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Speaker 1: Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio.

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Speaker 1: Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host,

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Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart Radio

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Speaker 1: and a lot of all things tech, and it's time

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Speaker 1: for another classic episode of tech Stuff. This episode originally

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Speaker 1: published November two thousand thirteen. It is titled the Hype

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Speaker 1: About hyper Loop, and it's interesting to point out that

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Speaker 1: in the seven years since we recorded this episode, we

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Speaker 1: haven't seen an enormous amount of progress on hyper loop.

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Speaker 1: There have been some tests, there have been some sort

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Speaker 1: of uh experiments with hyper loop technology, most of which

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Speaker 1: are not true implementations of the original vision of hyper loop,

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Speaker 1: but we really haven't seen a whole lot of no

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Speaker 1: pun intended movement on this. Let's listen back to this

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Speaker 1: classic episode. Long time tech Stuff fans will remember that

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Speaker 1: one of my co host, uh, the legendary Matt Frederick,

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Speaker 1: made a guest appearance on tech Stuff right many many

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Speaker 1: moons ago. So anyway, we are grateful to have you here,

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Speaker 1: and uh, you know you you're you're kind of sort

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Speaker 1: of a transportation guru by now, I would say, And

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Speaker 1: I asked Ben what topic would he like to cover,

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Speaker 1: and he said, hey, have you guys covered hyper loop?

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Speaker 1: And that's when I had to kind of kick the

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Speaker 1: ground and look at the look at the ground, and

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Speaker 1: then say no, because we did an episode about Elon Musk,

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Speaker 1: who has a lot to do with hyper loop, but

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Speaker 1: we did that on March thirteen, and he didn't talk

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Speaker 1: about hyper loop until like June. Yeah, this is a

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Speaker 1: pretty This is a fairly recent development in the context

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Speaker 1: of his career. Now, Ellen Musk, for anybody who hasn't

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Speaker 1: checked out the Tech Stuff episode on you, yeah, shame on.

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Speaker 1: You get the to a speaker of some sort, find

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Speaker 1: an RSS feed or iTunes or something and download that

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Speaker 1: and listen to it. We'll wait, Okay, welcome back, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: welcome back. And that was what you just listened to

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Speaker 1: if you hadn't heard it before. Was a great overview

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Speaker 1: of this inventor's life, including his origin story and the

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Speaker 1: companies he's been associated with. Jonathan if if I could

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Speaker 1: defer to you for a quick recap of l mu

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Speaker 1: s okay so um. He came up with a little

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Speaker 1: idea that would eventually be called PayPal. PayPal is, of course,

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Speaker 1: a payment system that you can use online. You can

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Speaker 1: create an account through PayPal, and it allows you to

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Speaker 1: process payments or to to make payments to vendors that

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Speaker 1: accept PayPal, particularly things like eBay. But it was one

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Speaker 1: of those ideas to try and make online transactions secure

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Speaker 1: and easy, so that maybe you didn't want to um

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Speaker 1: to hand over your credit card information every time. Maybe

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Speaker 1: you want to create a special bank account and then

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Speaker 1: make that a PayPal account, and so you could do

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Speaker 1: transfers in a more secure format. You knew that you

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Speaker 1: had a certain amount of money in that account, nothing

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Speaker 1: beyond that was ever going to get tampered with. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it kind of controlled your risks. Yeah, absolutely. And now,

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Speaker 1: of course, as we've talked about with inventors in the past,

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Speaker 1: because you've also done a show called Stuff of Genius,

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Speaker 1: so we know that often when somebody invents something that

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Speaker 1: appears to be new, they're standing on the shoulders of

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Speaker 1: giants earlier innovations. PayPal not necessarily the first time someone

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Speaker 1: attempted to do this, but by far the most successful instance. Yeah. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and even that was not Elon Musk's first foray into business.

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Speaker 1: He had tried a few times, but PayPal was I

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Speaker 1: guess you could say, ridiculously successful. Yea. It gave him

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Speaker 1: the freedom to pursue whatever else he wanted to do

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Speaker 1: because he made so much money so quickly that the

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Speaker 1: constraints were off, and so he began to pursue another

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Speaker 1: interest of his, which was, you know, cars that go

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Speaker 1: really fast. Yes, Tesla Motors, another little company by must

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Speaker 1: that some of you may have heard of. You Scott

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Speaker 1: Benjamin and I cover this often on car stuff and

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Speaker 1: tech stuff. Has also looked into some of the fascinating

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Speaker 1: innovations and technology here. Uh. So we've got a guy

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Speaker 1: who's done PayPal, We've got a guy who's done Tesla Motors. Uh.

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Speaker 1: He also was interested in another transportation initiative. Yeah, before

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Speaker 1: we even get to hyperloop. He was interested in a

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Speaker 1: transportation that would send you up, like really really up.

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Speaker 1: And not not balloons on a house. No, no, not

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Speaker 1: not not that up. No. We're talking, of course about

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Speaker 1: space X, which is a privatized space initiative. Really it's

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Speaker 1: it's the business of getting things up into space. But

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Speaker 1: because as we all know, NASA was getting further and

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Speaker 1: further budget cuts as time was going on, and it

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Speaker 1: became apparent that if we weren't going to have a

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Speaker 1: public space industry, something that was funded by the government.

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Speaker 1: Then if we still wanted to pursue things in space,

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Speaker 1: and we do, because there was a lot of important

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Speaker 1: stuff out there, communication satellites being one of the simplest

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Speaker 1: to explain, it meant that we had to have some

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Speaker 1: private industry step in. And so Musk said, you know,

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Speaker 1: I think this is something else that I'm really interested in.

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Speaker 1: I've always been interested in space. And he began to

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Speaker 1: devote quite a bit of time and money and resources

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Speaker 1: to creating a viable private space enterprise, and in fact,

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Speaker 1: but not the spaceship, and that would have been probably

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Speaker 1: a little beyond even his amazing reach. It's yeah, so

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Speaker 1: mostly what he's looking at is our ways to try

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Speaker 1: and create an aconomically feasible private space enterprise. And he

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Speaker 1: talked a lot about how that's difficult to do because

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Speaker 1: you have very limited vendors from whom you can get

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Speaker 1: the important components or your rockets. So he remember specifically,

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Speaker 1: he pointed out this problem he had in Russia, where

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Speaker 1: he would be quoted a price, he would agree to

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Speaker 1: purchase a certain number of units of rockets at that price,

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Speaker 1: and then upon the actual manufacture of it be told. Oh,

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Speaker 1: we're sorry. I know. We said there was gonna be

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Speaker 1: twenty million dollars for all of these, but it's actually

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Speaker 1: gonna be twenty million per rocket. Yeah, something along those lines.

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Speaker 1: It's just he talked about how, you know, you have

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Speaker 1: to deal with these things, and that it gave him

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Speaker 1: a lot of uh experience and knowledge about the industry

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Speaker 1: and how to try and and get around that by

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Speaker 1: making as much of the stuff yourself as possible. In fact,

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Speaker 1: that was one of the things he said, like this

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Speaker 1: explains why NASA budgets go out of control. It's not

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Speaker 1: that they're poorly managed. Is that you have such limited

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Speaker 1: resources to go to to get what you need that

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Speaker 1: you're kind of held hostage by them. So, but that

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Speaker 1: all of these interests are stuff that we had already

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Speaker 1: talked about on Tech Stuff, right. Yes, that was the

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Speaker 1: quick and dirty recap of the episode you should listen

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Speaker 1: to in full. We say all of this to say

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Speaker 1: that Musk has some street cred. He's not just some guy,

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Speaker 1: you know making a YouTube video. Uh. He is proposing

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Speaker 1: another transit innovation, another potential transit innovation, and that would

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Speaker 1: be the hyper loop. But my first question, you, Jonathan,

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Speaker 1: we're talking hyper loop, What what is it? Well, if

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Speaker 1: we were to take elon Musk's own words, and this

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Speaker 1: is somewhat paraphrased from an interview he gave at the

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Speaker 1: D eleven event, he said, it's a cross between a

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Speaker 1: concorde and a railgun and an air hockey table. He

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Speaker 1: I of the air hockey table last, like he said

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Speaker 1: concorde and a railgun first, and I got a great responses.

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Speaker 1: You know, technically, if I really want to blow your minds,

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Speaker 1: I need to add in the fact that there's an

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Speaker 1: air hockey table element in there too. And then he

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Speaker 1: made uh an inappropriate joke, But essentially he said that

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Speaker 1: if these three things got together and had nice romantic times,

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Speaker 1: hyper loop would be the bibbet that would be produced

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Speaker 1: as a result. You now that that alone doesn't really

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Speaker 1: tell you what hyper loop is, and I think that

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Speaker 1: was actually Musk's point. He knew he didn't want to

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Speaker 1: spoil the surprise at that event, so he wanted to

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Speaker 1: give just enough information for people to get curious about it,

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Speaker 1: but not enough to actually explain what it was. Right,

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Speaker 1: and one of the things one of the best ways

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Speaker 1: for us to approach this. Over the course of this episode,

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Speaker 1: I think we're going to go into what the science

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Speaker 1: behind a hyper loop. Uh, you know, maybe some pros,

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Speaker 1: some cons some similar systems. Uh, the elevator pitch. We

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Speaker 1: we can't really beat that great quote, right, but if

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Speaker 1: you want to, if you want something that's a little

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Speaker 1: easier to actually visualize beyond the fact that what you're

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Speaker 1: gonna shoot people through some form of high energy mechanism

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Speaker 1: and they're just gonna fly across you and you get

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Speaker 1: points if they hit the goal, And I'm like, what

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Speaker 1: is this? Yeah, but no, it's it's more like, all right,

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Speaker 1: so it's it's an elevated system in more ways than one.

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Speaker 1: For one, it's going to if it were to be built,

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Speaker 1: would be built on pylons that would go and hold

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Speaker 1: the the whole system above ground. Um, it's was proposed,

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Speaker 1: but to be between Los Angeles and San Francisco. Yes,

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Speaker 1: with an incredibly short transit time. Yeah, we'll get into that.

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Speaker 1: I don't want to spoil it, but but it's it's

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Speaker 1: the ideas that the capsules that you would travel and

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Speaker 1: it wouldn't be a train, it would be a sort

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Speaker 1: of a capsule that could hold a certain number of people.

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Speaker 1: Um that these these capsules would float above the floor

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Speaker 1: of the system. The whole thing would be inside a

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Speaker 1: tunnel that's on top of these pylons, so it's all

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Speaker 1: in loosed, but the capsule would float above the ground.

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Speaker 1: So that means you've eliminated friction from the wheel. There's

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Speaker 1: no wheels towards huge and then it would be propelled

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Speaker 1: down this tube, which also would have very low air pressure,

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Speaker 1: so you would have low air resistance. It's of partial vacuum. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: we'll talk a little bit more about that too in

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Speaker 1: a second. So essentially you're talking about some sort of

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Speaker 1: imagine a straw, but the straw has closed off at

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Speaker 1: both ends more or less, there's there's a little bit

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Speaker 1: of a gap in there to allow some air passage.

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Speaker 1: And then imagine a P that's inside, like a dried

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Speaker 1: p that's inside that that straw. And then imagine that

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Speaker 1: you have somehow maybe bombarded that p with electrons so

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Speaker 1: that it now has built up a negative electrostatic charge,

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Speaker 1: and then you put another negative magnet end next to it,

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Speaker 1: and it would zip across to the other end of

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Speaker 1: the tube in a very very oversimplified way. That's what

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Speaker 1: the hyper biz. And you are inside the p Yes,

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Speaker 1: you are inside, so you yeah, obviously there's some questions

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Speaker 1: that we have to answer, but that's the general idea.

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Speaker 1: So you know, this is this is actually it's we'll

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Speaker 1: talk about this too. This is not the first time

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Speaker 1: this kind of system has been proposed. And in fact,

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Speaker 1: there's a really interesting story we'll get to about another

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Speaker 1: person who has proposed a very similar system that they've

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Speaker 1: they've been talking about for a couple of years before

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Speaker 1: Musk ever said anything, and they received a slightly different reaction,

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Speaker 1: I would say, than what Musk has received. Um, and

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Speaker 1: we'll we'll have to talk about spoilers. Yeah, yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's just just teasing you. So Hyperloop essentially, what we're

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Speaker 1: getting at is it's a high speed transportation system that

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Speaker 1: allows multiple passengers to go between the cities of Los

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Speaker 1: Angeles and San Francisco, at least initially. Shouldn't never be built. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and uh, also, of course the questions that we need

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Speaker 1: to address, they are going to be popping up in

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Speaker 1: everybody's head. Um, I just want to put this in

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Speaker 1: the radar for the very end of the show. Jonathan

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Speaker 1: the question I want to us both to attempt to

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Speaker 1: answer the very end of the show, is this vaporware.

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Speaker 1: That's an excellent question, and yes, I think that we

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Speaker 1: will have to kind of give our own opinions on

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Speaker 1: that at the very end. So we've got a lot

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Speaker 1: to talk about. But before we get into the nitty

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Speaker 1: gritty about exactly how this thing is supposed to work,

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Speaker 1: should it ever be built, let's take a quick break

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Speaker 1: Tech now. And as for shows I like to watch

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Speaker 1: on Hulu Plus, Agents of Shield is a big one, actually,

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Speaker 1: because occasionally I'm traveling and I miss stuff, and when

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Speaker 1: I come back, I want to catch up and see

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Speaker 1: what's going on. I feel that shows really just now

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Speaker 1: starting to hit its stride. I think it might have

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Speaker 1: struggled a little early in the Marvel universe. It's so huge,

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Speaker 1: and then you're dealing with these, you know, human people

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Speaker 1: and how they are interacting in this world. And I

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Speaker 1: think they're really getting into some interesting territory. So that's

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Speaker 1: a recommendation for me. You should go check it out. Alright,

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Speaker 1: so we're back, let's talk about all the hyper loop

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Speaker 1: would actually work. Now. You remember I was mentioning that

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Speaker 1: whole idea of a closed off straw with a P

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Speaker 1: in it. Yeah, so if you know that's that's that's okay,

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Speaker 1: except for the fact that if you have air in

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Speaker 1: that tube and the air doesn't have anywhere to go,

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Speaker 1: that P is going to be pushing against the air

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Speaker 1: in that tube, and even if there's space around the P,

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Speaker 1: it's not going to go as fast as it could

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Speaker 1: if there were no air at all. Right, The air

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Speaker 1: resistance is one of the biggest speed killers. Yeah, so there.

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Speaker 1: You might have heard of some maglev trains, you know,

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Speaker 1: trains that actually float above the track through magnetic levitation.

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Speaker 1: And by magnetic levitation, we're essentially talking about magnets that

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Speaker 1: repel one another and maintain the trains distance above a tract.

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Speaker 1: Usually it's it's like just a tiny distance above it, right,

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Speaker 1: and that's you know, and this this helps reduce friction

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Speaker 1: for those those sorts of systems. I think what we're

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Speaker 1: seeing here is that these can be thought of as

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Speaker 1: similar in some ways, but they have they have very

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Speaker 1: different mechanisms. And also, you know, if you have a

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Speaker 1: mag lev train that's in an uncovered track, then it

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Speaker 1: still has to deal with that air resistance. It's top

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Speaker 1: speed is going to be mitigated by the fact that

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Speaker 1: it has to push against air. So one of the

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Speaker 1: elements of this hyper loop system is it would be

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Speaker 1: at a very low pressure. You would have have a

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Speaker 1: near vacuum, but not a total vacuum. Total vacuum is

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Speaker 1: very difficult to maintain if you are talking about a

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Speaker 1: significantly long tube, right, Yeah. Total vacuum is in fact

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Speaker 1: so difficult to maintain that even if one could just

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Speaker 1: throw billions of dollars at the problem making really long

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Speaker 1: when uh, it might be impossible to do it effectively.

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Speaker 1: You would have to have some form of of you know,

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Speaker 1: vacuum stations all along the tube just to constantly deal

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Speaker 1: with any differentiation and pressure. So in stead, Musk says,

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Speaker 1: why don't we just have something that will lower the

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Speaker 1: air pressure quite a bit, uh, and that will allow

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Speaker 1: for reduced air resistance because you don't have as much

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Speaker 1: air to push against, and then all that means the

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Speaker 1: capsule can move faster within that tube. So that's that's

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Speaker 1: one element to Another element is, well, how do you

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Speaker 1: get the tube to float above the base of the track,

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Speaker 1: the base of the tunnel, and it's not through magnetic limitation? Yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's uh, it's weirdly enough. It goes back to our

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Speaker 1: air hockey comparison exactly, the air cushioning. Right, Yes, so

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Speaker 1: you've got you've got these little air skis on the

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Speaker 1: base of the metal capsule. So imagine these flat surfaces,

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Speaker 1: lots of surface area on the base of this capsule,

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Speaker 1: and then the track could blow air up and the

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Speaker 1: capsule is on a cushion of air. So that there's

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Speaker 1: another reason why you can't have a total vacuum, because

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Speaker 1: if you're using air to keep the the capsule up, Uh,

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Speaker 1: you obviously can't have a toll vacuum, right. Yeah. In

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Speaker 1: this in this case, in a very crew comparison, it

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Speaker 1: would be trying to drive a car without wheels. Yeah yeah,

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Speaker 1: And um, for anyone who has tried that, I'm sorry.

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Speaker 1: I wish we had talked earlier. I know a lot

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Speaker 1: of people who have cars without wheels on their front yard.

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Speaker 1: But that's because we live in the South, right, that

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Speaker 1: is because we live in the South. But so if

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Speaker 1: we just take if we just take these two ideas, right,

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Speaker 1: partial vacuum, eliminating the air resistance, having these air skis.

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Speaker 1: Um one of the first things that I thought about

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Speaker 1: when I was reading about the hyper loop system was

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Speaker 1: it always reminded me in principle of the pneumatic bank tubes,

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Speaker 1: remember those. Yes, I know exactly what you're talking about.

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Speaker 1: And there's even a there's even this such a tangent,

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Speaker 1: but there's even a system that someone tried to build,

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Speaker 1: I believe in New York that was supposed to be

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Speaker 1: a pneumatic train system. Spoiler alert didn't work out? And

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Speaker 1: so how how would we like We're gonna keep explaining

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Speaker 1: the science, but but it's it's important that we under line,

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Speaker 1: we emphasize that this is at best wildly ambitious. So

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Speaker 1: we've got um, we've got back to uh to the

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Speaker 1: idea with the science. Now at this point we're talking

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Speaker 1: about principles, we're talking about blue sky stuff. I love

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Speaker 1: that you brought up the p example. This is a

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Speaker 1: great example P A P E A for our family show.

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Speaker 1: I'm sorry, so this uh, this p this sealed capsule

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Speaker 1: um could carry twenty eight passengers, right, so it's larger

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Speaker 1: than your average pe. He even suggested that if you

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Speaker 1: wanted to expand the hyperloop, you could have larger capsules

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Speaker 1: that could carry not just passengers, but cars as well.

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Speaker 1: One of the reasons for that is that the proposed

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Speaker 1: stations that would be in Los Angeles and San Francisco

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Speaker 1: would actually be in outlying areas, meaning that once you've

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Speaker 1: got there, you would not be right there in the

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Speaker 1: city center. You would have to find some other means

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Speaker 1: of transportation to getting you to your final location, assuming

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Speaker 1: that it's not a hotel that's a jacent to the

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Speaker 1: to the station, right, which would be probably wildly expensive. Yeah, well,

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Speaker 1: you know, yes, And I remember I read one report

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Speaker 1: that said because you would have to transfer to a

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Speaker 1: different form of transportation, that would significantly increase the travel time.

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Speaker 1: And I'm thinking, have you ever driven between San Francisco

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Speaker 1: and Los Angeles? Because I don't know, you know, if

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Speaker 1: you know what the word significant means, because I have

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Speaker 1: gone between San Francisco and Los Angeles by car and

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Speaker 1: it is not leisurely is a good word for it?

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Speaker 1: How long did it take? We actually decided to make

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Speaker 1: it a road trip, so we stopped overnight between the

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Speaker 1: two and we we took a more scenic route anyway.

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Speaker 1: We didn't take a direct route between San Francisco in

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Speaker 1: l A. We went down the Coastal Highway, so we

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Speaker 1: were already going out of our way, but we stopped

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Speaker 1: just south of Big Sir, which is gorgeous by the way.

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Speaker 1: If you've ever been to California, and you've been there,

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Speaker 1: you know what I'm talking about, and if you haven't,

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Speaker 1: you should check it out. It's absolutely beautiful landscape. But

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Speaker 1: it's a long drive, and we decided we would make

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Speaker 1: that an ex sperience as opposed to a frustration. Right,

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Speaker 1: We planned for it to be a long drive and

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Speaker 1: that we would take a break halfway down. Now, if

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Speaker 1: you were to go just down the highway, it'd be

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Speaker 1: a few hours, right, it wouldn't be It wouldn't be

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Speaker 1: like a you know, a twelve hour drive or anything,

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Speaker 1: depending upon how bad the traffic is, because it can

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Speaker 1: get rough. But it's it's it's definitely not a quick

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Speaker 1: trip and uh, at least not yet, but the hyper

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Speaker 1: loop could possibly make it a quick trip. Now. We

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Speaker 1: haven't talked even about the propulsion system, all right, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: we talked about that. It's floating above the track, well,

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Speaker 1: not even a track. It's floating above the ground of

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Speaker 1: this tunnel, which again is elevated. It's on these pylons,

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Speaker 1: and we talked about how uh you know, it's we

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Speaker 1: got the lower air pressure inside the tunnel, but how

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Speaker 1: does it actually move. It uses a series of linear

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Speaker 1: electric motors which actually create a magnetic field, and so

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Speaker 1: in this case, it's like the maglev trains that also

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Speaker 1: use magnetic fields for two purposes. They use it one

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Speaker 1: to levitate the train and the second one is to

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Speaker 1: propel the train down the track. So while you're not

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Speaker 1: using magnetism to levitate the capsule inside the hyperloop, you

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Speaker 1: are using it to push it forward. And here's the

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Speaker 1: neat thing it is because you've got that low air

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Speaker 1: pressure system within this tunnel and you don't have to

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Speaker 1: worry so much about friction. You've really reduced friction. You

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Speaker 1: only have to accelerate the capsule for a relatively short

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Speaker 1: amount of time and then it can glide the rest

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Speaker 1: of the way. Because you don't have to continuously pour

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Speaker 1: an energy to maintain that speed. You will slow down

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Speaker 1: on your own because uh, you still have entropy to

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Speaker 1: deal with. It's not a purely frictionless system. It's not

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Speaker 1: a pure vacuum. So clearly eventually it's going to stop.

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Speaker 1: But the term there is eventually. So that's the neat

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Speaker 1: thing is that you accelerate to a top speed and

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Speaker 1: then you stop, and then you just allow the capsule

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Speaker 1: to travel the rest of the way. So, now that

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Speaker 1: we know how it goes, how fast can this thing go?

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Speaker 1: The route is three hundred fifty four miles or about

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Speaker 1: five seventy kilos. Uh. Yeah, And and since we know,

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00:22:06,359 --> 00:22:09,199
Speaker 1: since now we can get into our spoiler territory and

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Speaker 1: say that the proposed transportation time is thirty five minutes.

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Speaker 1: That's incredible. That's so such a short amount of time

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Speaker 1: to go between l A and San Francisco. That's that's crazy.

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Speaker 1: We are automatically gonna be old codgers who people will

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Speaker 1: dismiss when we say, you know, day, it took here.

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Speaker 1: It took care at least five hours to get it

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Speaker 1: to me. It takes more than thirty five minutes to

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Speaker 1: drive across Los Angeles. I mean that's l A is enormous.

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Speaker 1: So yeah, and this, um, so this this speed, let's see,

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Speaker 1: how would you I've I've heard some differing numbers, so um,

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Speaker 1: I usually say I usually say it's right around like

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Speaker 1: just below six hundred miles per hour as the average

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Speaker 1: speed somewhere somewhere between five and six hundred miles per

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Speaker 1: hour would be the average speed. So that's roughly around

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Speaker 1: nine kilometers per hour give or take, you know, kilometers

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Speaker 1: per hour. Because because again, like you said, the discussions

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Speaker 1: vary on this, because it all depends upon uh, you know,

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Speaker 1: how you're defining everything. And thirty five minutes, I think

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Speaker 1: when they say thirty five minutes, to me, that just

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Speaker 1: sounds like a number, like like, I don't know that

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Speaker 1: they have specifically worked it out where scientifically speaking, it's

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Speaker 1: thirty five minutes travel time and almost to me sounds like, well,

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Speaker 1: here's here's a short enough amount of time for you

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Speaker 1: to consider this incredible accomplishment. But that would mean that

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Speaker 1: you would have a top speed, Like I said, you'd

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Speaker 1: hit that top speed and then allow it to slow down.

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Speaker 1: That would be probably around between seven and fifty and

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Speaker 1: seven and seventy five miles per hour, or around twelve

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Speaker 1: hundred kilometers per hour for your top speed. That's faster

428
00:23:47,320 --> 00:23:51,040
Speaker 1: than what how most uh commercial jets travel, right, And

429
00:23:51,200 --> 00:23:54,200
Speaker 1: that also gives us that also gives us a good

430
00:23:54,240 --> 00:23:56,800
Speaker 1: place to note that if you are ever writing in

431
00:23:56,840 --> 00:23:59,440
Speaker 1: this and you have some sort of phobia about this

432
00:23:59,520 --> 00:24:03,840
Speaker 1: kind of stuff. Um, you know, do your best. You

433
00:24:03,920 --> 00:24:06,959
Speaker 1: might you might need to um have someone sing you

434
00:24:07,359 --> 00:24:10,560
Speaker 1: a sweet song thirty five minutes because if you think

435
00:24:10,560 --> 00:24:13,679
Speaker 1: about you are in an enclosed capsule. I'm guessing that

436
00:24:13,720 --> 00:24:16,399
Speaker 1: there wouldn't be any real windows, because what would be

437
00:24:16,480 --> 00:24:18,440
Speaker 1: the point. There's a really a way to do it

438
00:24:18,680 --> 00:24:21,000
Speaker 1: that would be worth the effort. Yeah, I mean, I

439
00:24:21,040 --> 00:24:23,719
Speaker 1: guess you could. You could put something along the tubes

440
00:24:23,840 --> 00:24:26,600
Speaker 1: so that when you travel it's almost like animation that

441
00:24:27,040 --> 00:24:29,359
Speaker 1: I've actually seen train tunnels that have this kind of

442
00:24:29,400 --> 00:24:32,080
Speaker 1: stuff where because as long as the train is moving

443
00:24:32,119 --> 00:24:35,879
Speaker 1: at the average speed, you get this illusion of animation

444
00:24:35,920 --> 00:24:38,000
Speaker 1: because of the way that things are lit and the

445
00:24:38,040 --> 00:24:40,439
Speaker 1: way you're moving through this tunnel. So I guess you

446
00:24:40,480 --> 00:24:43,040
Speaker 1: could do that. But otherwise you are in an enclosed

447
00:24:43,040 --> 00:24:45,439
Speaker 1: steel tunnel. It's not like you've got a lot to

448
00:24:45,480 --> 00:24:48,879
Speaker 1: look at. So if you are clustrophobic, I would imagine

449
00:24:48,880 --> 00:24:52,080
Speaker 1: that would be scary. Plus you're going to experience some

450
00:24:52,080 --> 00:24:55,280
Speaker 1: some you know, some acceleration. I I I'm sure that

451
00:24:55,280 --> 00:24:57,920
Speaker 1: the acceleration would be gradual, so it wouldn't be so

452
00:24:58,720 --> 00:25:01,959
Speaker 1: incredible that you'd be you know, crushed back in your seats,

453
00:25:02,600 --> 00:25:05,920
Speaker 1: experiencing like tend gees of force. That would be way

454
00:25:06,000 --> 00:25:09,440
Speaker 1: too much, um, but there, Yeah, but there will definitely

455
00:25:09,560 --> 00:25:14,639
Speaker 1: be noticeable effects. It's pretty much unavoidable at that at

456
00:25:14,720 --> 00:25:16,520
Speaker 1: that level of speed. Yeah, and then you have to

457
00:25:16,600 --> 00:25:19,199
Speaker 1: also worry about deceleration when you get to the end

458
00:25:19,240 --> 00:25:21,920
Speaker 1: of your trip. So again they would be using magnets

459
00:25:22,000 --> 00:25:26,399
Speaker 1: to help slow down the capsule's travel so that you

460
00:25:26,440 --> 00:25:29,600
Speaker 1: would come to a smooth stop. But that would be

461
00:25:29,760 --> 00:25:32,680
Speaker 1: something that you have to take special care of. And obviously,

462
00:25:33,080 --> 00:25:35,680
Speaker 1: like you, you definitely need to put this into very

463
00:25:35,880 --> 00:25:39,960
Speaker 1: narrow ranges of acceptance because otherwise, how can you guarantee

464
00:25:40,040 --> 00:25:44,560
Speaker 1: that the average person would would experience no ill effects

465
00:25:44,760 --> 00:25:47,840
Speaker 1: inside this capsule? Keeping in mind that the average person,

466
00:25:48,520 --> 00:25:51,280
Speaker 1: you know, there's what we say average, We're talking about

467
00:25:51,320 --> 00:25:55,040
Speaker 1: a huge variety of variables, everything from uh, you know,

468
00:25:55,240 --> 00:26:00,159
Speaker 1: health issues, part conditioning right right exactly, or you know,

469
00:26:00,280 --> 00:26:03,640
Speaker 1: just someone who is older, would they be safe? Would

470
00:26:03,640 --> 00:26:07,480
Speaker 1: they are they likely to suffer ill effects from this

471
00:26:07,640 --> 00:26:10,600
Speaker 1: acceleration and deceleration. Well, someone who really had to use

472
00:26:10,720 --> 00:26:13,760
Speaker 1: the bathroom but they forgot to do it before they

473
00:26:13,800 --> 00:26:15,239
Speaker 1: got on the train. Yeah, I don't know if there

474
00:26:15,240 --> 00:26:18,199
Speaker 1: would be a bathroom in here. You would think there

475
00:26:18,200 --> 00:26:20,560
Speaker 1: would need to be, just because you know, if you've

476
00:26:20,560 --> 00:26:23,440
Speaker 1: got a group of people together. Yeah, and asking someone

477
00:26:23,520 --> 00:26:25,280
Speaker 1: to hold it for thirty five minutes might be a

478
00:26:25,359 --> 00:26:28,200
Speaker 1: bit much depending upon that person, but they they're probably okay,

479
00:26:28,240 --> 00:26:29,840
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go out and live and say there probably

480
00:26:29,960 --> 00:26:32,520
Speaker 1: isn't at least yet. We do know that there are

481
00:26:32,680 --> 00:26:36,960
Speaker 1: emergency exits built along the tubes um or at least

482
00:26:36,960 --> 00:26:40,280
Speaker 1: there there would be. We haven't. We haven't built anything yet. Yeah,

483
00:26:40,400 --> 00:26:42,480
Speaker 1: let's underline that again. And you did a great job

484
00:26:42,560 --> 00:26:45,360
Speaker 1: emphasizing that in the beginning, but we can't say it enough.

485
00:26:45,640 --> 00:26:48,440
Speaker 1: This has not been built yet. And the recording of

486
00:26:48,480 --> 00:26:52,879
Speaker 1: this podcasting of this podcast, Hey guys, it's Jonathan from

487
00:26:53,680 --> 00:26:55,800
Speaker 1: here to break in just so that we could take

488
00:26:55,960 --> 00:27:06,600
Speaker 1: a quick break, will be right back. Where does the

489
00:27:07,240 --> 00:27:10,360
Speaker 1: hyperloop get its power? Because you're talking about electric motors

490
00:27:10,440 --> 00:27:14,280
Speaker 1: providing that force to propel them. Uh, presumably you'd be

491
00:27:14,359 --> 00:27:17,000
Speaker 1: using some form of electric motors to to create the

492
00:27:17,080 --> 00:27:21,159
Speaker 1: air cushion. So where are you getting that power? And

493
00:27:21,680 --> 00:27:24,280
Speaker 1: Musk had said, well, let's put solar panels along the

494
00:27:24,359 --> 00:27:28,879
Speaker 1: top of this this raised tunnel and you just harvest

495
00:27:28,920 --> 00:27:32,080
Speaker 1: solar energy and you store that and use that as

496
00:27:32,160 --> 00:27:35,160
Speaker 1: the power source, saying that if you did this properly,

497
00:27:35,600 --> 00:27:37,440
Speaker 1: you would not have to tap into the power grid

498
00:27:37,480 --> 00:27:40,840
Speaker 1: at all. It would be completely self contained in that respect,

499
00:27:41,560 --> 00:27:45,000
Speaker 1: which you know obviously that would be a huge benefit.

500
00:27:45,200 --> 00:27:49,440
Speaker 1: You can say, well, while the operating costs have only like,

501
00:27:49,560 --> 00:27:51,560
Speaker 1: we can't even estimate what the operating costs of this

502
00:27:51,680 --> 00:27:54,440
Speaker 1: system would be, but if you can remove power from that,

503
00:27:54,560 --> 00:27:57,120
Speaker 1: then you can at least compare that part to any

504
00:27:57,200 --> 00:28:01,440
Speaker 1: other alternative plan. That's true. And also you know the

505
00:28:01,560 --> 00:28:04,880
Speaker 1: other the other power source they're inside the pods would

506
00:28:04,880 --> 00:28:08,520
Speaker 1: be the batteries that Tesla that again come from uh

507
00:28:09,080 --> 00:28:13,240
Speaker 1: Tesla bottlesque electric cars. Well they don't, they're related to it, yeah,

508
00:28:13,640 --> 00:28:16,320
Speaker 1: and Tesla, the Tesla motors. The one of the things

509
00:28:16,359 --> 00:28:19,680
Speaker 1: that they've they've really innovated in is battery technology and

510
00:28:19,760 --> 00:28:23,440
Speaker 1: charging technology. They have something called a supercharger which allows

511
00:28:23,560 --> 00:28:27,199
Speaker 1: them to charge batteries to essentially full capacity at relatively

512
00:28:27,320 --> 00:28:32,640
Speaker 1: short intervals. So that would allow them to continuously operate

513
00:28:32,720 --> 00:28:36,639
Speaker 1: and recharge these these capsules so that you didn't have

514
00:28:36,720 --> 00:28:39,440
Speaker 1: to worry about taking them offline for a great deal

515
00:28:39,480 --> 00:28:42,760
Speaker 1: of time. Now clearly. Uh. You know, one of the

516
00:28:42,880 --> 00:28:47,200
Speaker 1: criticisms I've heard is that the system might work in California,

517
00:28:47,360 --> 00:28:49,680
Speaker 1: where you get a lot of sunshine. But if you

518
00:28:49,760 --> 00:28:52,400
Speaker 1: were to try and expand this so that you could,

519
00:28:52,480 --> 00:28:55,680
Speaker 1: you know, maybe people who I don't know don't live

520
00:28:55,720 --> 00:29:00,360
Speaker 1: in California. As crazy as that sounds to the people

521
00:29:00,400 --> 00:29:03,000
Speaker 1: who in this room three, really because we got no

522
00:29:03,200 --> 00:29:05,800
Speaker 1: here too, none of us live in California. We would

523
00:29:05,800 --> 00:29:07,320
Speaker 1: not be able to take advantage of this unless we

524
00:29:07,360 --> 00:29:09,040
Speaker 1: were to head out and see our buddies at Revision

525
00:29:09,120 --> 00:29:11,959
Speaker 1: three and then say, hey, let's go to Disneyland. Uh.

526
00:29:12,480 --> 00:29:14,320
Speaker 1: And you know it's just a thirty five minute tripped

527
00:29:14,360 --> 00:29:18,080
Speaker 1: on hyperloop. Um. But yeah, it's it wouldn't necessarily work

528
00:29:18,200 --> 00:29:21,800
Speaker 1: everywhere using solar energy. It's like in the UK. Yeah, yeah,

529
00:29:21,840 --> 00:29:24,680
Speaker 1: the UK might not get enough son to keep that going.

530
00:29:24,800 --> 00:29:27,240
Speaker 1: So they Now, you could argue that sure, you could

531
00:29:27,320 --> 00:29:30,600
Speaker 1: offset whatever the power needs were with solar panels, and

532
00:29:30,640 --> 00:29:32,800
Speaker 1: then the rest you would supply with whatever the power

533
00:29:32,880 --> 00:29:35,640
Speaker 1: grid would supply. So it's not like it's an all

534
00:29:35,760 --> 00:29:37,600
Speaker 1: or nothing game. It's not a zero sum game. I

535
00:29:37,640 --> 00:29:39,840
Speaker 1: don't mean to say that, but it's one of those

536
00:29:39,840 --> 00:29:42,760
Speaker 1: things you've got to take into consideration. So all right,

537
00:29:42,880 --> 00:29:45,640
Speaker 1: so this sounds pretty incredible. Ben, This, this, this whole

538
00:29:45,680 --> 00:29:50,120
Speaker 1: system sounds amazing to me. Um, you know what, everything

539
00:29:50,200 --> 00:29:52,880
Speaker 1: that's amazing comes to the price tag. And I'm curious

540
00:29:52,960 --> 00:29:56,760
Speaker 1: how much Musk thinks this system would cost. Oh man,

541
00:29:57,200 --> 00:30:00,480
Speaker 1: you know, I think the bargain number that I've heard

542
00:30:00,600 --> 00:30:05,040
Speaker 1: thrown around is as low as uh six billion? Is

543
00:30:05,080 --> 00:30:07,600
Speaker 1: that what? That's what I saw? That's the the alpha

544
00:30:07,960 --> 00:30:12,080
Speaker 1: design has been called six billion dollars because this is again,

545
00:30:12,200 --> 00:30:15,560
Speaker 1: no one has seriously looked into building this, at least

546
00:30:15,600 --> 00:30:18,800
Speaker 1: to the point where talks go beyond just a kind

547
00:30:18,840 --> 00:30:22,200
Speaker 1: of hypothetical situation. Right. Yeah, that's a good point. Right now.

548
00:30:22,440 --> 00:30:24,760
Speaker 1: A lot of the numbers that you and I are

549
00:30:24,840 --> 00:30:31,160
Speaker 1: pulling come directly from a fifty seven page uh. I

550
00:30:31,200 --> 00:30:34,320
Speaker 1: think it's fair to call the manifesto written by Musk

551
00:30:34,480 --> 00:30:39,320
Speaker 1: about the hyperloop and this, uh, this number comes from

552
00:30:39,440 --> 00:30:43,080
Speaker 1: his estimate this alpha system. Think of it like, uh,

553
00:30:43,600 --> 00:30:45,920
Speaker 1: think of it like when the first PlayStation came out,

554
00:30:46,040 --> 00:30:49,080
Speaker 1: you know, it was it was it was chunky, it

555
00:30:49,160 --> 00:30:51,880
Speaker 1: was first gin. It didn't have all the amenities, all

556
00:30:51,920 --> 00:30:54,920
Speaker 1: the bells and whistles. For instance, the Alpha system doesn't

557
00:30:55,120 --> 00:30:58,400
Speaker 1: take into account the idea of UM which you mentioned earlier,

558
00:30:58,440 --> 00:31:01,960
Speaker 1: the idea of putting passenger vehicle right right. So in fact,

559
00:31:02,200 --> 00:31:04,000
Speaker 1: I think they said that if you wanted to make

560
00:31:04,040 --> 00:31:07,440
Speaker 1: it for passenger vehicles UH to be stored on those

561
00:31:07,520 --> 00:31:09,000
Speaker 1: kind of pods as well, it would be more like

562
00:31:09,080 --> 00:31:12,560
Speaker 1: seven point five billion, and at one point five billion

563
00:31:12,720 --> 00:31:18,960
Speaker 1: increase for something that significance seems really really optimistic to me. Yeah,

564
00:31:19,000 --> 00:31:23,080
Speaker 1: optimistics the diplomatic word, because you imagine that any capsule

565
00:31:23,160 --> 00:31:26,640
Speaker 1: that could hold at least a vehicle and presumably more

566
00:31:26,720 --> 00:31:28,880
Speaker 1: than one, if you're talking about this being a mass

567
00:31:28,960 --> 00:31:33,120
Speaker 1: transportation system, then you know you're going to have to

568
00:31:33,240 --> 00:31:35,240
Speaker 1: have larger capsules, which means in turn, you have to

569
00:31:35,320 --> 00:31:40,160
Speaker 1: have larger tunnels to to accommodate those larger capsules, stronger

570
00:31:40,280 --> 00:31:43,720
Speaker 1: pylons or the weight. Yeah, it's I mean, everything ends

571
00:31:43,760 --> 00:31:48,200
Speaker 1: up having to be larger and more more resilient, and

572
00:31:48,320 --> 00:31:50,440
Speaker 1: it just then means it's going to cost more. So

573
00:31:50,640 --> 00:31:53,000
Speaker 1: one point five billion more is kind of I mean,

574
00:31:53,400 --> 00:31:56,840
Speaker 1: I'm curious to see how they arrived at their numbers. UM.

575
00:31:57,520 --> 00:32:01,840
Speaker 1: I've read other estimations one person and had suggested that

576
00:32:01,920 --> 00:32:04,600
Speaker 1: it would be more like one hundred billion dollars to

577
00:32:04,680 --> 00:32:07,040
Speaker 1: make such a system because you have to factor in

578
00:32:07,120 --> 00:32:13,920
Speaker 1: everything from the design prototypes, development, testing it, making sure

579
00:32:13,960 --> 00:32:15,840
Speaker 1: that it's safe for people to use, and then finally

580
00:32:15,960 --> 00:32:19,920
Speaker 1: building out the real system, and then uh and then

581
00:32:20,760 --> 00:32:23,360
Speaker 1: operating it, maintaining it. You know that there are a

582
00:32:23,440 --> 00:32:26,600
Speaker 1: lot of costs in there, so uh, it's interesting too.

583
00:32:26,640 --> 00:32:29,560
Speaker 1: Did you see how much they had proposed a ticket

584
00:32:29,600 --> 00:32:33,880
Speaker 1: would be on the hyperlop, Yeah, twenty dollars. One way,

585
00:32:34,160 --> 00:32:36,520
Speaker 1: it's more it would be more expensive for you to

586
00:32:36,560 --> 00:32:39,800
Speaker 1: take a cab to the station than it would to

587
00:32:39,880 --> 00:32:42,760
Speaker 1: take a trip from San Francisco to Los Angeles. Yeah,

588
00:32:42,920 --> 00:32:45,920
Speaker 1: and twenty dollars. That to me, out of all the

589
00:32:46,040 --> 00:32:48,400
Speaker 1: numbers we've got thrown around, twenty dollars is the one

590
00:32:48,840 --> 00:32:52,600
Speaker 1: that is most likely to make me smirk. Yeah, because

591
00:32:52,760 --> 00:32:56,280
Speaker 1: that's that's blue sky. Know. If it works, is it fantastic? Sure?

592
00:32:56,680 --> 00:32:59,880
Speaker 1: If it's fifty dollars for a ticket, is it worth

593
00:33:00,040 --> 00:33:04,200
Speaker 1: it still? Yes? Yes, there's so much worth it. Yeah.

594
00:33:04,400 --> 00:33:07,800
Speaker 1: That's the thing is that I wonder there. I've seen

595
00:33:07,840 --> 00:33:10,360
Speaker 1: some economists say that I can't understand how they would

596
00:33:10,400 --> 00:33:12,760
Speaker 1: come up with this idea that if you had a

597
00:33:12,880 --> 00:33:16,040
Speaker 1: twenty dollar ticket, it would recapture the cost of building

598
00:33:16,120 --> 00:33:19,560
Speaker 1: this thing within the time frame that Musk was suggesting. Uh,

599
00:33:19,800 --> 00:33:23,000
Speaker 1: you know, I just I also think now, granted, Musk

600
00:33:23,160 --> 00:33:27,240
Speaker 1: is a a pretty smart businessman. He's he's he's achieved

601
00:33:27,520 --> 00:33:30,240
Speaker 1: way more on the business side of things than I

602
00:33:30,400 --> 00:33:33,920
Speaker 1: have or that I ever expect to achieve. You know,

603
00:33:34,080 --> 00:33:36,040
Speaker 1: you never know what tomorrow brings. You know, maybe I

604
00:33:36,440 --> 00:33:39,120
Speaker 1: maybe I end up coming up. Hey, I came up

605
00:33:39,160 --> 00:33:41,040
Speaker 1: with an idea that could win me a Nobel Prize

606
00:33:41,520 --> 00:33:44,840
Speaker 1: when I was talking about possibly the existence of white

607
00:33:44,880 --> 00:33:47,640
Speaker 1: holes and why we haven't identified any. I'm still waiting

608
00:33:47,680 --> 00:33:49,320
Speaker 1: on that check. I got a certificate though, I'll show

609
00:33:49,360 --> 00:33:54,000
Speaker 1: it to you. Episode listeners sent me a certificate. Um. Yeah,

610
00:33:54,360 --> 00:33:58,040
Speaker 1: it's just to me that just that twenty dollars per ticket,

611
00:33:58,640 --> 00:34:01,920
Speaker 1: it really makes me wonder how many people per day

612
00:34:02,600 --> 00:34:06,040
Speaker 1: the system would allow to travel so that you would

613
00:34:06,520 --> 00:34:10,239
Speaker 1: recapture those costs within a reasonable amount of time. Well,

614
00:34:10,280 --> 00:34:12,080
Speaker 1: I've got musk take on it, and it is an

615
00:34:12,120 --> 00:34:14,759
Speaker 1: excellent question because that price has to we have to

616
00:34:14,840 --> 00:34:18,920
Speaker 1: assume that there are there, there's at least concrete estimation

617
00:34:19,040 --> 00:34:22,879
Speaker 1: behind that. Um, here is what he's thinking. He said

618
00:34:22,960 --> 00:34:26,319
Speaker 1: the capacity of would be on average eight forty passengers

619
00:34:26,480 --> 00:34:30,480
Speaker 1: per hour. Wow. So he argues that's more than sufficient

620
00:34:30,600 --> 00:34:34,160
Speaker 1: enough to transport all of the six million passengers traveling

621
00:34:34,239 --> 00:34:37,719
Speaker 1: between l A and San Francisco per year. Uh, and

622
00:34:37,960 --> 00:34:41,359
Speaker 1: that accounts for sevent those travelers to use hyper loop

623
00:34:41,440 --> 00:34:45,080
Speaker 1: during rush hour. So there's a lot of there's a

624
00:34:45,120 --> 00:34:47,840
Speaker 1: lot of wind at your back scenario stuff going on

625
00:34:48,320 --> 00:34:51,680
Speaker 1: dred and forty per hour that's you know, that's pretty

626
00:34:52,120 --> 00:34:55,080
Speaker 1: amazing if and how many people did they say the

627
00:34:55,120 --> 00:34:58,480
Speaker 1: capsule could hold, like twenty something, So there are there

628
00:34:58,520 --> 00:35:00,759
Speaker 1: are a lot of capsules traveling on that system in

629
00:35:00,880 --> 00:35:04,439
Speaker 1: order to get and obviously this is a two way loop.

630
00:35:04,520 --> 00:35:07,680
Speaker 1: I mean there's a loop, So you would divide that

631
00:35:07,760 --> 00:35:09,960
Speaker 1: by two to figure out how many are traveling north

632
00:35:10,080 --> 00:35:13,200
Speaker 1: versus south essentially and leaving every two minutes. That's the

633
00:35:13,600 --> 00:35:18,000
Speaker 1: interval of the trains. Again, that's the proposed interval of

634
00:35:18,120 --> 00:35:21,160
Speaker 1: the trains. And um, you know, yeah, it might sound

635
00:35:21,200 --> 00:35:23,440
Speaker 1: weird to some of the listeners that you and I

636
00:35:23,719 --> 00:35:28,080
Speaker 1: are taking a few moments every few minutes to say, well,

637
00:35:28,200 --> 00:35:31,120
Speaker 1: that would be this is conditional. But it's very, very

638
00:35:31,239 --> 00:35:34,960
Speaker 1: very important to note this because any time that we're

639
00:35:35,000 --> 00:35:39,360
Speaker 1: talking about um an infrastructure process uh an infrastructure of

640
00:35:39,520 --> 00:35:44,160
Speaker 1: this size, or in any any kind of new transportation,

641
00:35:44,840 --> 00:35:47,960
Speaker 1: we have to understand that it's very safe to assume

642
00:35:48,440 --> 00:35:52,239
Speaker 1: that the cost will balloon, will skyrock. Sure, yeah, because

643
00:35:52,239 --> 00:35:54,360
Speaker 1: you're always going to run into other costs, just like

644
00:35:54,600 --> 00:35:57,440
Speaker 1: Musk ran into other costs with SpaceX, things that he

645
00:35:57,520 --> 00:36:00,239
Speaker 1: did not anticipate because he was told one thing and

646
00:36:00,360 --> 00:36:02,640
Speaker 1: it turned out to be another thing. I would imagine

647
00:36:02,680 --> 00:36:05,759
Speaker 1: the same situation would happen here where things that you know,

648
00:36:06,120 --> 00:36:09,160
Speaker 1: you're basing it off of a certain set of expectations,

649
00:36:09,239 --> 00:36:12,400
Speaker 1: but you haven't factored into all the other variables that

650
00:36:12,719 --> 00:36:17,399
Speaker 1: could affect any of those numbers, including things like well,

651
00:36:17,560 --> 00:36:21,400
Speaker 1: in order for me to get the political uh angle covered,

652
00:36:21,800 --> 00:36:25,160
Speaker 1: I need to make sure that all these other things

653
00:36:25,200 --> 00:36:27,040
Speaker 1: are covered first, or I'm not going to get the

654
00:36:27,040 --> 00:36:29,560
Speaker 1: support I need to get this done, which kind of

655
00:36:30,000 --> 00:36:32,320
Speaker 1: this is kind of brings us into those pros and cons. Obviously,

656
00:36:32,440 --> 00:36:35,719
Speaker 1: the pro here is that you would have a high

657
00:36:35,760 --> 00:36:39,440
Speaker 1: speed transportation system that could get you between two distant

658
00:36:39,520 --> 00:36:43,080
Speaker 1: cities in thirty five minutes, which is phenomenal for a

659
00:36:43,160 --> 00:36:46,279
Speaker 1: low price twenty bucks a ticket. That's yeah. I can

660
00:36:46,320 --> 00:36:48,560
Speaker 1: imagine so many people in l A or San Francisco

661
00:36:48,640 --> 00:36:51,640
Speaker 1: taking weekend trips. You know, because you've got twenty bucks

662
00:36:51,680 --> 00:36:53,960
Speaker 1: a person, it's not nothing. You can go visit the

663
00:36:54,000 --> 00:36:56,319
Speaker 1: other city and your you can spend most of your

664
00:36:56,360 --> 00:36:58,560
Speaker 1: time doing whatever it is you want to do instead

665
00:36:58,560 --> 00:37:01,720
Speaker 1: of in the car. Great. Yeah, I like the idea

666
00:37:02,080 --> 00:37:05,080
Speaker 1: that's getting most it's electricity from solar power, so it's

667
00:37:05,160 --> 00:37:09,960
Speaker 1: not causing too much of a carbon footprint. Depending upon

668
00:37:10,040 --> 00:37:11,400
Speaker 1: how you know, you would have to factor in how

669
00:37:11,480 --> 00:37:14,880
Speaker 1: much carbon footprint was generated just through the construction, but

670
00:37:15,400 --> 00:37:17,920
Speaker 1: the operation you would imagine would be you know, pretty

671
00:37:18,000 --> 00:37:20,680
Speaker 1: low since you're using solar power as your source of energy.

672
00:37:20,960 --> 00:37:24,239
Speaker 1: I love that. I love innovation obviously. I love the

673
00:37:24,360 --> 00:37:27,160
Speaker 1: idea that if this were actually to be as cost

674
00:37:27,239 --> 00:37:31,880
Speaker 1: efficient as Musk claims, it would be remarkably less expensive

675
00:37:32,000 --> 00:37:35,160
Speaker 1: than the proposed train high speed train system that they

676
00:37:35,400 --> 00:37:38,080
Speaker 1: want to build between l A and San Francisco. Ah. Yes,

677
00:37:38,320 --> 00:37:40,560
Speaker 1: I am so glad you mentioned that because that's one

678
00:37:40,640 --> 00:37:42,719
Speaker 1: of our that's one of our other factors. We should

679
00:37:42,760 --> 00:37:45,880
Speaker 1: take just a just a sidebar here and talk about that,

680
00:37:46,440 --> 00:37:50,040
Speaker 1: uh hyper loop is. While hyper loop might be the

681
00:37:50,120 --> 00:37:52,960
Speaker 1: Internet favorite right now, it is not is not the

682
00:37:53,120 --> 00:37:56,719
Speaker 1: only contender in the game for high speed transit in

683
00:37:56,880 --> 00:38:01,920
Speaker 1: this realm Uh there's also califour ands UH state sanctioned

684
00:38:02,080 --> 00:38:06,560
Speaker 1: transit system, which which, let's see, what's the nicest way

685
00:38:06,600 --> 00:38:09,840
Speaker 1: to say it. It throws that six billion dollar price

686
00:38:09,960 --> 00:38:14,520
Speaker 1: tag into a very favorable contrast, right. Yeah. Musk was

687
00:38:14,640 --> 00:38:16,839
Speaker 1: making this point when he was talking about hyper loop

688
00:38:17,080 --> 00:38:18,880
Speaker 1: for the first couple of times. He said he was

689
00:38:19,000 --> 00:38:23,480
Speaker 1: looking at the figures for this proposed bullet train between

690
00:38:23,800 --> 00:38:26,120
Speaker 1: l A and San Francisco, and he said, there are

691
00:38:26,120 --> 00:38:29,919
Speaker 1: two factors here, two superlatives that you never want. One,

692
00:38:30,400 --> 00:38:34,160
Speaker 1: it's the most expensive bullet train per mile than any

693
00:38:34,239 --> 00:38:36,759
Speaker 1: other one in the world. And to it's the slowest one.

694
00:38:37,160 --> 00:38:40,239
Speaker 1: So it's very slow and very expensive. He's compared to

695
00:38:40,320 --> 00:38:43,120
Speaker 1: other bullet train systems. Right, and we know that we

696
00:38:43,280 --> 00:38:47,000
Speaker 1: know that in the case of bullet train technology, this

697
00:38:47,360 --> 00:38:50,160
Speaker 1: is not in the same situation as the hyper loop.

698
00:38:50,360 --> 00:38:53,239
Speaker 1: Bullet train technology has been tested, has been proven to

699
00:38:53,280 --> 00:38:57,319
Speaker 1: work successfully in Japan, and works successfully in China. There's

700
00:38:57,320 --> 00:38:59,319
Speaker 1: some in Europe as well as some in Europe as well.

701
00:38:59,520 --> 00:39:02,719
Speaker 1: And it's not as though it's not as though this

702
00:39:03,000 --> 00:39:07,960
Speaker 1: is slow and inordinately expensive because of a lot of research.

703
00:39:08,640 --> 00:39:13,880
Speaker 1: It might just be, as Must proposes, a frustrating example

704
00:39:14,320 --> 00:39:18,680
Speaker 1: of poor implementation, which he was so frustrated with it

705
00:39:18,800 --> 00:39:22,279
Speaker 1: that it led to this hyperloop idea. Yeah. I said

706
00:39:22,320 --> 00:39:25,319
Speaker 1: that that was essentially the impetus that got into thinking

707
00:39:25,360 --> 00:39:27,640
Speaker 1: there had to be a better way to get people

708
00:39:28,239 --> 00:39:34,600
Speaker 1: quickly between uh, these two cities and at a lower price. Yeah,

709
00:39:34,760 --> 00:39:38,000
Speaker 1: And I'll put on some pros to dovetail with the

710
00:39:38,080 --> 00:39:40,680
Speaker 1: pros that you you earlier mentioned, which we are all

711
00:39:40,800 --> 00:39:44,360
Speaker 1: great good points. Um. One of the other pros that

712
00:39:44,560 --> 00:39:47,360
Speaker 1: I see, and this is all blue sky. If this works,

713
00:39:47,840 --> 00:39:51,880
Speaker 1: how amazing would it be to be able to build

714
00:39:52,440 --> 00:39:57,320
Speaker 1: a network of hyper loops kind of picture just almost

715
00:39:57,360 --> 00:40:01,719
Speaker 1: like a chain of loops around a around a coastline

716
00:40:02,320 --> 00:40:07,880
Speaker 1: or traversing through the United States. I mean, that's wildly ambitious.

717
00:40:07,960 --> 00:40:12,560
Speaker 1: That's that's something that's not to bring mortality into it, Jonathan,

718
00:40:12,640 --> 00:40:15,000
Speaker 1: but that's something that might be beyond our lifetimes even

719
00:40:15,080 --> 00:40:17,960
Speaker 1: if it did work. Right, we have this, uh, well,

720
00:40:18,000 --> 00:40:20,040
Speaker 1: I can also imagine that if you're talking about a

721
00:40:20,640 --> 00:40:24,319
Speaker 1: more of a nationwide rollout of this, you would face other,

722
00:40:25,120 --> 00:40:28,320
Speaker 1: uh interesting opponents to it. I could imagine the airline

723
00:40:28,360 --> 00:40:31,520
Speaker 1: industry being very much interested in the fact that you

724
00:40:31,560 --> 00:40:35,080
Speaker 1: would suddenly have a high speed method getting between two

725
00:40:35,160 --> 00:40:38,960
Speaker 1: locations at perhaps lower travel times than you would in

726
00:40:39,080 --> 00:40:42,960
Speaker 1: the air and you know that would be there'll be

727
00:40:43,000 --> 00:40:46,279
Speaker 1: a lot more politics going into it, absolutely, And it's

728
00:40:46,320 --> 00:40:49,080
Speaker 1: funny because on car stuff, we did an episode once

729
00:40:49,160 --> 00:40:54,319
Speaker 1: on the proposal for a global inter interstate system lack

730
00:40:54,400 --> 00:41:00,839
Speaker 1: of a better word, and by far even countering the infrastructure,

731
00:41:00,840 --> 00:41:04,799
Speaker 1: even countering in the cost of maintenance, which is astronomical. Yeah,

732
00:41:05,239 --> 00:41:07,719
Speaker 1: the by far one of the most difficult things would

733
00:41:07,760 --> 00:41:12,760
Speaker 1: be political opposition, which I think leads us naturally into

734
00:41:13,080 --> 00:41:16,680
Speaker 1: the cons of of this system. Right. So one would

735
00:41:16,719 --> 00:41:19,040
Speaker 1: be we can't really be sure what the cost is,

736
00:41:19,600 --> 00:41:22,480
Speaker 1: so we don't while we know what Musk claims he

737
00:41:22,560 --> 00:41:28,360
Speaker 1: thinks it'll it'll cost that maybe wildly optimistic um, Whereas

738
00:41:28,440 --> 00:41:31,879
Speaker 1: we can look at what other systems cost based upon

739
00:41:32,200 --> 00:41:38,879
Speaker 1: previous builds. Although I think the the proposed bullet train

740
00:41:39,400 --> 00:41:42,680
Speaker 1: is already something at like sixty eight billion dollars. So

741
00:41:42,760 --> 00:41:45,719
Speaker 1: it's already ten times more expensive than what Musk is proposing.

742
00:41:45,920 --> 00:41:49,040
Speaker 1: And it was sixty billion dollars and it jumped up

743
00:41:49,080 --> 00:41:52,279
Speaker 1: eight billion by right. And it also it would take

744
00:41:52,320 --> 00:41:54,600
Speaker 1: you about two hours forty minutes to get from l

745
00:41:54,680 --> 00:41:57,080
Speaker 1: A to San Francisco on that train as opposed to

746
00:41:57,640 --> 00:42:01,359
Speaker 1: as opposed to the Musk's train or Musk's hyperloop. It's

747
00:42:01,400 --> 00:42:04,120
Speaker 1: not trained but anyway, um, so that's a con. Another

748
00:42:04,200 --> 00:42:08,680
Speaker 1: con is it's a totally unproven technology. So with no precedent,

749
00:42:08,840 --> 00:42:10,879
Speaker 1: it's really hard to say whether or not it will work.

750
00:42:11,080 --> 00:42:13,640
Speaker 1: Like you could build some prototypes and test it out,

751
00:42:13,719 --> 00:42:16,520
Speaker 1: but we honestly don't know. And it could be one

752
00:42:16,520 --> 00:42:18,520
Speaker 1: of those things where you test out and it doesn't work,

753
00:42:18,560 --> 00:42:23,040
Speaker 1: and then you've you've, in some people's minds anyway, wasted time,

754
00:42:23,239 --> 00:42:26,000
Speaker 1: energy and effort in order to prove that you could

755
00:42:26,080 --> 00:42:28,479
Speaker 1: not do what you had hoped to do. So there's

756
00:42:28,600 --> 00:42:30,600
Speaker 1: that's one. Another one is just you know, trying to

757
00:42:30,640 --> 00:42:33,640
Speaker 1: figure out how do you you know, how do you

758
00:42:34,120 --> 00:42:37,120
Speaker 1: navigate those tricky political waters where you want to erect

759
00:42:37,280 --> 00:42:43,040
Speaker 1: all these pylons alongside highways in California? You know, and

760
00:42:43,200 --> 00:42:45,719
Speaker 1: and then just the construction alone, like how how long

761
00:42:45,760 --> 00:42:50,799
Speaker 1: would that take to build an enormous loop built on pylons? Uh,

762
00:42:51,239 --> 00:42:55,120
Speaker 1: you know, And and so there's there's that con as well. Yeah,

763
00:42:55,280 --> 00:42:57,640
Speaker 1: and that's a that's an interesting one because that is

764
00:42:57,680 --> 00:43:01,359
Speaker 1: a con that is going to become more expensive over

765
00:43:01,520 --> 00:43:05,919
Speaker 1: time given the growth of that area of California. If

766
00:43:06,440 --> 00:43:10,400
Speaker 1: you know, let's say, let's just be wildly optimistic. Man,

767
00:43:10,520 --> 00:43:14,000
Speaker 1: let's say eight years from now, right the great ground,

768
00:43:14,200 --> 00:43:17,320
Speaker 1: and they've got they probably have a lot of agreements

769
00:43:17,400 --> 00:43:20,960
Speaker 1: secured right for the land or whatever. But then it's

770
00:43:20,960 --> 00:43:22,680
Speaker 1: obviously it's going to take more than a year to

771
00:43:22,760 --> 00:43:26,600
Speaker 1: build something this gargantelin. So the next year comes around

772
00:43:26,719 --> 00:43:30,320
Speaker 1: and wait, oh the prices have changed. So instead of

773
00:43:30,440 --> 00:43:33,600
Speaker 1: twenty million dollars for this stretch of land, it's twenty

774
00:43:33,640 --> 00:43:37,120
Speaker 1: million per acre now, just like the rockets. But again,

775
00:43:37,719 --> 00:43:40,480
Speaker 1: just back to your earlier point, there's no, it's very

776
00:43:40,560 --> 00:43:43,480
Speaker 1: difficult because there's so many variables that are in the dark.

777
00:43:43,560 --> 00:43:48,040
Speaker 1: I've got some additional cons that I haven't seen totally addressed,

778
00:43:48,280 --> 00:43:50,280
Speaker 1: um one of at least, and a lot of stuff

779
00:43:50,280 --> 00:43:52,560
Speaker 1: we've been reading. Now. One con that I love that

780
00:43:52,640 --> 00:43:55,719
Speaker 1: you brought up was the idea that of the price,

781
00:43:55,800 --> 00:43:58,880
Speaker 1: of course will balloon. And people have rightly said that

782
00:43:59,040 --> 00:44:01,759
Speaker 1: there are some factors that are not taken in consideration here.

783
00:44:02,120 --> 00:44:06,680
Speaker 1: I think that is up there with political political maneuver,

784
00:44:06,760 --> 00:44:07,960
Speaker 1: and I think that is the thing that will be

785
00:44:08,080 --> 00:44:12,279
Speaker 1: most likely to kill it. Another thing is um Now

786
00:44:12,640 --> 00:44:15,320
Speaker 1: you know, I'm kind of like a softie. I'm a

787
00:44:15,360 --> 00:44:18,520
Speaker 1: heart on my sleeve or whatever. Uh, this could be

788
00:44:18,680 --> 00:44:23,000
Speaker 1: damaging to some communities or industries that rely upon that

789
00:44:23,280 --> 00:44:29,479
Speaker 1: traffic to sustain their part of the problem. Exactly nail

790
00:44:29,560 --> 00:44:32,239
Speaker 1: on the head. Now. Of course this could be a

791
00:44:32,320 --> 00:44:34,640
Speaker 1: little bit dark for some people, but in the spirit

792
00:44:34,719 --> 00:44:39,560
Speaker 1: of objectivity, we must mention this what happens when there's

793
00:44:39,560 --> 00:44:41,959
Speaker 1: an accident. What happens if we already have a sunk

794
00:44:42,080 --> 00:44:45,759
Speaker 1: cost of billions of dollars and then there's a disaster. Yeah,

795
00:44:45,800 --> 00:44:50,120
Speaker 1: because if the capsule has a failure inside it, you're

796
00:44:50,120 --> 00:44:53,880
Speaker 1: talking about a low pressure system, it's much higher pressure

797
00:44:53,920 --> 00:44:57,600
Speaker 1: inside the capsule. You just like an experience of being

798
00:44:57,640 --> 00:45:00,719
Speaker 1: in a plane at a high enough altitude, You've got

799
00:45:00,840 --> 00:45:03,799
Speaker 1: very low pressure outside, higher pressure inside. If there's a breach,

800
00:45:03,880 --> 00:45:07,360
Speaker 1: then everything gets blown out and there's a there is

801
00:45:07,520 --> 00:45:10,600
Speaker 1: a line of well, if you think about an entire

802
00:45:10,719 --> 00:45:14,799
Speaker 1: loop of other capsules two minutes behind, So if there

803
00:45:15,040 --> 00:45:18,239
Speaker 1: is any sort of failure of the propulsion system, then

804
00:45:18,320 --> 00:45:20,800
Speaker 1: you could end up having a collision. If there's a

805
00:45:20,880 --> 00:45:23,680
Speaker 1: failure of the propulsion system in the sense of deceleration,

806
00:45:23,840 --> 00:45:27,120
Speaker 1: then you could have injuries as the capsule gets to

807
00:45:27,200 --> 00:45:30,440
Speaker 1: its stopping point. There are a lot of safety questions.

808
00:45:30,440 --> 00:45:32,320
Speaker 1: I mean you're talking especially if some talk about capsule's

809
00:45:32,360 --> 00:45:35,719
Speaker 1: leaving every two minutes. That thing literally has to run

810
00:45:35,840 --> 00:45:38,280
Speaker 1: like clockwork like. It would have to be so efficient.

811
00:45:38,840 --> 00:45:41,160
Speaker 1: You would have to have a very secure system to

812
00:45:41,320 --> 00:45:44,080
Speaker 1: slow down capsules and maybe have them in a little

813
00:45:44,120 --> 00:45:48,200
Speaker 1: waiting area along one section of the loop before uh,

814
00:45:48,320 --> 00:45:52,080
Speaker 1: the previous capsule is completely unloaded, because again, depending upon

815
00:45:52,760 --> 00:45:55,400
Speaker 1: who is in that capsule, it may take longer than average,

816
00:45:55,520 --> 00:45:57,319
Speaker 1: or you know, it may not take that long at all.

817
00:45:57,719 --> 00:46:00,520
Speaker 1: And that whole thing has to be set up so

818
00:46:00,640 --> 00:46:03,479
Speaker 1: that you know, you don't have any safety concerns. That's huge.

819
00:46:03,640 --> 00:46:06,880
Speaker 1: The software would have to be as innovative as the

820
00:46:07,000 --> 00:46:10,320
Speaker 1: two idea itself, because you have to be continual security.

821
00:46:10,440 --> 00:46:13,359
Speaker 1: I'm not seeing it's impossible man, it's just hard. It's

822
00:46:13,440 --> 00:46:15,320
Speaker 1: just hard, that's the thing is. And then you know,

823
00:46:15,600 --> 00:46:19,399
Speaker 1: humans have done some stuff that's really freaking hard. Yeah,

824
00:46:19,480 --> 00:46:23,319
Speaker 1: and the Musk has sent people into space. So it's

825
00:46:23,360 --> 00:46:25,880
Speaker 1: not that it's not that we're saying that it's impossible

826
00:46:25,920 --> 00:46:28,759
Speaker 1: to do, but you know it, we definitely have to

827
00:46:28,880 --> 00:46:31,320
Speaker 1: keep the challenges in mind in order for us to

828
00:46:31,440 --> 00:46:34,279
Speaker 1: meet those challenges, Like, even from the optimistic side, you've

829
00:46:34,280 --> 00:46:36,719
Speaker 1: got to acknowledge it so that way you're prepared to

830
00:46:36,920 --> 00:46:39,640
Speaker 1: overcome them. If you don't acknowledge them, then you're just

831
00:46:40,080 --> 00:46:44,560
Speaker 1: it's just a ticking time bomb. Really. Hey, it's twenty Jonathan. Again,

832
00:46:44,560 --> 00:46:47,560
Speaker 1: we're gonna loop on into this episode so that we

833
00:46:47,600 --> 00:46:58,800
Speaker 1: can take another quick break. Okay, So we've talked about

834
00:46:59,160 --> 00:47:02,320
Speaker 1: Musk and his influence. We've talked about his idea of

835
00:47:02,360 --> 00:47:06,080
Speaker 1: the hyperloop and how it would work assuming everything went

836
00:47:06,200 --> 00:47:08,520
Speaker 1: as planned. We talked about the pros and cons. Let's

837
00:47:08,560 --> 00:47:11,799
Speaker 1: talk about some of the other systems out there. We've

838
00:47:11,840 --> 00:47:15,120
Speaker 1: mentioned a little bit about Maglev trains, and I've done

839
00:47:15,160 --> 00:47:17,279
Speaker 1: an episode about Maglev trains, so I don't want to

840
00:47:17,320 --> 00:47:20,960
Speaker 1: go over it too much, but it is, like we said,

841
00:47:21,000 --> 00:47:24,480
Speaker 1: a similar idea, this idea of having a train that

842
00:47:25,200 --> 00:47:28,360
Speaker 1: doesn't actually sit down on wheels, at least not the

843
00:47:28,560 --> 00:47:32,000
Speaker 1: entire way on. Whenever it's at a station, it would

844
00:47:32,000 --> 00:47:36,120
Speaker 1: be down on the track, wheels to the track, and

845
00:47:36,239 --> 00:47:39,719
Speaker 1: then once it leaves the station, magnets would end up

846
00:47:40,280 --> 00:47:43,760
Speaker 1: creating a repulsive force against one another. And they're different

847
00:47:43,840 --> 00:47:49,239
Speaker 1: approaches to this. There's the electromagnetic suspension, there's electro dynamic suspension. UH.

848
00:47:49,320 --> 00:47:53,200
Speaker 1: There's the induct tracks system, which is the permanent magnet

849
00:47:53,280 --> 00:47:55,719
Speaker 1: passive suspension. There's all these different ways of doing it,

850
00:47:55,800 --> 00:47:59,439
Speaker 1: but essentially the same idea arises. You're just using these

851
00:48:00,160 --> 00:48:04,480
Speaker 1: magnets to push the train up over the rails and

852
00:48:04,600 --> 00:48:08,400
Speaker 1: then to propel them down the track's length uh, and

853
00:48:08,480 --> 00:48:10,440
Speaker 1: then also to slow them down when they get to

854
00:48:10,520 --> 00:48:12,399
Speaker 1: where they need to be, where they can then come

855
00:48:12,440 --> 00:48:15,000
Speaker 1: back down onto their wheels and come to a rolling stop.

856
00:48:15,120 --> 00:48:18,600
Speaker 1: And these are these are also high speed. But how

857
00:48:18,760 --> 00:48:21,840
Speaker 1: high speed are we talking in comparison to the hyperlop proposal.

858
00:48:21,920 --> 00:48:24,319
Speaker 1: They're not as fast, mostly because most of them are

859
00:48:24,400 --> 00:48:27,719
Speaker 1: not encapsulated in a tunnel with low air pressure. They

860
00:48:27,880 --> 00:48:32,120
Speaker 1: tend to be out among the outside, so they still

861
00:48:32,200 --> 00:48:34,400
Speaker 1: travel at an incredible speed because again, you don't have

862
00:48:34,400 --> 00:48:36,360
Speaker 1: to worry about that friction. See, friction is not just

863
00:48:36,520 --> 00:48:39,760
Speaker 1: something that slows you down. It means that you're losing energy.

864
00:48:40,120 --> 00:48:43,160
Speaker 1: Because you're losing energy in the form of heat. Right,

865
00:48:43,200 --> 00:48:46,160
Speaker 1: you're having to pour more energy into your vehicle to

866
00:48:46,280 --> 00:48:48,680
Speaker 1: make it go the speed you want to compensate for

867
00:48:48,719 --> 00:48:51,560
Speaker 1: the fact that you're losing energy and heat. By making

868
00:48:51,600 --> 00:48:54,400
Speaker 1: it frictionless, not only can they go faster, but you

869
00:48:54,440 --> 00:48:56,680
Speaker 1: don't have to pour as much energy into it because

870
00:48:56,680 --> 00:48:59,440
Speaker 1: you're not losing so much in this this heat problem.

871
00:49:00,040 --> 00:49:03,800
Speaker 1: There are other issues. For example, most maglev trains have

872
00:49:04,000 --> 00:49:07,960
Speaker 1: to use superconductors because you know, actually they all use

873
00:49:08,000 --> 00:49:12,240
Speaker 1: superconductors in order to generate these magnetic fields, and superconductors

874
00:49:12,280 --> 00:49:15,840
Speaker 1: are not cheap and uh, most of them, although this

875
00:49:15,960 --> 00:49:18,600
Speaker 1: has changed over the last couple of decades, most of

876
00:49:18,640 --> 00:49:23,240
Speaker 1: them require being cooled to very, very very low temperatures.

877
00:49:23,239 --> 00:49:26,040
Speaker 1: We're talking just a couple of degrees above absolute zero,

878
00:49:26,239 --> 00:49:28,879
Speaker 1: so right, and that's not just to be clear, that's

879
00:49:28,960 --> 00:49:32,480
Speaker 1: not something that happens every every so often or on

880
00:49:32,560 --> 00:49:36,279
Speaker 1: a cycle that has to be continuous. Yeah, So you're

881
00:49:36,320 --> 00:49:38,560
Speaker 1: talking about using something like liquid nitrogen to get it

882
00:49:38,640 --> 00:49:40,720
Speaker 1: down to a certain temperature and then switching to liquid

883
00:49:40,760 --> 00:49:44,439
Speaker 1: helium because liquid nitrogen is not cold enough. That being said,

884
00:49:44,480 --> 00:49:47,440
Speaker 1: there are some supercolliders that have been developed since then,

885
00:49:48,080 --> 00:49:52,960
Speaker 1: since they started building maglev trains that operate at higher temperatures,

886
00:49:53,080 --> 00:49:55,640
Speaker 1: and by higher I still mean really really cold, just

887
00:49:55,760 --> 00:49:58,800
Speaker 1: not just not as cold, right. So it's not like

888
00:49:59,280 --> 00:50:02,399
Speaker 1: the deepest reaches of space cold, right, but it's way

889
00:50:02,520 --> 00:50:04,959
Speaker 1: chillier than it gets in Minnesota and the winter cold.

890
00:50:05,360 --> 00:50:08,600
Speaker 1: So um, you know, it's not it's not something that

891
00:50:08,719 --> 00:50:11,080
Speaker 1: makes it. It makes it more expensive to operate. And

892
00:50:11,200 --> 00:50:15,439
Speaker 1: so because of the expense of having to operate these

893
00:50:15,480 --> 00:50:19,319
Speaker 1: not just operate them, but also build them. There there

894
00:50:19,400 --> 00:50:22,880
Speaker 1: aren't as many maglev trains as you might imagine based

895
00:50:22,920 --> 00:50:26,279
Speaker 1: upon their their initial appeal from the fact that they

896
00:50:26,400 --> 00:50:29,440
Speaker 1: don't have as much fiction. There are maglev trains, there's

897
00:50:29,480 --> 00:50:32,080
Speaker 1: not a lot of them. Some of them are just prototypes. Yes,

898
00:50:32,239 --> 00:50:35,320
Speaker 1: some of them are just prototypes. And and for a while,

899
00:50:35,560 --> 00:50:39,400
Speaker 1: to be honest, maglev trains seemed like they could be

900
00:50:39,480 --> 00:50:42,759
Speaker 1: a candidate for this. There's this joke that you and

901
00:50:42,880 --> 00:50:45,000
Speaker 1: I have made before off air, and that's gott I

902
00:50:45,080 --> 00:50:48,880
Speaker 1: have made before off air that there's all this fantastic technology. Man,

903
00:50:49,120 --> 00:50:51,399
Speaker 1: it's just ten years away. Yeah, it's always ten years

904
00:50:51,400 --> 00:50:54,040
Speaker 1: ago whatever, right, you always are You're always just ten

905
00:50:54,080 --> 00:50:56,400
Speaker 1: years away. Yeah, we make that same joke on forward

906
00:50:56,440 --> 00:50:59,759
Speaker 1: thinking as well. Plug um. But yeah, so so the

907
00:51:00,120 --> 00:51:03,680
Speaker 1: love trains their top speeds maybe somewhere between three and

908
00:51:05,680 --> 00:51:10,400
Speaker 1: so that's still significantly slower than what the hyperloop would

909
00:51:10,640 --> 00:51:13,560
Speaker 1: attain assuming it worked the way we think it's supposed to. Yeah,

910
00:51:13,640 --> 00:51:16,360
Speaker 1: big difference being that maglev trains are wait for it

911
00:51:16,640 --> 00:51:20,160
Speaker 1: real um. So that I think alone gives them some

912
00:51:20,640 --> 00:51:25,440
Speaker 1: bonus points in my book. But also if we if

913
00:51:25,760 --> 00:51:30,160
Speaker 1: we think about this, um, the the advantages that maglev

914
00:51:30,280 --> 00:51:34,399
Speaker 1: trains have are um in comparison to the hyper loop.

915
00:51:35,400 --> 00:51:39,600
Speaker 1: You have to ask yourself, does do those advantages make

916
00:51:39,680 --> 00:51:43,000
Speaker 1: the maglev trains a more feasible option? You know? Is

917
00:51:43,080 --> 00:51:47,400
Speaker 1: the advantage of extra speed uh preferable? I think the

918
00:51:47,680 --> 00:51:52,080
Speaker 1: biggest advantage maglev trains have is not, uh, you know,

919
00:51:52,200 --> 00:51:54,280
Speaker 1: in their operation, but the fact that we have proof

920
00:51:54,400 --> 00:51:57,560
Speaker 1: of that it works, right, Like, we know that maglev

921
00:51:57,600 --> 00:52:01,120
Speaker 1: trains work. So therefore that is a huge advantage over

922
00:52:01,200 --> 00:52:04,360
Speaker 1: the hyper loop because that's something that from what we understand,

923
00:52:04,400 --> 00:52:06,399
Speaker 1: it should work, assuming you built it the right way,

924
00:52:06,880 --> 00:52:08,879
Speaker 1: but we don't have proof of it. Alright, So Ben,

925
00:52:08,960 --> 00:52:10,920
Speaker 1: let's talk about this other guy. Have you heard about

926
00:52:11,120 --> 00:52:16,080
Speaker 1: Darryl Auster. Darryl Auster, Yeah, he might be familiar. Why

927
00:52:16,160 --> 00:52:18,520
Speaker 1: he proposed a system that would be a transportation system.

928
00:52:18,640 --> 00:52:23,400
Speaker 1: It's a steel tube on some elevated structure, like on pylons,

929
00:52:24,000 --> 00:52:27,719
Speaker 1: that would use linear electric motors to push capsules at

930
00:52:27,800 --> 00:52:32,839
Speaker 1: high speed across vast distances. Um, might sound a little familiar. Yeah, Hey,

931
00:52:32,920 --> 00:52:35,440
Speaker 1: I didn't. I didn't want to interrupt, but um, this

932
00:52:35,719 --> 00:52:39,040
Speaker 1: this does sound a little bit familiar. Not to be

933
00:52:39,120 --> 00:52:41,320
Speaker 1: a guy living in the past. But isn't this just

934
00:52:41,480 --> 00:52:44,440
Speaker 1: what we've been talking about? Yeah? Yeah, like, um, like

935
00:52:44,600 --> 00:52:47,480
Speaker 1: five minutes ago. Yes, this is exactly it's It's called

936
00:52:47,520 --> 00:52:51,040
Speaker 1: the Evacuated Tube Transport System or e T three. Right,

937
00:52:51,160 --> 00:52:54,560
Speaker 1: And didn't the ET three hit the news and hit

938
00:52:54,640 --> 00:53:00,279
Speaker 1: the public sphere, uh before this hyper loop proposal? Yeah,

939
00:53:00,440 --> 00:53:04,200
Speaker 1: well before it. And also Auster, interestingly enough, paid a

940
00:53:04,239 --> 00:53:08,680
Speaker 1: little visit earlier this year to SpaceX, which is Um,

941
00:53:08,800 --> 00:53:10,480
Speaker 1: I don't know if you know this, because we talked

942
00:53:10,480 --> 00:53:12,279
Speaker 1: about at the top of the show, one of the

943
00:53:12,320 --> 00:53:15,560
Speaker 1: things Musk does. It's the it's the ancient paths to

944
00:53:15,640 --> 00:53:17,960
Speaker 1: Me now the top of the show. But the Yes,

945
00:53:18,360 --> 00:53:21,360
Speaker 1: this is a very interesting point because this has fueled

946
00:53:21,440 --> 00:53:25,720
Speaker 1: some uh, some speculation. Yes, yes, yeah, I would agree,

947
00:53:25,840 --> 00:53:28,360
Speaker 1: that's a good word for it. So the speculation is

948
00:53:28,480 --> 00:53:33,279
Speaker 1: essentially that perhaps either Musk knew about Auster's idea and

949
00:53:33,400 --> 00:53:37,200
Speaker 1: essentially lifted it because other people had suggested that Auster was,

950
00:53:37,960 --> 00:53:41,560
Speaker 1: for lack of a better word, whackadoodle um, or rather

951
00:53:41,719 --> 00:53:45,759
Speaker 1: that his ideas were probably unrealistic and difficult to put

952
00:53:45,880 --> 00:53:50,320
Speaker 1: into practice, he did not get the same consideration or

953
00:53:50,480 --> 00:53:54,120
Speaker 1: street cred that that he encountered much more. Skepticism is

954
00:53:54,280 --> 00:53:57,360
Speaker 1: right best way, and it's it's possible that Musk is

955
00:53:57,520 --> 00:54:00,960
Speaker 1: exactly the right guy to go to about this sort

956
00:54:01,000 --> 00:54:03,640
Speaker 1: of thing, because Musk has this already has this past

957
00:54:03,719 --> 00:54:07,640
Speaker 1: of making these incredible accomplishments, things that some people might

958
00:54:07,719 --> 00:54:11,720
Speaker 1: have called impossible before he achieved them. So, uh, there's

959
00:54:11,840 --> 00:54:16,480
Speaker 1: some speculation that in fact Musk has licensed the technology

960
00:54:17,000 --> 00:54:19,920
Speaker 1: or the design from Auster, and in fact Auster has

961
00:54:20,000 --> 00:54:23,920
Speaker 1: said that there are people or organizations that are licensing

962
00:54:24,160 --> 00:54:27,200
Speaker 1: his ideas but he does not go so far as

963
00:54:27,280 --> 00:54:29,880
Speaker 1: to identify who they are. He says that that's up

964
00:54:29,960 --> 00:54:33,600
Speaker 1: to them. It's their choice to come out and say, yes,

965
00:54:33,680 --> 00:54:36,560
Speaker 1: I've licensed this technology from so and so. Yeah, and

966
00:54:36,680 --> 00:54:39,400
Speaker 1: that's you see. I think we're being very fair about

967
00:54:39,480 --> 00:54:42,000
Speaker 1: this because the only three things there are three things

968
00:54:42,080 --> 00:54:44,880
Speaker 1: we know for sure. First, the design of hyperloop and

969
00:54:44,960 --> 00:54:53,319
Speaker 1: et three very similar. Second, uh, the Darryl did visit SpaceX. Yes. Third, uh,

970
00:54:53,760 --> 00:54:57,400
Speaker 1: Darryl did mention that there was licensing involved, But none

971
00:54:57,440 --> 00:54:59,880
Speaker 1: of that even all of that together does not can

972
00:55:00,000 --> 00:55:04,480
Speaker 1: eclusively prove anything. No, it's circumstantial. Circumstantial, So we call it.

973
00:55:04,800 --> 00:55:08,120
Speaker 1: We call it speculation. And I'm gonna go ahead and

974
00:55:08,280 --> 00:55:11,520
Speaker 1: call it interesting. Yes, I I will go so far

975
00:55:11,560 --> 00:55:16,040
Speaker 1: as to say very interesting. I raise your interesting with

976
00:55:16,160 --> 00:55:19,160
Speaker 1: a very um yeah. I think it would not surprise

977
00:55:19,239 --> 00:55:21,640
Speaker 1: me to find out that Musk had heard of this

978
00:55:21,960 --> 00:55:24,400
Speaker 1: and then thought it was a great idea, and that

979
00:55:24,640 --> 00:55:28,040
Speaker 1: maybe together they realized that because of the resistance that

980
00:55:28,120 --> 00:55:30,560
Speaker 1: Auster had faced when he was proposing his idea to

981
00:55:30,640 --> 00:55:33,760
Speaker 1: other you know, like essentially outlets were like that's crazy.

982
00:55:34,080 --> 00:55:37,120
Speaker 1: Then must goes forward and he says essentially the same

983
00:55:37,200 --> 00:55:42,680
Speaker 1: thing and it's crazy awesome. Yeah. So so it's it's

984
00:55:42,760 --> 00:55:46,560
Speaker 1: possible that this is in fact an evolution of Auster's idea.

985
00:55:46,680 --> 00:55:48,880
Speaker 1: It could very well be that it's two people who

986
00:55:48,920 --> 00:55:52,680
Speaker 1: thought the same thing independently. That has happened many, many,

987
00:55:52,840 --> 00:55:56,560
Speaker 1: many times. It happened Tewriter, Yeah, it happened with it

988
00:55:56,680 --> 00:56:00,440
Speaker 1: happened with calculus, that happened with lots of things, you know.

989
00:56:00,880 --> 00:56:05,000
Speaker 1: So we're not going to jump to that conclusion, but

990
00:56:05,120 --> 00:56:08,799
Speaker 1: it is interesting. Uh. And so you know, there are

991
00:56:08,800 --> 00:56:10,879
Speaker 1: a couple of other things we can mention, like there's

992
00:56:10,920 --> 00:56:14,919
Speaker 1: some other high speed technologies that could possibly come into play.

993
00:56:15,000 --> 00:56:18,880
Speaker 1: But I think that that really it's down to the

994
00:56:18,920 --> 00:56:20,879
Speaker 1: brass tacks, Ben. I think we have to sit down

995
00:56:21,640 --> 00:56:27,120
Speaker 1: and actually predict will hyperloop come to pass or is

996
00:56:27,200 --> 00:56:30,680
Speaker 1: it as you mentioned before, vapor ware, Get out of

997
00:56:30,719 --> 00:56:32,920
Speaker 1: my head. You're reading my mind, man, because you're right,

998
00:56:33,280 --> 00:56:35,680
Speaker 1: the time has come. Uh. I don't know if we

999
00:56:35,760 --> 00:56:38,160
Speaker 1: have any dramatic music playing in the background, but it's

1000
00:56:38,160 --> 00:56:41,600
Speaker 1: in my head right now. Who should do the honors? Sir?

1001
00:56:43,040 --> 00:56:45,160
Speaker 1: You know what I'm gonna go first. I'm going to

1002
00:56:45,400 --> 00:56:53,080
Speaker 1: say that we will not see this become a transportation

1003
00:56:53,360 --> 00:56:57,920
Speaker 1: between Los Angeles and San Francisco, because the challenges of

1004
00:56:58,120 --> 00:57:02,160
Speaker 1: making sure that it will work properly and navigating those

1005
00:57:02,200 --> 00:57:05,719
Speaker 1: tricky political waters that are already so invested in a

1006
00:57:05,920 --> 00:57:10,600
Speaker 1: bullet train uh plan for those cities. I just think

1007
00:57:10,640 --> 00:57:12,800
Speaker 1: that's too great a challenge to overcome. I think that

1008
00:57:13,680 --> 00:57:16,400
Speaker 1: even if you were to prove the technology works, getting

1009
00:57:16,480 --> 00:57:21,400
Speaker 1: past that political barrier is a huge, huge task, right, Okay,

1010
00:57:21,720 --> 00:57:25,080
Speaker 1: So to dovetail onto that, I am going to also

1011
00:57:25,160 --> 00:57:28,800
Speaker 1: have a bit of a qualified prediction. I I predict,

1012
00:57:29,000 --> 00:57:31,320
Speaker 1: I want to be optimistic about this, that we're going

1013
00:57:31,440 --> 00:57:35,800
Speaker 1: to see something like the hyper loop in the future. However,

1014
00:57:36,560 --> 00:57:39,360
Speaker 1: I don't think it's going to be quite up to

1015
00:57:39,440 --> 00:57:42,880
Speaker 1: the specs that we've heard proposed, and I am also

1016
00:57:43,280 --> 00:57:46,560
Speaker 1: skeptical that it could be built in California at this juncture.

1017
00:57:46,760 --> 00:57:48,840
Speaker 1: You know, there's a reason that Google Fiber went to

1018
00:57:48,920 --> 00:57:52,440
Speaker 1: Kansas City, right, yeah, right, right, that's my prediction. I

1019
00:57:52,480 --> 00:57:54,800
Speaker 1: think that's fair something like it. And I will say

1020
00:57:55,040 --> 00:57:59,280
Speaker 1: that the hyper loop proposal is in many ways much

1021
00:57:59,440 --> 00:58:04,520
Speaker 1: more deserved than Auster's originally uh than his proposal, because

1022
00:58:04,640 --> 00:58:07,160
Speaker 1: Auster had said that he wanted this e T three

1023
00:58:07,240 --> 00:58:09,600
Speaker 1: system to be deployed throughout the United States, which means

1024
00:58:09,640 --> 00:58:12,360
Speaker 1: that you have interstate politics to deal within, not just

1025
00:58:12,520 --> 00:58:16,000
Speaker 1: within one state, right, You've got all these different states

1026
00:58:16,080 --> 00:58:19,600
Speaker 1: that you have to factor into that consideration, and that

1027
00:58:19,760 --> 00:58:23,600
Speaker 1: makes it way more complex. And that wraps up this

1028
00:58:23,960 --> 00:58:28,080
Speaker 1: classic episode of tech Stuff. I hope you guys enjoyed it.

1029
00:58:28,680 --> 00:58:31,800
Speaker 1: If you have any suggestions for future topics for current

1030
00:58:31,840 --> 00:58:34,120
Speaker 1: episodes of tech Stuff, reach out to me on Twitter.

1031
00:58:34,240 --> 00:58:37,240
Speaker 1: The handle is tech stuff h s W and I'll

1032
00:58:37,240 --> 00:58:44,960
Speaker 1: talk to you again really soon. Text Stuff is an

1033
00:58:45,000 --> 00:58:48,640
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio production. For more podcasts from my Heart Radio,

1034
00:58:49,000 --> 00:58:52,160
Speaker 1: visit the i Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever

1035
00:58:52,280 --> 00:58:53,800
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.