Hmmmmm.....

Any thoughts?

Was only able to watch the first 6 minutes so far. I think we're vain to posit that physics presents a ceiling only (to quote the vid) "...a little bit higher than where we are now". I think we don't know what we don't know, as of now. Or to quote Donald Rumsfeld, there are known knowns and known unknowns. Or something like that. heh.

Of course, then again, in another 10 years my 7800X3D might be ruling the planet.

I didn't watch, but I'm of a mind that technology, or because of technology, is a massive filter blocking truly advanced civilizations.

I mean, just look at where we are at this time. Hot enough for ya?!

One reason this resonated with me is that I've noticed more and more of the hard-science pundits I watch have been mentioning the increasing difficulty of learning more, as the energies required to reveal new particles/science is steadily withdrawing beyond even theoretical human power capabilities. At the same time certain particles are so elusive that its acknowledged we may have no chance at all at ever directly studying them.

Meanwhile, parts of the cosmos are already forever beyond our sight, and even the true beginnings of the universe will eventually become completely obscured for truly late-arriving civilizations.

The possibility of a hard ceiling on our (or anyones) capability to realistically explore beyond certain energy and size regimes does not seem an especially hard concept to swallow.....

Example 1:

Edited Thursday at 02:28 AM2 days by HiFlyer

I haven't watched the video either, but there is a minimal amount of energy required to store information: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landauer%27s_principle

So, yes, at some point you cannot know more, but we are still pretty far away from that limit. As for the graviton, researchers already discuss ideas how to demonstrate its existence using interferometry with nano-diamonds, but it will take a long time until those experiments could be realized. Also, it is quite possible that the graviton is just a fiction. The best experiments can resolve structures of about 10^-18 meters, and graviton physics only becomes relevant around 10^-35 meters. That's 17 orders of magnitude about which you assume that nothing new happens there. That is comparable to being only able to measure objects that are many meters large (say, around Isaac Newton's time or even earlier) and then infer you have an idea how the atomic nucleus works.

Interesting....

If absolutely nobody is watching the video, how can anyone effectively refute it?

This is a question that's actually interesting to me, because I've wondered for years about he apparent forum aversion to youtubers and youtube videos, and also social media of various types especially Discord and etc.

Plus a general disdain for the press, especially on any technical subject.

I've contemplated starting a thread on the subject multiple times but honestly, i've been too chicken s***. 😃

It was intelligence that brought us plastics. Now are oceans are poisoned. Nano technology. Being small they can be absorbed by the skin and then bypass the human body's natural defense systems with ease. Nuclear weapons. Bombs can destroy cities and nations. Applied biology. World wide disease plagues.

Relatively laid back rural communities (the Shire) are full of happy lazy beings living the good life. Meanwhile in advanced communities (Isengard) the scientists (Saruman) is creating powerful machinery and robotics which might inevitably lead to the ruin of all.

Edited Thursday at 10:18 PM1 day by Fielder

20 hours ago, HiFlyer said:

If absolutely nobody is watching the video, how can anyone effectively refute it?

Don't worry, they don't watch mine either, but still comment. 😁

But... I give you my assurance that as a fellow cat lover I WILL watch it some time today. 👍

9 hours ago, Fielder said:

It was intelligence that brought us plastics. Now are oceans are poisoned. Nano technology. Being small they can be absorbed by the skin and then bypass the human body's natural defense systems with ease. Nuclear weapons. Bombs can destroy cities and nations. Applied biology. World wide disease plagues.

Any technology can be both positive and negative.

I was sewing my sock the other day and the needle stuck in my finger.

Watched video.

Certainly valid that there's a limit to how much we can glean using high energy physics.

But humans are crafty critters, so we try to find ways around such difficulties.

Here are the two primary ways we are breaking through the traditional energy barriers:

1. Cosmic Rays: Nature's Free Particle Accelerators

Instead of spending billions to accelerate particles on Earth, scientists look to outer space. Deep-space phenomena like supernovae, colliding neutron stars, and supermassive black holes act as ultimate particle accelerators.

• Ultra-High-Energy Cosmic Rays (UHECRs): The universe routinely fires protons and atomic nuclei at Earth with kinetic energies exceeding \(10^{20}\) eV.

• The Oh-My-God Particle: In 1991, scientists detected a single cosmic ray particle with the energy of a fast-pitched baseball. It possessed roughly 40 million times the energy of the protons accelerated at Europe's Large Hadron Collider (LHC).

• The Limit: By studying how these ultra-energetic cosmic rays interact with our atmosphere, physicists can observe particle physics at energy levels we could never generate artificially.

2. Gravitational Wave Astronomy: Seeing the Unseeable

Traditional telescopes use light (photons), which gets blocked by the opaque, dense plasma of the early universe. Gravitational waves—ripples in the fabric of space-time itself—pass through absolutely everything completely unimpeded.

• Looking Past the CMB Wall: Gravitational waves allow us to look past the 380,000-year cosmic wall. In theory, primordial gravitational waves could carry data from the first fraction of a second after the Big Bang.

• Probing Extreme Physics: When black holes collide, they distort space-time to its absolute limits. By analyzing these waves, we can test Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity under conditions of infinite density and gravity without needing to create a black hole ourselves.

Edited 14 hours ago14 hr by martin-w

I think what the video might be missing is that technology can continue to progress well into the future, likely centuries or millennia... without bigger and bigger colliders.

No more colliders might stop further understanding of particle physics, but it doesn't stop us rearranging the science/physics we know to build revolutionary tech.

"As physicist Richard Feynman famously noted, "There’s plenty of room at the bottom." If we can master building materials atom-by-atom—creating flawless room-temperature superconductors, ultra-strong carbon nanotube structures, or meta-materials that manipulate light perfectly—we could revolutionize space travel, construction, and electronics using only the elements on the periodic table."

In my opinion (not that I know much) I'd say the video has some validity but underestimates how far we can go before the limits mentioned restrict further technological advancement.

Edited 14 hours ago14 hr by martin-w

Indeed civilizations can avoid technical advances destroying itself. And new technologies that overcome relativistic speed limits for space travel. The proof is the familiar myriad of strange cultures we see and hear all around us.

Those horned and winged creatures from space crowding every travel bar on Earth at our spaceports. We all remember each new species from the outer universe when it first appeared on our planet. And opened up diplomatic offices and retail stores full of wonderful gadgets at attractive prices. Obviously proving that intelligence is likely to overcome the dangers of runaway knowledge advancement.

7 hours ago, Fielder said:

Indeed civilizations can avoid technical advances destroying itself. And new technologies that overcome relativistic speed limits for space travel. The proof is the familiar myriad of strange cultures we see and hear all around us.

Those horned and winged creatures from space crowding every travel bar on Earth at our spaceports. We all remember each new species from the outer universe when it first appeared on our planet. And opened up diplomatic offices and retail stores full of wonderful gadgets at attractive prices. Obviously proving that intelligence is likely to overcome the dangers of runaway knowledge advancement.

😉