“Such explanations insult us as humans”
Well not all humans, just the stupid adult ones. Which is most people on this topic when it comes to space travel. A solar system only 10 or 15 light years away would take literally a million years at space shuttle speeds. I remember reading Chariots of the Gods over and over again as a kid and believing every word of it LOL.
The space shuttle is super slow.
Just last week I read about 1g electric propulsion.
At 1g acceleration and without propellant the universe becomes much smaller, and with cryogenics smaller still