155
If you could ask one question and get a 100% true answer, what would it be and why?
(lemmy.blahaj.zone)
this post was submitted on 16 Oct 2023
155 points (98.1% liked)
Ask Lemmy
27028 readers
1236 users here now
A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions
Please don't post about US Politics. If you need to do this, try !politicaldiscussion@lemmy.world
Rules: (interactive)
1) Be nice and; have fun
Doxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them
2) All posts must end with a '?'
This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?
3) No spam
Please do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.
4) NSFW is okay, within reason
Just remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either !asklemmyafterdark@lemmy.world or !asklemmynsfw@lemmynsfw.com.
NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].
5) This is not a support community.
It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions.
If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email info@lemmy.world. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.
Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.
Partnered Communities:
Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
What's the optimal engineering solution for fusion energy.
To consign combustion to the past.
Why limit to fusion? Ask for the optimal energy production solution, period. Might be something we never thought of.
The answer might be impossible or impractical like a Dyson Sphere.
Or it might just be pretty straightforward: Use Solar panels to harvest the energy of the sun, that is there for free goddammit.
What's the most efficient design for an energy generation device that fits in an area smaller than 1 cubic mile, uses materials found on Earth or nearby planets/passing comets, and if it outputs particle, waves, or any combination thereof that destroy the atmosphere or DNA/life, contains the destroyers?
But if we're dealing with a demon or a genie or aliens, we won't like the answer. Fuckin' tricksters.
Gather solar energy over millions of years and accumulate it as a thick liquid. Then, to unlock the energy, simply burn that liquid. Or process it into other forms and burn that.
Or maybe impossible or impractical like fusion.
Yeah, a Dyson sphere is arguably pretty optimal (or one of the even more outlandish interstellar level theoretical solutions). Why deal with fuel when stars are already there? There's even a classification system for how advanced a species is, which measures efficiency of energy consumption. In that, harnessing the power of a single star is a type 2 civilization (humans are generally considered on the scale of type 0.7).
But yeah, knowing that maybe it's theoretically possible does nothing to help us actually make such a thing. Even if we were to also be told exactly what materials it would take and an exact blueprint of what to do, the scale of construction is pretty much beyond current human levels.