Відео

Eventually, we would be able to. It all comes down to the resources required and our ability to access and work in space. By the time we can consider building any type of O'Neill cylinder, we will have a much larger space program and will have started mining asteroids for additional resources.

That wouldn't be an O'Neil cylinder then. Also, there are material constraints. You can make them as long as you want, potentially wrapping around a star, but with normal materials, the largest you are going to get is the Mckendree cylinder, which at a length to radius rate matching the O'Neil cylinder, would have surface area on par with Australia. That is assuming graphene, but if we are talking about steel or aluminum, the surface area would be similar to a US county and could support a few million people at the most. However, you can make it longer. If one were to make it long enough to wrap around a star, that is called a Topopolis, which can have thousands of times the surface are of the earth. At about a third the earth's mass.

No problem! Some of the stuff we can do now is crazy.

Initially, they would be a bit behind those that have fusion energy. You can either trust in humanity's good nature where we would share the knowledge and capability once we can reliably do so, or trust in humanity's greed in selling that information to those who want it. In the worst case scenario, nuclear powers just sell the excess energy to those countries that need/want it. Even with this, I don't think it would be terrible. Energy would be so cheap at this point even large markups wouldn't be too bad.

@@StuffIFI No sorry, I meant the materials needed. I can see that becoming an issue

The raw materials for fusion reactions are just a few isotopes of hydrogen, which is just about everywhere. The only real hangup would be the construction and maintenance of the actual facilities themselves.

I always thought of it as capturing all of the energy radiating from the star, not just the light. Maybe you are right, where the technology synchronizes or something with the star and leeches power that way. I hadn't thought of it that way before.

You might be right. At the very least it will take an incredible amount of time. Even if we end up not being able to achieve advancing up the Kardashev Scale, I think that having it as a goal will be a net benefit to humanity.

That's entirely possible. We have always taken inspiration from our imagination and it should only be a matter of time until we have something similar.

I like the idea of smaller, redesign-able O'Neill cylinders for experimentation. These experiments can inform self-sustaining ecosystems and space colonization. By iterating on designs and embracing adaptability, we can optimize space, energy efficiency, and well-being. These cylinders serve as testbeds for future space habitats, shaping the future of sustainable living and pushing the boundaries of human ingenuity. Once we get it right, we would be able to scale up with minimal difficulty.

It would be a huge undertaking. If/when we get to that point, we wouldn't go all out and not stop until we have a completed sphere. We would be able to essentially make modules that interconnect as we get more resources. Eventually, we would have the ability to go to other solar systems and get resources from there to help with our own Dyson Sphere.

@@StuffIFI I think if we can gather resources from other solar systems I doubt we'd require a Dyson sphere many of our scarce resources are abundant in space. If we develop nuclear power to a better point we can have little portable sun's to power almost anything indefinitely.

@michaelmerryman7806 I agree with you that fusion is the way to go, and it will likely solve many/all of our current and near future energy problems. There was even a recent breakthrough on that front. I think that there will always be a point where the current supply doesn't meet demand. There are plenty of steps between what we have now and a Dyson Sphere, I just think that eventually it is something we will need to build.

That is likely true. It doesn't mean we can't use it as a goal to drive innovation and advance our understanding of everything that would go into creating one.

You are right. The Sun would obviously be much easier to use than a more distant star. I went with star instead since organizations like SETI and NASA are searching for stars that show evidence of Dyson Spheres as proof of intelligent life. I chose to go with more general language to cover the edge cases.

Glad you think so!

Thank you for the feedback and well wishes! Without being fully in the genetics field it is hard to know the full scope of what CRISPR can do. Since genetic/ancestry testing can identify a whole host of traits, I would imagine that researchers can do studies with at least that list. The hard part is figuring out which pieces of DNA are interconnected or dependent on each other. They finally fully mapped human DNA sometime last year, so hopefully we can get some groundbreaking research in the coming years to start eradicating some genetic diseases. Ignoring ethical concerns, the only true downside that I see is that we don't have long-term, generational data to ensure that gene editing is safe. The only way to get that is time and study.

That is a little harder than you might think it is. Merck's systems were infected using state-sponsored level malware. They knew about vulnerabilities that the software developers themselves had no clue about until it happened.

And the earth is flat ?

@@ribtickler7793 Bodies of water at rest are demonstrably flat and level.

No for real though. As countries have more dominance on earth, we need more dominance in space. Put feelings aside for once, this was a smart move.

The US Space Force’s primary mission is to organize, train, and equip space forces to protect U.S. interests and capabilities in space.