Space Flight.

[Beemerguy53]

Threads and discussions like this are fascinating. Consider...

Only three hundred years ago, the most ordinary, mundane aspects of our daily lives, things we don't even think about, would have been considered the stuff of fantasy.

Electric lights...refrigerators...elevators...paved roads...surgical anesthesia...pneumatic tires...air conditioning...weather forecasting...radio and television...railroads...mass-produced consumer goods...farm equipment...photography...GPS...video doorbells...fire engines...

When we talk today about what "can't be achieved", or what "we'll never be able to" do, we aren't taking into account future scientific, engineering, and technological discoveries that will make today's "impossible" become tomorrow's "mundane"...but progress is inevitable.

Consider what life was like in 1724, and how people lived back then...and then realize that folks in the year 2324 (if we last that long) will look at us the same way...

 

[Grayfox]

I believe that at some point in our future, perhaps hundreds of years from now, that the survival of the human race will require us to leave Earth and move to other planets.
I support space exploration today because it sure would be nice that when that time comes, we have someplace to go and the means to get there.

 

[delcrossv]

It wasn't until the 1850s that man first went over 50mph on trains. 75 years earlier our founding fathers could no more envision traveling at such an astounding speed than we can imagine traveling at the speed of light. Many believed speeds like that would cause permanent bodily harm. The speed of sound was also though to be impossible and detrimental for the body to withstand, Yet, that happened in 1947 less than 100 years after the 50mph train. When Kennedy said we would go to the moon in 1962 and most people didn't believe it. Just 22 after first hitting the speed of sound in 1969 and just 7 years after JFKs statement, man has hit 24,791 mph in Apollo 10 on his way to the moon and Apollo 11 landed on the moon, July 20th 1969. Plus, the Parker solar probe hit 394,736mph.

What in the world would make anyone think we have reached our limit now????

Yes the speed of light is astounding, But, never say never. We have said that many times in the past and always been WRONG. There maybe something rather simple our pea brains have yet to conceive.

Look at communications. The first telegraph was less than 200 years ago. Now we can talk, send video and data from almost anywhere on the planet with a small hand held device.

The Commissioner of Patents wanted to close the Patent Office in the 1890's because "everything has been invented"

Here's the quote:

In 1889, Charles H. Duell was the Commissioner of US patent office. He is widely quoted as having stated that the patent office would soon shrink in size, and eventually close, because…

“Everything that can be invented has been invented.”

 

[rwsmith]

Like I said......

..........

That said, a permanent presence on the moon is the key to exploring the rest of the solar system. (And don't forget all that He3 up there for your fusion reactors).

Mars, as of now, is kinda a dog and pony show. Do the moon first then see if you want to go down another deep gravity well.

I courteously disagree. I don't see any sense in blasting off, sending stuff to the moon, and blasting off again. A moon base would probably be beneficial for some reason but not to further getting to other planets. Probably to practice maintaining a base. Maybe I think modules could be blasted into earth orbit, assembled (like the space station) and 'trans-planetarily injected' into a trajectory to go where we want.

 

[CalifEd]

Threads and discussions like this are fascinating. Consider...

When we talk today about what "can't be achieved", or what "we'll never be able to" do, we aren't taking into account future scientific, engineering, and technological discoveries that will make today's "impossible" become tomorrow's "mundane"...but progress is inevitable.

We don't know what we don't know it, until we know it.

 

[delcrossv]

I courteously disagree. I don't see any sense in blasting off, sending stuff to the moon, and blasting off again. A moon base would probably be beneficial for some reason but not to further getting to other planets. Probably to practice maintaining a base. Maybe I think modules could be blasted into earth orbit, assembled (like the space station) and 'trans-planetarily injected' into a trajectory to go where we want.

Most of the effort and expense in space travel is getting through the first few hundred miles above the earth's surface because we have to overcome Earth's gravity.

If you start from the moon, it's 1/6th the gravity and 1/6th the cost. With a full base on the moon, with the exception of things that have to come from Earth, there'd be no sense lifting heavy interplanetary spacecraft (or components thereof)off the earth at all.

The Moon really is the gateway to the rest of the system.

 

[Protocall_Design]

What I want to know, is if we could go the speed of light, or even close, how would we navigate around all the space debris, planets, and other obstacles? There are plenty of small rocks that would be like an atomic bomb at that speed.

 

[LVSteve]

What I want to know, is if we could go the speed of light, or even close, how would we navigate around all the space debris, planets, and other obstacles? There are plenty of small rocks that would be like an atomic bomb at that speed.

That's what the navigational deflector is for. Duh!

 

[delcrossv]

What I want to know, is if we could go the speed of light, or even close, how would we navigate around all the space debris, planets, and other obstacles? There are plenty of small rocks that would be like an atomic bomb at that speed.

I'd doubt anyone would be going that fast near a destination star, but it's a fair question. Interstellar space still has about 1 atom/cc. And what happens when those atoms smack against a spaceship going at a high fraction of the speed of light? Radiation- lots and lots of radiation, that would have to be shielded against.

But as I've heard physicists say: "that's an engineering problem. "

 

[SMSgt]

What I want to know, is if we could go the speed of light, or even close, how would we navigate around all the space debris, planets, and other obstacles? There are plenty of small rocks that would be like an atomic bomb at that speed.

Nose gunner with a photon blaster.

 

[Beemerguy53]

What I want to know, is if we could go the speed of light, or even close, how would we navigate around all the space debris, planets, and other obstacles? There are plenty of small rocks that would be like an atomic bomb at that speed.

Shields up, Mr. Data!

 

[Golddollar]

What I want to know, is if we could go the speed of light, or even close, how would we navigate around all the space debris, planets, and other obstacles? There are plenty of small rocks that would be like an atomic bomb at that speed.

More power to the shields, Scotty!