http://www.lifeboat.com

"With the survival of the human race at stake, we have to be successful.

Mathematician, computer scientist, and prophetic SF writer Vernor Vinge foresees a time when many intertwined technological revolutions will exponentially combine to cause scientific advancement to rapidly increase, achieving as much advancement per day as is typically achieved per year. He has dubbed this phenomenon the Singularity and believes it will happen around 2020"

I read one of that guy's books a while ago, A Fire Upon The Deep. Rather groovy, a bit of fun.

If that's the case then I can't wait to be around when it happens. The website seems pretty cool, but the whole idea seems kind of useless. Has any one organization saved a failing society, as ours is?

Science grows as a punctuated equilibrium -- there are long-standing plateaus in which no adavancement occurs, separated by quick upheavels in which advancement occurs almost overnight. Science has progressed this way since the time of Aristotle.

What gives this guy the justification for the belief that scientific advancement will buck all of its previous trends and instead become "exponential?"

- Warren

Well advancement has been accelerating, hasn't it? We're doing more and more all the time. It might be too positive a viewpoint, but maybe at least one worth consideration.

Better safe than sorry.

I wonder if you could get a mobile space colony that can behave similar to a living thing? Hook on to an asteroid, extract material, and then grow a "bud" similar to the way a freshwater hydra does. Later the new colony could break off from its parant.

I have been thinking about this possibility for years, and am currently (half-jokingly) planning an organization called COG, or Counsel of Geniuses. I'm planning on somehow getting a hold of a rocket and taking a couple hundred intelligent, capable people to survive nuclear holocaust, comet impact, etc... Send me a PM if ya wanna join. hehe

(these are not actual product claims and the validity of this is questionable. Restrictions apply. Results may vary. Do not attempt to use this post as a flotation device. Not copyright Dylan, Inc.)

Do you have to be a geinius (iq of >200) or can you just have an above average inteligence.

Originally posted by chroot
What gives this guy the justification for the belief that scientific advancement will buck all of its previous trends and instead become "exponential?"
Perhaps he believes that scientific advancement will occur so rapidly that the little gaps between advance will not be noticable. Or, maybe he just didn't consider this.

you just have to be of above average intelligence, or have some special unique ability that could help the colony: computer scientist, farming engineer. it's pretty much if you come to sciforums.com for fun, i'll probably consider you in.;)

What i'd like to know is how these space colonies plan on supporting themselves. How will they get food and oxygen ?

For food and oxygen probably there'd be small farms. water, it seems would be another problem--asteroid mining or mars ice cap?

I thought I might design an orbiting colony, but I designed an intersteller starship first...

Starship Generations (http://geocities.com/womplex_oo1/StarshipGenerations.html)

Cant it be both? A starship and a colony... all a starship is is a colony with an engine strapped on one end.

Anyway you want to get your colony into orbit around something (mabe not earth) so why not have it fly itself there. The engine can later pop off and fly itself back.

Modular design perhaps? What do you think?

How would a ship of that magnitude be able to make it out of the earths atmosphere ? It would require alot of thrust to defeat gravity.

It would be assembled in orbit from thousands upon thousands of components. The components would be launched individually using a Skyhook, read Topic #9, Starship Generations (http://geocities.com/womplex_oo1/StarshipGenerations.html) .

I think that people with average or below average intelligence still feel and can be good people even if they don't understand things as well as the geniuses. Me? According to the net test I took I'm slightly above average, ever so slightly, for a teenager.

It disapointed me. I had such a wonderful superiority complex going...

Life goes on. You know even back in the days of Columbus, when mankind's domain was thought to be even smaller and more finite, people still did their thing. This fascinates me.

It's an astonishing fact.

You're definitely right Pollux--I'm including people who are of average intelligence also--everyone can help the COG colony. Intelligence is just a perk.

Is it a space ship for exploring outer space and finding another home planet for humanity

or

a stationary space station for surviving the next asteroid impact on earth ?

Name: Mike Ossipoff
e-mail: ossipoff2002@yahoo.com

People sometimes post math questions here, and now I'd like to post one. It's about numerical integration, numerically evaluating definite integrals. An interpretation of a definite integral is the area under a function's graph. Integration has much application in math & the sciences.

Some functions can be exactly integrated, in terms of a formula, but some functions don't have an exact integral, and those must be integrated numerically.

The trapezoidal rule is the simplest numerical integration method. It isn't very accurate, and so it isn't nearly as popular as Simpson's rule. Simpson's rule is the most popular numerical integration formula.

Siimpson's rule makes use of the function values at 3 points to estimate the function's integral. Where h is the subinterval size, the distance between function values, Simpson's formula says:

h(1/3)(F1 + 4F2 + F3).

Of course when there are more than 3 equally spaced function values, the above Simpson's rule formua can be used repeatedly, once for each pair of subintervals.

There are a number of more accurate methods, and one of them
(not the most accurate one) is called Romberg integration. Romberg integration is based on improving on the trapezoidal rule's accuracy by working with the trapezoidal rule's error sum.

That's why the trapezoidal rule's error sum has some importance, because of its use in Romberg integration.

Here's my question:

A number of books on numerical analysis or numerical
methods say that the trapezoidal rule's error can be
written as a sum involving only even powers of h, the
subinterval size.

But what about this?:

Say that the function we want to apply the trapezoidal
rule is the Taylor approximation for some function
(any function whose Taylor series has both even & odd
powers of x-a will do, which means it could be almost
any functionn), evaluated about a point at the middle
of the subinterval.

Call the endpoints of the subinterval A & B.

B-A=h

The Taylor series contains factors that are powers of
(x-a), where x is the independent variable, and a is
some number.

So then, what I'm saying is that, for this Taylor
approximation, a = (A+B)/2 That's the middle of the
subinterval.

The middle of the subinterval is the most natural
place to have "a", and it's also where "a" would be
placed in order to get the most accurate Taylor
approximation in that interval.

The trapezoidal rule says to multiply the average of
the integrand's values at A & B by h.

I'm going to let F(x) stand for the Taylor
approximation evaluated at x.

So the result of the trapezoidal rule is:

h(F(A)+F(B))/2

As I said, the terms of the Taylor approximation have
as a factor various powers of (x-a).

At A, x-a = -h/2 At B, x-a = h/2

Odd powers of a negative number are negative, and so
since x-a is negative at A, the odd power terms of the
Taylor approximation at A are identical to those at B
except for being opposite in sign. So when we add the
Taylor approximation's value at A and at B, the odd
power terms cancel out, leaving us with a sum
involving only even powers of h.

Then, when we multiply by h, as the trapezoidal rule
calls for, those even powers of h become odd powers of
h.

So, the result of the applying the trapezoidal rule to
that integrand function is a sum involving only odd
powers of h.

Now, what about the actual correct value of the
integral?:

The Taylor approximation is a polynomial. It is
antidifferentiated term by term, and the
antiderivative, like the Taylor approximation itself,
is a sum of both even & odd powers of x.

Now, when a positive or negative number is raised to
an even power, the result is always positive. So the
even powers of -h/2 are the same as the even powers of
h/2. So, when the antiderivative of the Taylor
approximation is evaluated at A & B, and when the
value at B is subtracted from the value at B, the even
power terms, which are identical at A & B, subtract
out, leaving only the odd power terms.

So the actual correct integral from A to B is a sum
involving only odd powers of h.

So both the actual correct integral and the
trapezoidal rule approximation are sums involving only
odd powers of h.

Therefore their difference, the error of the
trapezoidal rule, is also a sum involving only odd
powers of h.

That contradicts what a number of books on numerical
analysis or numerical methods say about that error
sum.

The function that we used isn't contrived. The Taylor
approximation could be of any function whose Taylor
approximation has both even & odd powers of x-a.

The middle of the subinterval is the most natural
place about which to evaluate the Taylor
approximation.
And it's the place where one would do so in order to
have the most accurate Taylor approximation over that
interval.

And, if we wanted to contrive a function for which the
error of the trapezoidal rule would be a sum involving
only even powers of h, we'd have to _start with_ an
integrand function that is a sum of terms involving
only odd powers of h.

As shown above, if the integrand is a sum of odd &
even powers of x-a, with "a" at the middle of the
subinterval, the error is a sum involving only odd
powers.

If the integrand is a sum of both odd & even powers of
x-a, with "a" anywhere other than the middle of the
subinterval, then the error is a sum involving both
odd & even powers.

So the books' statement apparently is true only for a
special patricular kind of function.

So, my question is: Why do they say that the error of
the trapezoidal rule is a sum involving only even
powers of h?

I realize that finding a proof that it's a sum
involving only even powers of h could be difficult.
But my arguments above are elementary and not
complicated, and if there's an error it should be easy
to point out. Would you tell me what the error is, or
let me know if you don't find one?

Mike Ossipoff

Arks in space. What a stupid idea. If humankind can't live without spoiling the planet, we don't deserve to live in space. If we show that we can't look after a planet. why give ourselves any other environment to ruin?

It's pure arrogance to think that we are worth saving anyway.

And projects like this just distract people from the real issues, like doing something about limiting energy consumption and pollution.

Mind you, not that I care, I don't have any children, so have no investment in this planet. Screw Earth!

Mike Ossipoff said:

People sometimes post math questions here, and now I'd like to post one.

Actually, people usually post math questions in the Physics and Math subforum. It's a little off-topic here, because this thread is about space colonies/craft.

Yes, you have a point. I didn't realize that this newsgroup or bullentin-board was officially for that one topic. I mistakenly thought that sciforum was one big bulletin-board. Well, to thell the truth, after I'd posted my question, I'd noticed the index, and had begun to realize that I'd inadvertantly posted to a special-topic bulletin-board.

Sorry about the inconvenience.

By the way, someone has answered my question:

The error in each panel is as I said. But when you make h twice as small, then you're making there be twice as many panels,. So the power of h with which each term of that error decreases as h decreases, is reduced by one, since you've got more panels when you decrease the size of h.

Mike Ossipoff

K Mike! Thanks for your consideration.

Phlogistician said:

It's pure arrogance to think that we are worth saving anyway.

What's WORTH to a living thing? The important part is to live and have babies. If you refuse to survive, what makes you think you'll be replaced by something more deserving?

If all of society really wants to get together to save your backside, don't argue, 'cause it's not your mistake. Just enjoy...

Being replaced by something more deserving does't come into it. It's the pure arrogance that we must survive that amazes me.

There is no ultimate point in survival. The Universe will suffer a heat death, or collapse, and we will be powerless to prevent this. So ultimately, it's futile.

So why bother putting off the inevitable demise of our race? Sure the ride is fun, but it comes to an end and we've got to get off eventually.

Also, I for one don't want to pay taxes to save some other asshole's life, or a bunch of assholes' lives so they can go spoil another planet. We fix the shithole we live on, and nobody leaves.

And if we fail, we fail together, and some other species takes over. A species that is not better, not worse, just more suited to living in the environment we spoiled.

Why is it arrogance to want something?

(Excuse me if I've posted this twice. The first time it didn't seem to post).

Have you heard of the Fermi paradox? The particle physicist Enrico Fermi wrote to a radio-astronomer, saying only
"Where is everybody?". It was clear that he was asking why we haven't been visited or contacted.

The age of the galaxy is great enough that there's been plenty of time for an early civilization to have thoroughly explored the galaxy, visiting & cataloging all the stars (and noting which ones to revisit or leave with an automated explorer/communicator).

But no visits or communication.

It's likely that we're quarantined. But is our terrestrial notion of quarantine rather quaintly old-fashioned?

Arthur Clarke pointed out that a sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

Someone could have quarantined us by putting us in a universe containing no life but us.

You've probably heard that cosmologists report that there's increasing evidence that the universe is infinite, and that means that anythng that can happen must be happening somewhere, including exact and near-exact duplicates of Earth.

But that's only true if the universe is natural. An artifician unverse could be designed in such a way that, even in its infinite space, there's really no life but us.

Don't you suspect that there's no one out there? Very likely you're right.

Mike Ossipoff

That's a possibility but not the only one. Our own technology is relatively feeble as far as transmitting information a long way is concerned; we only started producing serious radio signals and sending out probes in the last 50-60 years, which means that anyone looking for radio traffic that's farther than 50-60 light years away hasn't heard us yet.

We're only just starting to be able to communicate with anybody, so it shouldn't be a big surprise that we haven't managed to find anyone else yet. Furthermore, any civilizations that aren't more advanced than we are almost by definition not going to be able to hear us either, unless they are VERY close. Hell, even if we did pick up a message, the people who sent it would have to have sent it quite a while ago because of the travel time.

But that's only true if the universe is natural. An artificial unverse could be designed in such a way that, even in its infinite space, there's really no life but us.

Hmm. The cheapest -in fact the only- way I know of making an artificial universe is by a fully immersive simulation; you could call it a Matrix scenario.
In this way it would not be necesary to model the whole universe- just the wavelengths that reach our instruments and eyes.

Certainly in this scenario there would be no need for aliens to be modelled if they were not required.
_________________
SF worldbuilding at
http://www.orionsarm.com/main.html

Is the lifeboat only for the rich or well connected?

BBH wrote:

That's a possibility but not the only one. Our own technology is relatively feeble as far as transmitting information a long way is concerned; we only started producing serious radio signals and sending out probes in the last 50-60 years, which means that anyone looking for radio traffic that's farther than 50-60 light years away hasn't heard us yet.

I reply:

Sure, but if civilizations millions of years ago had passed this way in their thorough exploration of the galaxy, cataloging each interesting star, they'd have recorded that Earth had life, and made a note to return later to check it out. Or left an automated
communicator/reporter behind here.

So the thing is that there's been time to explore the whole galaxy and catalog every star and its planets, so someone would know about us, and we should have heard from them again.

Mike Ossipoff

Originally posted by cosmictraveler
Is the lifeboat only for the rich or well connected?

It costs $1000 per pound to lift something into orbit plus life support. What do you think.

I just read that lifeboat page, and something tells me that whoever concocted this lifeboat plan is just a bit paranoid...

However, that nowithstanding, I would like to respond to phlohgistician, who said that the human desire for survival is arrogance. If that is arrogance, then arrogance is not so bad...

Originally posted by Ebedalmo
However, that nowithstanding, I would like to respond to phlohgistician, who said that the human desire for survival is arrogance. If that is arrogance, then arrogance is not so bad...

So, raping a planet, leaving it in a mess, so our species, and probably many others can no longer survive, taking a few rich people, who doubtless got rich by engaging in the very plunder that caused the problem, leaving the people that made them rich behind, and starting a new society descended from these exploiters, is just fine is it?

The attitude that because a few rich assholes can get off the planet, and human kind will carry on, we can keep screwing the environment, is not arrogant? Hey, guess what bub, you aren't getting on that lifeboat, and neither are your kids. So, you want to live in what these assholes leave behind?

If humans are arrogant, so are all other animals. Perhaps a wolf is arrogant because it believes it can kill deer? Perhaps termites are arrogant because they believe they can kill trees? Humans are not special in this regard, they are just a more advanced species. If you believe life is futile, then just go kill yourself. The world won't miss you.

Originally posted by Ebedalmo
If humans are arrogant, so are all other animals. Perhaps a wolf is arrogant because it believes it can kill deer? Perhaps termites are arrogant because they believe they can kill trees? Humans are not special in this regard, they are just a more advanced species. If you believe life is futile, then just go kill yourself. The world won't miss you.

You miss the point entirely. Wolves don't kill other predators which also eat the same prey, to keep the prey for themselves. Humans do.

All of termite kind is not living on the same single log, and eating their own home from underneath them. Humans are.

I didn't say life is futile, I said ultimately survival is futile. The species will end when the Universe ends, so answer me why the struggle is worth it? As to your suggestion to kill myself, no, I have so much to look forward to, like another witty ad-hom from you, and perhaps a decent answer?

Originally posted by phlogistician
You miss the point entirely. Wolves don't kill other predators which also eat the same prey, to keep the prey for themselves. Humans do.

All of termite kind is not living on the same single log, and eating their own home from underneath them. Humans are.


What is your point exactly? That humans are evil because they are greedy individualists? Are you suggesting that since humans are the dominant species, they are naturally the most evil and arrogant ones? I am not sure if I understand you.

Originally posted by phlogistician

I didn't say life is futile, I said ultimately survival is futile. The species will end when the Universe ends, so answer me why the struggle is worth it? As to your suggestion to kill myself, no, I have so much to look forward to, like another witty ad-hom from you, and perhaps a decent answer?

Very good.
You believe that life isn't futile... even though everybody dies in the end.
But you believe survival is futile... because everybody will die in the end. You have just made a very interesting point. If one believes that the only point of life is the survival of his entire species, then life is ultimately futile, because survival is futile. But if one believes that the purpose of life is for each individual to seek as much fulfillment as he can for himself, then life has a purpose. You have made a very good case for individualism and against collectivism, not something I expected from you at all.

Why not just send women into space, with a huge sperm bank with frozen samples collected from everyman on earth. Then after said disaster the women land back on earth they randomly select a sample do their thing with a turkey baster and start to repopulate earth hey presto we'll be at each others throats again in no time at all :m:

Hello all. Fenix here, and I was just wondering if there are any new thoughts/ideas about the Lifeboat Foundations goals. I myself think that their ideas and goals are very grand. Some seem improbable, but I think it is very duable if peeps would stop critisizing their gaols. We all have to come to turms with the fact that a very simple accident or a lunatic terrist can easely destroy most, if not all, of the human race. ( with the proper serqumstances). Technology can't evolve with everyone sitting back and critisizing it, only the support of anyone or everyone can push our tech to new hights.
Course, this is just a small view of how i see things. :cool:
Fenix Tribal

It costs $1000 per pound to lift something into orbit plus life support. What do you think.


Well that leaves the poor people out doesn't it? So they only want to save those with money, not everyone.

Thats not true. If we can acheive the tech in quetion then it wont cost so much any more. Their goal is to save anyone and everyone that they can. As long as you aren't the next Jeffery Dohmer you have a chance to be a part of any one of their proposed colonies.

So then let them fix the problems here on Earth so that EVERYONE can survive!

Thats not true. If we can acheive the tech in quetion then it wont cost so much any more. Their goal is to save anyone and everyone that they can.

A spaceship + life support, food, and water, for 6Bn people? Riiiiight. And this is once we've screwed the earth up so much it's inhospitable to us, ... so where are we going to find the resources to sustain us?

This project could only work on a small scale, for the very rich, who probably got rich by exploiting this planet and it's inhabitants. So I'd be more interested in sabotaging this effort, than supporting it.

cosmictraveler, how do we just "fix the problem"?! we must be very much like God Almighty himself if you honestly believe we have the power to "fix the planet". First, as this god-like force, we'd have to define what fixing the planet is. Bringing it back to pre-human times? pre technological times? pre-nuclear times? how pompus must one be to be able to determine a point in time where everything was just as happy-happy-joy-joy as can possibly be?! How arogant must you be to say that what we do is not natural? That's saying that we're no longer part of nature, which is complete and utter BS seeing as we're an integrated part and product of nature and thus anything we do is an integrated part and product of nature. But even if we could bring ourselves back to huble amish living, the world would not be a nice place, as everyone would still lie, cheat, steal, kill, mutilate, and all the other fun activites that not just people, but EVERY animal known engages in by some way. World peace is a frozen planet devioid of life. Chaos is the one and only pulse, so be glad this world is churning like it is, it's how we enjoy it's many pleasures.

And yes, we will probably eventually break this habitat we're in like anything we touch and witness, so a good backup plan would at least extend mankind's existence, bringing me to my next point. The lifeboat foundation could be sucessful if only launch costs were cheaper. Way cheaper. Talking revolutionary fussion or anti-matter engines here. Once someone builds those ANYONE will be able to go into space, maybe even start communal efforts to build small interplanetary colonies independent of a major organization. Far fetched, but i thought there was some romance to it. :)

There are way too many problems on Earth to fix. Where would we start? A lot of todays youth and next generations are becoming more enviromentaly concious, but it might be too late for anything to help stop the decay of our enviroment. So why not give the next generations the chance to not make the same mistakes we, or our ancestors, have made. Heck, they might even be the ones to come up with the means to save whatever might be left of our home in the future.
Standing back and bitching about the things that have gone wrong and saying that we should fix things here wont help a thing. Actions speak louder than words. So if you think things should be fixed here on Earth, than y don't you try and do something. Talking about it gets us no where.
The technologies that the Foundation seek could be used to save the planet as well. Nano tech has a multi range of uses. Nono tech can be used to sustain technologies, it could be helpful in the medical fields, etc. Nano tech is what has been holding my intrest. But, hey, whatever floats your boat. Gotta go for now.

they just found a star leaving our galaxy (in about 10^8 years) mayeb we should hitch a ride on that. a few billion years later and we might be in a whole new glaxy. wouldn't that be cool.

Yes, that would be awesome.
But i would like to see something awesome happen within my life time.

Put ten thousand people living in orbit, two thousand people on the moon, two thousand people on mars, and make them halfway self sufficient. We can then call it quits and let nature take its course for a few hundred years. After that, strap a few thousand people on the inside of a few big rocks and launch them at nearby stars so that they can get there in a few thousand years.

I don't expect us ever to get the whole population off the ground. A bare handfull is enough in my opinion.

I agree. A handful of survivers is all we need to survive as species.

the planet is beautiful after an asteroid smashed into the gulf of mexico, i think it can survive us,it's own creation

cato, you have a link for that star? i didn't know a star would just leave the galaxy like that, kindof a cool thought. or maybe it's being driven... by aliens that have somehow found how to move their star system...