Building a Star Ship

[Moontanman]

The more complex something gets it seems to me the more likely things are to go wrong. I once heard that the Space shuttle was the most complex machine made by man.

 

But if we had the technology could we build something as complex as The Star Ship Enterprise? I was looking over a cut away picture and it occurred to me that there might be a real limit on how complex and reliable a machine can be...

 

This video is very pretty, and makes my Treker Heart jump with Joy but could such a complex machine really be made?

 

 

[Phi for All]

To invent something along those lines, I have to start with Mother Necessity. We'll always have a need for propulsion, life support, sensors. Is it necessary to have complex weapons systems? Are we assuming we'll need to blast something (or maybe ourselves) once we get some experience navigating space? I suppose it's inevitable.

 

Imagine the first ocean-faring people who came up with the concept of attacking from one boat to another. It must have scared the willies out of the other guy. "Are you INSANE?! We're out in the ocean here! It's already dangerous enough with the weather, waves, and sharks, and now you have to start throwing crap at us?!"

 

Having a moving perspective that broadens the depth of information we observe with telescopes would be a huge leap. We already gain much by having telescopes separated by Earth distances, so imagine what a starship could tell us about life in other systems, even without traveling there.

[Moontanman]

To invent something along those lines, I have to start with Mother Necessity. We'll always have a need for propulsion, life support, sensors. Is it necessary to have complex weapons systems? Are we assuming we'll need to blast something (or maybe ourselves) once we get some experience navigating space? I suppose it's inevitable.

 

Imagine the first ocean-faring people who came up with the concept of attacking from one boat to another. It must have scared the willies out of the other guy. "Are you INSANE?! We're out in the ocean here! It's already dangerous enough with the weather, waves, and sharks, and now you have to start throwing crap at us?!"

 

Having a moving perspective that broadens the depth of information we observe with telescopes would be a huge leap. We already gain much by having telescopes separated by Earth distances, so imagine what a starship could tell us about life in other systems, even without traveling there.

 

 

But could such a complex machine be built? The more complex something is the more likely something will go wrong. There is no doubt much knowledge could be garnered by such a machine but are there limits to engineering complex machines?

[Phi for All]

But could such a complex machine be built? The more complex something is the more likely something will go wrong. There is no doubt much knowledge could be garnered by such a machine but are there limits to engineering complex machines?

 

A watchmaker in the 18th century would probably have said the same thing. "There's a limit to how complex you can make any mechanism."

 

I think the most important thing is to keep investing in space travel as citizens. It's always been an investment with generous returns, and it needs to be controlled by humans without profit as the primary concern. Private enterprise wants as few rules and regs as possible, but that won't help us build machines like this.

[StringJunky]

Would it be much more complex than a modern nuclear powered aircraft carrier; they are floating towns in terms of logistics and self-contained for long periods.

Edited September 22, 2016 by StringJunky

[Moontanman]

Would it be much more complex than a modern nuclear powered aircraft carrier; they are floating towns in terms of logistics and self-contained for long periods.

 

 

That is a great comparison, I'm not sure if an aircraft carrier is that complex or if it is just big...

 

A watchmaker in the 18th century would probably have said the same thing. "There's a limit to how complex you can make any mechanism."

 

I think the most important thing is to keep investing in space travel as citizens. It's always been an investment with generous returns, and it needs to be controlled by humans without profit as the primary concern. Private enterprise wants as few rules and regs as possible, but that won't help us build machines like this.

 

 

My desk top is a schematic of the Enterprise, as fictional as it is it still looks like something that would take decades if not centuries to build...

[StringJunky]

 

 

That is a great comparison, I'm not sure if an aircraft carrier is that complex or if it is just big...

The world's first aircraft carrier was called.....USS Enterprise!

 

A Nimitz class AC has 6000 personnel living on it. Now tell me that's not complex.

Edited September 22, 2016 by StringJunky

[Phi for All]

My desk top is a schematic of the Enterprise, as fictional as it is it still looks like something that would take decades if not centuries to build...

 

Perhaps the components could be assembled in different locations, and brought together in drydock (vacdock?). Hundreds of thousands of workers, robots, drones, printers, engineers, scientists. By the time we're laying out the real schematics, it won't sound as monumental and unattainable.

[MigL]

A modern microprocessor has billions of components ( transistors ), while one built just 40 years ago had less than 10000.

 

There are many ways to handle complexity and the exponential increase of things that can go wrong. One of the simplest is redundancy. Modern military aircraft don't have mechanical signaling for controls anymore, as many are now unstable and need computer control to be able to fly. But these digital signaling systems are triplex or even quadruplex redundant.

[arc]

 

 

But could such a complex machine be built? The more complex something is the more likely something will go wrong. There is no doubt much knowledge could be garnered by such a machine but are there limits to engineering complex machines?

 

I am rather limited in the incredibly wide range of scientific and engineering knowledge that is required to produce our current level of space faring craft, let alone something that could be thousands of years away in the future. Think of a similar conversational comparison with a passenger on the Mayflower imagining a ship like the Titanic just few hundred years later. Never mind what the original builder of the Mayflower would be able to estimate what the state of the art will be in 1912. We are rather blinded by our own generational cultural biases. The 1930's Buck Rogers was a viable speculation to countless movie goers the same way the 1960's Star Trek seduced my generation.

 

We saw in that original craft the farthest reaches of that era's speculation of future possibilities. And with each additional revamp of the franchise the subtle adjustments kept the concept up to date and fresh in the same way the newest remake of the Corvette does to that automotive line.

 

I would even venture that the most current rendition of the Star Trek Enterprise shares more in technological semblance with the Corvette than that far in the future assemblage of technology that would allow humans to travel between the stars.

 

And it may, and most likely will require, there be as much technological advancement in human physiology as the vessel they will ride in. So much so, they might not resemble us in many ways. Such is the price we will pay to travel to the stars.

Edited September 22, 2016 by arc

[Danijel Gorupec]

 

 

But could such a complex machine be built? The more complex something is the more likely something will go wrong. There is no doubt much knowledge could be garnered by such a machine but are there limits to engineering complex machines?

When we build really complex systems, we build it in redundant way. This way the system is always in some fault, but it never stops completely. The Enterprise star-ship would be more like a large city traffic system (or the internet) than like the space shuttle - it will be in constant state of repair but will be able to continue its missions.

[iNow]

There are clearly limits to what we can achieve and build, but (despite its obvious complexity) I don't feel something like the starship enterprise is a valid representation of that boundary.

Edited September 22, 2016 by iNow

[Moontanman]

The world's first aircraft carrier was called.....USS Enterprise!

 

A Nimitz class AC has 6000 personnel living on it. Now tell me that's not complex.

 

 

Did I mention I was a trekker?

[michel123456]

this is the last take on it

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/nasa-publishes-faster-than-light-spaceship-design-to-imagine-interstellar-exploration-9535294.html

[Phi for All]

this is the last take on it

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/nasa-publishes-faster-than-light-spaceship-design-to-imagine-interstellar-exploration-9535294.html

 

It is intriguing, but you need warp brakes to go along with the drive. AFAIK, the Alcubierre drive has no way to stop. I'm not sure the same principle in reverse halfway through the trip will allow you to end up where you want.

[imatfaal]

The world's first aircraft carrier was called.....USS Enterprise!

 

A Nimitz class AC has 6000 personnel living on it. Now tell me that's not complex.

 

Exactly - even the large cruise ships have a maximum complement and passengers getting close to 9,000 and all the infrastructure to entertain, feed, and secure these souls. We can knock them out in a couple of years from the steel being cut to the first guests arriving (yours for a billion dollars)