Technical Ben

Thanks KSK. A nice informative and polite reply. So DNA has many properties and is observed to contain a code that cellular mechanisms can use. Why would anyone wish to deny that?

Many non-crackpots and extremely well educated and professional people claim either FTL, perpetual motion, or magic. It's no loss to me. I've seen it first hand in general life, professionalism in no way protects against disillusion and risk to others (eg banking crisis, most peoples family life). The runaway problem with AI, is the same as with any system we use, or tool. A car or aircraft has simple "ai" and autopilot. It can malfunction, or cause a problem because we ask it to do a specific thing really well, and we made a mistake on the destination. So the same applies to AI. A car cannot take over the world can it? A well trained cat or dog? An intelligent person? A car has speed and armour, a person intelligence and craftiness. It's impossible to combine the two and not make a sacrifice on efficiency in one area or the other.

That statement is observed, tested and scientifically shown to be false. If the codon table produces different results, it proves it's part of a code, not part of a reaction. That's what a code under a different translation mechanism does, it gives different results (or junk in, junk out). Thus showing it's not bound by chemical results that are required to give the same result. If it was bound by chemical reactions, it would give the same result in all animals, as chemical reactions always give out the same substances each time. Language is flexible, it can be English, French, Spanish etc. Chemicals always give the same result. Ink in a book is not a chemical reaction, it's data for us to use. Do we see the ordering of the nucleotides in DNA to be chemically restricted, or to be chemically free? For example, tRNA, the codon table and the arrangement of nucleotides are all able to hold arbitrary information. It's true that as with everything in existence they are bound by the laws of physics. They are effected by chemical reactions. But so is my HDD on my pc. So is a DVD. So is a car and a computer. Does it effect the data held within them? shynung, a book can be a library. A book or library can easily contain the information required to produce more books mechanically. A DVD can. There is enough of a separation, and many scientific papers on it, of the data and mechanical properties in DNA, for me to confidently state it is not bound by them as to it's ordering of it's nucleotides. That ordering does effect it's larger structure, just as it can do so in a book, HDD or DVD. But the structure of the data, is again not linked or a limiting factor to the information in that data. For example, I have to be limited to a page in a book, or a sector on a HDD/DVD, but can put any arbitrary data within that. So science can currently see there is structure (physical limits in DNA), but there is also freedom to it's ordering (it can code for any protein, via any codon table of choice). If we can (and we can), choose any arbitrary codon table, and any arbitrary dna sequence, to produce and arbitrary protein, how can we state it is chemically or physically constrained? TLDR version, the DNA it's transcription and translation, it's codon table and the tRNA each contain "free" information, that can be assigned any other chemical bond. Thus they are not chemically restricted (eg any nucleotide order for any nucleotide substitution to any amino acid).

Joking about "adding more struts" and the actual comments made (possibly in reference to KSP) by the spaceX team on another site got me downvoted for the "weight problems" involved. Yey internet for not getting the joke, except the poster who said they "should roll back a version so it's a massless dragless strut". Even more subtle a joke!

Anyone watch "Sea Quest"? Similar concepts. Similar problems. Similar realities. We're at 2015, no moon base and no deep sea bases.

Seen Googles latest image processing system? It's scary "clever". It is however limited. Software problems are not really much different than engineering problems, which are physics problems. Which is to say, we can engineer things "like" other things, but exactly the same, so as to say "this is a person" or "this is a [virtual] worm"? Take Boston Dynamics PetaMan as an example in engineering. It should be theoretically easy to replicate the mechanical and software systems the human body (or any biological system) uses, right? Well, we can get close, we can do faster or stronger. But can we get all the attributes and qualities? And that's a mainly engineering problem, with power and control mechanics, not a software one with a few billion neurons worth of information to track. PS, I don't watch videos about "scary computers can learn and hit the singularity". Mainly because diminishing returns and limits to hardware apply to AI as much as they do to squishy humans. An AI is as dangerous as any other human, car, bomb or animal. It's not anything "special" beyond that (if AI can self improve at any speed, it will not be as fast as the existing intelligence, people and animals. Unless we magic in magic hardware for it to run on).

I assume the gradual drop off of atmo could be added with a simple tweak on a line of code/ini file. So why not ask and wait and see?

That's great then! Who said it cannot be a molecule with both a chemical reaction and contain a code? Is a HDD not also a bit of magnetic metal and contains a code? Which is an amazing system. Of any construction, it's always more than just "chemistry", right? A book, in context of pages and words, is more than just "chemistry of ink and wood". Why? Ink and wood have no specific physical property to arrange as they do. They require construction to be in that specific arrangement. I would have thought the construction can be any means, and is not restrained by or to chemistry (we can have a Kindle, a TV or a book showing words and being used in context). Is this true of the code in DNA, the transcription mechanisms applied to it and at work in a cell? The statements and observations I've seen in biology papers and other more laymen explanations, has been that chemical bonds in DNA have no preference on the ordering of the nucleotides. Yes, all physical iterations have an effect on all things, but in this case not to a (significant) extent to effect things. For example even the Codon table, I've seen described as also being free from chemical influence, in that it can also be arbitrarily chosen (we can theoretically assign any tRNA type to produce and any nucleotide->RNA->tRNA->Amino Acid ordering we wish, thus so can nature). So is it a coded system, a mechanical system, or a chemical system?

I don't. However, I expect the same problem with QM computers to apply to silicon/transistor ones. Try making either the size of a human brain, and running off the same wattage, without overheating and with at least 50 years lifespan/service life (doable for silicon but not sure on the other requirements). Doing 1 thing really well is easy. Doing all at the same time? Then we hit natural limits of physics. Biology already works on the atomic scale, it already has a lead start on us, and theoretically may already be using the most efficient, thus only means, to get to it's goal. An example being, we can make jumb jets, but making something fly as well as a bird on the same power requirements with the same maintenance (IE, self maintaining)? We need a bird, not a robot then.

Again. Go out and check the processes involved. Your stating "It must always be kept in mind that an HDD fundamentally isn't a code or a language, it's an actual magnetic force." Yes, because DNA is not a code, it contains the code. Just as a HDD is just magnets. A clock work Turing machine is just cogs. A usb stick is just silicone. A DVD just tin foil and oxidisation. But none of those things are "just molecules", but actual functional objects. DNA is a molecule. The processes applied on it are of copying, translation, transcription, recombination, error checking, etc, etc, etc. These are not "chemical" functions, though they are chemical processes, they are mechanical processes. Just as space flight is via chemical processes, we do not call a solid rocket booster "just a molecule". Do we? Calling DNA just a molecule, is like calling a Computer, with a HDD, DVD drive, RAM and CPU as "just a silicon reaction with magnetic attraction". That's it's materials, not it's observed mechanical function (or just "observed action", if removing all possible accidental "intent" from our observations). It's correct to call it that, but incorrect to argue it thus holds no "code", just as it's wrong to argue my computer holds no "code". Defining c# on my HDD may be difficult, but it's certainly a scientific fact. First prove to me my OS does not exist, and this forums software is not coded, then I could understand why people are attempting to suggest the same functions applied to DNA + cellular machinery also does not exist as a "code" within such a system.

I do feel the shields have too much "fuel". I'd be happy with the shields being nerfed a little (perhaps half or a quarter of the ablation resource) and heating from re-entry staying the same.

Granted I am in sandbox, but getting to duna was fine. Even when my craft spun due to balance/drag problems. All new craft to duna will have airbreaks on the rear to stabilise. Going to attempt gravity assists around Jool. Eve? I've decide to never go there. Never... too much DV to return. Nope. Not even going to try. Never. Large stick, end of, not even touching!

Cutting weight is fine, as long as it's not replaced by more fuel and/or less flight time. Unless weight is a problem, the heavier craft may perform better.

Quantum computers though, have a risk of going back to the room sized computer for a singly byte of calculation power. Plus even with all the computational power in the world (the internet is not far off a single human brain in complexity/potential parts IIRC), we still don't know where to start on the software to run on it. XD

It might have 5k DV less than my designs in 0.90, but it's a first draft of a giant interplanetary cruiser.

You play KSP to watch things explode? What is wrong with you... oh wait, that is part of the game! But in all honesty, most explosions are take off and landing. Events mid flight are by their nature less dramatic. Heating is still in need of tweaking I agree.

It could be added just as multiple launch locations. Either as stock, or as a "option". Such as "buy/sell launch facilities". We could have multiple places, and certain bonuses/drawbacks. IE, the little island would have a "no reputation loss from explosions/crashes/lost building" but be limited to teir 1 sizes and part limits. The "secret base" would have no money bonuses and no reputation gains on mission completion (so science only) but would be totally top secret, so explosions and failures offer no reputation losses. Then launching from a city location would give reputation and money and sit seeing bonuses on missions, but hold harder launch restrictions due to being far from the equator, and very hard landings avoiding the city! (Plus no nukes or other fuel restrictions) There could even be a city location with just a runway, so either space plane, or ferry to KSC.

Remember, the pioneer probes was solved over a simple heat leak. Don't get too hung up on physics.

People tend to define sentience as feeling in the same way they do. But also extend it to animals that feel in a similar way. Though people tend to define sapience as thinking and feeling in the same way a person does. As animals are observed to be different, we do not apply this ability or quality to most, if not all, animals. This may give us definite cut offs between a person and a bird and a fly and a flower and a rock. Or it may give us gradual separation and differences. However, until we know how to exactly model one or the other, or all of them, it's rather hard to say and AI is "the same" or not. So once we can model (if ever) human thinking and feeling, once we model animal thinking/reactions and feelings, then we can say yes or no to "we can do the same with a computer". Theoretically, the answer is always "yes". But there may be practical limitations to what we can construct, see the Rocket Equation for where we hit physical limits. We may just be unable to hold onto a brain and read it's patterns/arrangements long enough without damaging them, to be able to record and copy them. Or we may just be able to make a clock work fly and a clock work fish and a clock work person. Clock work Turing machines (computers) are totally possible, as as said, some things are too impractical though! So it may be too impractical to build a silicon "brain" just as it's too impractical to build a clock work "brain" or clock work "Deep Blue" ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_Blue_%28chess_computer%29 ). For now the answer has to be "unknown", until we do more research or get wiser.

Last post in this thread. May I suggest anyone thinking DNA is not a code, to go out and learn about DNA, transcription and translation (depending on cell type) and the control mechanisms involved in gene expression. Then ask yourself, does the scientific community and scientific definitions call these things "code" or does it call it something else?

Even the pioneer probes extra momentum/speed got figured out recently. Right? If I remember correctly it was heat leaking from their nuclear power... if we can figure that out, and it's not some "magical" (word used lightly) physics breaking discovery, then we can here.

An article, on the internet, accurate? More chance of a perpetual... oh wait.

I've got 2 of the smallest panels only (yes I was really min/maxing and exploiting... and still aim to!). Thankfully power does not drain when not in focus on the craft. So I'm jumping in, burning (engines generate more power), switching out. I will leave it in orbit, as it's mainly a spare fuel tanker (I send a couple as a test/backup each journey now), so I can use KIS/KAS to attach some nuclear power or just drain it.

The difficulty of Antimatter trapping, only need to be as equal to the difficulty of making a steampunk rocket. IE, it's fictional. But I agree with the oxygen/carbon dioxide problem. The ideas were only as plot devices. With what can be added, or left out.

What is this I don't even...?