[Keith_McClary]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('AgentR11', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('KaiserJeep', '.').. It is unlikely that private investors would take such a risk, some government would have to make it a priority.

[Keith_McClary]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('KaiserJeep', 'W')e could build the space colonies we need if funding and priorities were assigned by politicians in a fashion similar to the Manhattan Project or Kennedy's moonshot program. But the current entirely erroneous assumption is that we can "save the Planet" if we halt "Climate Change". As if 7.3B people would then silently vanish from the Earth and the current Mass Extinction would cease.

[SeaGypsy]

Existing rail guns a fraction of the power and size KJ is yabbering on about have continuous maintenance requirements, the HEAT generated around the firing end, combined with shock wave on atmospheric entry- keeps smashing and or melting, usually they require major maintenance within 1-3 firings. The 'steel can' better be ok with being liquefied with whatever is in it.

[Tanada]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SeaGypsy', 'E')xisting rail guns a fraction of the power and size KJ is yabbering on about have continuous maintenance requirements, the HEAT generated around the firing end, combined with shock wave on atmospheric entry- keeps smashing and or melting, usually they require major maintenance within 1-3 firings. The 'steel can' better be ok with being liquefied with whatever is in it.

[Keith_McClary]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', ' ') Many Doomers are eco-doomers, they think Humanity is such a disaster for the ecosystem that we will manage to either wipe out all life or make ourselves extinct along with many other species. ... Luddites are those who tend to believe that Technology, either a specific type like Artificial Intelligence, or in general like the invention of Agriculture, is the root of all evil and should be opposed axiomatically.

[SeaGypsy]

I would class KJ as a sentient virus, and proud.

[AgentR11]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('KaiserJeep', 'T')he humans on Earth will complete the destruction of the planet. The humans in space colonies will be chronically overpopulated until the materials available in zero G are nearing exhaustion, then the same debate about changing human culture or fecundating other solar systems will happen. Then we will spread through the Universe like an algae bloom in the sea, while the original solar system faces the same grim fate as the original planet.

[vision-master]

The Dogon, the Nommos and Sirius B

In Mali, West Africa, lives a tribe of people called the Dogon. The Dogon are believed to be of Egyptian decent and their astronomical lore goes back thousands of years to 3200 BC. According to their traditions, the star Sirius has a companion star which is invisible to the human eye. This companion star has a 50 year elliptical orbit around the visible Sirius and is extremely heavy. It also rotates on its axis.

This legend might be of little interest to anybody but the two French anthropologists, Marcel Griaule and Germain Dieterlen, who recorded it from four Dogon priests in the 1930's. Of little interest except that it is exactly true. How did a people who lacked any kind of astronomical devices know so much about an invisible star? The star, which scientists call Sirius B, wasn't even photographed until it was done by a large telescope in 1970.

The Dogon stories explain that also. According to their oral traditions, a race people from the Sirius system called the Nommos visited Earth thousands of years ago. The Nommos were ugly, amphibious beings that resembled mermen and mermaids. They also appear in Babylonian, Accadian, and Sumerian myths. The Egyptian Goddess Isis, who is sometimes depicted as a mermaid, is also linked with the star Sirius.

The Nommos, according to the Dogon legend, lived on a planet that orbits another star in the Sirius system. They landed on Earth in an "ark" that made a spinning decent to the ground with great noise and wind. It was the Nommos that gave the Dogon the knowledge about Sirius B.


more.....

[Timo]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('AgentR11', 'B')ack to the real world, even *IF* humans were wise enough to moderate themselves to provide enough time and became space fairing in a significant way, there is no escaping our local cluster of stars. NONE. Getting humans living and self-sustaining/breeding on Mars is a task on the scale of a millennia.

[Keith_McClary]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('AgentR11', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('KaiserJeep', 'T')he humans on Earth will complete the destruction of the planet. The humans in space colonies will be chronically overpopulated until the materials available in zero G are nearing exhaustion, then the same debate about changing human culture or fecundating other solar systems will happen. Then we will spread through the Universe like an algae bloom in the sea, while the original solar system faces the same grim fate as the original planet.

[Newfie]

I think that is what Ibon has been trying to explore.

Maybe we can get him back here to answer that? He seems to be the only one considering it seriously.

[SeaGypsy]

Ibon knows it's a crock, like the rest of us.

[Synapsid]

vision-master:

Look into the following:

Dogon Restudied: A Field Evaluation of the Work of Marcel Griaule, by Walter E A van Beek.

van Beek worked with the Dogon for years.

[dinopello]

I fear this may actually happen (unlike driverless, flying cars)

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he scale of surprise is certain to be huge because info-glasses are just one of a zoo of wearable devices that are coming into our lives.

[Subjectivist]

Ludd was right our civilization is doomed by technology. Please read

http://www.ijreview.com/2014/07/160051- ... lity-time/

[Newfie]

Yeah, that restaurant experience sounds like any one of many meetings I attend

[Subjectivist]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', 'Y')eah, that restaurant experience sounds like any one of many meetings I attend

[Tanada]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'N')ow, although this particular instance may or may not be true, it tells a story that is all too common today in America.

We are so engrossed in ourselves and in our technology that we lose sight of the importance of the relationships we have and the importance of experiencing things rather than recording them.

Sometimes we just need to put the phone away and get back to the basics.

[Lore]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'N')ow, although this particular instance may or may not be true, it tells a story that is all too common today in America.

We are so engrossed in ourselves and in our technology that we lose sight of the importance of the relationships we have and the importance of experiencing things rather than recording them.

Sometimes we just need to put the phone away and get back to the basics.

[Newfie]

Wen I look at them I always think "BORG."