"Real" ringworlds

[Primogenitor]

I havnt read the culture novels so im not too sure about this but here goes. I got some background from the site below, by banks himself (apparently)
culture orbitals and stuff

A bit of basic research shows that it would have to be as strong as a ringworld. I like the idea of building it from pairs of plates and cables(sound familiar?), you could apply that to ringworlds too, to a degree. An orbital would be useable if unfinished, you would just have to have temporary walls around the edge. Ringworlds could be built from orbiting plates, but couldnt be spun at full speed untill completed.

Each orbital holds 20 earths surface and 1 earth can be made into 1500 orbitals. By contrast a ringworld is made from 250 earths and has 3 million times the surface area. So by orbitals 1 earth => 30000 earths and by ringworld 1 earth => 12000 earths. So orbitals are more efficient (in terms of surface area/mass ratio) and easier to make (cos smaller).

I have found one reaseon for contruction, going back to the original dyson sphere. Since all known energy is derived from the sun (eventually) to achieve maximum efficency you would have to cover all the sun with solar panels to harness it to maximum capacity. This is a sphereworld (without being lived on). It wouldnt have to be very large, only to about the orbit of mercury at most. Surely it would be easier to start a small star separatly though? cold fusion, for example

[Primogenitor]

Every single living organism on this planet .... wants to do only one thing: Find and fix problems.

Thats not stricly true. There is no concious disire to "fix problems". Its simply that those that do not "fix problems" die. Conside a group of foxes and a group of rabits. The foxes chase the rabits, the slow rabits are caught and die, so the remaining rabits are the only ones that can breed and the next generateion are on average faster. The slow foxes don't catch any rabits and die of starvation. Therefore only the fastest foxes breed and the next generatin is also, on average, faster than the previous one. This kills the slower of the new rabits, which get faster, and then starve the slower foxes, which get faster,..... and so on ad infinitum. Until you get light speed rabitts

We have ears because long ago things with ears did better than things without ears. Then things with relatively good ears did better than things with relatively bad ears. etc

Its a great debate whether this applies to emivromentaly mannipulative organisms (humans) because there nothing to compare us with. As a species, nothing hunts us, we dont have to struggle for food, we change our eviroment to suit us rahter than us changing to suit our enviroment, virtually everyone has children.

The question is, given everything else is equal, will a group that builds a ringworld do better than a group that doesn't build a ringworld. But how do you measure better?

[Aloofi]

Originally posted by Primogenitor:

As a species, nothing hunts us, we dont have to struggle for food, we change our eviroment to suit us rahter than us changing to suit our enviroment, virtually everyone has children.

Nothing hunt us?
We hunt ourselves, and waste our lives and resources in civil wars, from an species perspective.
And some of us do have to struggle for food, and all of us have to adapt to the enviroment that we have changed.

.

[Primogenitor]

Ok then, point accepted

No other species hunts us. We are plagued by simian tribalism and teritoriality from our ancient genetic heritage that has little relevance to our "sentient" minds. Our selfish genes that once drove us to band together with others who were likely to hold other copies of those genes in order for those genes to prosper and spread now propell humanity on a hopeless course towards essesive resource accumulation and short term gains at the expense of long term survival. Unless our minds can surpass our genetic makeup, we are doomed to destroy ourselves in overpowering greed and guttony. Evolution had no design, no forsight, no plan, no morals, no order, no direction, no skill, no predictability, no rules, no fairness, in humanities creation. It simply is, because it could not be otherwise. Do we have the will to plan, to survive the evolutionary forces that would destroy us? Can our society evolve fast enough that we can survive without destroyed all the resources we need? Could the earth ever support a species like us again? Evolution may have given birth to us, and the earth may be our cradle, but you cannot stay in the cradle forever.

[/End Rant]

[Narrew]

I thought that Dyson Spheres were inhabited on the inside like a Ring World, but completely encompass the sun to trap all energy and possiably hide from the rest of the universe (wasnt it a Star Trek movie that found a bunch of Dyson Spheres?).

*sigh* too bad we have to mess around on this rock of a world instead of going out to the "Last frontier"

[Jack Simth]

Originally posted by Dingocat85:
The only thing physicists see as a use for black holes (besides a big trash can ) is going forward in time, in a sense.

Actually, there is the theoretical possibility of using one to get energy - Microscopic black holes produce Hawking Radiation - the smaller the black hole, the more radiation produced. However, you can't readily control the rate of production (it is a function of the black hole's mass, which can be difficult to change). You could also capture energy by feeding the black hole matter - gas dropped into a black hole heats up to compensate for the gravitational potential energy loss, and hot gas produces light, some of which can escape the gravity well from the black hole.

Mind you, to get this energy, you have to be able to manipulate a small black hole, which is probably very difficult (if possible) and very dangerous.

[ May 14, 2003, 22:33: Message edited by: Jack Simth ]

[Jack Simth]

Originally posted by Narrew:
I thought that Dyson Spheres were inhabited on the inside like a Ring World, but completely encompass the sun to trap all energy and possiably hide from the rest of the universe (wasnt it a Star Trek movie that found a bunch of Dyson Spheres?).

That was the original idea, but the mass of the Dyson Sphere is useless for producing gravity inside the sphere, as the gravitation produced by the mass "below" you is cancelled out exactly by the rest of the sphere (assuming an even distribution, that is) leaving only the mass of the star to pull on you - which means things tend to drop into the star if they aren't anchored down. Some form of artifical gravity, or anti-gravity would be required.
Likewise, the star isn't affected by the gravity of the sphere, and can wander around, probably impacting on the sphere's inner surface, unless some controlled force is applied.

In other words, to get a Dyson Sphere to work, you need artifical gravity and the ability to move stars around at will - in addition to the matter needed to build the sphere, the materials technology so that the sphere maintains its shape, and possibly a few other things.

If you plan on living on the outside, you can drop the artifical gravity, but not the rest.

[ May 14, 2003, 22:34: Message edited by: Jack Simth ]