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To Everywhere in 42 Minutes

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Re: To Everywhere in 42 Minutes

#11

Post by ars »

d1rge wrote: post #9

Putting practical considerations aside, what might the effect on society be if we could be at any other place on earth in less than an hour? Would tourism explode? What would that mean for the environment? What about international business? Would it be the end of remote workers? Or would it encourage even more distributed workplace?

It would more or less mean the end of nations.

In some parts of the world you can live on $5 a day, in others it's $100 - but with cheap travel, those earning lots would buy services in the cheaper places - increasing prices.

And those earning little would seek employment elsewhere, reducing wages.

The overall result would be to flatten the income disparity about nations. (But it would have no effect on the disparity within nations, since that is caused by differences in intelligence, and that won't change.)

Some places would of course "cut themself off the grid" (like North Korea), but the majority would not, and the world (or at least the connected places) would become much more similar.

And some counties would put up barriers (like those separating the US and mexico - if not for those the wages in the US and mexico would tend to equalize, but they don't because of the barrier).

All this assumes that the travel is cheap - if it's expensive, it doesn't much matter that it's fast.

Re: To Everywhere in 42 Minutes

#12

Post by ars »

anigbrowl wrote: post #5

It sounds like great fun until your rapid transit pod plunges into a bath of superheated magma. Vomitous fellow passengers would not be my primary anxiety about this mode of travel.

Superheated magma is not really much of a problem.

If you don't go too deep (a few thousand KM), the temperature is under 1000 degrees. We have plenty of materials than can handle that. For insulation use vacuum, or aerogel (which melts at 1,473 K) and is a phenomenal insulator. Add a large cold reservoir (liquid nitrogen) and you don't need a conventional A/C - it only has to last 42 minutes, and weight is not a problem.

The pressure is a much bigger problem. You can't bore a tunnel in the conventional sense since the rock is a liquid. You'd need some sort of wall, but I don't know if we have anything strong (and stable) enough. Most metals will oxidize and destroy themself at those temperatures.

Maybe a ceramic, or alumina coated metal. Perhaps a tungsten compound of some sort that is stable in oxygen at high temperature.

Another problem is the speed (reaching 1000 MPH), you'd need magnetic bearings (mag-lev), but magnets don't like being hot. The curie point of iron is 768 C, which is too low. Cobalt might work - but barely.

Re: To Everywhere in 42 Minutes

#13

Post by gtufano »

ars wrote: post #11
d1rge wrote: post #9

Putting practical considerations aside, what might the effect on society be if we could be at any other place on earth in less than an hour? Would tourism explode? What would that mean for the environment? What about international business? Would it be the end of remote workers? Or would it encourage even more distributed workplace?

It would more or less mean the end of nations. In some parts of the world you can live on $5 a day, in others it's $100 - but with cheap travel, those earning lots would buy services in the cheaper places - increasing prices. And those earning little would seek employment elsewhere, reducing wages. The overall result would be to flatten the income disparity about nations. (But it would have no effect on the disparity…

I find interesting that you assume that disparity within nations is caused by differences in intelligence. While this is true (i.e.: differences in intelligence make a difference, sorry for the joke) there are many, many, other causes for differences: geographics (easy), social (not all the countries are permeable to social status changes) and so on... I feel this "all is caused by the intelligence" a bit ingenuous. But may be it is only my european culture speaking...

Re: To Everywhere in 42 Minutes

#14

Post by mseebach »

ars wrote: post #12
anigbrowl wrote: post #5

It sounds like great fun until your rapid transit pod plunges into a bath of superheated magma. Vomitous fellow passengers would not be my primary anxiety about this mode of travel.

Superheated magma is not really much of a problem. If you don't go too deep (a few thousand KM), the temperature is under 1000 degrees. We have plenty of materials than can handle that. For insulation use vacuum, or aerogel (which melts at 1,473 K) and is a phenomenal insulator. Add a large cold reservoir (liquid nitrogen) and you don't need a conventional A/C - it only has to last 42 minutes, and weight is not a pro…

IANA chemist, but couldn't you solve the oxidation problems by getting rid of the oxygen? In the article, he talks of a vacuum to avoid friction.

Re: To Everywhere in 42 Minutes

#15

Post by ars »

mseebach wrote: post #14
ars wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Superheated magma is not really much of a problem. If you don't go too deep (a few thousand KM), the temperature is under 1000 degrees. We have plenty of materials than can handle that. For insulation use vacuum, or aerogel (which melts at 1,473 K) and is a phenomenal insulator. Add a large cold reservoir (liquid nitrogen) and you don't need a conventional A/C - it only has to last 42 minutes, and weight is not a pro…

IANA chemist, but couldn't you solve the oxidation problems by getting rid of the oxygen? In the article, he talks of a vacuum to avoid friction.

Don't forget about the other side of the wall....

Also, I wouldn't want to build something where a single seal failure would mean the entire thing is destroyed. Plus, how would you construct it.

Re: To Everywhere in 42 Minutes

#16

Post by ars »

lisper wrote: post #10

There's no such thing as a free lunch. Most of the energy required to go from A to B is needed to overcome friction, not provide kinetic energy. That remains true whether you are above or below the surface. So burrowing down buys you virtually nothing. The amount of energy you'd need to pull yourself up the other side of the tunnel would be almost exactly the same as you would need to make the same trip at (almost) t…

Not completely true. You need energy to start, and then you waste it (or try to recover it) when you stop.

With this you don't need to provide all that initial energy to get you going. You just have to handle the friction.

Re: To Everywhere in 42 Minutes

#17

Post by dantheman »

gtufano wrote: post #13
ars wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would more or less mean the end of nations. In some parts of the world you can live on $5 a day, in others it's $100 - but with cheap travel, those earning lots would buy services in the cheaper places - increasing prices. And those earning little would seek employment elsewhere, reducing wages. The overall result would be to flatten the income disparity about nations. (But it would have no effect on the disparity…

I find interesting that you assume that disparity within nations is caused by differences in intelligence. While this is true (i.e.: differences in intelligence make a difference, sorry for the joke) there are many, many, other causes for differences: geographics (easy), social (not all the countries are permeable to social status changes) and so on... I feel this "all is caused by the intelligence" a bit ingenuous.…

You misread his statement: > The overall result would be to flatten the income disparity about nations. (But it would have no effect on the disparity within nations, since that is caused by differences in intelligence, and that won't change.)

He's saying that local effects of a nation would quickly be brought up to par, whereas the distribution in nations wouldn't likely change.

Re: To Everywhere in 42 Minutes

#19

Post by patrickg-zill »

There was work done on similar things to this in the 1970s, however it all went classified. The term is "subterrene" - a tunnel boring machine that keeps the drill tip at high temperature, melting the rock and allowing a smooth glassy tunnel to be made.

Re: To Everywhere in 42 Minutes

#20

Post by pmjordan »

ramchip wrote: post #8
anigbrowl wrote: post #5

It sounds like great fun until your rapid transit pod plunges into a bath of superheated magma. Vomitous fellow passengers would not be my primary anxiety about this mode of travel.

If you read the article carefully, he also talks about shorter tunnels which would only go a few miles below the surface. Not necessarily through the core, although I believe the journalist got a little confused himself with the Moscow-Washington bit (716 miles depth != Earth core). Anyway, it's nice to see he solved the pathfinding, but it's probably not the most challenging part of the problem!

Have a look at a globe. (or google earth or whatever) The direct line between DC and Moscow is surprisingly shallow. The exact number does seem too low by a factor of 1.5-2 though.
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