[extropy-chat] Singularity heat waste

[Anders Sandberg]

George Dvorsky wrote:
> Dear Anders,
>
> It would appear you have some explaining to do:
>
> Robert Bradbury wrote:
>> When he shows you the *designs* for how one would achieve this, tells
>> you precisely *how* he intends to manufacture them and *where* he
>> intends to get the resources from, then, and only then, should you take
>> him seriously.  Until then you should consider his wishful thinking as
>> being related to the "ideal singularity" or the "fantasy singularity"
>> and not a "real singularity" that we should reasonably concern ourselves
>> with.

Indeed :-) It is very simple: consider a spherical singularity on a
frictionless surface...

The difference between Robert and me is that I am very much a
theoretician, using known data and physics to put upper limits on various
things, while Robert is interested in what can actually be built and how.
His above demands are quite reasonable if I were trying to make a real
prediction rather than just play around a bit with the problem.

Actually turning my above calculation into something more practical would
require a lot of engineering analysis. My guess is that a start would be
to take my Uranos semi-Matrioshka model and combine with Robert's analysis
of how to build a Matrioshka (which is much more realistic). Then we could
go into the engineering of planetary disassembly and the kinds of high
density storage available (is C12/C13 diamond the best atomic information
storage?). But while fun, I think the exercise is a bit like late 19th
century physicists calculating maximum speeds for steam-powered racing
cars: they would have had good reasons to believe there would be better
energy sources and engineering solutions in the future, but they could
only do rigorous calculations and design for the steam cars.

Why do we care about singularity energy demands? Perhaps because we want
to look form them as part of SETI. Perhaps to put upper bounds on how hard
a takeoff can be. That can be useful for thinking about policy.



-- 
Anders Sandberg,
Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics
Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University