TigerTedd

That's such a wonderfully egocentric approach.  The point of nature is to be, without or without us, it still holds a purpose to all the other living beings.  The tree question is flawed of course, the animals hear it falling, the insects, the trees feel the ground vibrate.  i know that it's potentially upsetting to many, but nothing is dependent on us, except we.  Likewise, the animals can see the stars at night and even if they didn't, it's illogical to assume that the universe is dependent on observation, unless we are approaching the matter from the Holographic Universe model, which is of course a possibility and in that case i am wrong from a-z, except for my mention of consciousness being key.

Nature may well get on fine without us, but what’s the point, really, without anyone to observe it. If a tree falls in the woods, and there’s no one to hear it, does it make a sound? Likewise, if the universe  keeps ticking along, but there’s no one to observe it, does it really exist?

Nature may well get on fine without us, but what’s the point, really, without anyone to observe it. If a tree falls in the woods, and there’s no one to hear it, does it make a sound? Likewise, if the universe  keeps ticking along, but there’s no one to observe it, does it really exist?

Forget government's and politicians, it's people like Musk who create the positive change. We could do with 10 more people just like him. 
One project I'm particularly excited about is Starlink. I don't like the encroaching grip ISP's, government's and mega tech and major corporations have on the internet. 
Forget the cloud, Musk will announce plans in the next few years for larger data centres beyond the clouds, in space. 

Few humans have done more for the planet than Musk. For decades we were facing Carmageddon with the motor industry not giving a stuff. Elon single-handedly has transitioned the world towards electric cars and sustainable transport, with a heavy focus on solar power too. Reluctantly the traditional car companies are being dragged kicking and screaming in Tesla's wake, but they're all a decade behind now so effectively are already dead. 
You can look after your own planet and want to improve it at the same time as wanting to colonize others. Call me crazy, but I'm speciesist. I want Humanity to survive. We might be the only complex intelligence in the Universe, and if we go that could be the end of intelligence everywhere. Of course the other planets of the solar system should be ours to do with as we see fit, to help protect intelligence in the Universe and let it flourish. 
Meanwhile, Starship is to begin twice monthly test flights from next week, having established a 90 square mile safety zone around Boca Chica, mainly in the ocean, where spaceships will be blown up if they get out of control. 
https://www.krgv.com/news/spacex-planned-9-mile-launch-self-destruct-zone-over-gulf
 

I'll have the Kenny Burns sofa..........more space! ?

Perhaps we should start naming seats instead of whole stands? Then we could have a different famous Ram being honoured every day for 30000 days. That should make us classy enough.

I am. Started off well, got smashed 4-1 twice and drew with Arsenal 0-0 who are in poor form.
A lot of hype about them which will fizzle out as reality hits. They haven’t strengthened enough to sustain the tempo of football they play for a full season at a higher level.
I don’t see this tactically astute manager, Lampard in his first season sprung a surprise on them which he had no answer for as the spy’s were already busted.
What he is, is a cheating Argentinian Billy Davies, squeeze every last drop out of whatever he has at his disposal but admittedly has them playing a more attractive but unsustainable style of football.
Sheff Utd will finish above them. Calling it now.

Not sure about anyone else but I have completely lost interest in Derby now. previously I thought this thread was embarrassing given we are comfortably the worst team in the champ so shouldn't be laughing at anyone else. Now I find supporting whoever leeds are playing much more interesting than Derby, I've embraced schadenfreude 

It was a very short static fire, but everything went well. According to Elon, we remain on course for next week's historic test flight. 
He gives it a one in three chance of succeeding fully, but whatever happens we'll learn something. 

At the moment it looks as if what we call a static fire will be happening today. It's where they fire up the engines to test them, before a rocket flight and is being live streamed here: 
Last time they tried this it went wrong, leading to some molten stuff pouring out onto the launchpad, meaning they've done some design fixes and replaced one of the engines. 
This is very rapid development and prototyping. The philosophy is, if you're not failing at times you're not innovating quickly enough. Should the SN8 rocket blow up on the pad (very possible!), SN9 is now completed and a little better, so would simply be rolled out to take its place. Amazing! 

My fact for the day, which is apt considering all the big numbers involved in space travel:
1 million seconds = about 11 days. 
1 billion seconds = about 35 years. 
we tend think of a billion as being the next number up from a million. But this demonstrates just how massive a billion really is. The thought of billionaires existing in the world makes me sick to be honest. The thought of trillions of dollars of debt is crazy. But money is just a made uk thing anyway, it’s all just 1s and 0s, and you can always take a few zeros off if it gets out of hand. The size of space, and the age of the universe, however, will always be massive. Really, really, ridiculously massive. 

Quantum communication isn’t against the laws of physics. Manipulate an electron on this side of the universe and through quantum entanglement it will manipulate an electron on the other side of the universe instantly. Digital communication is all down to ones and zeros, so you can use quantum entanglement to create the ones and zeros and communicate instantly across any distance. In theory. 

My fact for the day, which is apt considering all the big numbers involved in space travel:
1 million seconds = about 11 days. 
1 billion seconds = about 35 years. 
we tend think of a billion as being the next number up from a million. But this demonstrates just how massive a billion really is. The thought of billionaires existing in the world makes me sick to be honest. The thought of trillions of dollars of debt is crazy. But money is just a made uk thing anyway, it’s all just 1s and 0s, and you can always take a few zeros off if it gets out of hand. The size of space, and the age of the universe, however, will always be massive. Really, really, ridiculously massive. 

Here's one of the live feeds from the site, which runs 24/7. The tanks are for the different cryogenic propellants. There's a small stainless steel object nearby that looks a little like a water tower, but in fact is StarHopper, the first vehicle to ever fly using one of the Raptor engines that have been developed for Starship and Super Heavy. Again, it only flew to 150m as a test.
 

This is so important, not just for space travel but also life on Earth. People struggle so much to grasp the meaning of numbers as they become large. Unless things are put in context, people can easily draw wrong conclusions.
We know from Douglas Adams that space is big, but to try to convey some of the relative distances, just here in our inner solar system, here's a great animation about the speed of light to different places. When we have a settlement on Mars, there will be no real-time communication with Earth. The Human Martians will be cut off and taking all their own decisions, making their own laws.
 

My fact for the day, which is apt considering all the big numbers involved in space travel:
1 million seconds = about 11 days. 
1 billion seconds = about 35 years. 
we tend think of a billion as being the next number up from a million. But this demonstrates just how massive a billion really is. The thought of billionaires existing in the world makes me sick to be honest. The thought of trillions of dollars of debt is crazy. But money is just a made uk thing anyway, it’s all just 1s and 0s, and you can always take a few zeros off if it gets out of hand. The size of space, and the age of the universe, however, will always be massive. Really, really, ridiculously massive. 

Good job it’s not your money then. It’s Elon’s to do with as he wishes.
you can’t get to Mars, but you can install solar panels, drive an electric car, recycle more, eat less meat, boycott companies that don’t lower their carbon footprint, encourage others to do the same etc. That’s all in your power. It’s happening. It needs to happen better and faster, but Elon can’t personally do much more than he’s already doing. Saving this planet is down to us now.
Not that Elon hasn’t done some pretty incredible stuff in his own right to help us help the planet. 
PS colonising Mars could eventually enable us to move automated heavy industry onto Mars, thereby leaving earth as an essentially carbon free utopia. 
that could be centuries away, but it’s got to start somewhere. 

My fact for the day, which is apt considering all the big numbers involved in space travel:
1 million seconds = about 11 days. 
1 billion seconds = about 35 years. 
we tend think of a billion as being the next number up from a million. But this demonstrates just how massive a billion really is. The thought of billionaires existing in the world makes me sick to be honest. The thought of trillions of dollars of debt is crazy. But money is just a made uk thing anyway, it’s all just 1s and 0s, and you can always take a few zeros off if it gets out of hand. The size of space, and the age of the universe, however, will always be massive. Really, really, ridiculously massive. 

Thanks @TigerTeddfor your rebuttals to these, but they are representative of comments that will likely keep surfacing throughout what I hope will be an ongoing thread, so I'll add my two-penneth too.
There's a movement called Effective Altruism (or EA), whose aim is how to do the most good with what you have. They have three core priorities which are:
relieving extreme global poverty fighting for nonhuman animal rights working to prevent existential risk but it's number 3 that is their highest priority. If Humans become extinct, then we can no longer do any good, Conversely, the more Humans there are, the more potential good we are able to do in the Universe. Earlier this year I helped publish a book called The Precipice by Toby Ord, one of the founders of EA, and Toby's dedication reads:
"To the hundred billion people before us, who fashioned our civilisation; to the seven billion now alive, whose actions may determine its fate; to the trillions to come, whose existence lies in the balance."
The thing is, future people do not have a voice to ask for our help or plead their case. They are wholly reliant on us to create a future in which they can exist and flourish. The plan for a self-sustaining settlement on Mars is massive to help increase the potential future good that can be done in the Universe for two reasons.
One, which is Elon Musk's argument, is that it's like creating a backup in case your computer goes wrong. If everything goes to hell here on Earth, then Humanity can still go on and eventually spread to the stars, doing good in the process. The other is that it accelerates Humanity's expansion into space and becoming a multiplanetary species, which means we will be on course to spread out across the Universe more quickly, allowing trillions more future Humans to be born and do good. Another influential figure in the EA movement whose books I publish is Nick Bostrom, and he wrote about this in a paper entitled "Astronomical Waste: the Opportunity Cost of Delayed Technological Development". Bostrom writes:
"With very advanced technology, a very large population of people living happy lives could be sustained in the accessible region of the universe. For every year that development of such technologies and colonization of the universe is delayed, there is therefore an opportunity cost: a potential good, lives worth living, is not being realized."
For me these are compelling arguments from two of the most prominent moral philosophers in the world today.  They resonate especially because I'm a mathematical physicist and often try to think in higher dimensions, meaning I'll often think about the Universe as a continuous present rather than past, present and future. The future isn't some nebulous thing that's going to happen. In a very real sense it coexists with us at the moment. It's just as real as the present we're living in. And I want that future to be the best it possibly can be for Humanity and for the Universe. And despite the Universe existing for nearly 14 billion years the only evidence of an advanced technological civilization existing anywhere within it, is here on Earth. So if the Universe is to realize its potential for future good, it could well be down to us to make that happen.
From Boca Chica to Mars is the next step on that road, but an incredibly important one.
 

But it’s not NASA that’s doing this. It’s not publicly funded (the vast majority at least). So the US debt has literally nothing to do with this. Elon can do whatever he wants with his own money. And if he believes it’s a good money making investment, and even if he doesn’t, that’s his choice. 
are you saying he should be using his billions to bail out the American national debt?
this thread is barely a page old, it’s meant to be about the amazing achievement on putting a man, or men (and women) on Mars in our lifetimes, and the road towards that goal. @Carl Sagan‘s aim of building a chronicle of that progress through the eyes of rams fans is laudable. 
it’s not about the finances of it all. I’m just happy to trust that some accountant somewhere has worked out it’s financially a good a idea. 
leave your cynicism at the door, and revel in man’s ingenuity and adventurous spirit. Or just don’t come on this thread.

But it’s not NASA that’s doing this. It’s not publicly funded (the vast majority at least). So the US debt has literally nothing to do with this. Elon can do whatever he wants with his own money. And if he believes it’s a good money making investment, and even if he doesn’t, that’s his choice. 
are you saying he should be using his billions to bail out the American national debt?
this thread is barely a page old, it’s meant to be about the amazing achievement on putting a man, or men (and women) on Mars in our lifetimes, and the road towards that goal. @Carl Sagan‘s aim of building a chronicle of that progress through the eyes of rams fans is laudable. 
it’s not about the finances of it all. I’m just happy to trust that some accountant somewhere has worked out it’s financially a good a idea. 
leave your cynicism at the door, and revel in man’s ingenuity and adventurous spirit. Or just don’t come on this thread.

Good job it’s not your money then. It’s Elon’s to do with as he wishes.
you can’t get to Mars, but you can install solar panels, drive an electric car, recycle more, eat less meat, boycott companies that don’t lower their carbon footprint, encourage others to do the same etc. That’s all in your power. It’s happening. It needs to happen better and faster, but Elon can’t personally do much more than he’s already doing. Saving this planet is down to us now.
Not that Elon hasn’t done some pretty incredible stuff in his own right to help us help the planet. 
PS colonising Mars could eventually enable us to move automated heavy industry onto Mars, thereby leaving earth as an essentially carbon free utopia. 
that could be centuries away, but it’s got to start somewhere. 

Ack! Ack ack!!

we can do both