Navigating 21st Century: Transportation & Navigation

[Gear300]

It was after listening to podcasts on Freeman Dyson two or three years ago that I was convinced that our best bet at Earth-Moon navigating was somewhere along the lines of a nuclear-chemical pulsed transmission. And I guess the subject matter leads itself into plasma physics somehow. (Funny enough, it was not after reading on Edward Teller or Leó Szilard years before that the thought came to me, probably because they were thinking along the lines of blowing bombs in rivers and Alaskan ice.) If my guess is right, then taking it further, we might even be able to navigate the solar system with this if it were not for the quantum constituency of matter changing near light speeds, or for human squishiness (I still find it hard to believe that the energy of high speed objects is relative).

My question actually more particularly deals with automobiles. Futurists have reason to believe that navigation and transportation shall change in the latter half of the 21st century. Currently, policy seems to be bolstering EV infrastructure, but is stuff like cold fusion still being looked into in automobile firms and stuff?

 

[DaveE]

is stuff like cold fusion still being looked into in automobile firms and stuff?

no

 

[Gear300]

no

Dang.

 

[DaveE]

Cold fusion isn't real. It only exists in Sci Fi books (so far).

It takes many decades for any significant transportation technology to be truly adopted. The stuff the public will have in 80 years is already known and being built in demonstration projects.

 

[Gear300]

It takes many decades for any significant transportation technology to be truly adopted. The stuff the public will have in 80 years is already known and being built in demonstration projects.

80 years, is it. Sounds neat, but probably beyond my gait at the moment.

 

[DaveE]

80 years, is it. Sounds neat, but probably beyond my gait at the moment.

You chose the time frame, not me.

Futurists have reason to believe that navigation and transportation shall change in the latter half of the 21st century.

The "latter half" starts in 27 years.

GM introduced the first modern electric car (EV1) in 1996, most car buyers today, 27 years later, are still very reluctant to by a fully EV car because of cost and infrastructure issues.

 

[russ_watters]

...is stuff like cold fusion still being looked into in automobile firms and stuff?

They never did.

Electric cars aren't a perfect solution, but they are pretty good so I don't see a need for something more exotic in the future.

 

[PeterDonis]

Moderator's note: Thread moved to General Discussion.

 

[Gear300]

GM introduced the first modern electric car (EV1) in 1996, most car buyers today, 27 years later, are still very reluctant to by a fully EV car because of cost and infrastructure issues.

Electric cars aren't a perfect solution, but they are pretty good so I don't see a need for something more exotic in the future.

I figured a lot of the shift to EVs is green financing, i.e. a momentary bridge between today and future technologies, despite their imperfections. Although I am unawares of the actual financial solutions involved (and of course the politics). I got the impression that many solutions for commercial transport, terrestrial and aviation, are financial for the moment, like a decade or so. EV cars seem right as an urban niche so long as urbanization is increasing. And at the end of the day, looking past the diesel punk, it makes sense that highway transit should be automated since otherwise everything from sedans to twenty-wheeler trucks get jammed into lanes between construction hours.

The "latter half" starts in 27 years.

Lol. I guess most would agree that the latter half of the 20th century began after the Great Wars, or maybe with '60s America. I take it a lot of historians like to split centuries (in modernity) between former and latter halves with the pivot varying, between the "dawn of the century" and the "fin de siècle." I was trying to apply the argument to Navigation.

 

[Vanadium 50]

but probably beyond my gait at the moment.

Eat more green, leafy vegetables.

or maybe with '60s America.

Which really didn't start until 1967 or so. The early 60s were the 50s.

Electric cars aren't a perfect solution, but they are pretty good so I don't see a need for something more exotic in the future.

I think you might see hybrids with fuel cells replacing the IC engines. I think we'll have to see how the use cases evolve, and how battery energy densities and costs evolve. These are a fine solution to a problem, but perhaps not the problem.

 

[Baluncore]

Training by teachers, of the next generation, happens while the elderly retire, rejecting new technology. That is why it takes half a century to change anything significant.

High speed rail takes 25 years of preparation. The gauge of the railway network can only change once in a century. Massive changes to infrastructure require several generations of investment. Roads and bridges become more of the same, while the vehicles become obsolete fashion items, but all road vehicles have rubber tires.

The development of the next generation of technology, is funded by the sales and investment in the current technology. That limits stepwise refinements and tooling up of a production line, to an accounting cycle of about 3 years.

Earth-Moon navigation began without spaceports. Things will change with time. The flying boat operated when runways were sparse. After WWII there were runways everywhere, so the flying boat fell out of use. What similar thing might happen to change the Earth-Moon transport link?

 

[Gear300]

After WWII there were runways everywhere, so the flying boat fell out of use. What similar thing might happen to change the Earth-Moon transport link?

Thus space sports. Although as far as space is concerned, I was wondering whether or not telling "junior" to study nuclear plasma physics for the future of space jet fuel would be the right thing.

 

[berkeman]

Thus space sports.

https://www.space.com/space-sports-ideas-microgravity-games

 

[DaveE]

Thus space sports. Although as far as space is concerned, I was wondering whether or not telling "junior" to study nuclear plasma physics for the future of space jet fuel would be the right thing.

Junior will be dead before we have nuclear powered rocket engines.

 

[berkeman]

Junior will be dead before we have nuclear powered rocket engines.

Mr. Sunshine strikes again!