"Sylvia Else" wrote in message
u...
Joe Strout wrote:
http://www.world-science.net/otherne...ble-planet.htm

That is pretty interesting. Surface gravity of 2G or so, and average
temperatures estimated at 0-40 C. It'd be really interesting to see what
has evolved there, if anything.

Let's see, 20 light-years away... that'll be within reach of our probes
within the century, I'd guess. Can't wait to see what they turn up.

Seems to me that no credible probe could deliver results within a human
lifetime of its launch. I cannot see any government being willing to fund
such an enterprise even if it became technically feasible.

It's hard to say. I mean we're already planning probes that have 5 or more
years of "nothing" before results are returned.

I tend to agree, since we're talking a minimum of 40+ years before results
are returned, but 100 years from now, it could be that a project that size
is done on a University level budget rather than a national government level
budget.

And of course there's the transit itself that could provide some interesting
results.

(btw, I do suspect we're talking far closer to 60-80 years before we get
results back, at least with 100+ years of tech from now. Now if a few laws
of physics are found to be "inaccurate" and we can warp space or perform
some other form of FTL, then the equation changes, dramactically. But I
somehow don't think that'll happen.)



Sylvia.

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Greg Moore
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