0.03c? Are we talking pulsed nukes? Orion?

>Even with current technology we could theoretically make a 16 ly journey in somewhere around 1,000 years.

If you consider Orion, 1950s tech, to be 'current' then it could be more like 200-300 years. What calculations did you use to get 1000 years anyway? Just asking because I love those sorts of calcs.

FTL is impossible. So forget it. Best you've got is time dilation. Either we will travel to the stars at less than c or we won't do it at all. I for one truly hope that we do it. Although clearly I won't be alive to see it.

Unfortunately the presumption that it is incorrect in the sort of good way that you seem to be hoping is even more laughable. Physics rarely works to make things easier for us Just the opposite. It almost seems to have a grudge against whatever it is we want to do. If our theories prove to be wrong it is more plausible imo that it will make things more difficult for us to do cool stuff. Not less.

And if we have not bothered to travel 16 light years in 400,000 years of tech advancement then we probalby will have no interest in going 3 ly at that point either. We could head for alpha centauri right now if we had the will and the billions of extra dollars floating around.

First build the the ship at a Lagrange point. Then launch for our nearest neighbor. If we used an Orion drive the astronauts could be at Alpha Centauri in maybe 75 to 80 years. A single human lifetime. Unfortunately, unless we got very lucky with our ship design we probably couldn't get adult astronauts there before they died. So it has to be a generation ship albeit barely with just 2 generations.

Or we could just send computers and robots there. I personally think it would be better to send at least some quasi-suicidal humans as well because nothing ever works out the way it is supposed to. For such a long trip I think it would be wise to have tech people to fix things and adjust for unpredicted events and breakdowns.

Well if Malays are not a race perhaps you should tell them that. They seem to believe that they are and as such give themselves special treatment under the law when compared to the Chinese and Indians who were also born here.

http://www.iep.utm.edu/hume-cau/

REDUCTION OF OXYGEN CONTENT TO BELOW TWO PARTS PER MILLION WITHIN FIFTY KILOMETER RADIUS OF SOURCE AFTER DIATOM BLOOM MANIFESTS AEMRUDYCO PEZQEASKL MINOR POLLUTANTS PRESENT IN DEITRICH POLYXTROPE 174A ONE
SEVEN FOUR A COMBINES IN LATTITINE CHAIN WITH HERBICIDES SPRINGFIELD AD45 AD FOUR FIVE OR DU PONT ANALAGAN 58 FIVE EIGHT EMITTING FROM REPEATED AGRICULTURAL USE AMAZON BASIN OTHER SITES OTHER LONG CHAIN MOLECULAR SYNERGISTS POSSIBLE IN TROPICAL ENVIRONS OXYGEN COLUMN SUBJECT TO
CONVECTIVE SPREADING RATE ALZSNRUD ASMA WSUEXIO 829 CMXDROQ VIRUS XM-PRINTING STAGE RESULTS 3 THREE WEEK DELAY IF DENSITY OF SPRINGHELD AD45 AD FOUR FIVE EXCEEDS 158 ONE FIVE EIGHT PARTS PER MILLION THEN ENTERS
MOLECULAR SIMULATION REGIME BEGINS IMITATING HOST CAN THEN CONVERT PLANKTON NEURO JACKET INTO ITS OWN CHEMICAL FORM USING AMBIENT OXYGEN CONTENT UNTIL OXYGEN LEVEL FALLS TO VALUES FATAL TO MOST OF THE HIGHER
FOOD CHAIN WTESJDKU AGAIN AMMA YS ACTION OF ULTRAVIOLET SUNLIGHT ON CHAINS APPEARS TO RETARD DIFFUSION IN SURFACE LAYERS OF THE OCEAN BUT GROWTH CONTINUES LOWER DOWN DESPITE CONVECTIVE CELLS FORMING
WHICH TEND TO MIX LAYERS IN XMC AHSU URGENT MADUDLO 374 ONLY SEGMENT AMZLSOUDP ALYN YOU MUST STOP ABOVE NAMED SUBSTANCES FROM ENTERING OCEAN LIFE CHAIN AMZSUY RDUCDK BY PROHIBITIONS OF FOLLOWING SUBSTANCES
CALLANAN B471 FOUR SEVEN ONE MESTOFITE SALEN MARINE COMPOUND ALPHA THROUGH DELTA YDEMCLW URGENT YXU CONDUCT TITRATION ANALYSIS ON METASTABLE INGREDIENTS PWMXSJR ALSUDNCH

Did God tell you this? Are you time traveler? How could you possibly know that?

You are free to ignore whoever you wish to ignore. However I believe that the AGW crowd have a flawed understanding of what science actually consists of. I happen to believe that science requires comparing an idea against the real world. I "deny" that comparing ideas against a computer model is science.

This lack of confidence in computer models is I believe a fundamental distinction between those who believe that AGW is "undeniable" and those who believe the hypothesis should be questioned as much as any other unproven idea. Unproven, that is, by comparing the idea with meatspace observations rather than computer simulations that are intended to be 100% perfect replacements for the real world.

Has some warming occured in the last century based on temperature measurements? Yes. Probably. By a small amount. Less than 1 degree. Does that mean it will continue over the next century or accelerate? That is simply unknown at this time. The only way to know is to wait and take more measurements. Anything else is no better than guessing. It's certainly not how science is done. It is not a viable method to ascertain how closely your idea matches the reality out there in the complexity of the real world.

From the perspective of the scientific method there was nothing wrong with being skeptical of the earth being round. In fact it isn't round. It's not flat, but neither is it mathematically circular or spherical. Science is all about asking questions and being suspicious of any easy answers.

From what I have seen of the people who question that AGW is 100% proven and undeniably going to cause the end of all mammalian life in less than a century or so at least on slashdot you are beating on a strawman.

I do not consider AGW theory to be even remotely proven and yes I have looked at the so called "evidence". However I would never argue that AGW is impossible. That would be silly. The basic mechanism is sound, but it might take 10,000 years or 100,000 years or the small effect may be overwhelmed by other factors.

The climate of an entire planet is extremely complex and cannot be accurately 'modeled' with a naive computer program. Just like we cannot build a model of the universe in a computer and use it as a substitute for testing our hypothesis in meatspace to see what happens. Science is about testing hypothesis by actually trying stuff out to see what happens. Testing ideas against nature itself. Testing ideas against naive assumptions inherent to computer simulations is not science. When it comes to climate "science" this would mean waiting to see what happens.

At least so far the effect does not seem extraordinarily great. In a few hundred years we can again take measurements to see how things are going. Or however long it takes to see a noticeable and arguably dangerous warming effect. So far the rise has not been dangerous. There is nothing inherently bad about a rise of 1 degree over a century. Just as there is nothing inherently good about a drop of 1 degree over a century. Nor is a 100% perfectly stable temperature inherently good.

The theory is plausible. The effect is plausible. Now AGW just needs to be actually demonstrated in meatspace. It's just a matter of being patient. There is no shortcut when trying to test long term theories. You have to wait. Writing a computer program to accurately mimic a natural process is not a shortcut. At the very least first you would have to demonstrate that your model is 100% accurate and again that requires waiting many years to compare the model's predictions against observations.

IOW proving a negative. You do realize that is impossible right? How convenient for you.

I see. So only scientists are allowed to be skeptical of ideas and theories. That is good to know. Thank you. I hope you do not deny the existence of God. You have no right to do that unless you are a priest. Only priests are qualified.

There is an easy solution. Take away this thing you refer to as "copyright". Afaik such a thing does not exist in nature. In fact it is highly unlikely that the thing an owner asserts the 'rights' to is not even original. It itself is derived from other people's ideas. You cannot own an idea. You cannot own information. Information just is. The best you can do is keep it secret. That is just the nature of reality.

Bullshit. I'm a Libertarian and I believe no such thing. Corporations are evil because people are evil and corporations are just a bunch of irresponsible, short sighted people who will choose profit over pretty much any other value. Profit at any price. Corporations are indistinguishable from what we would call a 'sociopath' if it were an individual. Although, unlike governments, they at least usually stop short of actual acts of violence.

As a libertarian I believe in the free market not because it is perfect in every way. There is no perfect system. But because I think the advantages outweigh the disadvantages. I think genuine freedom is worth the price of not being able to reign in bad/evil corporations as quickly as in this case.

That is of course when the system actually works and it doesn't always.Things don't usually turn out like this. This is not a typical outcome of the system. Generally the government has a cozy relationship with large corporations like this and lets them get a away with all kinds of evil and greedy shit.

So the system worked this time. Yay. Before we all start celebrating consider the bullshit extension they are getting on nothing more than a coated pill. Until fucking 2025. That makes *no* sense and is obviously an abuse of the system. Extended release pills should not be grounds for a patent extension unless maybe the process used is more effective than any done currently, but then the novel process itself would qualify for the patent. Not the actual drug which is no longer 'novel'. It's a perfect example of how governments and corporations are often partners.