[ExI] Interstellar Travel is really hard

[BillK]

On Sat, 8 Jan 2022 at 01:13, Rafal Smigrodzki via extropy-chat
<extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
> Just one civilization that likes the idea of spreading and develops the technology is enough to change its light-cone.
>
> Rafal
> _______________________________________________


'Liking' or 'wishing' won't change the laws of the universe.
So if interstellar travel is impossible, it will remain impossible no
matter how many resources are thrown at the problem.
Therefore the alternative is that interstellar travel is so difficult
and so expensive in resources that while theoretically possible, it
becomes impossible in practice.
Humans have arrived quite late in the universe development so the
chance of other intelligent civilisations arising before us is rather
high also. But looking around, we see nothing unnatural appearing in
our galaxy. So nobody else has so far decided that spamming the galaxy
or re-engineering the galaxy is a good idea. We could be the first!

Interstellar travel will require the resources of (at least) a nation,
plus more advanced technology than we have at present. AGI will
probably arrive before advanced space technology and that may cause
the famous Singularity to happen. Will posthumans think that
colonising the galaxy is the best way to spend resources? They are
supposed to be highly intelligent after all, with the advanced
knowledge to do almost anything they desire. Running the Metaverse
with universal uploading and eternal life may be much more preferable.


BillK