Life as it goes

The most fuel-efficient things in the whole universe have just been found: black holes. If you are currently feeling the pain of rising gas prices, this CNN article might just sound like the good news you've been waiting for. Perhaps in as little as few thousands of years from now, human civilization will be advanced enough to harness energy from such celestial bodies as planets and black holes.

Black holes have fascinated many physicists and cosmology enthusiasts for long, and as speculative as the idea might sound, many serious scientists do believe the idea of using things like black holes as energy source is theoretically conceivable.

The quest that leads to such far-fetched imagination is the classification of future human civilizations. What will human socities be like 1000s or millions years from now? The question was first seriously considered by Russian astrophysicist Kardashev. It turns out human civilizations can be classified into various types (TYPE I, TYPE 2 and TYPE 3) based on the energy sources they used, and consequently on the extent to which they can travel. Dr. Michio Kaku of Princeton University elaborates about the various civilization types in this article

Type I civilizations are planetary civilizations. They mostly control the weather, things like huricans and volcanoes and they can harness the energy output of an entire planet. They can travel within the neighborhood of they home planet.

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Type II are more advanced than TYPE I civilization. They can harness the energy output of a star, and generate about 10 billion times the energy output of a Type I civilization. These folks can pretty much travel anywhere within their own galaxy.

Type III civilization are most advanced imaginable human civilization. They have exhausted energy source on their own planate and neighboring stars. This civilization harnesses the energy output of an entire galaxy, or about 10 billion time the energy output of a Type II civilization. By this time, inter-galactic travel should be a piece of cake.

The most advanced (imaginary) human civilization we can think of, the type 3 or inter-galactic, may be able to master whole galaxies and things like black holes. When (or should I say If) that happens, Steve Allen of the Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology at Stanford University and leader of the study reported here by CNN will perhaps be proven right. He told CNN "If you could make a car engine that was as efficient as one of these black holes, you could get about a billion miles out of a gallon of gas."

Perhaps you are asking how far we are from becoming such an advanced human society. The question is where our current civilization is placed on Kardashev's civilization scale. Well, according to Dr. Michio Kaku, we are currently a TYPE 0 civilization. Hey, how can we aspect better? We still get our main energy supply from dead plants and animals ... However, there is hope. Growing at the average rate of about 3% per year, we might turn into a TYPE I civilization in about 100 to 200 years. If we don't blow ourselves up in the process that is...