Interstellar GPS

[carnageX]

Are you sure the term theory is a correct description for them?

Theory: Current working model or explanation, built on evidence, as to how a known fact or phenomena occurs.
e.g. Gravity is a known fact/phenomena. The theory of gravity is the model detailing how it works, tested through repeatable experimentation.

Yay for english and its multiple definitions!

Theory:

• a proposed explanation whose status is still conjectural, in contrast to well-established propositions that are regarded as reporting matters of actual fact.
• contemplation or speculation.
• guess or conjecture.

So yes, theory can be a correct word.

Maybe if somebody divides by zero....

 

[S0ULphIRE]

How do you pertain that to even be possible?
The entire stockpile of nukes on this planet is only capable of 'destroying' things mostly on the surface of this planet.
And that's only in the context of reforming/rearranging their physical makeup, with a very slight loss in mass converted into other forms of energy (as per E = MC²)

Maybe if somebody divides by zero....

go back a thousand years from now. What was the best weapon available? Go forwards a thousand years...I'm pretty sure there'll be something pretty epic built by then.

 

[Apokalipse]

Yay for english and its multiple definitions!

Theory:

• a proposed explanation whose status is still conjectural, in contrast to well-established propositions that are regarded as reporting matters of actual fact.
• contemplation or speculation.
• guess or conjecture.

So yes, theory can be a correct word.

When speaking scientifically, I prefer to use the word theory in its scientific context

Otherwise, I prefer to avoid use of it, because of this ambiguousity.
It goes to further confuse people who don't understand the scientific context, and just equate everything with the label theory to a hypothesis.

go back a thousand years from now. What was the best weapon available? Go forwards a thousand years...I'm pretty sure there'll be something pretty epic built by then.

Everything we have done is just change the form of things already in existence.

Reminds me of something I read: "If you want to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe".

There are no indications it is at all physically possible to create or destroy energy. It's one of the laws of thermodynamics.

Atomic fusion or fission is just converting matter into energy, or energy into matter.
Or rather, matter is energy, which can have its behavior changed.

Quantum Physics just tells us that energy comes in the form of discrete packets of energy, which have a certain behavior.
Some quantum energy/particle packets carry force, some carry mass. But all of them are made of an amount of energy (depending on the particular form), and all of them can be changed into other forms.

I think quantum physics makes a lot of things make more sense.
Problem is that there's so much to know about it; nobody has a complete understanding of it.

 

[S0ULphIRE]

Rant about The fate of our race:

Exactly, all I am proposing is we will have 'altered' the current state of the universe into lots of little clouds.

The violent and unpredictable nature of humans as a race, with emphasis on the last hundred years, leads me to hypothisize that the future of not only this planet but the larger existance of at least our local planetry system could be placed in jeopardy as a direct result of our actions in less than a thousand years.

The technological growth since around 1900 has been exponential, which I attribute to the ease with which new ideas and theories can be shared. That coupled with the fact that the population on earth is now much larger than it ever has been before means many more potential geniuses are being produced than before.

With the increase in population and technology, I would like to suggest that in a thousand years we will have had to do several things. In my opinion, those things include:

1. either putting in place STRICT birth control measures (imo not likely) AND/OR
2. advancing our current technology far enough to make the habitation of other planets viable. Even more than that, to make their habitation a reality.
3. Given that point 2 is true, planetry governments will be installed, as control from another planet is hardly a viable idea. There might be a ruling body of people, in the same way as many companies already do that are distributed across many countries.
4. Using previous relationships between countries as a guideline, these planets will at sometime violently disagree. Right now we have weapons capable of wiping out entire continents, it is only logical to think that by then weapons will have been made that are capable of destroying entire planets.

As population rises, also exponentially by the way, many things will start happening much quicker. In fact, nearly everything will start happening much quicker. Technological advances, new records, new ideas, etc.

The quick advances will mean methods will become more efficient, more cost efective, and in general will perform better.
However, these quick advances will benefit not only good purposes, but bad ones as well. Such as wanting to blow up everyone.

 

[Apokalipse]

It wasn't exactly clear what you meant by 'destroy'.
In the context of altering the form of things, to become something other than what they currently are; sure that can and does happen. I think the question is at what scale?

We can't be sure how human technology will progress in the future, or what it will progress into.
I don't think that we will have an impact on the entire universe, however.

From what relatively little data Hubble has provided us, saying there are billions of galaxies would be off by an extremely large order of magnitude.

 

[Luke]

The word theory can be used 2 ways in science apok.

1.) Likely to be true from observation but not a certainty
2.) an educated guess

these two meanings are near the same except that the second is more of a guess, not as much based on facts. So my using the word theory was accurate.

But anyway, who cares even if it were not right, let me put it in simpler words. "There are to points of view"

 

[Apokalipse]

The word theory can be used 2 ways in science apok.

1.) Likely to be true from observation but not a certainty
2.) an educated guess

these two meanings are near the same except that the second is more of a guess, not as much based on facts. So my using the word theory was accurate.

But anyway, who cares even if it were not right, let me put it in simpler words. "There are to points of view"

those definitions are basically the same; they're also not the same as a scientific theory.

A scientific theory is not a guess, or just "likely to be true"
a scientific theory is a model, or explanation as to how something occurs. It is built with evidence.

It can be incomplete. For example, the theory of gravity isn't complete. We don't know all of the mechanics behind its operation. But what we do know so far is pretty accurate, because it's based on repeated evidence.
It is usually composed of many ideas, which are related.

The theory of gravity is the explanation as to how gravity occurs.
It includes things like F = GMm/r² (which we know to be true).
If we discover more about gravity and the evidence supports it, the new ideas will then be incorporated into the theory of gravity.

But the key thing is; In order to qualify as a scientific theory, or part of a scientific theory, it must be built on evidence. Otherwise, the idea is called a hypothesis.

 

[Luke]

^i would assume you know of some of the major theories then... M-theory, Multiverse theory ect.

Those two examples have no proof, yet they are theories mate.

 

[Apokalipse]

I think M-theory is built on mathematics. And unless there is evidence I don't know about, the multiverse idea is a hypothesis

*edit*
after reading more, I think I would consider M-theory a hypothesis.
Kind of an oxymoron, since M-theory is the label used to describe this particular body of ideas. But it hasn't passed the process of scientific scritinisation.
The basic steps of science are:
a) develop idea
b) make predictions
c) test the predictions to see if they work

and M-theory so far hasn't made it to b. It hasn't made predictions we can test.

 

[Luke]

^m-theory is a mix of mathematics and science.

Multiverse was a bad example on my part, sorry. (it is hypothetical).

Theories are intended to be an accurate, predictive description of the natural world. However, it is sometimes not clear whether the conclusions derived from the theory inform us about the nature of the world, or the nature of the theory.

^taken directly from wikipedia.

Theories are intended to be factual, but they can/and do sometimes move to the realm of philosophy. So Theories are not entirely accurate.

So this in mind, there is evidence to support the two theories i listed before (about what would happen during the colision) because we have observed things, but there is also the odd thing that does not add up.

Edit: Here is another little thing i found:

A scientific theory summarizes a hypothesis or group of hypotheses that have been supported with repeated testing. A theory is valid as long as there is no evidence to dispute it. Therefore, theories can be disproven. Basically, if evidence accumulates to support a hypothesis, then the hypothesis can become accepted as a good explanation of a phenomenon. One definition of a theory is to say it's an accepted hypothesis.

Example: It is known that on June 30, 1908 in Tunguska, Siberia, there was an explosion equivalent to the detonation of about 15 million tons of TNT. Many hypotheses have been proposed for what caused the explosion. It is theorized that the explosion was caused by a natural extraterrestrial phenomenon, and was not caused by man. Is this theory a fact? No. The event is a recorded fact. Is this this theory generally accepted to be true, based on evidence to-date? Yes. Can this theory be shown to be false and be discarded? Yes.