mars, on top of a few months to a year to get the stations safely away from the Earth where the plasma wouldn't be a danger, plus several years for design and construction, plus a lot of money both for that and for sending the parts into orbit - it would take a decade or two and several billion dollars, but the payoff to having a stable (relatively) and reusable system could be enormous...
My wife had a Dell laptop, Inspirion 4150 I think, that died mysteriously when she plugged it in to the AC adaptor one day. I wonder if the adapter, which appears to fall under this recall, could have caused it? It was a few months over a year old, and so just out-of-warranty, but she is still stuck making payments on it to Dell. I took it apart since their tech support said it would cost something on the order of $800-900 to fix it (it would need a new MB, plus the standard repair fee). It seemed to have some burnt smell originating from near the adaptor socket, but I couldn't get it all the way apart to verify any physical damage. If Dell were to admit that these were faulty adaptors, then would they replace her whole laptop rather than just the AC adaptor (which is still working)?
Either the universe exists, or it does not. If it does not, then everything you see and read (including this!) are simply figments of your imagination. If that is the case, there is not only no purpose to further discussion, but also no foundational basis on which to discuss. Therefore, we will assume, for the purposes of this writing, that the universe does in fact exist. You exist. I exist. This document exists (if only in digitized form). So, there are two possibilities: the universe (or some form of it) has always existed, or it was, at some point in time, created. If it was created, then its creator(s) either had always existed, or were in turn created by something (or someone) else. Again, either way, there would have to have been a being (person, mind, intelligence, etc.) that had "always existed". So we have those two choices: either a matter-and-energy mixture has always existed, and from it has sprung intelligent life (us humans at least, if you want to call us intelligent) or an intelligence (or group thereof) of some form has always existed and it created the universe.
/. discussion... at least for now :)
So, the question now becomes: which of these two is more logical and/or more likely? Well, to answer that question we should think a little bit more about the properties of the two possible existants. The second, an intelligence of some form, is rather vauge: all that can really be known for sure is that it (I will use singular forms of pronouns from now on for convienence sake, though keep in mind that there is no limit as to the quantity or quality of creators, if it/they exist, or at least none has been established yet) would have a level of what we would call "mental" ability far beyond anything we can imagine. It is even possible that this "mental" power would be enough to create the universe, since this being would not neccessarily be bound by any physical laws (these are, after all, a part of the universe, and it is concievable - in fact, essential - that these would have been created too in this case).
The universe, however, is fairly well known to us. It contains a fixed amount of matter and energy. We can observe that it contains, at a minimum, thousands of galaxies each with billions upon billions of stars, many with the potential to house a planetary system. Our Solar System is one, with a myriad of planets and other orbiting debris, and with at least one planet which contains (intelligent?) life. We also know that the universe is governed by physical laws, like the law of gravity. These laws govern how the matter and energy work. There is even a law that covers how the matter can be converted to energy and vica-versa (I know, there is debate about Relativity Theory, but even if the law as we know it is incorrect then there is a correct one we simply have not discovered yet).
So, again, which is more logical and likely: a self-existant intelligence of incredible (infinite?) power, or a massive, complex, self-existant matter-energy universe with laws governing the actions that take place within it? That I am going to leave up to our wonderful