Warp drive a realistic possibility now?

[MAKG1]

Who, exactly, was claiming it was impossible?

The New York Times.

No one who actually worked with aircraft at the time thought so. But if it's in print, it must be true, eh?

 

[Palmpilot]

Hey, baby steps first.

If VGER really is 1500lbs, that converts into 6.1150e+19 joules of energy.

What do we know that produces that much E ?

Shouldn't be that hard to find something to power it....

And "exotic materials"...not long ago, composites were considered exotic, now it's "ordinary".

Outside the box, people.

Thinking outside the box, while it can be useful, does not eliminate the necessity of working out the details.

Controlled fusion should be possible too, but bringing it to reality is not an easy task.

Maybe someday interstellar space travel will be practical, but considering the incredible number of solar systems that exist, the fact that none has sent visitors yet is not encouraging.

I'll believe it when someone demonstrates a working prototype.

 

[fgcason]

If VGER really is 1500lbs, that converts into 6.1150e+19 joules of energy.

Why does voyager keep getting referenced as vger? Unlike Fred, NASA at least had the money to complete the name of the vehicle in the 1970's...and unlike Fred, launch it too.

Ok, so magically you suddenly have 6.1150e+19 joules of energy out of whatever it is you're playing with the calculator and pretended it exists from that you extracted from mass by some magical means. What now?
If you get that amount of energy scattered across 600 million years, it won't do much. If you get it all at once, it'll make a really big hole in the ground where you were standing. We won't even get into how you make that energy from mass in the first place. Let's start with how do you control that much energy delivered over say 15 minutes? Then once you magically control it, what's next? What do you do with it? You can't magically fold the reality of the Universe like a piece of cloth and magically pop out somewhere else...well, that's not entirely true. You can pop over to a whole bunch of somewhere elses nearby pretty damned quick when the whole thing blows up in your face but that doesn't do much good as operational transportation in much the same way that sitting in your car and setting off a thermonuclear bomb on your bumper to power you across town.

Outside the box, people.

There's a difference between outside the box and deep into fantasy land.

 

[ChrisK]

Why does voyager keep getting referenced as vger?

Zomg. Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979). Voyager came back and was called VGER.

 

[Capt. Geoffrey Thorpe]

Hey, baby steps first.

If VGER really is 1500lbs, that converts into 6.1150e+19 joules of energy.

What do we know that produces that much E ?

One million bombs like the ones dropped on Japan would do the job.

 

[Bob Noel]

The whole concept of equal and opposite reaction has been around for a lot longer than anyone knew there was no air in space.

I was taking a poke at "pop experts" prior the first shots into space.

 

[Jhernandez04]

We have realists and dreamers. If realists ruled the world we would of never made it this far. Its a sad life to live without dreams, even if you aim for the moon and come up short, your at the top of the world.

 

[denverpilot]

In all fairness, I suspect the government will have absolutely 0 to do with any future relevant space exploration.

Unless they find something they can tax and make money on. Then they'll be all over it like stink on ****.

 

[MAKG1]

We have realists and dreamers. If realists ruled the world we would of never made it this far. Its a sad life to live without dreams, even if you aim for the moon and come up short, your at the top of the world.

I find it amazing how non-engineers think wild and crazy ideas are how engineering makes progress. No, that's how projects go way over budget trying to do the impossible, and fail.

The first thing one must establish is that something is actually possible. The Apollo program did not happen because Werner von Braun made up the whole thing on his blog. It happened because he and his team made careful and exhaustive analyses, and made dozens of major proof of concept steps before attempting or even verbalizing a moon landing. The hard part there was convincing Congress to throw quite a lot of money at it. And despite the Rice speech and other statements about it, the only dreams that motivated it were nightmares -- it was intended to show up the USSR and gain the "high ground of space" (Kennedy's words). That's a statement about fear, not dreams.

The Wrights invented the powered heavier than air aircraft not because they had massive dreams. Everyone knew it was possible because of earlier work of Lillienthal and others. Several people had already started the science of aerodynamics. There were several competitors trying to do the same thing, especially Langley. And the Wrights succeeded not because their dreams were bigger, but because their methodologies were better thought out.

Ambitious attemtps at new technology are useful, but impossible attempts are just foolish. And the difference is the first thing a competent engineer tries to determine.

 

[denverpilot]

The Apollo program did not happen because Werner von Braun made up the whole thing on his blog.

Quote of the day, right there. And the basis for most of the problems in Software "Engineering". It's isn't engineering. It's code monkey hammering on a keyboard hoping for a desired outcome from the computer.

 

[Jhernandez04]

I find it amazing how non-engineers think wild and crazy ideas are how engineering makes progress. No, that's how projects go way over budget trying to do the impossible, and fail.

The first thing one must establish is that something is actually possible. The Apollo program did not happen because Werner von Braun made up the whole thing on his blog. It happened because he and his team made careful and exhaustive analyses, and made dozens of major proof of concept steps before attempting or even verbalizing a moon landing. The hard part there was convincing Congress to throw quite a lot of money at it. And despite the Rice speech and other statements about it, the only dreams that motivated it were nightmares -- it was intended to show up the USSR and gain the "high ground of space" (Kennedy's words). That's a statement about fear, not dreams.

The Wrights invented the powered heavier than air aircraft not because they had massive dreams. Everyone knew it was possible because of earlier work of Lillienthal and others. Several people had already started the science of aerodynamics. There were several competitors trying to do the same thing, especially Langley. And the Wrights succeeded not because their dreams were bigger, but because their methodologies were better thought out.

Ambitious attemtps at new technology are useful, but impossible attempts are just foolish. And the difference is the first thing a competent engineer tries to determine.

Once again, a realist misses the whole point. You dont make inventions, new technology without dreaming or thinking about it. A realist knows he's hungry and get food. A dreamer thinks of ways to keep food stocked.

Stop over thinking and analyzing things. Your not going to win the internet or this discussion, because guess what.... this window that your typing text in and reaching across the globe.... was someones dream that was once your so called "impossible."

 

[SkyHog]

Engineers don't get to build something until someone with a free mind thinks it up first. Engineers don't think, they do.

So forgive me if I don't hold the weight of an engineer saying a new, untested as of yet idea being impossible.

Of course its impossible...you haven't been told how to do it yet.

 

[Jhernandez04]

Engineers don't get to build something until someone with a free mind thinks it up first. Engineers don't think, they do.

So forgive me if I don't hold the weight of an engineer saying a new, untested as of yet idea being impossible.

Of course its impossible...you haven't been told how to do it yet.

+1

 

[MAKG1]

So, you guys claim the Wrights and von Braun are not engineers? Look a little closer at what they actually did. Not the Hollywood myth. What they did.

Clever and free are not the same thing. In fact, they are almost (but not quite) mutually exclusive.

This idea that "dreamers" feed engineers would be funny if it weren't so sad. Hollywood is like that. Real life isn't. Engineers feed other engineers. Sometimes with a few scientists thrown into the mix. Almost never with "futurists" or other crackpots involved.

 

[Palmpilot]

We have realists and dreamers. If realists ruled the world we would of never made it this far. Its a sad life to live without dreams, even if you aim for the moon and come up short, your at the top of the world.

False dichotomy. It's not true that realist don't dream nor that dreamers can't be realistic. Having read the Wright Brothers' book, it's clear that they were realists and dreamers.

 

[Palmpilot]

Quote of the day, right there. And the basis for most of the problems in Software "Engineering". It's isn't engineering. It's code monkey hammering on a keyboard hoping for a desired outcome from the computer.

I seriously doubt that that characterizes successful software engineering.

 

[ChrisK]

I seriously doubt that that characterizes successful software engineering.

More complex frameworks require experimentation that may appear to be gorilla coding to a casual observer.


Sent from my brain using my fingers.

 

[SkyHog]

I seriously doubt that that characterizes successful software engineering.

Its a fairly accurate description. Software Engineering is hardly the engineering that others think of. We use a lot of trial and error and "free thinking" to resolve issues.

We don't generally follow directions, like a paint by numbers.

 

[denverpilot]

I seriously doubt that that characterizes successful software engineering.

Define successful.

 

[denverpilot]

Its a fairly accurate description. Software Engineering is hardly the engineering that others think of. We use a lot of trial and error and "free thinking" to resolve issues.

We don't generally follow directions, like a paint by numbers.

Thinking like that is what makes thedailywtf.com even possible.

Seriously.

All the mountains of open source (let alone closed source available inside company servers) and what does every coder do when they start on a project?

Go get all the best, and by best, I mean peer reviewed and engineered code, from the source repository and build from it?

Nope, open new file. Start typing.

Engineering builds from knowns toward unknowns. It's a very very rare coder who does that or has time to.

Not blaming it all on the coders, just saying, companies have yet to really do much true software engineering. It would take them far too long to crank out something that barely works and needs a hundred patches a year...

Which is where we are today. Total lack of discipline on all parties parts.

 

[Bob Noel]

Its a fairly accurate description. Software Engineering is hardly the engineering that others think of. We use a lot of trial and error and "free thinking" to resolve issues.

We don't generally follow directions, like a paint by numbers.

Not all software and software processes are created equal. In the safety-critical domain there tends to be more structure and discipline.

 

[Skip Miller]

What if you can't find any dilithium crystals without ethanol in them?

On a voyage several years long, my bet is that the crew will find a way to extract the ethanol. :wink2:

 

[airguy]

Engineers don't get to build something until someone with a free mind thinks it up first. Engineers don't think, they do.

As an engineer, I'm happy to tell you that you're bull of BS. People hand me problems, I find ways to solve them.

 

[SkyHog]

As an engineer, I'm happy to tell you that you're bull of BS. People hand me problems, I find ways to solve them.

People hand you problems, and you pick from a library of solutions, modify one, and hand back the solution.

Otherwise, the argument about "warp drive" being possible wouldn't even be a question - it'd be a matter of "Ok, lets get the engineers together, and think of a solution without any building blocks."

Scientists, Theorists, and Engineers all approach problems differently:

Theorists envision a problem and a solution without lifting a finger.
Scientists test possible solutions to the problem and apply knowledge based on previous experiements.
Engineers take the results from the Theorists and Scientists, and go heads down on building the answer.

I could have said "Engineers take the work of the Theorists and Scientists and throw it away, and deliver a solution from 2 decades ago because its 'good enough,'" but I didn't want to be a jerk.

 

[Capt. Geoffrey Thorpe]

People hand you problems, and you pick from a library of solutions, modify one, and hand back the solution.

Otherwise, the argument about "warp drive" being possible wouldn't even be a question - it'd be a matter of "Ok, lets get the engineers together, and think of a solution without any building blocks."

Scientists, Theorists, and Engineers all approach problems differently:

Theorists envision a problem and a solution without lifting a finger.
Scientists test possible solutions to the problem and apply knowledge based on previous experiements.
Engineers take the results from the Theorists and Scientists, and go heads down on building the answer.

I could have said "Engineers take the work of the Theorists and Scientists and throw it away, and deliver a solution from 2 decades ago because its 'good enough,'" but I didn't want to be a jerk.

I have to assume that you are not an engineer.

"Scientists discover the world that exists; engineers create the world that never was." [SIZE=-1]—Theodore Von Karman[/SIZE]

 

[SkyHog]

I have to assume that you are not an engineer.

"Scientists discover the world that exists; engineers create the world that never was." [SIZE=-1]—Theodore Von Karman[/SIZE]

Not in the traditional sense, no. Degree is software engineering, but truthfully, I don't even really much of that lately. But I calls a spade a spade when I sees it.

 

[Piloto]

The only aliens that we are going to see are just south of the border. And unlike the ones in Star Trek they do not speak English.

This planet amazes me. Who needs to go to other planets to see how aliens looks like when we have here on Earth such a variety of life forms that I can not imagine a form that would be different to anything that we have here. Ranging from a tree to a bird or from a bacteria to a human.

I may sound pessimistic but the reality is that space is VEEEERY BIIIG. So big that average distances in our galaxy are measured in thousands of light years. To give you an idea trying to listen for intelligent radio signals from Alpha Centauri (4 light years) by the SETI program is like trying to listen with your ears at St. John's Newfoundland a conversation taking place at Piccadilly Circus in London.

For mankind to explore beyond our solar system would need to have a life expectancy of at least 200 years in good health. Not to mention what he is going to eat. That's what I like about this robotic mission to Mars and other celestial bodies. No need to worry about food, water, oxygen, depression, isolation, illnesses and no need to return to Earth.




Live long and prosper.

 

[Palmpilot]

As an engineer, I'm happy to tell you that you're [full] of BS. People hand me problems, I find ways to solve them.

Next I expect people will be heading over to the Medical Matters section to explain to Doc Bruce how medicine is practiced!

 

[Palmpilot]

One point that I think has been forgotten is that the thread title says "Warp drive a realistic possibility now?" Maybe someday it will be, and maybe not, but there are way too many problems to be worked out for it to be a realistic possibility now.

 

[Jhernandez04]

As an engineer, I'm happy to tell you that you're bull of BS. People hand me problems, I find ways to solve them.

You said all you need to say with that sentence right there.

People hand you "dreams" you've never thought of, and you fix them or make them a reality. Without those problems, your out of a job.


Or maybe you can engineer some original problems or ideas, oh nevermind thats right, people hand you problems.

 

[ChrisK]

Software people have the same mental issue. We believe that we are the creators of things, yet we complain when we don't have a "user" telling us what they want.

 

[Capt. Geoffrey Thorpe]

You said all you need to say with that sentence right there.

People hand you "dreams" you've never thought of, and you fix them or make them a reality. Without those problems, your out of a job.


Or maybe you can engineer some original problems or ideas, oh nevermind thats right, people hand you problems.

The day that the world runs out of problems and things that can be made better, faster, more efficient and cleaner and runs out of new places to go or new things to do will be the day that engineers run out of work.

That will also be the day that engineers stop dreaming.

I think that day is described in Revelations...