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If we wish to colonize another world, finding a planet with a gravitational field that humans can survive and thrive under will be crucial. If its gravity is too strong our blood will be pulled down into our legs, our bones might break, and we could even be pinned helplessly to the ground.
Finding the gravitational limit of the human body is something that's better done before we land on a massive new planet. Now, in a paper published on the pre-print server arXiv, three physicists, claim that the maximum gravitational field humans could survive long-term is four-and-a-half times the gravity on Earth.
Or, at least you could if you are an Icelandic strongman – and Game of Thrones monster – who can walk with more than half a metric ton on your back. For mere mortals, the researchers say, it would need to be a little weaker.
[...] For the maximum gravity at which we could take a step, the team turned to Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson, an Icelandic strongman who once walked five steps with a 1430 pound log on his back, smashing a 1,000-year-old record[*].
[*] YouTube video.
What's the Maximum Gravity We Could Survive?
(Score: 2) by wisnoskij on Saturday September 22 2018, @07:15PM (1 child)
> Well, if you're imagining them landing troops on a planet and going door to door, sure.
More like I imagine High G accustomed soldiers to be anywhere they want to me 10 times faster than low G accustomed soldiers. Sure, your "spend 90% of their lives in free fall" people can get to Planet X given 100 years of low acceleration. But my high G accountomed colonists can get their in their own lifetimes and with enough time to spare to erect satellite defences before you arrive.
Acceleration is everything in space, the ship with more A wins every encounter.
(Score: 1) by Arik on Saturday September 22 2018, @07:45PM
Really, you now seem to be assuming not just that acceleration will not only continue to be a limiting factor in space movement, but will become even more important with time. This seems far from assured.
Currently, the limiting factor is light speed, and while higher accel *will* cut some time off a given trip, it's really not much on a long journey when you figure the large majority spent at light speed regardless.
There's no reason that technology to exceed light speed would not also imply technology to modify inertial forces and shield humans from extremes of it as well, but you're implicitly implying nothing of the sort develops.
You're *also* assuming that your guys have effectively infinite resources behind them. And this is where our estimates drastically diverge. You won't have infinite resources, nowhere close. You'll have effectively *fewer* resources, because your development is planet centered, most of your resources aren't "available" properly without spending incredible amounts of energy to boost them out of the gravity well. While ours are mined, refined, and manufactured in zero-g, much more efficiently.
And you're assuming that getting there before my humans is enough. It isn't. You need to beat my *robots* there. Robots manufactured from materials and energy gathered at greatly reduced energy costs, outside the gravity well.
More likely, by the time your guys can afford to send a probe, we have robotic manufacturing and defenses setup already.
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