Ouija Board Experiences

[EvilNed]

EvilNed, Your arguments based on the acknowledged vastness of Interstellar Distances (Light-Years) continue to assume we'd be attempting to traverse Light-Years using conventional propulsion, which a recent post did an excellent job of explaining why Special Relativity makes conventional propulsion useless for this purpose. So far, nothing's been established, nothing's been proven (or disproven) nothing has worked, nothing has shown any real promise and we're still talking about particles. Folding space opening wormholes are all part of a new side in physics: Altering the shape of the universe. Something which we've never done before and nobody has any experience in. It'll be awesome if it works. Don't be surprised if it doesn't. Side note: I brought up Gleesa-581 in reference to our discussion about the probability of life developing elsewhere. The core information I wanted you to take from it was that even in the presently TINY sample of studied Planets (a few dozen solar systems and 350 planets) we find an example of a planet that fulfills many of the criteria we know were required to create the long-term sustainability of the conditions necessary for life here on Earth. As long as we haven't discovered any new lifeforms, I fail to see why it's relevant. But meh. If you think it's important. I don't understand why you seem dismissive of the many credible theories that if proven correct promise to open the door to non-conventional travel. Just a few of the theories considered credible, albeit most unproven due either to prohibitive cost or our current lack of experimental models to prove or disprove these theories: 1) The innumerable variety of wormhole-based theories. If they prove true, awesome, if they don't, too bad. Don't be expecting it to work. Altering dimensions and all that stuff is just not really something we have alot of experience with. 2) What amounts to "Brane Skimming"...Ie: Pulling an object onto the edge of one of the dimensions that make up the Multiverse. Excuse me, what the fuck? Are you seriously expecting this to work? 3) Albucierre's (mispelled) theories of controlled spatial warping. "Movement without moving" as previously mentioned. In addition to the gravity-related space-bending, and all the other theories for essentially making the shortest distance between Point A & B = zero, regardless of amount of conventional distance normally separating Point A & B. Altering physics and the dynamics of it (i.e. gravity) is a bad idea. If you want to bend gravity, the one thing that holds this universe together, you're likely to fuck something up along the way. This one, I don't put much stock in at all. Prove me wrong, awesome, until then I'll watch it on Star Trek. 4) Tachyon-based theories related to taking advantage of the (so far) unique faster-than-light properties of this particle. The major experiment at the moment being to get two Tachyons very close together to see if the value of constant-change increases. The prototypical hypothetical construct here being to surround an object in an unbroken field of tachyons and creating a "bubble" within the field where natural laws respond differently. Prototypical hypothetical construct? Altering the laws of physics again? Good luck, that'll be so cool. 5) Feyemann's Quantum "Path values" theory (won him the Nobel prize)...the basic example of which is when you resolve to attempt to walk to the other side of the room there are a variety of potential outcomes besides going from Point A to B, each "Path" (some of which cross many light-years or even cross time) having its own assessed probability. (Incidentally, this is where Douglas Adams got the idea for the Probability Drive featured in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.)... Whenever you put your hand on your desk, or leaning against the wall, there is a small chance (because quantum physics are what they are: almost random) that your hand will go right through the desk, or you will fall through that wall. Is it a big chance? No. Infact, it's a miniscule chance. Probably never happened, and never will. Infact, I can tell you right now that it never well. Because again, it's the perfect example of Theory vs. Practicality. In theory? It is possible. But in reality? It is impossible. You also have to understand the difference between quantum physics and physics. Things operate quite differently on a minute scale, which may be why these things are possible. To particles. Not saying such a discovery will happen anytime soon, but I've found NOTHING in favor of the notion that such travel is impossible to develop, and quite a bit of preliminary indications that the potential exists. Have you found anything in favor of the notion that such travel is possible to develop, then? No, that's right. Because they're all theories. While I won't dismiss theories, these are all theories that have alot to prove until they become scientifically accepted theories. Evolution did too at the start. And then it pulled through. Why should we expect anything less from these? Interesting how you avoided my "Resources" argument, tho.

[Wyldwraith]

Wasn't avoiding it, Just had a lot else to reply with. Regarding the resources required to actually make one of these theories bear practical-value fruit: I'll state right now that as a Type 0 civilization, Earth/Man do not, and likely will not have the capacity to produce viable experimental models for many of these theories until we advance further in energy production/harvest and storage. The most promising candidates here being efficient geothermal, fusion and/or "cold" fusion, and large-scale solar-cell collectors, particularly in space where you get more collected energy by far. In my estimation, Earth/Man will need to fulfill the criteria needing to be met in order to become a Type 1 Civilization. These requirements are: 1) Yearly power production/collection = to the yearly Solar output. Ie: Using 90-100% of our star's cast-off energies. 2) A truly Global, unbroken/nearly unbroken information transfer/communication network capable of transferring 1 Terrabyte of information nearly instantaneously between any two points on Earth. 3) Truly Global/unified scientific and industrial efforts. Not going into potentially needed social change that may or may not factor in to this one. Suffice to say that the sum of our research and production capabilities globally needs to become unified in direction and equally (as equally as physically feasible) shared resources. The core trait of a Type 1 Civilization is its truly Global nature. Mankind has and will continue to progress along the path to meeting these criteria, but I don't expect us to achieve Non-Conventional Travel until we've achieved Type 1 status at a bare minimum...or (more likely IMO) Type 1 and some small fraction towards becoming Type 2. I really don't know why you continue to state many serious, well-regarded theories are some sort of fringe pseudo-science, and you continue to mangle my explanations in the effort to oversimplify and deprive them of context to seemingly make your point. Out of the theories I mentioned in my last post, your crude statements in regards to Feynman's Quantum Path Values theory I want to respond to. This Nobel laureate has himself proved mathematically that it is possible to alter the intrinsic Path Integral Value. Ie: The probability of arriving at a particular destination when attempting to walk across the room being the archetypical example. This theory is universally accepted and mathematically proven, and it states conclusively that the "So improbable as to = Impossible events described by Quantum theory" you stated is incorrect. Feynman proved that an increase in the value of the Path Integer can increase the probability of a given event occurring, and his theory dealt with experimental criteria using a hypothetical object of significant mass (a human body). While as a general rule Quantum Mechanics deal with the incredibly small, Feynman proved that objects of substantial mass are affected in precisely the same way as a traveling particle (for example). If you're going to try and shred a theory, I suggest you start on something a wee bit less exalted than the work of one of the Fathers of Quantum Theory.

[Kaos]

I think I have a certain personalty disorder the makes me for most practical purposes indifferent to either praise or criticism. I would think you would prefer fans since it is entirely expected that you can ignore them. Friends require more effort to maintain.

[Terran]

I would think you would prefer fans since it is entirely expected that you can ignore them. Friends require more effort to maintain. Yea Friends do require more effort to maintain. But "literal "fans require more effort to avoid. Fans, I imagine can be a significant nuisance because unlike friends, where effort needs to be mutual, they can make a great deal of effort to establish contact with their target. It would be like the nuisance of telemarketers. Friends are a nuisance of choice. Fans are a nuisance of ....erm?...unchoice?

[Kaos]

It must be terrible for you.

[EvilNed]

It's also been "proven" that leaning on a wall, there is a small chance of falling through it. But please accept the ridiculous difference there can be between theory and practice. It's possible to walk through walls. It's just not probable in the least. See the difference? Even if something is possible (like Feynman's theory) doesn't mean it's in the least bit probable. And as far as I know, this hasn't been executed in reality yet, has it? As for Earth reaching a "Type 1" civilization (nice communistic society you described there, tho, I do approve!) you do realize that the Earth, as a planet, is slowly dying, right? As I said, we've outgrown it and even if we're technologically reaching upwards and outwards, human civilization as a whole has seen it's hayday. We don't have the resources to maintain this large a population. The society you describe IS possible. If we kill off half of our population.

[Wyldwraith]

Well, I'm not sure I agree humanity has seen its best days already. Yes, fossil fuels are disappearing faster than virgins on prom night, but there are a variety of stop-gap alternatives that are becoming more cost-effective all the time. What we REALLY need though is a new advanced energy-application with as game-changingly profound an impact as oil had at the turn of the 20th century. In the meantime I think we need more nuclear reactors to take weight off our beleaguered power grid, and some HUGE solar-cell farms in places like the Mojave Desert and Death Valley. Every scientist in the energy field considers this a no-brainer, but Big Oil has been cock-blocking major wind and solar installations forever. Of course that doesn't solve the core problem/get us any closer to the Holy Grail of cheap, ever-abundant and clean energy, but if we manage the strain of the energy crisis better, we free up a LOT of money to go into more R&D. That would also require Americans to stop eating up partisan rhetoric for 5 minutes and develop an attention span longer than said 5 minutes, but if we don't climb down the throats of legislators soon the first symptom of the worsening infrastructure problems will be a huge hit to the middle class's quality of life. Quite disgusted with Obama. This oil spill is the PERFECT opportunity to rape Big Oil for what we need to get out of our energy woes, but typical for him he's prancing between the eggshells and squandering yet another choice opportunity. Depresses me that this prick is going to drive us into the ground when his unpopular ways doom us to another 4-8yrs of lying Republicans who believe the citizenry = medieval serfs existing to turn over 90% of their productivity so the "Nobility" can play. Wonder who the next unnecessary mismatch of a war wrapped in the flag and the Holy Mantra of "The War On Terror/whackos that 97.5% of which could never hurt us despite the good game they talk" will be with? Oh, for the record, don't believe in Communism but I do believe nationalism needs to die an unmourned death. It's high time the people of the world start thinking of themselves as Human, instead of Black/White/Asian/Latino etc., or American/Mexican/Canadian. In Unity is Strength.

[MaximusIncredulous]

I certainly would not rule that out as an explanation, but it didn't seem to me to be that. It was a set pattern of knocks...three...pause...then another, spaced out over a minute or so. Knock on your desktop, allowing the weight of your hand to determine the force of the knock. This approximates the sound that I heard. Three knocks, pause for a second, then one more. The pattern repeated several times with 15 or 20 seconds between each. It was like there was an intelligence behind it (I am not saying that there was, but it did seem that way). Just for grins I looked on a Morse code chart to see if there was something similar. According to the chart 'knockknockknock...knock' is dot dot dot dash or "V". "V" stands for "Visitors"...they're here. Honestly, I do not know what made the noises, but I don't think it was the house settling. It was the first time I've heard it, and I haven't heard it since. Maybe another time I'll tell you about the spooky little girl in the nightgown that my wife claims came out of the laundry-room one night and stood there staring at her while she was working at her desk. -stray- Thumps in threes. Don't know how BSsy this is but I read once that demonic hauntings will do things in threes, such as noises in series of three, paranormal activity occurring around 3am. Supposed to be a perversion of the holy trinity or something like that.

[EvilNed]

I'd recommend the documentary film "Collapse" for anyone who thinks human civilization is just going to expand and go on into a better and brighter future. In 20 years we'll still have our good healthcare and all that stuff. But compared to now, most of the western world will look like a third world country. The third world, as it is now, is not as dependant on oil as we are. Countries like the United States which are very much more dependant on oil because of their extremely sucky public transport systems are probably going to suffer the worst of it. The safest way to get across this issue is to install a advanced and easy to use public transport and logistics system that covers everything, which would eliminate the need for cars. They're going to go out of business pretty quick anyway. EDIT: It's also worth pointing out that the most common form of life, by about a billion to one, are germs and bacteria. So if there is alien life out there, it's probably just germs. Life is rare enough as it is. And when we get down to it, life is really just germs. We're the exception.

[Wyldwraith]

@EvilNed: You're overlooking a crucial, historically proven trait of our species. When faced with deprivation due to changes in our environment and/or the dwindling of those resources we've utilized up until then, the driving necessity to discover a new means of "keeping the lights on" fosters an ever more favorable environment for such a breakthrough in energy production to occur. Yes, the continued unwillingness to begin making the hard decisions and following through on them when it comes to using ever-more-scarce oil (didn't say fossil fuels because recent investigations have proven the vast majority of natural gas has yet to be tapped) is going to have a TREMENDOUS negative impact on the First World if we don't buckle down and change our ways. Lack of resolve, greed (of Big Oil), and the glaring flaws inherent to a system that fosters the long-term dependency of our politicians on special interests, and more to the point, the huge amounts of money given to the politicians BY these special interests in exchange for vast influence over the bought politicians' decision-making are what: A) Prevent each and every truly large-scale collection of wind and solar power. B) Reroute, significantly cut or even completely withhold grants/research dollars from researchers either exploring completely new avenues of scientific inquiry into undiscovered and/or underutilized sources of energy production. This is why I can't agree with your statement that mankind has seen its best days already. There are too many options left to explore, too many inhibiting factors that may yet be removed once necessity becomes more stark, and too much left to try to conclude (very prematurely, I believe) Man is definitely and inevitably on his way downward. I know your general rule is to adopt a position of skepticism where new theories and technologies are concerned EvilNed, but surely you can conceive of the world-changing upswing if and when the next breakthrough harnessing of abundant energy is made? We don't know which breakthrough will come through for our species, but there is NO reason to believe that such a source of clean abundant energy with the kind of impact the advent of Oil had isn't there, just waiting for us to put the last few pieces together and work out how to tap into it. In the meantime,we can finally get off our asses, tell Big Oil to go to Hell, and follow common sense by establishing huge Wind Farms in the Great Plains and equally extensive Solar Farms in the southwestern United States. I cannot emphasize ENOUGH the profoundly positive impact of doing so. 1) The construction of the needed equipment would create new jobs, or at least forestall the loss of more jobs when the government contracts to create these Solar and Wind Farms, History has proven that these sorts of publicly funded, privately constructed building projects work. They worked as a linchpin of the New Deal during the Great Depression, and they can work again in exactly the same manner. Also, these created and/or saved jobs would be a Godsend to skilled blue-collar workers, who have been one of the hardest hit demographics, first because of the bursting of the real estate bubble, and yet again when other types of large-scale construction projects disappeared. I offer the construction of Hoover Dam as a PERFECT example of creating desperately needed jobs by harnessing renewable energy. The Hoover Dam project, in conjunction with the excavation of the four huge tunnels required to divert the Colorado River before work on the Damn could begin created well over 50-60,000 jobs, for a period of four years and change. The Hoover Dam was an economic success, and its hydroelectric power production transformed the Southwest in a profoundly positive manner. 2) The vast increase in long-term, abundant and CLEAN energy would relieve a huge amount of strain from existing power plants, while significantly lowering the average citizen's energy-related expenses, which has more positive benefits for the economy than I can easily list here. 3) Once Big Solar and Wind pay off their initial construction expenses in energy, the big money desperately needed to further promising energy research will become available. All of these are excellent reasons why Man isn't washed up. What do you think?