Reality Check: Trip To Pluto Cost Less Than Vikings' Stadium

WCCO-TV ^ | July 15, 2015 6:39 PM | Pat Kessler

[Colonel_Flagg]

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) — NASA scientists and planet lovers everywhere are cheering the Pluto space probe, which is now sending images of the dwarf planet back to Earth.

The cost of the 10-year voyage is raising eyebrows, but not for the reasons you might think.

(snip)

The edge-of-the-solar-system breakthrough cost $720 million. That’s less than the cost of the $1 billion Vikings stadium. And less than half the $1.7 billion price tag of the Southwest Rail Project.

[wally_bert]

Some people would get upset but that probe and space exploration is more valuable than “big sports”.

[Colonel_Flagg]

You’re probably right.

[cripplecreek]

I’ve read that we could send a probe to Alpha Centauri for about $1 trillion.

Its really a matter of scaling up our existing ION propulsion or VASMIR and assembling a “very large” probe in orbit. With a couple of loops between the sun and Saturn to build up a head of steam and the trip could be cut down to a couple of centuries.

[backwoods-engineer]

And New Horizons had some incredible communications technology on board. I'm looking at their white paper, and am seeing some possible earthbound applications for some of their approaches.

[xp38]

That's no planet

[LegendHasIt]

"No amount of money is too much to keep the peasants quiet with bread and circuses.

Well said. I was coming in to mention Bread and Circuses, but you did it perfectly.

[backwoods-engineer]

I’ve read that we could send a probe to Alpha Centauri for about $1 trillion.

The problem is, the government that launches such a probe will almost certainly not be around when it arrives, tens of centuries from now.

There is no known technology that can get a probe to Proxima Centauri (nearest star) in less than 4,300 years (i.e., velocities of >c/1,000). Just doesn't exist; too much mass and energy are required that that amount of delta V.

The fastest spacecraft ever built by man, 'Voyager 1', traveled a mere 15 km/sec (which is c/20,000). If aimed correctly, it would take 'Voyager 1' a mere 8,600 centuries to make the trip.

Also, the communication technology does not exist to send pictures back than any existing radio telescope receiver could receive. It's just too far, and requires too many bits to send even the most rudimentary picture. For more on that, see my post on "Aliens watching 'I Love Lucy'".

[SkyDancer]

Aww, spoil sport .... :)

[JohnBovenmyer]

Impressive proof the universe is safe from Lucy. Is the reverse true. Is SETI similarly hopeless? Or is there some alternative transmission method that theoretically could bridge such distances?

[backwoods-engineer]

I personally think SETI is hopeless. You have the Seth Shostak contingent that thinks that there are advanced aliens out there who can build transmitter masers the size of planets, and powered by plasma from their star. If so, why haven't we received a transmission yet?

The problem for any civilization wanting to communicate is, where to point your transmitter beam? There are some ways to weed out non-candidates; blue supergiants, red drarves, variable stars, and tightly-packed regions with many stars are bad choices, because life isn't likely to survive there.

NASA, and I think, the SETI Insitute, sent SETI transmissions toward Epison Eridani, because that star is similar in type to our sun. They've also tried to listen in the direction of Epsilon Eridani and similar stars.

What message would a putative alien civilization send? It has to be something mathematical, because assuming a common basis for language is Star Trek science fiction. The bit rate it has to be sent is going to be EXTREMELY SLOW, because your intended audience has to be able to correlate it our of the noise. So, your message needs to be small. Something like, maybe the first 10 prime numbers, repeated, then maybe the squares of the first 10 prime numbers, repeated. After that, maybe you could send a 10 x 10 bitmap... though that makes an assumption about vision.

Your intended recipients also have to be able to guess (pretty closely) your transmission frequency. Using a harmonic or subharmonic of the neutral hydrogen line frequency (1420.40575 MHz, or about 21 cm wavelength), or even that frequency itself, would be a good natural choice.

Me, I think the whole thing is pretty hopeless.

[Colonel_Flagg]

I’d be curious to hear which ones you think would be useful. The paper is a bit over my head, I’m afraid :)

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks Colonel_Flagg, extra to APoD.

[colorado tanker]

Look at this design. I'm not in the business, but all I see are dollar signs, from the number of buildings, all the curved glass, the gynormous atrium running down the whole thing.

No way that could've been built for $500 million. What were they thinking? Or was no one thinking?