Posted on 07/29/2021 8:39:44 PM PDT by blueplum
Why wait for them to come here like all of our sci-fi novels predict?
-PJ
Oh indeed. When cars were invented there were people who said it is impossible for man to go faster than riding a horse. I like to think of it like an airplane. Once inside, you can travel at many times the speed of sound without noticing it because you are traveling at the same speed as the craft. So theoretically it is not impossible to build an environment that could travel at the speed of light. Technologically speaking, I’d say near impossible but could not rule it out entirely assuming the human race lives long enough to develop it. Not, imo, in anyone who is currently living to find out. Maybe in 3000 years someone will read this thread via mind meld - but then it wouldn’t matter if they did :-)
Frankly I’d say it is more realistic to think that we humans could someday copy and paste ourselves into a computer, at which point we could travel the universe indefinitely, and colonize other galaxies as some form of AI/Bot. After which, the primates would take over and evolve. Though that’s my wife’s obsession with Ancient Aliens rubbing off on me.
Moreover, at 50 light years, the person in the craft would age 50 years to get there. That’s basically an entire adult lifetime inside an artificial spacecraft. You’d have to make the environment such that 2nd and 3rd generations would be the ones who land on the planet. From a moral perspective, that’s tantamount to slavery. The persons born on the craft would be, without free will, indentured servants of those who planned the mission.
Not to mention, there is no turning back. One light year is almost 700,000 earth years. Just travel for a fraction of the time, when you return to earth everyone you knew will be dust. So may the planet.
Glad to see you back.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nu2_Lupi
Planet “b”: Mass: 4.6 x Earth; Diameter: 1.48 x Earth; Orbit: 11.5 days
Planet “c”: Mass: 11.3 x Earth; Diameter: 2.6 x Earth; Orbit: 27.6 days
Planet “d”: Mass: 8.8 x Earth; Diameter: 2.6 x Earth; Orbit: 107.3 days
And a “G” main sequence star, too; not one of the much, much more common and dimmer “Red Dwarf” stars. All three planets orbit within 0.5 AU and are likely too hot to maintain liquid water.
Focus of the article is Planet “d” because of its longer orbit period and the possible presence of water in detectable quantities. Water or water vapor? Maybe not a Super Earth, but a Super Venus?
With a mass 8.8 times that of Earth and a diameter 2.6 larger, humans could live under Planet d’s gravity which would be about 1.3 times that of Earth.
https://www.azcalculator.com/calc/surface-gravity-calculator.php
And unless there is something consumable in the water, this exciting discovery is worthless. Not even Culligan will go that far.
wy69
The distance to Mars is miles, not light years.
One light year = @ 6 trillion miles.
Alpha Centari, the nearest star to Earth is about 4.3 light years away. At current estimated best speeds for an interplanetary ship, one way travel time is estimated at 19,000 Earth years.
The star in the article is @ 50 light years away; so 221,000 voyage years?
Nope. We are just going to have to come up with faster-than-light (FTL) drive somehow.
Somehow.
Yeah.
Yeah whales, dolphins, seals, walruses, narwhals, dugongs, otters, polar bears, and beavers have a real hard time in aquatic habitats.
Nu2 Lupi d
We’re supposed to stay away from Europa The black monolith said so
#7. Let’s call this exoplanet “Waterworld II”.
Mars is about 42 million miles from Earth and can come as close as 38 million.
Just a day-tripper voyage compared to reaching the nearest star system of Alpha Centauri. (You’re gonna need one helluva bigger ship to get there and back).
Whoa. That's a long way away.
Trillion.
238 trillion light years away.
I heard eleventy-skadillion light years.
Like you Laz, I failed a lot of math classes. /sarc but true
100 pounds here would be 140 pounds there. The radius is 2.5 earth radius but the mass is 8.8 times earth's. You need to multiply by 8.8 then divide by the square of 2.5 to make the conversion. That gives you the 1.4 conversion factor.
Or Toad Suck Ferry, Arkansas?
Congress can spend several trillion dollars a year. Why don’t they just pass a law saying we can travel a trillion miles a year?
Actually, at 8.8 times the mass, 100 lbs would be 880 lbs.
wtf are you talking about lol. Mars isn’t a million light years away lol
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.