is manned interstellar space travel even possible?

Post Reply New Topic

Just saw on the news that even in this day of financial meltdown we're all set for a new race to the moon! Why are we going backwards? I'm sure that in my lifetime i will see a man on mars, even though it may be pushed right to the end after the inevitable tragedys in waiting.

My point is can we really ever expect to travel other stars and answer the obvious questions that all of us ask at some point in our life? When you consider the vast distances and incomprehensible technology involved, it all seems a little depressing to me. I know the moons of gas giants and even mars have been touted as possible locations for life, but surely given the conditions we're talking micro-organisms at best! I don't see us fishing the methane lakes of titan anytime soon! it's also very difficult to have faith in worm holes and the like. Maybe in the far future man will be prepared to spend their entire life in a tin can traveling at the speed of light (capital punishment anyone?), but for now it just seems too far fetched.

With neutrino particles possibly traveling in advance of the speed of light there may be scope for future possibility, but i won't be buying a nice shiny Einstein was wrong badge quite yet, but a glimmer of hope perhaps.

yes. It is possible. Put an earth crew in a deep freeze and send a ship far and away, then thaw out the crew when they get there.

Possible, but not practical. There are two chances of developing propulsion systems that could acheive, say a tenth the speed of light --- slim and none. And forget going at are very near the speed of light. We don't have and cannot get the energy to do that.

ruveyn

Not yet, but give it enough time. Napoleon Bonaparte once laughed at the man who suggested putting steam engines onto wooden ships "You would make a ship sail against the winds and currents by lighting a bon-fire under her deck... I have no time for such nonsense." There is always opposition to new ideas simply because they are not yet common

In real terms, no.

The far side of the Moon would be a good location for a telescope.

Out as far as Mars, the Sun is just another star.

Best chance, 500 years on autopilot, freezer burn, and no idea what the other end is about. The energy needed to stop is equal to the energy needed to get there.

Call home, 40 years, 40 more for their "Hello," 40 more for "We Made it," 40 more for "Who is this?"

First we repair the one we have, downsize the crew, learn to maintain a life cycle.

Where microscopic life exists, the chances are that a lot of bigger stuff will too, but also, if we find a planet/moon/gas cloud/star/other with vaguely animal life, then it probably won't have human-level intelligence life, as intelligent life seems to be short lived (based on observation of the human species on Earth).
If you want clever life-forms to explore, the best possibility of that happening is getting their attention, since we've only been in the computer age for less than a century, and other civilizations may already have methods of getting around general relativity to meet us, if they know we're here.
I'm guessing you'll be long dead before we come in contact with intelligent aliens, if we ever do. I plan to live forever so I might be meet them...

- That it happens to orbit, and is really bright
- Nope, with assuming some form of fuel or something similar is used, it would take more energy to set off, even assuming similar gravity at the destination, as the energy required accelerate a spacecraft that has just set off by 5mph would be greater than the energy to decelerate a spacecraft with less fuel (unless the fuel has no/negative mass) by the same amount.

Yea I've heard about them, think they're called SETI. They listen out on radio frequencys for earth bound messages. From what I understand, even if these messages were sent, the chances of detection are pretty slim.

I think it was Bill Hicks that said an alien invasion is about the only thing that would over bring mankind together, maybe alien detection would go someway toward. Although surely intellegent beings able to make such a journey would have left war and conquest long behind.

It was mentioned somewhere on these forums a while ago, and i liked it. That its likely we are part of an advanced alien species territory. No advanced lifeform capable of travelling space has any benefit of contacting us, except if they want to take our recources. So they will just leave us to medle with our own business.

No one has yet mentioned a generational spaceship?

A generational spaceship would be completely nuts unless there were no other options due to a doomsday scenario.

There is too much of a possibility of things going wrong, not to mention the children of the original crew might not be able to operate the spacecraft after a few generations, then there would be extremely rigid population controls, etc. Then we have a power issue, any generational ship would be forced to rely on nuclear power period, no other power source would cut it between the stars.


The best option would actually be working on new methods of propulsion, no matter how you slice it, due to the human lifespan, the best option would honestly be coming up with a way to get around the light barrier.

We additionally need to come up with a way to shield the craft from micrometeorites.

If aliens have visited us in the past, odds are they have a way to travel faster than the speed of light. If you have a way to go FTL, journeys that would take decades, could be reduced to days, and would make space travel to be a lot more practical and economical.

Even at the speed of light, the distances are so vast that interstellar travel isn't very practical.
We will have to come up with amazing new technology similar to warp drives or wormholes to get past that whole speed of light limit by somehow shortening the distance traveled by a great amount.

If humanity ever achieves such a thing it will likely be many, many millennia before we do so.

Within centuries, we are pretty much limited to this solar system, MAYBE the closest half a dozen stars, not much further.

But before all that happens the human race will have to learn how to get along with itself much, much better. There are more political barriers to this than technological ones.

FTL = Faster than Light



I'm guessing it would be more along the lines of warp drive, personally. Warping space/time would be a lot safer than punching holes in it.



There is the theory behind it, but the problem is power and generating the field.



The nearest star system is 4.3 lightyears away, I don't think we could make it to another star system without FTL.



The barrier is also economic, it takes a lot of resources to even make it off of Earth. Part of the idea behind a moon base is as a possible staging point to launch the trip to Mars. The other possibilty is constructing the vehicle in Earth orbit.

In order for space travel to be economical, we honestly need some major leaps in power and propulsion technology.

First we have to be able to provide for ourselves when we get wherever. This was a proposal to sample lunar soil and see if it is fertile.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZRWtZjDuLA[/youtube]

Our first proposal was for Mars:



Neither happened, and aren't likely too...

Very good point. The anime series 'Cowboy Bebop' illustrates the hazards of wormhole technology pretty well.



I have come across some writing on that. But you do have to admit generating a stable, safe warp field and having enough power to do it is quite a hurdle to jump. And there will be many unforeseen problems along the way.
I will say that my time estimate is a tad bit on the conservative side. It could happen within a 1000 years if things don't completely collapse and we get knocked back to a agrarian civilization.



there are about a dozen within 10 light years
wikipedia link
They might be reachable with suspended animation/cryosleep, multi-generational ships, and sub/near light speed propulsion. maybe.



economics & politics are deeply intertwined. To clarify myself it was the politics of economics I was talking about.
But an off-earth staging base is the best place to start.



yes very true.

Right now there is too much profit interest in the realm of power generation technology to get the kind of attention needed to develop powerful enough reactors. Not enough profit in high power reactors.

Not to mention there will be a lot of ignorant paranoia around developing a high power fusion or anti-matter reactor. Just look at how scared people we're of powering up the LHC, some thought it would destroy the earth, or worse. Of course all the fear turned out to be completely unfounded.

BTW:cool nickname, great show.

Cell damage is a problem, just like a can of Coke left in the freezer, the cells rupture as the water freezes and expands.

That is probably one of the biggest obstacles to developing reliable cryosleep technology.
And even if you could revive someone successfully, how about the risks of brain/neurological damage?
They could wake someone up and , yeah, they could be conscious and moving around, but more than half of their memory could be gone, or maybe worse, they are almost a vegetable.