Is war necessary to advance science and technology?

Some people are saying we'll never realize fusion power, flying cars, faster than light travel and holographic displays in our lifetimes unless there is a World War 3

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It's not, but since most of our psychology is inherited from the time when Humans were apes in trees, we tend to respond more effectively against obviously dangerous, fast acting threats.

Challenge is necessary. But it's not necessarily war. People don't move their asses unless they depend on it, or if there's a demand and they profit from it.

There simply isn't a demand for flying cars, fusion, holographics devices and such.

no

No. Tho science and technology does advance warfare.

FTL is never going to happen. We are never leaving this solar system. There will never be a grand unified human space empire.

The speed of light is the great filter.

No. War is utterly destructive, think of all the potential lives, natural and engineering resources that have been destroyed or that have no other purpose but to destroy others.

The thing is that war has helped to focus our resources on building stuff needed to kill each other. It is this massive, focused concentration of resources directed towards a single goal that makes us achieve great things. Just as how humans made it to the Moon because the US threw its industrial capacity before this very task, and once completed, all those resources were focused elsewhere

Huge government subsidies are what's required, or nearly required, to make huge leaps in tech.

Governments just don't care enough about science unless there's a war

You are a great big party pooper. But I also think you are wrong because we simply don't know what the future holds for physics.

I kind of agree with: Never say never.

Take your nevers and shove them up your ass.

War helps as a motivator, provided it isn't so bad that it sends you into a dark age. Almost all the space faring tech we do have has come out of war, afterall.

A meteor wiping out a major city or two, however, would be much more effective and to the point. (With the same caveat, that it wasn't so large as to send us back into the stone age or otherwise wipe us out.)

At the same time, I wouldn't expect to see many of those things within your lifetime... Though, if we're unfortunate, we may see some, potentially, rather unpleasant human genetic engineering programs that may have a much larger impact on your life than any of those things would.

>Implying biological immortality and/or suspended animation isn't on the horizon.
There's filters, but the speed of light isn't really one of them, just a hinderance, and in the end, no more so than the fact that there's nothing to breath up there.

>Implying biological immortality isn't on the horizon.
NTG. What makes you so sure biological immortality is on the horizon?

It's theoretically possible, plenty of critters have it, between CRISPR and rebuilding huge swaths of the genome from scratch by other methods, and the fact that human genetic engineering has been being held back by a thin leash of ethics for quite awhile. (Albeit, a very sensible thin leash - as we're just as likely to do something that irreparably fucks us all first.)

It's a fairly distant horizon though - likely not in our lifetimes (less certain about something else that irreparably fucks us all first thing happening in our lifetimes though, particularly if some jerk comes up with an airborne retrovirus.)

>But I also think you are wrong because we simply don't know what the future holds for physics
It is possible that he's wrong, but that doesn't mean you should think he's wrong. It's possible that FTL is possible, but I don't believe it is. You only think he's wrong because you want him to be.

There are two requirements for something to be achieved.
It must be possible.
And you must wish to do it.

Without hope and the will to achieve, nothing is possible. So long as you are optimistic and try, only the truly impossible (whatever it is) is impossible.

TL;DR: Assume all thing are possible until it is utterly shown that they are not.

Well, yes, but OP said "within our lifetime", and at the moment, we only have one theory as to how to even try, and it's a very shaky one at that. You at least need some ideas as to where to begin the attempt.

Other advances may come along to make the speed of light a non-issue, even if it does turn out to be an eternally unbreakable barrier, but none of those are likely to come along within our lifetime either.

But true, ya never know. Science is in its infancy, and while we can build working shit based on our current theories, the holes said theories produce point to them being woefully incomplete, if not simply largely based on misinterpretation... and maybe singularity will happen and fix (and break) everything, or Vulcans will land and show us how it's done - just all the possibilities for any such happening soon seem rather far fetched.

That, and the will to achieve is in woefully short supply, even with the ever-increasing knowledge of just how sudden and even entirely without warning our extinction can be.

This is not the age of intrepid explorers willing to risk their lives and fortunes for glory. Something truly drastic would have to happen to the culture itself, to give us back the balls to get the balls rolling.

While I don't disagree with you, there still must be the will to believe that it's possible in our lifetimes. Even if it's not, we'll still have gotten a damn lot of work done for the next generation.
Somebody has to make the first step and hit the ground running, even if they won't see the end of the trail.

War stagnates science.

I think if the US wasn't in a constant state of war with the middle east they could have landed humans on Mars or cured cancer by now. In truth the ONLY reason we were able to land on the Moon was because it was a military goal and not a scientific goal. Seriously, name just one scientific goal that can't be achieved with today's technology if given enough funding.

I doubt it, there is an inherent motivation for many to drive to invent and discover. What it is and when generally coincides with the general attitude of the time and place is and what they think would be the most essential at the time. This is just my guess, but it seems like innovation has been and will continue to be focusing on things that would make a consumer more comfortable. Should we get to a point of
>maximum comfiness
and
>maximum sustainability
I think there will be more or less of a stagnation of innovation. But you shouldn't take much from a post on an aboriginal didgeridoo woodworking appreciation forum.

all this bullshit...
socialist entitlements to non-whites pushed by the dems & neo-cons is what starves science.

The military is the one essential thing that the government is required to run, everything else is bullshit.

Japan hasn't had a formal military for decades. It's been doing quite nicely.

War is nothing compared to redirecting 50% of the GDP into socialist waste
Even then a huge chunk of the private sector is makework service industry crap that exists largely because of regulation rather than real demand.

Japan has been stagnating in degeneracy for a while now
And yes they do very much have a military.

Some militaries are probably already looking into that stuff in secret; to use as an advantage in-case someone else pulls out their secret weapons. And even if WWIII broke out. You may not even see that technology come out because they could save it for WWIV or WWV or WWVI... to avoid revealing to enemies what they have.

If that's "stagnating in degeneracy" sign me the fuck up!

Though a better argument might be to point out the fact that they depend on another military for their continued existence. (Granted, a whole lot of the world is depending on said military).

(Also could do without the constant recession, but meh, things could certainly be worse.)

>socialist entitlements to non-whites
>pushed by the neo-cons
D-do you even know what a neo-con is? ie. the driving political force for almost all military spending and austerity?

Money is necessary to advance science and technology, not war

War simply loosens the belts of governments and financiers, freeing them up to spend more money than they normally would on technology during peacetime.

If strong funding is in place then science and tech will thrive. Fusion for example is looking promising with international collaborative projects like ITER. The main limitations now are materials based not monetary.

It's not necessary, but not wanting to die is a strong motivator for human ingenuity. In war the best way to not die is to kill those other motherfuckers over there before they kill you. If you can use your knowledge of science to kill them deader faster then it might help you win.

Are kinda ignoring the fact that 90% of everything in the blue and green bars is a result of military efforts. (And the fact that things like, rocketry, nuclear power, and computers, are all derived from military efforts.)

Also the fact that said military is what allows for all that money to continue to exist to begin with.

I mean, yeah, it'd be nice if we could have world peace, toss all the world's resources into science, and be motivated by more distant threats than war, but alas...

there's no reason to leave earth, it's already the best planet we know of

>military claiming accomplishments done by civilian research because it happened sort of coincidentally
wew
No lad, Marie Curie wasn't working on military grants.

All the eggs are in one basket, and we know, sooner or later, any number of a thousand things are going to cause basket is going to burn.

Not that we can do much to remedy that within OP's specified frame, but gotta start somewhere, and the sooner you start, the less apt you are to end up with a basket of boiled eggs.

All the most powerful computing technology came out of ever-increasingly sophisticated targeting and security/decryption efforts, as did the mass-scale application of said (and the internet you are using).

...as did the fact that Marie Curie was ever allowed to be something other than barefoot and pregnant, and leave the kitchen.

>be motivated by more distant threats than war

Like global warming? Peak oil/energy crisis? Rogue AI? Over population? Food shortages? Curing cancer or unlocking the genome?

Although in regards to that last one, thanks to CRISPR the possibility of a man made virus of mass destruction (possibly one that targets people of certain ethnicity) will quickly become a very real military issue.

>formal military
Japanese Self Defense force is a military, don't kid yourself.
I love how even though veterans account for roughly 10% of the population and pretty much the largest chunk of federal employment, people get mad that we actually fund veterans services, as if it's a major financial problem to provide healthcare to those who have worked for the government. Either way between all projects under the NIH, NASA, DoE, and NSF, the employment opportunities are significantly smaller. These graphics also hide the fact that money gets channeled into major engineering projects (which propel research forward) as well as military oriented research through organizations like DARPA.

Ya can pull that without CRISPR - it's just messier.

But most of those threats people don't take seriously, as they aren't imminent and glorified, and, in some cases, their existence is even debated.

I mean, if a meteor were to wipe out a few major cities, maybe then... Otherwise, nothing gets all the people of a nation on the same page like a war.

>Japanese Self Defense force is a military, don't kid yourself.
Not on the scale of the threats it's dealing with - without the US, China or Best Korea would steam roll them. Japan would have to invest nearly everything it had into its military to be militarily secured against such threats.

...but hey, maybe we'd get Gundams.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhism

>their existence is even debated
Kinda like the existence of nuclear weapons in certain middle eastern countries?

>nothing gets all the people of a nation on the same page like a war.
It's not that people need a common goal like war to be motivated. Just look at the moon landing, everyone rallied behind that goal. The reason why war is chosen over something else is because it's more difficult for politicians to take credit. A politician can't put billions into research for curing cancer then take credit for it when it was obviously the scientists who did the work. The same can't be said of war tho.

>Just look at the moon landing
1) No, they didn't. Ask your parents.
2) It was part of a military arms race with the Soviet Union.
3) It was built almost entirely using technology developed to fight World War II.
4) In large part by Nazi war scientists.

If not for the Cold War, the moon landing probably would not be a thing now. If not for the world wars that preceded that, maybe not even a thing hundreds of years hence.

>2) It was part of a military arms race with the Soviet Union.
Blarg, we so should've back-door funded the USSR to keep it alive. That threat motivated nearly all of mankind's greatest achievements in the 20th century. (The Internet, the moon landing, nuclear power, the list goes on...)

Seems nothing motivates like the daily imminent threat of global annihilation at the hands of an "evil superpower". Now all we have is these pissant towel heads running about, that if anything, are making us think smaller and shorter term (which just perpetuates the nuisance).

>Seems nothing motivates like the daily imminent threat of global annihilation at the hands of an "evil superpower".
What is China?

>flying cars

Helicopters
Planes
Jets

We need to take all the shekels we're wasting to bloat clapistan's overly big military in the name of the oily Jew and throw them at Lockheed martin until they give us fusion 2bh senpaitachi

A pale reflection of the military beast that was USSR, that's completely dependant on our own economy to remain afloat.

Maybe some day though - they at least have enough nationalistic pride to be working towards a moon landing. Hopefully that'll rustle our jimmies enough to get back on track.

>Implying the first type of biological immortality won't be available in our life time for 1st world countries.

this is a philosophical question. you're gonna get both yes and no answers, since it's more of a matter of opinion we cant really accurately test this. what were you trying to achieve with this post ?

He was trying to get a technology thread going?

What can I most likely expect in terms of new technology both medical/civil use in the next 20 years?

A philosophical question would be, "should we do so?"

It's a technological question, in that it's, "can we do so?"

Or a logistics question if it's, "how do we do so?"

But it's more Veeky Forums than half the threads around here, so meh, maybe he was just hoping for some science news that would give him some hope.

We don't need any of those things to take out anyone right now though.

If aliens tried invading the earth, then some of those things would probably be necessary. But if that happened, the aliens would probably finish us off quick without us knowing so there's no chance of fighting back anyway.

>Fusion Power
I'm really not sure how a war would accelerate research in fusion power. We already have plenty of sources of power. If anything a war would put a hold on fusion research, as resources would be funneled towards improving existing generators.
>Flying cars
We already have planes. Flying cars would be completely useless in a war.
>FTL travel
Even if it were physically possible (it's not), it wouldn't be feasible in any sort of terrestrial war. The acceleration you would need to get up to light speed over any distance on earth would kill any human. Not to mention the vehicle would burn up in the atmosphere.
>Holographic displays
We already kinda have these. They're just not that useful outside of niche applications. 2D gets the job done in pretty much all cases.

To add on to you user. We already have flying cars.

The earth used to be flat, look at us now.

We used to think that there was no maximum speed, look at us now.

Life expectancy has increased a lot.

Up to recently it increased by one month per year. These days it increases by two months per year.

With CRISPR there could be huge leaps by eliminating hereditary diseases.

Look up the nuclear potential of Japan. It was known more than a decade ago that they have 11 tons of nuclear fuel that could be enriched to something that goes boom in the night.

Technology tends to advance faster than most realise. Ethnic warfare by genetic means has been a research topic for over 20 years. When the premise is that the first to pull the trigger wins it is reasonable to assume things will go messy in the near future. Gene sequencing that took months using equipment that filled large rooms can now be done in minutes on a USB stick. Most people have no idea how fast things are progressing.

>Up to recently it increased by one month per year.
>These days it increases by two months per year.
Damn son. That's pretty nice.

Wars are a horrible waste of materials and work hours. We should be funding research during peace time instead.

It gets better. With a 12 months increase per year we reach what already has been named "actuarial escape velocity".

>We should
Sure. Trouble is that during peace time R&D budgets are determined by bean counters demanding a result tomorrow. That is not how R&D works.

Pharma used to have a 20 years perspective but with the patent cliff things have gone south there too. it is now all about mergers and generics while they are firing researchers in droves. This is a major factor countering the acceleration in life expectancy-

What is left is military R&D. They still have a long perspective and a willingness to explore. Mind you that is DARPA. What L-M is doing with F-35 etc. is more like sinking a bilge pump into treasury.

>image
Looks like a paranoid cuck-memer was triggered by that IMAGE

If humanity acquires some form of indefinite lifespan this century, what does it do with the rest of time?

>War stagnates science

>The Manhattan Project achieved the unthinkable in 5 years.

It welcomed us into the Atomic Age

Time becomes irrelevant.

Assuming it's biological immortality, and not magic immortality, find a way to survive the inevitable death of the planet - that will suddenly not seem so far off... Followed by finding a way to fix the inevitable death of the universe.

shitposting on a mongolian throat-singing forum

The best way to advance and encourage innovation in war technology is to be at war, or have wars, OP. Easy answer.

Why does time become irrelevant?

>Find a way to survive the inevitable death of the planet.
>Followed by finding a way to fix the inevitable death of the universe.
Sounds like a daunting task that will take some time..

Well, you have it...
youtube.com/watch?v=ojEq-tTjcc0

Science is not about establishing facts, it is about documenting what you know and what is known is fluid.

>Last Question
user you know better.

If you have an indefinite life span there is nothing to lose by taking a 20 year journey to, say, Titan. No long term project will be too long.