Comment Re:The longer you live...Cancer could be your rewa (Score 1) 273
Fundamentally, it's an inesacpable consequence of the second law of thermodynamics. However, this consequence can be avoided if you keep throwing energy at the system.
Fundamentally, it's an inesacpable consequence of the second law of thermodynamics. However, this consequence can be avoided if you keep throwing energy at the system.
Suggestion: Develop an inexpensive and effective cure for cancer first.
Simple statistics can prove that luck plays absolutely no role in gambling if you look at a large enough number of individual games. No need to built a fancy robot for that.
In fact, most "casino" type games of "chance" are designed to have a very small house edge. This keeps the players playing while at the same time ensuring that the house does not lose money. Lotteries, on the other hand, have a house edge high enough that it's pretty close to cheating.
Technically, one could siphon protons and other ions off the star magnetically while orbiting it. You'd just need one hell of a magnet. But magnets are fun, and bigger magnets are more fun!
No, since the Dyson sphere does not modify ('digest') the star itself. It only converts the radiation produced by the star into usable energy.
A star-eater would modify the star itself, either by altering its mass or changing its composition.
'astron' is ancient Greek. 'astrum' is the loan-word version in Latin. You know, for those Romans who found 'stella' to sound too uneducated.
Unless you're an engineer. Then words like 'automobile' and 'television' are perfectly fine.
How about 'astrophage'?
I'd disagree, because just using the regular energy output of a star can be done without "digesting" or modifying it. An astrovore would have to actively modify the star itself by altering its mass (siphoning off hydrogen or other atoms) or changing the composition of the star.
And please, don't call it "starivore". Call it "astrovore" or, if you're an engineer, "astrophage".
Is that an axiom or can this statement be proven?
so it has no effect?
The effects of an omnipotent entity can be as detectable or as undetectable as the entity wishes.
Really, if it changes something that CHANGE is detectable even if you can't see what is causing it.
If you can't think of at least three ways an omnipotent entity could mess with your detection, then you have no imagination.
Can you detect the actions of a root user on a system where you don't have root privileges yourself (and no access to the hardware)?
We have discovered many thing we only initially knew because of there effect on something else, like planets.
Planets aren't omnipotent entities.
Also, please learn what entropy is. There are about a dozen different meanings. I'm referring to thermodynamic entropy.
So you think it is possible to freeze a drop of water without increasing the thermodynamic entropy of the universe?
On the other hand, even the tiniest effect that ignores the laws of thermodynamic can be taken as proof of god-hood. If any entity can freeze even a drop of water without increasing the universes entropy, it should be considered a god for all intents and purposes.
Atomic nuclei are matter. Disassembling and reassembling atomic nuclei, however, is an entirely different beast (several orders of magnitude difference in energy) than disassembling and reassembling molecules.
Which is why we should stop dreaming about it and stark working on things that are feasible with our technology. Mass drivers, launch loops, laser propulsion, you name it.
Venus won't be of much use until we can disassemble and reassemble matter itself.
Actually, we don't need anything that exotic (matter generation) for starters. We need a universal chemical synthesizer, which can assemble chosen molecules from a set of given input compounds. Basically a very flexible chemical plant. It doesn't need to create matter, just rearrange given molecules into new molecules.
Some parts of it are. The higher your altitude, the less sulphuric acid you'll find.
You must realize that the computer has it in for you. The irrefutable proof of this is that the computer always does what you tell it to do.