[ExI] Von Neumann Probes

[Adrian Tymes]

On Sat, Jan 24, 2026 at 8:56 AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat
<extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
> More computation doesn't require more energy, this is a common misconception. But more computational speed does require more density. And higher computational speed effectively seals you off from the rest of the universe. If you run your minds a million times faster, the speed of light becomes a million times slower from your perspective (about the speed of an airplane).
>
> To email or text someone, or to download a web page from the other side of the planet takes hours.

Actually it's even worse.  Downloading a small Web page from the far
side of the planet currently takes about a second (optimally: light
can circle the Earth about 7.5 times per second).  One million seconds
is 277.777... hours, which is a bit over 11.5 days.

> If a civilization wants to explore, their best bet is to make a copy of their entire civilization and send a copy outward in a miniaturized single ship

Exploration by entire civilizations, or any group larger than an
individual (or a collective small enough that they would all go
explore together), generally involves a small number of scouts going
forth and reporting back.  That ship can't just "go explore"; it needs
a way to send data back in reasonable time, or the civilization
wouldn't build and send that ship in the first place.