How do you manage an interstellar empire?

Straha · Post by **Straha** » 2003-01-20 05:18pm

Alright, your given a nation consisting of 4 stars, how do you manage them effectivley while obeying the known laws of physics?

Post by **Colonel Olrik** » 2003-01-20 05:21pm

Straha wrote:Alright, your given a nation consisting of 4 stars, how do you manage them effectivley while obeying the known laws of physics?

Strict obedience to the laws of physics <=> no FTL travel.

Giving that colonizable star system are likely to be at the very least decades of travel / communication apart from each other, no empire is sustainable.

RedImperator · Post by **RedImperator** » 2003-01-20 05:44pm

Without FTL, the only thing that could be remotely defined as an interstellar empire is a collection of star systems that share a common cultural lineage and make some deliberate, cooridinated effort to maintain that lineage. You could use powerful radio transmitters to broadcast novels, music, philosophy, images of artwork, and the like. But politically, there's no way to maintain a state larger than a solar system without some form of FTL travel.

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-01-20 05:49pm

Bomb them to oblivion before they've done anything because by the time the bombs arrive theyll have revolted. Besides, preemptive nuclear strikes are always fun.

You could, ofcourse, have ansibles or quantum tunnelling transmitters to get FTL+ speeds for transmitters so you can communicate with regional governors etc. kind of like how the US did when going from washington to california took days.

Joe · Post by **Joe** » 2003-01-20 05:53pm

Announce the dissolution of my Empire and attempt to govern my own star as best as possible.

SirNitram · Post by **SirNitram** » 2003-01-20 06:18pm

Do everything I can to get nonlocality(Or Quantum Entanglement as it's been renamed..) working as a semifeasible communications system. If I can't, the best I can do is try and keep city-ships flying. Eventually, I suspect, city ships will become the norm, with planets being merely places to resupply.

ArmorPierce · Post by **ArmorPierce** » 2003-01-20 06:52pm

Give them a lot of anatomy and hope they don't decide to revolt for no real reason

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-01-20 06:58pm

Give them a lot of anatomy and hope they don't decide to revolt for no real reason

::chuckle:: I think you mean AUTONOMY not ANATOMY

Setzer · Post by **Setzer** » 2003-01-20 07:51pm

kojikun wrote:
Give them a lot of anatomy and hope they don't decide to revolt for no real reason
::chuckle:: I think you mean AUTONOMY not ANATOMY

It works either way. Get my hands on a lotta female anatomy and I sure won't revolt. It's a logical extension of Lord Wong's "Anal sex for everyone" program.

SyntaxVorlon · Post by **SyntaxVorlon** » 2003-01-20 09:50pm

Don't be asinine!
Either way, or in any way, you could not maintain an empire such as that. A loose confederation, yes, but a multiplanetary, multilightyear government with no FTL comms, no. The best you could hope for would be an interplanetary government, though I don't think it would be a good idea. I mean a planetary government is one thing, it could be made efficient via numerous AIs and such, but interplanetary is pretty hard in itself. I'd keep it nice and local.

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-01-20 10:04pm

syntax, noone said no FTL comms, just no FTL travel. FTL comms are completely realistic and while we havent got them working now, we might in the near future. quantum tunnelling and entanglement are both very plausible technologies.

GrandMasterTerwynn · Post by **GrandMasterTerwynn** » 2003-01-20 10:15pm

Straha wrote:Alright, your given a nation consisting of 4 stars, how do you manage them effectivley while obeying the known laws of physics?

If you scrupulously follow all the laws of physics with no loopholes, then the answer is simple . . . you don't manage the empire. The best you could do is occasionally export some emigrants and supplies from your homeworld to your colonies. Communicating them will be impossible without humongous, tightly focused transmitters. Sending your emigrants out to the colonies will be astonishingly expensive as 99% of your ship will be reaction mass and it will take around a century for your colony ships to get to their destinations.

David · Post by **David** » 2003-01-20 10:16pm

patience. It all depends upon your ability to CONTROL the various components of your empire. If you cannot move faster than light with your communications, military, etc. then I suggest you look to the British or Roman Empires. You would have to rule one solar system yourself and have the other three ruled by dictators that are absolutely loyal to you.

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-01-20 10:17pm

if the ship was 99% reaction mass I think it would take over 1000 years to reach Proxima

ArmorPierce · Post by **ArmorPierce** » 2003-01-20 10:41pm

kojikun wrote:
Give them a lot of anatomy and hope they don't decide to revolt for no real reason
::chuckle:: I think you mean AUTONOMY not ANATOMY

Bleh, I was thinking of the right word, just didn't come out right.

GrandMasterTerwynn · Post by **GrandMasterTerwynn** » 2003-01-20 10:45pm

kojikun wrote:syntax, noone said no FTL comms, just no FTL travel. FTL comms are completely realistic and while we havent got them working now, we might in the near future. quantum tunnelling and entanglement are both very plausible technologies.

No . . . FTL comms violate causality. (You can't know about an event before you observe it happening.) I have heard exactly one example of someone claiming to send information FTL. However, the bulk of experiments suggest that though you can exceed the speed of light, you can't send information that way.

There are problems with quantum entanglement and tunnelling. In quantum entanglement, you have two particles that are in a state of quantum superposition. Their quantum states are entangled. If you have Bubba measure the quantum state of his electron on Earth, Bob will notice a similar fluctuation of his entangled electron on Epsilon Eridani when he measures his particle.

Initially this may look like we're violating causality, but we're not. From the point of view of Sue (an arbitrary observer) on Epsilon Eridani, the act of Bob measuring his particle caused the change in it's quantum state. On the other hand, from the point of view of Anne on Earth, the act of Bubba measuring his particle caused the change in it's quantum state. As a result of this symmetry, no information was conveyed FTL. Bob and Bubba will end up observing the same random behavior from their particles, however.

The problem with quantum tunneling is even worse. When you convince a particle to hop from one place to another through quantum tunnelling, you run right up into Heisenburg's Uncertainty Principle. When Bubba sends his particle through the quantum tunneling machine, he cannot know exactly where his particle is going. When Bob tries to recieve Bubba's message, part of it may have emerged near Alpha Centauri, part of it will have emerged two inches in front of Bubba's nose back on Earth, and part of it may have emerged in Bob's FTL communications device. He has no way of knowing what particles appeared from where. As a result, no information is conveyed.

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-01-20 10:57pm

No . . . FTL comms violate causality. (You can't know about an event before you observe it happening.) I have heard exactly one example of someone claiming to send information FTL. However, the bulk of experiments suggest that though you can exceed the speed of light, you can't send information that way.

FTL comms by themselves dont violate causality. FTL comms doesnt inherently mean pushing a particle FTL. Quantum entanglement and tunnelling are both noncausality violating and completely FTL.

There are problems with quantum entanglement and tunnelling. In quantum entanglement, you have two particles that are in a state of quantum superposition. Their quantum states are entangled. If you have Bubba measure the quantum state of his electron on Earth, Bob will notice a similar fluctuation of his entangled electron on Epsilon Eridani when he measures his particle.

Yep. The problem is controlling what you measure

Initially this may look like we're violating causality, but we're not.

It doesnt look like it to begin with. To violate causality the event must preceed the cause and in this case it does not. The two are simultaneous.

From the point of view of Sue (an arbitrary observer) on Epsilon Eridani, the act of Bob measuring his particle caused the change in it's quantum state. On the other hand, from the point of view of Anne on Earth, the act of Bubba measuring his particle caused the change in it's quantum state. As a result of this symmetry, no information was conveyed FTL. Bob and Bubba will end up observing the same random behavior from their particles, however.

True.

The problem with quantum tunneling is even worse. When you convince a particle to hop from one place to another through quantum tunnelling, you run right up into Heisenburg's Uncertainty Principle. When Bubba sends his particle through the quantum tunneling machine, he cannot know exactly where his particle is going. When Bob tries to recieve Bubba's message, part of it may have emerged near Alpha Centauri, part of it will have emerged two inches in front of Bubba's nose back on Earth, and part of it may have emerged in Bob's FTL communications device. He has no way of knowing what particles appeared from where. As a result, no information is conveyed.

True enough. But we've already used quantum tunnelling to transmit signals FTL. And I mean full signals (Mozarts 40th, to be precise). It was on an episode of Secret, Strange, and True on TechTV. I'll get you the physicists name when the episode comes on again.

GrandMasterTerwynn · Post by **GrandMasterTerwynn** » 2003-01-20 11:11pm

kojikun wrote:if the ship was 99% reaction mass I think it would take over 1000 years to reach Proxima :)

That's right. It takes mind-boggling quantities of energy to get something to go from one place to another. People have suggested Bussard ramjets as a possible way of getting around this problem. Unfortunately, what you're collecting is garden-variety hydrogen, which turns out to be something of a sonofabitch to fuse. It's easier to fuse deuterium and tritium into helium. That's one problem. Another problem is that the particle density isn't that high in interstellar space. A third problem is that a ramjet has to have lots of radiation shielding to protect it's crew from the ramscoop and the particles slamming into it at high fractions of c. Oops, we just made the ship heavier. Also that big magnetic field produces humongous quantities of drag against the interstellar medium. That limits the optimistic top speed of a Bussard ramjet. And the energy density of fusion simply isn't that great.

That leaves matter-antimatter reactions. Sure you may not have to carry too much antimatter aboard, which is something of a good thing, as you need bulky storage facilities to keep the antimatter in. You also need radiation shielding to protect the crew from the ship's engine, as proton-antiproton annhilation is incredibly messy. (It produces lots of nasty short-lived subatomic particles, like pions, which decay into other subatomic particles and yadda, yadda, yadda.) Oh yeah, and it indiscriminately produces high-energy gamma rays, which have astonishing penetration power. You'll want lots of inert stuff for the gamma rays to slam into. Then you can throw that out the back of your interstellar rocket.

There's really no way around it. Any interstellar rocket is going to be big, heavy, and most of all, SLOW. Speeds of 1/100th or 1/1000th of the speed of light won't be uncommon, so actually, 1000 years to Proxima Centauri might actually be a pretty reasonable time for a big colony ship. Though 430 years would certainly be nicer. Sure you could build ships that could make the trip in say 20 to 40 years, but they'd be interstellar probes that don't need alll that life-support and radiation shielding.

GrandMasterTerwynn · Post by **GrandMasterTerwynn** » 2003-01-20 11:33pm

kojikun wrote:
No . . . FTL comms violate causality. (You can't know about an event before you observe it happening.) I have heard exactly one example of someone claiming to send information FTL. However, the bulk of experiments suggest that though you can exceed the speed of light, you can't send information that way.
FTL comms by themselves dont violate causality. FTL comms doesnt inherently mean pushing a particle FTL. Quantum entanglement and tunnelling are both noncausality violating and completely FTL.

But in order to maintain causality you can't have information of event A occuring (through FTL) before you actually observe it occurring (by watching the photons pass by.) This means you can't communicate FTL. FTL communication violates causality. And you can't violate causality (it leads to nasty, nasty paradoxes.) Thus, in order for a phenomena to be perfectly FTL and not in violation of causality, you can't use the phenomena to communicate FTL.

kojikun wrote:
There are problems with quantum entanglement and tunnelling. In quantum entanglement, you have two particles that are in a state of quantum superposition. Their quantum states are entangled. If you have Bubba measure the quantum state of his electron on Earth, Bob will notice a similar fluctuation of his entangled electron on Epsilon Eridani when he measures his particle.
Yep. The problem is controlling what you measure :)

Initially this may look like we're violating causality, but we're not.

It doesnt look like it to begin with. To violate causality the event must preceed the cause and in this case it does not. The two are simultaneous.

From the point of view of Sue (an arbitrary observer) on Epsilon Eridani, the act of Bob measuring his particle caused the change in it's quantum state. On the other hand, from the point of view of Anne on Earth, the act of Bubba measuring his particle caused the change in it's quantum state. As a result of this symmetry, no information was conveyed FTL. Bob and Bubba will end up observing the same random behavior from their particles, however.

True.

The problem with quantum tunneling is even worse. When you convince a particle to hop from one place to another through quantum tunnelling, you run right up into Heisenburg's Uncertainty Principle. When Bubba sends his particle through the quantum tunneling machine, he cannot know exactly where his particle is going. When Bob tries to recieve Bubba's message, part of it may have emerged near Alpha Centauri, part of it will have emerged two inches in front of Bubba's nose back on Earth, and part of it may have emerged in Bob's FTL communications device. He has no way of knowing what particles appeared from where. As a result, no information is conveyed.

True enough. But we've already used quantum tunnelling to transmit signals FTL. And I mean full signals (Mozarts 40th, to be precise). It was on an episode of Secret, Strange, and True on TechTV. I'll get you the physicists name when the episode comes on again.[/quote]

If we could legitimately, conclusively, and repeatedly communicate information faster than the speed of light, then every journal of physics will be screaming the news. As it is, they're not. So either this isolated incident was incorrect, or the rest of physics is wrong.

SirNitram · Post by **SirNitram** » 2003-01-20 11:35pm

I'm confused. How is causality fucked if I know about an event before the photons get here?

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-01-20 11:46pm

Its not fucked up. Causality is only an issue when youre going BACK IN TIME. FTL communication doesnt violate causality because reverse time travel is not happening.

The Dark · Post by **The Dark** » 2003-01-20 11:54pm

kojikun wrote:Its not fucked up. Causality is only an issue when youre going BACK IN TIME. FTL communication doesnt violate causality because reverse time travel is not happening.

Unless it turns out that the FTL communications arrive before the event happens, in which case a response would also arrive before the event, thus meaning that you could tell someone an event has occurred before it occurs.

GrandMasterTerwynn · Post by **GrandMasterTerwynn** » 2003-01-21 12:09am

kojikun wrote:Its not fucked up. Causality is only an issue when youre going BACK IN TIME. FTL communication doesnt violate causality because reverse time travel is not happening.

Ahh, but the problem is that FTL communication is going to be time travel from at least one point of reference. Sure it isn't going to be time travel for you, the guy sending the message. You compose mesage, you hit send button. Then Susie on Zeta Reticuli recieves message. From my vantage point, sitting behind you, A came before B, which comes before C.

However, from the viewpoint of my evil twin, GrandMasterBaldurr, who is sitting at a gigantic telescope near Susie's console, he observed her recieving your message. And then, 85 years later, his great grandson observes you composing the message and hitting the send key through his gigantic telescope. Unfortunately that, to GrandMasterBaldurr III, means that your message travelled back in time 85 years to reach Suzie, since she recieved it 85 years before you apparently sent it. That's time travel, and time travel violates causality.

SirNitram · Post by **SirNitram** » 2003-01-21 12:13am

This is getting back into the 'Observer shapes reality' stuff that makes no sense to me, I think...

GrandMasterTerwynn · Post by **GrandMasterTerwynn** » 2003-01-21 12:30am

SirNitram wrote:This is getting back into the 'Observer shapes reality' stuff that makes no sense to me, I think...

The basic principle here is that everything in the universe that conveys information travels at the speed of light. This includes photons, and gravity waves. This means that you can observe Alice composing her message, sending it, and then you can see Bob recieving the message. If you try to violate this, then, in other frames of reference, you can watch Bob recieve the message, and then watch Alice compose it. Explaining it thoroughly would involve complex integral equations and explaining the concept of light cones, which I don't feel like doing at the moment.

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