That "Earth-like" planet 490 light years away. SO WHAT?

On Saturday, May 10, 2014 12:47:34 PM UTC-4, Chris L Peterson wrote:
On Sat, 10 May 2014 08:53:59 -0700 (PDT), wsnell01 wrote:

We're unable to even manage what we already have. Our existing
societies are fragile.

If we adhere to your world-view, then yes. However there are more promising possibilities than what you offer.

The current way

-some- (fixed that for you)

societies operate does not bode well for the future.

Quite. The socialism that you favor gives little room for true creativity.

On Saturday, May 10, 2014 12:47:34 PM UTC-4, Chris L Peterson wrote:
On Sat, 10 May 2014 08:53:59 -0700 (PDT), wsnell01 wrote:

peterson wrote:

We don't understand how our own planet works.

So what if we don't? What difference does it make? And are you assuming that by the time we are capable of colonizing space that we won't know "how our planet works?" (Not that it matters.)

You're talking centuries from now. This is not the time to start human
colonization of space.

That is only your opinion, others with more vision see things differently. And when we do have the capability of colonizing space, an incomplete understanding of the Earth will be of no consequence to the colonists. They will be living somewhere else.

On Saturday, May 10, 2014 12:47:34 PM UTC-4, Chris L Peterson wrote:
On Sat, 10 May 2014 08:53:59 -0700 (PDT), wsnell01 wrote:

peterson wrote:

What purpose would be served by colonizing another planet with some
sort of generation ship?

Survival of the human species?

Hardly. If we lack the social evolution to survive on Earth, spreading
out to other planets is pointless.

Having forgotten to bring it with them, the colonists might not be carrying the baggage of socialism and tyranny.

"Chris L Peterson" wrote in message
...

On Sat, 10 May 2014 06:30:32 +0100, "Lord Androcles"
wrote:

Same reasons some climb Everest, same reason we sent a man to the Moon.
Because it is a challenge. Because it is there. Because we are naturally
more curious than cats. This does not apply to you as you are a pessimist.

I'm not a pessimist at all.

===============================
Yes you are, as is obvious for all to see.

-- Lord Androcles, Zeroth Earl of Medway

On Saturday, May 10, 2014 3:25:42 AM UTC-4, Martin Brown wrote:
On 09/05/2014 08:11, RichA wrote:

What good is it? With current Apollo-derived rocket technology, it would take what, 3.5 MILLION years to get to it? IF they'd kept Project Orion going and kept up development, they could get there in about 600 years.





That is still nothing like fast enough to be worth doing.



Imagine the provisions needed to explode a nuclear weapon out the back

every minute for 600 years.



If we ever learn to warp spacetime then interstellar travel becomes a

possibility but until then anyone who goes off on a conventional space

trip can comfortably expect to be overtaken pretty quickly by a later

traveller with more nearly relativistic speed.



Same issue applies to certain difficult computational problems as a

result of Moore's law the fastest way to get an answer is to sit on a

beach for 18 months until the hardware is up to the task in hand!

But once the craft reaches its maximum speed, can it just be left to coast, or is there some anti-inertia or drag out there I'm not familiar with?

On Friday, May 9, 2014 11:55:18 PM UTC-4, Chris L Peterson wrote:
On Fri, 9 May 2014 20:24:37 -0700 (PDT), RichA

wrote:



Humans will never leave the Solar System. It's not going to happen.



How depressing. I remember all the proposed propulsion methods, from Orion to "solar sails" and nothing came from any of them.



What's depressing about it?



Nobody has proposed anything that would be suitable for interstellar

travel. If we were more politically stable, and could plan for

missions lasting decades or centuries, we might send probes to a few

near stars. That's about it. No technology is ever going to make it

practical to send people to other stars, and frankly, why would we

really want to?

Because it beats sitting around, playing video games or slouching in bars?

wrote:
On Saturday, May 10, 2014 12:47:34 PM UTC-4, Chris L Peterson wrote:
On Sat, 10 May 2014 08:53:59 -0700 (PDT), wsnell01 wrote:

peterson wrote:

What purpose would be served by colonizing another planet with some
sort of generation ship?

Survival of the human species?

Hardly. If we lack the social evolution to survive on Earth, spreading
out to other planets is pointless.

Having forgotten to bring it with them, the colonists might not be
carrying the baggage of socialism and tyranny.

I'm not so sure about that.
They may well be Chinese and though you can argue about the extent of
socialism in China star travel is probably going to be the province of
government. Probably not a democratic government where too many people
argue about costs.
The future of the human race probably depends on starflight but I'm
pessimistic on whether it can be achieved.
But we shouldn't just dismiss it out of hand.

On Sat, 10 May 2014 11:52:09 -0700 (PDT), RichA
wrote:

Because it beats sitting around, playing video games or slouching in bars?

So does solving global warming. So does designing and operating more
Earth observation satellites. So does designing and operating more
spacecraft to explore the Solar System, to collect samples from comets
and asteroids. So does creating space telescopes to peer deeper into
space and time.

There is no shortage of academic pursuits that beat sitting around
playing video games and slouching in bars.

On Sat, 10 May 2014 10:04:52 -0700 (PDT), wrote:

Nope. First of all, I'm not old enough to have been a hippie.

Hippies were mostly born in the '40s and early '50s, and not all of them wore long hair and beads. They did seem interested in drugs.

Like I said, not me.

Second, I've always been a strong proponent of investing in scientific
research, and have never argued against funding important things just
because other important things needed funding as well.

You might have very well been in favor of scientific research in fields of interest to YOU, but not other important things.

I can't think of any area of scientific research that I'm not in favor
of.

On Sat, 10 May 2014 10:09:53 -0700 (PDT), wrote:

Incorrect. If we stop building rockets, then we might forget how and never have the resources or "spare time" to learn how to again. If we keep building the hardware and developing spaceflight, we stand a much greater chance of having something workable and useful in the 22nd century.

We're not going to forget how to build things unless civilization
collapses in a major way... something that will have nothing to do
with our scientific research.