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Project Hyperion: Interstellar ship design competition

projecthyperion.org

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Re: Project Hyperion: Interstellar ship design competition

#171

Post by ascorbic »

jandrese wrote: post #163
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A week in Bali Are you genuinely unfamiliar with the folks who launch off on their own into the deep wilderness for years on end. Not only for vanity, but largely to do groundbreaking research?

Sure, individual weirdos can do that for a few years. But you're talking about literally millennia of travel. Hundreds of generations of people living their entire life on the bus never getting to the destination before they die. Trapped out in the cold empty void of space with literally nothing around, for their entire lives, and the lives of their children, and their children's children, for longer than we have had…

In this exercise, it's 400 years. A long time, yes, but nowhere near what you're suggesting.

Re: Project Hyperion: Interstellar ship design competition

#172

Post by [deleted] »

mighmi wrote: post #131
munificent wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am increasingly certain that culture is by far the biggest limiting factor when it comes to large-scale problem solving now and in the future. We couldn't even reliably get people to put a piece of fabric over their face to stop killing their own relatives. Even if we could build a generation ship, it would turn into an Event Horizon hellscape if we don't figure out better cultural, communication, and sociological…

Sweden did not have a mask mandate and did very well.

[deleted]

Re: Project Hyperion: Interstellar ship design competition

#173

Post by jamiek88 »

mjevans wrote: post #151
os2warpman wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can build and maintain a system capable of sustaining the lives of 1,000 humans for 400 years, why do you care about interstellar travel anymore? “The indefatigable spirit of exploration” isn’t the answer. People, as a mass, only explore to find new resources due to scarcity. There are exceptions, but they tend to be thrill seekers or publicity hounds seeking to capitalize on a measure of fame upon their retur…

In that timeframe it would by nature need to be capable of full self repair, with the shipped materials and energy, and with no wasted byproducts. We'd have to completely re-think industrial processes. I'm in favor of realized nanotechnology and 3d printers at an atomic level. Evolution stumbled across carbon based lifeforms as it's answer on Earth.

> full self repair, with the shipped materials and energy, and with no wasted byproducts.

Isn’t this impossible? Doesn’t entropy preclude perfect ongoing repair?

Re: Project Hyperion: Interstellar ship design competition

#175

Post by teiferer »

mighmi wrote: post #131
munificent wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am increasingly certain that culture is by far the biggest limiting factor when it comes to large-scale problem solving now and in the future. We couldn't even reliably get people to put a piece of fabric over their face to stop killing their own relatives. Even if we could build a generation ship, it would turn into an Event Horizon hellscape if we don't figure out better cultural, communication, and sociological…

Sweden did not have a mask mandate and did very well.

Are you opining from the outside or did you live here during the pandemic?

If you entered a bus or any public space during that time, most people were wearing masks. And bus schedules were heavily adjusted to decrease density of people. Society did a lot to fight the virus, just not based on mandates but based on getting people to voluntarily do what was necessary because they in majority used common sense and an undertanding of what's the danger and what is needed. Similar to what an intergenerational space ship would need.

So, if your argument is "you can solve big problems without coersion" then I'm with you. You need a high trust society.

Though if your argument is "the mask stuff was just BS, just look at Sweden, they didn't use any and turned out well" then you just don't have a clue what you are talking about.

Re: Project Hyperion: Interstellar ship design competition

#176

Post by ascorbic »

Mistletoe wrote: post #61

What's the cost for getting all that to space? Is it still about $4,000/kg? What's a rough idea about how much Chrysalis would weigh? 2.4M tons it says. ~2.2B kg = $8.8 trillion dollars just for the launch costs alone? I also thought this was interesting from the 2nd place booklet. Did not know this. >The chance of a successful pregnancy in deep space without a geomagnetic field is essentially zero. >During mitosis a…

They suggest that a lot could come from the moon. This page has the rough breakdown of where each part would come from https://www.canva.com/design/DAGmr3ubC8E/LHHAeeAIGGQe_TkZVs-...

Re: Project Hyperion: Interstellar ship design competition

#177

Post by Ekaros »

AngryData wrote: post #141
hermitcrab wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the problems would come in the 2nd generation, who didn't choose to go on the mission.

Provided the first generation volunteered, I expect the second generation would still be indoctrinate enough to the idea and mission to be fine, but the third generation would definitely be stirring some shit up.

Change the programming and go back. I wonder what reaction back here would be...

Re: Project Hyperion: Interstellar ship design competition

#178

Post by teiferer »

jvanderbot wrote: post #50
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> we are never leaving this solar system unless we discover some new physics to get around our speed limitations The winning proposal coasts at 0.01c. Propulsion systems--not the speed of light--and thus engineering, not phsyics, are the relevant limitors.

We're one good new religion away from colonizing the solar system. Cathedrals were built over 100s of years. Imaging just living in a massive one and your whole holy purpose is to survive and thrive and spread. It's entirely reasonable we'd have the will to make it happen, and pretty reasonable we'd be able to build it with planet scale effort, but sadly quite difficult to imagine it surviving even dust impacts for 4…

> It's entirely reasonable we'd have the will to make it happen

"We" are not even able to sustainably inhabit our current planet. We have hundreds of millions starving every day, we have wars in many places, the threat of thermonuclear war looming as strong as ever, and are still using natural resources at an unsustainable rate even though we know that that's the case. Settling on other planets has all these problems plus the issue of getting there plus the issue that the environment you find there is more hostile than the most hostile desert areas here on earth.

We currently live on paradise planet and can't even make things work well around here. Hard to see how you could make things work on Mars where you can't just go outside pick a leaf to eat and get some water to drink. Or just, you know, breathe.

Re: Project Hyperion: Interstellar ship design competition

#179

Post by WithinReason »

virgildotcodes wrote: post #12
codeulike wrote: post #2

Link to Canva presentation for the winning entry https://www.canva.com/design/DAGmr3ubC8E/LHHAeeAIGGQe_TkZVs-...

Reading through this in detail just cements that we are never leaving this solar system unless we discover some new physics to get around our speed limitations.

We had the technology to do it in 44 years 60 years ago:

An atomic (fission) Orion can achieve perhaps 9–11% of the speed of light. [...] At 0.1 c, Orion thermonuclear starships would require a flight time of at least 44 years to reach Alpha Centauri, not counting time needed to reach that speed (about 36 days at constant acceleration of 1 g or 9.8 m/s2).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_(nuclear_propuls...

Re: Project Hyperion: Interstellar ship design competition

#180

Post by WithinReason »

Ekaros wrote: post #170
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> we are never leaving this solar system unless we discover some new physics to get around our speed limitations The winning proposal coasts at 0.01c. Propulsion systems--not the speed of light--and thus engineering, not phsyics, are the relevant limitors.

Energy is the limit. If used Wolfram Alpha right for reasonable comparison that is largest cruise ship with mass of 248663000 kg to speed up to 0.01c mentioned the kinetic energy would be 2.9 times the worlds fossil fuel reserves... Then double that to slow down. And remember efficiency and that well you need to spend some to keep people alive... Seems like energy in general is one of the true problems.

You wouldn't be burning coal for propulsion, you would fuse atoms: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_(nuclear_propuls...
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