From: Greg Jordan (jordan@chuma.cas.usf.edu)
Date: Fri Apr 25 2003 - 16:00:03 MDT
On Fri, 25 Apr 2003, Damien Sullivan wrote:
> A much better claim than Greg Jordan's "lightspeed is too slow". Not like
> there are known physically possible alternatives, Greg, and good reasons why
> there wouldn't be.
Well of course we don't know of alternatives, or we'd be using them. But
that is the very definition of our ignorance. It doesn't seem that
interstellar civilization would be possible without faster communication.
> You don't need to move lots of mass around far to take over more mass. Send a
> seed and have it grow. But more controlled mass means more energy collection
> and more computation, or in a different regime more mass which is 'alive'.
Historical human expansionism has been driven by exponential population
explosion, probably something an intelligent civilization would weed
out. On the other hand, putting your eggs in different baskets is a useful
strategy - which could be accomplished by widely spread out colonies
rather than dense, homgenous "empires".
gej
resourcesoftheworld.org
jordan@chuma.cas.usf.edu
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