aguy2

My apologies. It had been a long time since I checked this data. The galaxtic velocity of 1/35 C included recessional velocity. Our Local Cluster velocity in reference to the Virgo Cluster is only about 371 kps or only about 1/1000 of C. aguy2

As in communicating in 'real time' to someone 4 light years away? If communicating in 'real time' over relativistic distances is considered the problem, here is a possible future solution: you transmit the information you wish to communicate 4 years and 5 minutes into your past and request that they transcribe it and post it off electromagnetically, and 'waala' you've communicated to someone (or thing) 4 light years away in 'real time'! Of course then we would have to ask if we have broken any 'time rules' by transmitting information into the past. Here you may be asking an interesting and possibly important question we might be able to answer with our present technology. Our galaxy alone may have a velocity of up to 1/35 C, not counting the possibility that the universe may be expanding. Time dilation effects may not be that much at 1/35 C, but they still are real. aguy2

Are you saying that the "fabric of space" is an active contraint? aguy2

What constraints set C at 186,000 mps? Why not 196,000, or 176,000, or for that matter 1,860? aguy2

"Free choices, for free men, in free markets works and nothing else seems to." This 'War on Molecules' is nothing more than pseudo-moral, manmade dietary laws, that is a economic, political, social, and moral travesty. aguy2

I don't have to look that far for an exception. I went back to school at age 59 and got my degree. I completed 56 semester hours in 12 months with a 3.4 gpa, and it was as much fun as it was hard work. aguy2

Unless we insist on displaying our stupidity and try to murder the next logical phase of evolution like they tried to do in "Terminator 1 & 2", I think your extrapolation of evolutionary development could prove to be pretty accurate, if you left out the phrase, "destroy their makers". We are already starting to physically integrate ourselves with our 'true' progeny. aguy2

In doing some web research on possible linkage between sexual reproduction and 'programed mortality' I've run into a neat site called "Palaeos: The Trace of Life on Earth". http://www.palaeos.com/Default.htm#MainMenu On one of its pages called "The Diversity of Life" I couldn't help but notice the following statement: "Finally, its important to remember that this site, like life, was not planned. It grew and evolved. It began and, one day, we will become bored and it will die. It may be useful, but it has no overriding mission other than the fun of creating it." Even considering that we are investigating 'uncharted territory' this may be quite a 'stretch', but could it be possible that after the excitement and stimulation of surviving to relative maturity and the thrill of sexual reproduction the organism loses interest in life? After all, "Jack and Diane" are right, in that, "Life goes on, long after the thrill is gone." aguy2

I think we seem to be reaching a consensus that there seems to be some sort of linkage between 'absolute mortality' and sexual reproduction. They both arose at about the same time in the same species, and the genetic mechanisms that insure 'absolute mortality' definitely don't 'kick in' until after the the organism has had a chance to bear and rear it's young. aguy2

There has been a lot of excellent replies to this thread and I have been too busy to respond to them in a timely manner. Coquina's post #22: I believe Muslim's do this. Reverse's post #25: Neural cells are not normally replaced. Sorcerer's post #30: I believe the 'relatively immortal' organisms would have an advantage as 'K' was reached. As the 'old cowboys' say, "Old age and cunning beats youth and skill every time." Experience and its associated 'wisdom' is a big advantage. Mokele's post #32: The 'environmental insults' you speak of are a good point. Mabe we should talk in terms of 'relative immortality' vs. 'absolute internally programed mortality'? I think the point here is more that 'relative immortality' should have been the 'norm', and it is 'absolute internally programed mortality' that had to evolve. aguy2

From the pov of the biomass as a whole the 'natural' death of individual organisms is a very good 'idea' for many reasons, but DNA/RNA molecules don't seem to have 'ideas' about the general good, they seem to be only 'motivated' by survival through replication. It seems to me that the 'I.D.' advocates are missing the boat by not trying to use internally preprogramed death as an indication of 'intelligent design'. I think they may be missing this due to their propensity to present the 'Creator' of the universe as some sort of 'goody-two-shoes' whose purpose in creating the universe is centered around the care, feeding, and 'testing' of hairless anthropoids. aguy2

There is a hot new area of cellular biology they are calling 'apoptosis', that is concerned with internally programmed cell death, deliberate cell suicide, and how this process confers evolutionary advantages during an organism's life cycle. Here are a couple of sites: http://magazine.uchicago.edu/9606/9606Celldeath.html and http://www.ucalgary.ca/~browder/apoptosis.html I am still having problems on how multi-celled organisms developed such multi-faceted and intricate mechcanisms to insure the death of the individual so soon after such organisms developed during the 'Cambrian Explosion'. aguy2

What possible evolutionary advantage could be gained for an organism by dying? aguy2

One plus one might equal three in a situation that displays a rather high degree of 'gestalt'. aguy2

http://nedwww.ipac.caltech.edu/level5/March03/Lineweaver/Lineweaver7_7.html http://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=53309 If you find or compute a better guess, be my guest. Seriously, I don't really have the skills to double check this math, but if there is something better out there I would appreciate it. aguy2

The best guess I've heard is that the current rate of expansion is about 7.2 billionths of one percent per year. aguy2

I started a thread last month I called "Is the Universe Collapsing?" that in part dealt with matter/anti-matter's apparent lack of symmetry. The thread recieved almost as little attention as yours has; you might want to check it out. aguy2

We don't have the instrumentation to have any observational or experimental knowledge to determine if such small things exist or not. I don't want to seem to be belittling the valuable work the various 'string' theorists are doing, but what they have been doing is more akin to philosophical spectulation (dreaming) than it is to verifiable physics. Merry Xmas. aguy2

What do you get when you add an apple and an orange? aguy2