It was about 1800 years between the first steam engine and a practical steam engine. I’m sorry that one or two generations is too long for you.
Comment on France runs fusion reactor for record 22 minutes
DarkCloud@lemmy.world 3 days ago
Garantee you they weren’t generating a whole lot of power though… And if you can’t do that part then what’s the point?
GreyEyedGhost@lemmy.ca 2 days ago
bss03@infosec.pub 2 days ago
TIL. That sucks.
GreyEyedGhost@lemmy.ca 2 days ago
Well, there were a lot of fundamental steps that had to be completed first, not least of which was a high pressure vessel. This all took a lot of materials science, advancement in seemingly unrelated fields, etc., etc. Not unlike fusion technology… The difference is we have 2000 years more advancement than they had when they invented the steam engine.
garretble@lemmy.world 3 days ago
The first planes only flew for a few seconds.
Cocodapuf@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Well, the first ones didn’t fly at all, they usually just killed the inventor.
That’s basically where we are today with fusion, they don’t work at all yet. Luckily it’s not killing people.
DarkCloud@lemmy.world 3 days ago
Yeah, and we measured them to the purpose of flight… Not wingspan, or how soft the wheels were.
So maybe we should measure technology that’s about generating power by…
I’ll let you fill in the blank.
cubism_pitta@lemmy.world 3 days ago
LLNL has achieved positive power output with their experiments. llnl.gov/…/shot-ages-fusion-ignition-breakthrough…
No fusion reactor today is actually going to generate power in the useful sense.
These are more about understanding how Fusion works so that a reactor that is purpose built to generate power can be developed in the future.
Unlike the movies real development is the culmination of MANY small steps.
Today we are holding reactions for 20 minutes. 20 years ago getting a reaction to self sustain in the first place seemed impossible.
DarkCloud@lemmy.world 3 days ago
Predicted fusion energy and energy actually harvested and converted to usable electricity are not the same thing. Your article is about “fusion energy” not experimentally verified electrical output.
glimse@lemmy.world 2 days ago
It’s almost as if fusion is a significantly more difficult problem to solve than powered flight
SkybreakerEngineer@lemmy.world 3 days ago
Yes, but you’re asking how much cargo it can take while we’re barely off the ground. Research reactors aren’t set up to generate power, they’re instrumented to see if stuff is even working.
Evil_incarnate@lemm.ee 3 days ago
Not equivalent. Let’s measure the aircraft performance by its ability to carry passengers between capital cities.
It’s baby steps and we need to encourage more investment. Not dismiss the Wright brothers for being unable to fly from New York to London after ten years of development.
NOT_RICK@lemmy.world 3 days ago
A fusion reactor has already output more power than its inputs 3 years ago. Running a reactor for an extended period of time is still a useful exercise as you need to ensure they can handle operation for long enough to actually be a useful power source.
DarkCloud@lemmy.world 3 days ago
Generating massive amounts of heat and harvesting that and converting it to power are two (or three) different problems.
TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world 3 days ago
Code switch for: “I don’t have a point so why don’t you make it for me”
DarkCloud@lemmy.world 3 days ago
Verified electrical output, the answer is verified electrical power generated.
…as in we should measure lower generation experiments by how much power they generated.
Isn’t that obvious?