Sci Fi author Charlie Stross has a great essay on the inplausibility of interstellar travel using current technology. The last line essentially sums up my view of manned space exploration:
Colonize the Gobi desert, colonise the North Atlantic in winter — then get back to me about the rest of the solar system!
First, there is no business case for it, with the possible exception of LEO, GSO and maybe (if there is ice at the pole caps) the Moon. Riffing off of JFK, various presidents have called for going to Mars, but really that's both impractical and a huge waste of money. If it were up to me, I'd shut down almost all manned space flight from NASA, let private industry find a business case for humans and restrict government spending to robots (for which we get *some* scientific use) and technology development.
Second, our current technology is just not up to this. Yes, we put a man on the Moon, but it was hugely expensive and kind of a one-off. The shuttle was a good idea, but it's really technology as old as I am and aging less well.
Third, if you really want to do this, invest in something like the space elevator. That combines a practical business case, humans in space and technology within our current understanding of physics.
Not to say a) I dont want to see someone go to Proxima and b) I think it isn't possible ever. A breakthrough in our understanding of any of a number fundemental physical laws could open the way to the stars. If MOND were to turn out to be true, if we understood the HIggs field, if we re-wrote the laws of interia, it could be quite possible. But given chemical rocks, sunlight and "gumption", I dont think we can get there from here.
Not yet.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Not yet.
I have faith (a dirty word, but there it is) that we'll get there, by and by.
Take a guy standing on the shore of the Red Sea, 40,000 years ago. Show him a map of the world and how huge it is. Tell him that his descendants will cover the globe, travel under the sea, colonize Southern California .. he'd have the same reaction as Mr. Stross.
But we did - not from some grand plan but because it's what we do - expand and explore and see what is over the horizon.
Of course we won't get there at all unless we push (smile).
I agree about the push, but my confidence is quite a bit less now than it was a decade ago.
Bah - you're just older and grumpier.
Or at least that's _my_ excuse.
Post a Comment