[extropy-chat] MARS: Because it is hard

[Acy James Stapp]

You are going to be able to achieve an incredibly high 
compression ratio, since for bulk solids or liquids you
only need space proportional to the interfacial area where
bulk properties change; even then if the surface is planar
it could be described much more simply. A crystal of 
quartz, hematite, or whatever could be simply described
by it's bulk composition,  position of impurities, and
surface.

By the time we have the technology for planetary disassembly
we'll be able to recognize micro and macro-fossils
explicitly and either save them physically or record them
uniquely, ignoring all of the rock.

Acy

[ -----Original Message-----
[ From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org 
[ [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of 
[ Emlyn ORegan
[ Sent: Monday, 12 April, 2004 23:28
[ To: ExI chat list
[ Subject: RE: [extropy-chat] MARS: Because it is hard
[ 
[ 
[ Good compression strategies seem achievable. You should be 
[ able to find,
[ for instance, recurring large atomic arrangements which can 
[ be described
[ once, then referred to in place wherever they occur. Defining 
[ a relative
[ positioning scheme (each atom's x,y,z coordinate fixed in relation to
[ the previous atom, as defined by some algorithm) should do 
[ away with all
[ those x,y,z's . However, anything like this is going to be 
[ lossy. If you
[ want absolute fidelity, you'll need to turn Jupiter into 
[ computronium in
[ order to encode Mars, and then where do you put the info for Jupiter?
[ 
[ Emlyn
[ 
[ -----Original Message-----
[ From: Robert J. Bradbury [mailto:bradbury at aeiveos.com] 
[ Sent: Monday, 12 April 2004 11:02 PM
[ To: ExI chat list
[ Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] MARS: Because it is hard
[ 
[ 
[ On Mon, 12 Apr 2004, Robert J. Bradbury wrote:
[ 
[ > I suspect that for a while it will require several orders 
[ of magnitude
[ > more atoms to store the space location records of a number of atoms
[ > unless you have a very good compression algorithm.
[ 
[ Clarification... In case this isn't clear -- You have to encode the
[ element type, perhaps its isotope number, its location within a 3D
[ grid which is going to require accuracy down to the nm scale.  The
[ point I'm trying to make is that it is going to require N-bits
[ (where N is probably in the range of 128-1024 at least) and that
[ it is going to take 10's to 100's of atoms to store that much
[ information given relatively advanced storage systems even by
[ today's standards.
[ 
[ So you cannot have the atomic structure of the surface of Mars without
[ coming up with someplace to put it.  And the storage system is likely
[ to require more matter than that which one is disassembling unless
[ you (a) have good compression strategies; or (b) move to subatomic
[ storage strategies.
[ 
[ Robert
[ 
[ 
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