The Sun’s closest neighbour is a triple star system consisting of Alpha Centauri, Beta Centauri and Proxima Centauri. The latter is slightly closer to the Sun than the other two, being at a distance of 4.3 lightyears.
Which basically means that it would take 80 earth years to make a round trip at 10% of light speed (roughly 30,000 kilometers per second).
Apart from the fact that there probably isn’t much reason to go there at all (as there is no proof as yet of planets in that system), it appears to be a near impossible task. First of all, we haven’t got a clue how to propel ourselves at an appreciable percentage of light speed. Second, even if we did, the distances involved are too enormous to be feasible (even at light speed, which is unattainable as it would require an infinite amount of energy and a means of negating some rather invasive relativistic effects), it would take 8.6 earth years to make a round trip to Proxima Centauri.
My conclusion is, that speed isn’t the answer and shouldn’t be pursued at all cost. If a breakthrough ever comes, then it will emerge from drastic new insights into the nature of spacetime. Currently, we can only speculate about such a breakthrough. Theories that involve extra dimensions (such as string theory) might point us in the right direction, as distances in “our” 4D spacetime might be reduced significantly if use is made of the extra dimensions. Pure SF, at this point, but I personally feel that the future of space travel (if there is one) lies in this direction, not just in the pursuit of speed.
certainly so, wander. speed as an engineer intuits it has in fact little to do with speed for the phisicist anyway. so no better hydrogen burners will ever be significant, no matter how much better.
if istravelling is to ever be possible, i cant imagine yet how would one go about it. it is probably something that wont happen in our lifetimes.
Despite the fact that we can scarely conceive how it could be done, I think will be done anyway. Anything that’s not flatly outlawed by the laws of physics is inevitable, IMO.
It surprises me how people think that we reached the end of evolution. 2000 years ago, scholars believed that flying is impossibile because it contradicted averything they knew.
To say that interstellar travel is impossibile because you cannot generate the speed seems to me pretty short-sighted. How can you be so sure that 2000 years from now peoplw won’t be travelling at lightspeed? Few hundreds years ago people believed that the sun revolves around the earth and they were damn sure of it.
the theory of relativity is only 100 years old and far from being complete. the fact that we cannot conveive it is a not an argument for the imbosibillity of traveling at lightspeed.
Given 2 millenia to work on it, we may be able to travel near the speed of light. Or perhaps to go from point A to point B without going through the space between them. Perhaps an advance in our knowledge of biology will allow us to travel in statis. It’s even possible that our lifespans will be so extended as to make it practical at lower speeds.
Bear in mind that short of much more advanced propulsion (and something akin to the ‘inertial dampeners’ of Star Trek ) we’ll have to take a very, very long time to reach those kinds of speeds. Partly because present technologies take a long time to accelerate and because the human body can only withstand so many G forces. But due to time dilation, not nearly so much time would appear to pass to the astronaut as would pass for those outside the ship. Time dilation increases as the speed and acceleration increase.
The main reason I feel sad that I must die is that I’d love to see where the next 5,000 years will lead us, scientifically. Wish I could see it all. I had a great aunt that died a few years back that was old enough to remember the Wright Brothers flight! Imagine- she’d lived thru the birth of powered flight, two World Wars, the splitting of the atom, the fusing of the atom, the first man in orbit, the first man on the moon, the computer revolution, etc etc. So much for one lifetime. But even so, the next 100 years probably holds unimaginably more.
We’re already traveling at the speed of light. It’s just that the ‘travelers’ are radio and television waves. Given the current state of knowledge, it doesn’t seem very likely that the human body will ever experience speed of light flight. Granted, new knowledge may present new opportunities, but for the present, the only thing aliens would know of us would come from ‘I Love Lucy’ re-runs.
And besides, we haven’t even begun to figure out how to live on this planet. Why screw up the whole damned universe?
It is far from impossible. It is just immensely difficult from a technical standpoint. There is no law of physics prohibiting us from travelling 10% or even 80% lightspeed. Interstellar ramjets/ other contraptions have been proposed that can obtain the energies required to approach lightspeed. Eventually, I’m sure we’ll have the technology.
The fact that it will take a long time to get from one star system to another will probably not deter us. It just means that the people of the Solar System may not be immediately concerned with the colonization of other starsystems. If hundred year voyages are to be undertaken, they will probably be undertaken solely for the purposes of the voyagers. Prolonging of the human lifespan/ AI mind machine transfers/ suspended animation are all possible solutions to the problem of interstellar travel.
But we also have the whole solar system to conquer first. It is a lot bigger than just the moon and mars, and a whole volume of human history is probably sandwiched between our present era and the one where we will attempt interstellar flight.
So if it ends up taking 10000 years to get to your vacation spot on the other side of the galaxy, just pack a lot of books and upload your conciousness into a computer, and hope that pesky intelligent life doesn’t evolve on your target planet between departure and arrival.
I’m with the optimists on this one too, because we are going to screw up this planet/solar system eventually and we’ll need to move on (even if we resemble a bunch of interstellar locusts).
We could travel at the speed of light actually, if at one remove:
Send an unmanned probe to your target planet at whatever speed you can manage. A few 100’s of years later your Probe sets down, Von-Neumen’s* itself a work-force, terra-forms the planet, builds a seriously directional reciever and an "organic body fabricator " (available now at your closest Sony dealer) Then from the comfort of your living room here on Earth you zap yourself over to the new planet at the speed of light…! (Mind you - the paradox police would have to shoot you in the head an instant after uplink had been completed )
I don’t think that we need to worry about getting to other solar systems anytime soon anyway, given that if we somehow manage to get artifical atmospheres over planets that are normally inhospitable, we have eight other planets (as well as various satellites) to go use in this solar system. If we continue to make advances in speed technology and such, perhaps we could at least manage to get to other planets.
I remember reading somewhere that the mannerin which we define our universe doesn’t permit the development of tears in space. Furthermore, I beleive the advent of he ST theory adds to this. But, I am ot certain.
If it’s not flatly impossible it’s inevitable. Provided of course that we keep our little blue marble intact long enough.
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