That's the key word. Infinite or not, the universe is so mind-bogglingly huge that any knid of estimates as to its size or number of habittale planets is an educated guess at best, and a huge extrapolation at worst. This post has remianed civil so far, but let's remember that so an intresting discussion doesn't devolve into a "flame war".

This thread is interesting and fun, but unrealistic. Im not trying to burst any ones bubbles but i will bring some science to the discussion. I study astrophysics at the University of California, Irvine. So I know alot about this, And as a personal position, i would LOVE for humanity to go beyond our solar system and colonize other worlds... but...



The idea that there are 10 or 11 dimensions is part of string theory. A once very promising theory that in the last decade has lost ALOT of clout. There are still those that swear by it. But most of the scientific community has realized it is not really that useful. String theory can describe ANY universe. Which means it can make no testable predictions. There for it is a theory of ANYTHING not EVERYTHING. I can explain more later but this isn't the right thread.

as for the electron pairs communicating over great distances. This is phenomenon in quantum mechanics. The deseaving thing is that they arent really communicating any useful information. I dont have the time to get into the details, but there is a lot not known about the Quantum Measurement problem. And this example is just part of a much bigger problem with Quantum Mechanics. But whats important is that it doesn't realllly show faster then light communication. At least not to our current understanding.



The Alcubierre Drive is actually really interesting, except completely unrealistic as to our current model of mater and... well the fabric of space time. In order for this to work, you both need negative mater (not anti-mater but mater that is gravitationally repulsive) and the ability to have some one at your destination know the exact second you are traveling by to pull you out of the Alcubierre Bubble. This is a problem first because it would take an almost infinite amount of energy to both create and collapse said bubble (along with that negative mater) but also you would need the ability to send a supper lumminal signal ahead to tell them that you were coming.


Alcubierre Drive




I don't know where your getting this number? If this is true then that's VERY exciting. But the numbers i have run into are MUCH MUCH more dismal. What i've read is that for a planet like Earth to exist, and for life to evolve, the odds are roughly 1 to 10^42. There were alot of things that went into diriving that number, from the thing i read, and granted this is for Earth And Life to have come about. But again thats, a 1 with 42 zeros after it! Put that in perspecitve, there are roughtly 10^22 stars in our galaxy. So basically the probability of Earth occuring with life is about 1 in 10^20 universes. ... even if you go back and tween or strait up throw out lot of the things going into that number, its still EXTREAMLY unlikely that life exists. (accoarind to those calculations) personally i hope they are wrong, but i tend to believe that if we find any planets worth living on, we are gonna have to do some terraforming to make them livable. That's assuming we can get there

haha oh dang, i didnt realize there as another 5 pages to read. ... sorry if i repeated stuff that was already said.

In terms of our present technology and knowledge base, it is impossible, for all practical purposes, to travel even to the nearest star system. (Though I acknowledge that there were things considered "impossible" 100 years ago that are now "possible...").

But if human civilization manages to survive that long, human nature will not change, and it stands to reason that there will be wars, politics, and miscellaneous pettiness.

yeah but 100 years ago our understanding of what it meant to deem something possible or impossible was much different. today we treat science MUCH more open mindedly. If we say something is not possible, id say it carries a little more weight with the current way we treat science.

a 100 years ago it was illegal to tech the theory of evolution in school

I believe habitable planets are more common than modern scientist believe. One reason is our current method detection relies on the mass of object, meaning that smaller planets and other stellar objects would be invisible to our current means of observation. The second is that our definition for life is rather limited, and while planets similar to ours may be rare within our galaxy, other worlds could suit life. Its vary narrow minded of some people to assume that entire universe conforms to our set of rules. There simply to much chaos for their not to be some exceptions.

As I've read this thread I've noticed one commonality that gets my goat, people saying it is impossible to travel faster than light. As a correction it is impossible or, in my opinion, damn hard to accelerate faster than light. Accelerating to said speed would require not just huge amount of power but a huge burst of power, a slow acceleration is not feasible as it would be cheaper to build a generation ship.

FTL communication is a different story. There is a theoretical particle called a Tachyon that travels constantly faster than light. There has also been strong evidence that from the big bang to an unknown point in universal creation that the universe expanded faster than light as well. Anyways, if one could essentially "catch" a tachyon and redirect it so it travels in a loop the tachyon could be seeded with a message and directed towards another receiver etc.

And on to space colonization, this is the future of humankind our survival ultimately depends on it. Not only are there unlimited resources in space but unlimited commercial options and the ability to spread out our species as well.
There is a whole universe of factors that could spell our doom if we remain a single planet species, not just planet killer objects.Alien attack, famine, massive tectonic movements, and loss of the atmosphere to name a few of the possibilities.
And according to one of the laws of quantum physics nothing is impossible, we could all turn into massive poop sculptures tomorrow, some are just VERY unlikely.

The commercial aspect is one of great interest to me and many others, Imagine a world where gold is commonplace, as Astronomers spotted an asteroid made of nearly solid gold, and metals are pefectly blended. In this world steel could be harder than diamond, though I cringe a the amount of pressure and heat needed to achieve a 10 on the moh's scale, and radioactive waste is easily dealt with, lauching it into the sun detonating it in deep space etcetera, a plethora of wealth awaits us in space.

In order for any object to archive light speed, one very important thing must be archived, the object MUST be massless, that is, it must have absolutely no mass.



Hold your horses, tachyon, as you said, are a theorical particle, thus basicly we know nothing about it, we are not even sure it exist.



Three hundred years ago, people though the timber (wood) in North America's forests was unlimited......... and have you heard about petroleum and codfish?

I'm no scientist, but I believe part of Quantum Physics is based on probabilities. An event might have a probability of 1e-853 of happening. Who would call such a thing possible?



For one who just mentioned Quantum Physics, you really don't understand what physics is. The same physics that apply here on Earth will apply anywhere and everywhere in the known universe. Atoms will behave in the same way, energy will never be destroyed or produced, magnetict objects will always be bipolar never monopolar, mass will never be destroyed or produced, for any force applied there will always be an equal and opposite reaction, gravity will exist, and time will always move forward.

What we call steel is physically unable to be stronger to what we call diamond. Such a strong molecular structure is not possible with steel's molecules.

basically farther and farther up the periodic table you go the harder it is to find stuff naturally. stars, especially older stars, produce these heavier elements through fusion but not nearly in the volume that lighter elements are created. this is not an artificial rarity.

also consider if there was a asteroid made of solid gold, and that asteroid was easily minable, the market would instantly tumble as supply/demand would likely be thrown out of whack.

Then why have scientists found some particles that are moving faster than the speed of light. Don't remember the name of the particles sorry.

anything over iron requires a super nova explosion to be made.

the answer is they haven't. massless particles move at the speed of light - the only thing that can break c is quantum effects on two entangled particles

ya there called Tachyon particles and they move faster then the speed of light but unstable

When did I say estimate? I said calculate. And I would say that the universe, despite its immensity, is still limited to the rule of one naturally habitable planet per galaxy, at the very most. It is far more likely that one planet in a few hundred galaxies will be able to support complex life, and furthermore, as I said, we are not guaranteed that life arises on every planet capable of supporting it. Once again, the probability is not favorable; it has been calculated that it would take a blind man 1.7 trillion years to solve a rubik's cube, and that is far longer than the life-span of a star. Furthermore, a blind man isn't going to know he's solved the thing, and will very likely continue changing it until it is out of order again. And again, we're not asking a blind man to solve a rubik's cube: we're asking the wind and rain to solve two-hundred twelve rubik's cubes (that's the number and approximate complexity of the proteins contained in even a prokaryotic cell), and we need it to happen before the star our planet is circling dies. We also need it to happen at the same place, and at the same time, so that, as I said before, our blind man doesn't keep changing it after he's solved it. Now it is unquestionable that this happened on Earth, but I'd say the probability is VERY much against it happening anywhere else in the universe.