You do your argument a disservice when you conflate “laws of physics” with “extrapolations of current materials and energy engineering”.
If speed of light isn’t violated, and the force involved isn’t so great that the reaction would be measurable as changes in earth rotation or something, and the energy is much less than the theoretical limit of a small amount of antimatter, it’s not “laws of physics” that is the constraint.
Note I’m not saying you’re wrong in considering it very unlikely, but hyperbole doesn’t help in thinking or in discussion (here on LW, at least—it’s common and perhaps useful in other contexts).
You do your argument a disservice when you conflate “laws of physics” with “extrapolations of current materials and energy engineering”.
If speed of light isn’t violated, and the force involved isn’t so great that the reaction would be measurable as changes in earth rotation or something, and the energy is much less than the theoretical limit of a small amount of antimatter, it’s not “laws of physics” that is the constraint.
Note I’m not saying you’re wrong in considering it very unlikely, but hyperbole doesn’t help in thinking or in discussion (here on LW, at least—it’s common and perhaps useful in other contexts).
Ok, fair point, I was going too far in assuming that the sort of engineering necessary was physically impossible.