Nuclear fusion breakthrough

[BeachGuy23 514]

1 minute ago, HellToupee said:

A little off topic but my mind is always blown away when I hear Cleopatra lived closer to the iPhone launch than the building of the great pyramid 

Look at life in 1984 , kind of similar to today despite a 40 years of advancements. But 1944 to 84 is extremely different 

Huh.  I would disagree completely.  What was so different from 44 to 84?  Color tv and the nuclear bomb.  Medicines were better, but not that much different.  We still communicated the same way.  Used typewriters.  Went to libraries.  

Completely different today than 1984.  But that's my opinion. 

[jerryskids 5,212]

18 minutes ago, BeachGuy23 said:

You can have your opinion boyo.  You're wrong of course but you do you.

Do you have any clue how our advanced technology for something like immunotherapies has unlocked the body's ability to fight disease?  I'm sure you do, you use them.

Some cancers that were death sentences for all years prior can now be managed therapeutically.  With many many more in the pipeline.  

Pardon me if I give that TONS more weight than a freaking printing press or car. 

Of course I'm happy we've developed immunotherapies.  I wouldn't exactly put that in the same league as antibiotics and vaccines though, in the giant scheme of things.

Sheesh, I can't believe I'm having this debate with a guy who thinks a significant tech advancement is a new suite of macros in Excel.  

[Jose M 49]

You know what crosses my minds Seniors and Senioritis?  If you had said a cure for cancer or eliminated cancer it might rank up there with the eradication of smallpox.   But, hey, managing a couple cancers therapeutically, that's something.  

[EternalShinyAndChrome 2,539]

Just now, Jose M said:

You know what crosses my minds Seniors and Senioritis?  If you had said a cure for cancer or eliminated cancer it might rank up there with the eradication of smallpox.   But, hey, managing a couple cancers therapeutically, that's something.  

Don't forget about those advancements in Excel macros that BeachGhey is amazed by!!!

[The Real timschochet 2,971]

40 minutes ago, Thornton Melon said:

I'll be 60 at the end of the month, so you can drop the "boyo" schtick with me, Slappy. I've also been a mechanical engineer for 37+ years and I've worked with my share of physicists over the years. I love their optimism, but like I said, not in our lifetimes...

Why not? 

 

Im not an engineer, don’t claim to be one, and not trying to challenge your expertise, which I respect. But I do know that history suggests that when a technological breakthrough happens it can occur very quickly and it often upends all previous predictions. So why not be optimistic? 

[jerryskids 5,212]

By the way, I just looked it up:  Excel was introduced in 1985, which for the math challenged, is > 25 years ago.

[Mike Hunt 154]

46 minutes ago, BeachGuy23 said:

I'm in finance for a company that utilizes major technology advancements boyo.

Are you denying we've made more technological advancements in the last 25 years than all the years proceeding it?

And you're retired so likely not very familiar with the latest and greatest.

 

You really do need some new material.   The boyo schtick is stale. 

[BeachGuy23 514]

You guys are too much.

Unlocking the human genome not a big deal?

And cancer treatments are infinitely more complex than antibiotics FFS.  Note how little changed in cancer treatments prior to 2010 other than finding more drugs adapt at killing all cells.  We are so much more advanced in cancer treatments than we were 15 years ago that it’s incredible.

But yes, only Excel advancements…SMH

[Jose M 49]

4 minutes ago, jerryskids said:

By the way, I just looked it up:  Excel was introduced in 1985, which for the math challenged, is > 25 years ago.

ENIAC in 1945 and Moore revised his law in 1975.  And I'm just a dumb Mexican.  The retarded American still misses computing extending it to 50 years.

[jerryskids 5,212]

29 minutes ago, Hardcore troubadour said:

I think if you looked at any 25 year span post industrial revolution you could say that any of those 25 years saw the biggest leap in technological advancements. Boyo with the irrelevant observation once again 

I can see this argument.  I think part of it is how you define "advancements."  For instance, the raw increase in the number of transistors on an advanced computer chip in the past 25 years would dwarf the number in all years prior, because of Moore's Law and the way size increases in development.

But is this a bigger development than the invention of the transistor? Of the integrated circuit? Of the basic semiconductor process still fundamental to manufacturing today?  One could argue, and I'm inclined to do so, that going from zero to any number is an infinite increase, and more important than the subsequent improvements.

It is a difference of revolutionary vs. evolutionary, or research vs. development.  When I got my first engineering job in 1989, I worked on two different projects that came out of our research labs.  These labs were funded to hire brilliant people to go explore new, revolutionary things, many (most) of which would never come to fruition, but some might.  Large companies like IBM, Bell Labs, etc. attracted the best and brightest for such speculative work.  Fast forward to today though, and you don't see this.  Guys like Beach Guy, the finance expert, took over companies, and shareholders no longer would support "wasting" money on projects which couldn't be tied to improving the bottom line.

As such, most pure research today is limited to academia and government, two institutions full of people with little to no real world experience.

Of course, we do have AI creating revisionist history with black vikings, so we've got that going for us...

[BeachGuy23 514]

30 minutes ago, Baker Boy said:

But the USA is putting their money on thousand-year-old technology, such as wind and solar energy.

Agree that’s not the future.  Fine in localized usage but not close to a material impact on our energy needs.

[BeachGuy23 514]

7 minutes ago, Mike Hunt said:

 

You really do need some new material.   The boyo schtick is stale. 

My schtick is as fresh as the blooming tulips boyo.

[The Real timschochet 2,971]

1 minute ago, Hardcore troubadour said:

You damn sure did challenge his expertise when you brought up you do the books for a tech company.  Can’t keep your shitt straight for one thread. 

What books? I have no idea what you’re referring to. 

[Hardcore troubadour 12,677]

1 minute ago, The Real timschochet said:

What books? I have no idea what you’re referring to. 

My bad. Not for you. Apologies. Took it down. 

[BeachGuy23 514]

We have access to the accumulated knowledge of the human race on our phones.  But we’re haven’t advanced much in the last 25 years?

Complex models like weather forecasts are way more accurate now.

Scientist will be able to slow aging in a few decades.  Quantum computing is very close. Heck sports shows us exit velocity, spin rate, club head speed, etc.

We consume tv with tons more colors, resolution, size.  Not to mention all the advancement that AI will bring (if it doesn’t kill us).

But I guess you guys need to see flying cars like the Jetsons?

SAD

[Maximum Overkill 658]

I made nuclear fusion this morning. It was a 3 flusher. 

[Thornton Melon 544]

1 hour ago, jerryskids said:

Happy early birfday, old geezer!   

Thanks, skids 

[Thornton Melon 544]

1 hour ago, BeachGuy23 said:

Boyo is an expression of affection, age has nothing to do with it.

And after witnessing all the wonders of the last 25 years you doubt what's possible in the next 25?

I'm not talking about light speed or transporters, but known physics like this?  Maybe not in 25 years but definitely 50.  50 years ago we were nothing like we are 

No, "boyo" is just cringy and stupid. 

I'm not looking at the last 25 years in "wonderment". Sure, some everyday tasks have been made simpler and I can order a pizza from my phone, but big advances in areas like nuclear fusion, molecular electronics and nanotechnology just have not panned out like they were predicted 25 years ago.

I hope I'm wrong, but I don't think I am.

[Engorgeous George 1,198]

3 hours ago, Thornton Melon said:

I'll be 60 at the end of the month, so you can drop the "boyo" schtick with me, Slappy. I've also been a mechanical engineer for 37+ years and I've worked with my share of physicists over the years. I love their optimism, but like I said, not in our lifetimes...

I would think it would be difficult to contain and sustain a reaction at 100 million degrees since the melting point of all known and unknown containment verssels is much lower.  I suppose one could try to build in some sort of gravitational force to hold and contain such a reaction but what if that contgainment failed? Ii am glad there are smarter folks than me working on the matter.  Can you tell me is this why they use to work on cold fusion?

[Engorgeous George 1,198]

2 hours ago, BeachGuy23 said:

Just give it a thought.

There's a cool description in Three Body Problems that outlines just how quickly technology has advanced in the last 25 years.

And think, from the years 1925 - 1975 we did create nuclear fission and we did put a man on the moon and TV was developed.  But outside that, life changed very little.  Now think how vastly life is different between 1975 and now.  The sheer amount of information available to us.  Our ability to perform complex calculations at almost the speed of light gives us the ability to model, correct, re-model and then test.

Truly incredible. 

And yet the Concord no longer flies, high speed rail eludes us if not the Japanese or the Europeans, we look to the Soviets, Chinese and Space X for launch vehicles as the shuttles have been retired, and we still do not have personal flying cars or even a decent amphibious one, though I did see a rally of 1960's ampibious cars at Grand Lake Colorado a few years back.

 

I guess progress is sporadic. Certainly have to agree we have made great progress in computing.  I wonder what the next major advance will be in that field.  Will we move to using a new base for programing instead of base two.  Will it be in hardware, will it become some form of reconfigurable and programable pliableware?   I wonder will I appreciatge the scope of the next advances or will it be beyond my ken.

[iam90sbaby 2,127]

2 hours ago, jerryskids said:

Beach Guy, the finance expert, took over companies

Dude isn't an expert at anything 

[Engorgeous George 1,198]

1 hour ago, Maximum Overkill said:

I made nuclear fusion this morning. It was a 3 flusher. 

Did it go out your pipes or off into a black hole, or both?

[EternalShinyAndChrome 2,539]

4 minutes ago, iam90sbaby said:

Dude isn't an expert at anything 

Except glory holes.

[The Real timschochet 2,971]

34 minutes ago, Engorgeous George said:

there are smarter folks than me 

Major understatement. Includes about 99% of those reading this. 

[Mike Hunt 154]

10 hours ago, BeachGuy23 said:

My schtick is as fresh as the blooming tulips boyo.

OK...  It was amusing the first hundred times. It is stale now.  

[double tour 88]

12 hours ago, The Real timschochet said:

It boggles the mind. Unlimited free energy. Clean. No climate change; no nuclear waste. No dependence on oil. Enough for everyone around the world. An end to human poverty. 

WTF? Got it. This is a joke. Kind of lame but you tried I guess. 

 

[The Real timschochet 2,971]

58 minutes ago, double tour said:

WTF? Got it. This is a joke. Kind of lame but you tried I guess. 

 

?? No joke. The climate change problem we’re suffering from is a result of man’s use of fossil fuels. Eliminate fossil fuels and the problem goes away. 

[nobody 2,049]

13 hours ago, Patented Phil said:

Reality check from the article…

Nuclear fusion “is not ready yet and therefore it can’t help us with the climate crisis now,” said Aneeqa Khan, research fellow in nuclear fusion at the University of Manchester in the UK.

However, she added, if progress continues, fusion “has the potential to be part of a green energy mix in the latter half of the century.”

So the best case scenario is that by the end of the century it “has the potential” to be “part of” our overall energy sourcing.

Whoever said it won't be in our lifetimes is right, but it'll be like flipping a switch when they figure out how to control a sustainable reaction.  It'll go from nowhere to everywhere quite quickly.

And whoever weaponizes it first will be the winner.

[nobody 2,049]

14 hours ago, BeachGuy23 said:

Padon me if I give that TONS more weight than a freaking printing press or car. 

[double tour 88]

3 hours ago, The Real timschochet said:

?? No joke. The climate change problem we’re suffering from is a result of man’s use of fossil fuels. Eliminate fossil fuels and the problem goes away. 

That's not true. "Climate change" is a redundant term in a sense. The climate is defined by it changing. It's been that way since day one of the planet. And it will ALWAYS be that way.

The Earth has gone through volcano eruptions, meteor storms, ice ages, warming periods, hurricanes...you name it. And it will go back and forth like that until the sun swallows it whole. 

You can spend your life being afraid of this man made lie, but not me. In case you haven't noticed, the name of this "problem" kept changing until they could settle on the most generic of all terms. "Climate change". It's an easy sell to those who need some "problem" to hang onto and be concerned about. It helps elected officials have something to work people up about without them having to do anything that can be measured in their lifetime. They can run on that crap for years without any accountability or actual measurable results because there is nothing to fix.

[kutulu 1,551]

 

[jonmx 1,598]

18 hours ago, The Real timschochet said:

https://www.cnn.com/2024/04/01/climate/nuclear-fusion-record-korea-climate-intl/index.html
 

Biggest story on the planet. 100 years from now, historians looking back will talk about this topic as they do Gutenberg’s printing press or the start of the Industrial Revolution. This energy will change all of our lives in profound ways we can’t even imagine at this moment. Virtually every problem we face now will be eliminated. 

Pretty sure it will do nothing to solve the problem of the corrupt out of control leftist elitist bastards controlling every aspect of of our lives while illegally enriching themselves fighting useless wars while brainwashing 51 percent of the population through state run media and education. 

[MLCKAA 401]

19 hours ago, The Real timschochet said:

The vast majority of human poverty has nothing to do with the individual choices of those who find themselves in poverty. This will resolve that issue. There will still be poor people sure. But absolute destitution and starvation will become extremely rare, a thing of the past. 

It will be a very nice thing, but you’re overselling it.

Third world countries will realize the biggest improvements which affect quality of life.  In first world countries, where we already have a continuous supply of energy, many of the existing socioeconomic problems will persist.  There’ll just be cleaner energy.