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jlf1961 -> RE: Poll: Obama would handle invading aliens better than Mitt Romney (7/2/2012 7:51:37 AM)
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Muse, for us, at our present state of technology, practicality is a problem.
We are close, a few decades away from harnessing fusion power. CERN has made minute amounts of anti matter, and at present it is expensive to make.
At present, the fusion reactor in the UK has reached the milestone of generating 80% output compared to the energy it has taken to initiate the reaction. The reactor has been in research operation since 1983. That is 29 years of research. The research is still a long way from a self sustaining reaction that outputs more energy than it takes to start the reaction.
I stand corrected on the idea of anti matter as a energy source. According to CERN, you never get as much energy out of antimatter as it takes to create it. The only way around that problem is to find a source of anti matter that does not need to be generated. Or find a way to generate antimatter that is not limited by E=MC^2.
Soviet Astrophysicist, Nikolai Kardashev tried to rank civilization on the basis of how much energy we extract from the stars.
At present, humans are a Type 0 civilization, we use plants (or decayed plant matter in the form of oil, coal, and natural gas) to generate power.
We are easily a hundred years from being a type I civilization that uses nuclear fusion and solar to generate energy and all the energy that lands on the surface of the planet.
A type II civilization would be able to utilize 100% of the energy produced by its parent star to generate energy. If humans were to construct a Dyson's Sphere around the sun, we would be a type II civilization, or if we found a way to use the power of a star to generate our energy and power our machines. Basically, the civilization depicted in Star Trek is a type II civilization.
A type III civilization uses the power of all the stars in a galaxy to power its machines. According to physicist Michio Kaku, the Empire in Star Wars is a type III civilization.
Finally there is a type IV civilization, they are using Dark energy to power their machines.
Now this is all based on what we know about physics now. And Kardashev developed this scale in 1964.
Of course, there is the possibility that by some stroke of genius we may jump a stage.
However, the point we are making concerning an alien invasion is that fact that they would be thousands or millions of years ahead of us.
And if they are anything LIKE us, they are going to do to primitive civilizations what we did to primitive civilizations, and that is destroy them. And they will have the power and energy to do that.
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