social topic

2016-01-28 07:16:31 pm

red chamber dream

and once spacex gets reusability down, i won't be paying much at all for the launches themselves

2016-01-28 07:18:03 pm

the shuttle was a bit of a cock up costwise, I think everyone acknowledges that

although I realised recently one thing it could do that nothing else has ever been able to do is bring stuff back in its cargo bay ... that was a very unique ability which we probably won't see again for a very long time

arkarian

2016-01-28 07:19:35 pm

red chamber dream

yeah, i guess we're all waiting on the rocket that works like a car

maybe i'll see it in my lifetime

DJGrenola

2016-01-28 07:20:06 pm

I think the modern rocket reusability paradigm needs GPS, not sure it could have been done back when they made the shuttle, you need that pinpoint accuracy that GPS provides

arkarian

2016-01-28 07:21:08 pm

red chamber dream

oh yeah, no doubt. and i guess the reason nasa hasn't developed reusable rockets since is because of their budget

i'd still put my money on spacex if all things were equal though lol

Opium

Edit history:

Opium: 2016-01-28 07:21:28 pm

2016-01-28 07:21:17 pm

The space elevator will be a reality someday soon. Then it will be much less expensive to move things to space. Once that happens, we can build huge things in space.

arkarian

2016-01-28 07:21:46 pm

red chamber dream

that would be pretty cool. i dunno about soon though

Opium

2016-01-28 07:22:12 pm

Relatively soon, perhaps

arkarian

2016-01-28 07:22:41 pm

red chamber dream

relative to all of history, sure :)

Opium

2016-01-28 07:23:08 pm

Within the next century.

Opium

2016-01-28 07:25:34 pm

It's construction will probably be funded by a number of countries, and every govt or private company that wants to use it will pay per use in order to fund it's upkeep and operation. It will be a huge turning point in world history.

Opium

2016-01-28 07:27:39 pm

The last time I read about it, finding a way to produce large amounts of the carbon fiber that would be needed to make it was the biggest problem. I saw that there was a documentary about it on amazon, or netflix, not sure. I need to watch it.

arkarian

2016-01-28 07:28:04 pm

red chamber dream

that's the last i heard, materials are still way too expensive

Opium

2016-01-28 07:29:06 pm

or did they say that carbon fiber wouldn't be strong enough, and they still need to discover a material strong enough and light enough? Can't remember

DJGrenola

2016-01-28 07:30:35 pm

well they recently (~10 years) came up with carbon nanotubes which is the first known material that is theoretically strong and light enough to do it

however it's only feasible on paper, they don't have a way of manufacturing them anywhere near flawlessly enough to actually build the thing

DJGrenola

2016-01-28 07:31:39 pm

so it's probably going to take at least one further breakthrough in materials science

DJGrenola

2016-01-28 07:32:31 pm

so yeah, it's now theoretically possible but not practically so

DJGrenola

2016-01-28 07:34:38 pm

what's funny actually is when the news was announced I mentioned this to a friend of mine who has a quantum physics Ph.D., and he actually sat down then and there, made me look up the density of carbon nanotubes, and did the proof right in front of me

what I remember is that the numbers were really close, so the nanotubes were only just theoretically good enough, very little margin for error

arkarian

2016-01-28 07:58:45 pm

red chamber dream

hah that's awesome

DJGrenola

2016-01-28 08:02:39 pm

yeah I was like fuck you dude haha

I went to school with this guy and he was obviously reading well ahead of the stuff we were doing at the time, I probably learned as much off this guy as I did off the teachers

the teachers hated him haha

arkarian

2016-01-28 08:10:26 pm

red chamber dream

heh i work with a phd math super nerd like that

it's rather impressive

DJGrenola

2016-01-28 08:12:14 pm

actually I guess one of the interesting things about the space elevator is that in order to make it they'll have to mass-produce whatever material they make it from in such quantities that I imagine this supermaterial (whatever it is) will probably end up very cheap

and it'll be the best material ever, so they'll probably end up making absolutely everything out of it

DJGrenola

2016-01-28 08:12:53 pm

cars, buildings, bridges, you name it

arkarian

2016-01-28 08:13:41 pm

red chamber dream

that would be bad ass

arkarian

2016-01-28 08:17:01 pm

red chamber dream

man the witness is getting good reviews. seems like just my kind of game too, even though i didn't care for braid

basically the next evolution of myst