6 minutes ago, martin-w said:

 

Yikes, the radical feminist's would love that. 😀 And when the males are born, of course, they will be rendered mere thralls to the new feminist ruling class.  😏

The first interstellar flight in earths Herstory....

Edited April 15, 20233 yr by HiFlyer

Apropos of this topic, I was just watching the movie Passengers.

Very cool take on interstellar travel, though the math of the ships journey (120yr flight time at 50% lightspeed, slingshoting around Arcturus at 31yrs, when the star is actually 37ly from earth.....)

Even factoring in time dilation, the math doesn't work, but otherwise, fun movie.

I would take a trip on the Avalon!

On 4/15/2023 at 1:41 AM, HiFlyer said:

Heck, Mr Musk already has volunteers to go to Mars on a one-way trip that he says will almost certainly end in death. Human beings are interesting Critters.

Above and beyond that, any reasonable expedition should probably expect to take along the type of supplies to allow them to exist even if no habitable planet is found.

Now of course, if there are no useful asteroids, accessible water and Etc, our colonists are probably toast, but hey, Columbus's map showed monsters at the edge of the world, and he and his Crews still went....

On 4/15/2023 at 2:57 PM, martin-w said:

I recall, the now bankrupt, Mars One venture had 200,000 volunteers too. 

It all sounds so exciting until the first few hours after landing. After which comes the realisation that there's just a slow depletion of oxygen and eventual suffocation.

Until there's an ability to send teams/dozens of people to construct flimsy, yet life-supporting structures on Mars, there's no way Western society will tolerate sending 4-12 people to their certain, and wholly avoidable, deaths just to state that they were 'first' on a lifeless* rock.

Columbus' voyage may have had the chance of monsters, and a vast array of other perilous aspects that were features of journeys in that era. However, they still had all the elements necessary for survival.

One could argue that the Moon landings were incredibly risky. Yes, they were. What is different is that even though the odds were stacked high against a successful outcome, society made provision for the safe return of the crews.

I'm as excited as anyone at the prospect of the human species venturing out beyond Earth. Yet, sending some of our best to their guaranteed demise just to fulfil some childish 'I was here first' thinking is not acceptable or enjoyable. If we don't kill ourselves on Earth first, landing on Mars will happen. After that, the galaxy is the next frontier...

2 hours ago, F737MAX said:

It all sounds so exciting until the first few hours after landing. After which comes the realisation that there's just a slow depletion of oxygen and eventual suffocation.

Until there's an ability to send teams/dozens of people to construct flimsy, yet life-supporting structures on Mars, there's no way Western society will tolerate sending 4-12 people to their certain, and wholly avoidable, deaths just to state that they were 'first' on a lifeless* rock.

 

Life supporting structures is the plan. And the MOXIE system enables us to generate oxygen from the Martian CO2. Its about 7 to 9 months the journey., You then have to wait about 3 months for Mars and Earth to be in suitable locations for the journey home. So obviously generating oxygen is a requirement. 

Starship has a capacity of 150 tons reusable and 250 tons expendable. 

This is one of the points to returning to the Moon, to develop the technologies to enable us to go further, to Mars. 

I didn't take seriously the, now non-existent,  Mars One stuff to be honest. Nasa and SpaceX and partners like Blue Origin and Dynetics will get us there. 

We have to consider that NASA and DARPA are currently collaborating on a nuclear thermal engine, and planning to demonstrate a working engine by 2027. In which case the journey time to Mars will be cut to 3 months. 

Edited April 17, 20233 yr by martin-w

1 hour ago, martin-w said:

And the MOXIE system enables us to generate oxygen from the Martian CO2

"The goal of a Big MOXIE would be to make and store all the oxygen that the astronaut and their rocket would need for their mission before they even launch. That means the Big MOXIE would need to make 2,000 to 3,000 grams of oxygen per hour, compared to the 6-10 grams that the current MOXIE is making. And it would need to do that all day and night, without stopping, for most of the 20 months.

We expect that the astronauts would need at least 25 kilowatts of power for their mission, and that the Big MOXIE relies on being able to use that power plant for making oxygen until the astronauts arrive."

"Whenever we run MOXIE, we need to be very careful with the settings to make sure we only produce carbon monoxide (CO), and not pure carbon, which would ruin it." 

Edited April 17, 20233 yr by dmwalker

The large majority of our space exploration by probably about 99.9% has been unmanned or probes, so of course moving forward that will continue to be the majority of our expansion. If there are other advanced civilizations out there then 99.99999% have only sent probes that may have come to visit us. But in the infinite universe if only 0.00000001% of civilizations achieved intergalactic space travel then that is probably still a lot of civilizations out there. We don't really know at this point so speculative 😎

15 hours ago, Matthew Kane said:

But in the infinite universe if only 0.00000001% of civilizations achieved intergalactic space travel then that is probably still a lot of civilizations out there. We don't really know at this point so speculative 

 

In an infinite universe, its not "a lot" its an infinite number. 😲 In an infinite universe atoms can only arrange themselves in a finite number of ways. In which case arrangements of atoms must duplicate. So you, me, and everyone else will have exact copies out there, plus an infinite number of me's and you's that are different in an infinite number of ways.

So you, me, and everyone else will have exact copies out there, plus an infinite number of me's and you's that are different in an infinite number of ways.

You might be right about that Martin.  In fact I wrote a short story once about exactly that.  Only the number wasn't quite infinite.

Captain Joseph Tillman was making his final pass in his FA-18 at the target range at Fallon Naval Air Station.

He was thinking, “Today’s my birthday and Mary is baking my favorite chocolate cake.  As soon as I land and refuel it’s back to Miramar and a four-day pass.”

All of a sudden, the FA-18 began to shake and become uncontrollable.

Captain Tillman woke up in a small room.  It was bare except for the chair he was sitting in.

The door opened.  “Captain Tillman?” a voice asked?

“Yeah, I’m Captain Tillman.  Who the heck are you?”

“Oh my!  I’m sorry.  I’m Mister Farqua.  There’s been an accident.  Please wait here captain and I’ll be back shortly.”  Mister Farqua left the room and left the door open.

Captain Tillman looked out the door and saw a huge office with perhaps 100 men and women all punching their fingers at something embedded in the tops of their desks.  They all seemed very intent on what they were doing.

Then Captain Tillman heard someone coming down the corridor.  He stepped out and saw Mister Farqua escorting someone down the hallway.  They were chatting about something.  The man walking with Mister Farqua seemed disturbed and was speaking in a raised voice.

“What the heck am I doing here?  How did I get here?’

“All in good time Captain Tillman.”

As they got closer Captain Tillman stepped out of the room and confronted the pair.  He looked at the man next to Mister Farqua and thought he was looking at himself in a mirror.

“Who the heck are you and what kind of flight suit is that you’re wearing?”

“I’m Captain Tillman.  Who the heck are you?”

“Bologna!  I’m Captain Tillman!”

“Oh my,” said Mister Farqua.  “Captain Tillman, come with me.  Captain Tillman go back in the room and sit down until I come for you.”

Captain Tillman went back into the room and sat down.  His head was buzzing.  He didn't know where he was or what was coming.

Fifteen minutes later Mister Farqua came into the room and said, “Captain Tillman, come with me.  They went into a small room where a young woman was sitting at a console.  In the corner of the room was a small booth.

“Captain Tillman, go into that booth and sit down in the chair.”

Captain Tillman sat down in the chair and waited.  After a minute or two he felt a buzzing and became lightheaded.

As Captain Tillman rolled out to line up with the tank on the range, he felt a slight shudder of the aircraft.  He thought it was probably nothing.  He lined up on the tank and fire his remaining rockets.  A direct hit!

Captain Tillman’s thought went back to his birthday and Mary.  “I’m a lucky guy,” he thought.  “I’m a bigamist married to two lovely women.  My FA-18 and Mary.  I can’t wait for that chocolate cake.”

Captain Tillman rolled out to line up with the bunker on the range he felt a slight shudder of the aircraft.  He thought it was probably nothing.  He lined up with the bunker on the range and fired his laser gun.  A direct hit!

Captain Tillman’s thought went back to his birthday and Anya.  “I’m a lucky guy,” he thought.  “I’m a bigamist married to two lovely women.  My GXT-235 and Anya.  I can’t wait for that coconut cream pie.”

Mister Farqua was standing by Maria at the console.  “Maria,” he said, “That’s the second time you’ve done this.  And this time both men met each other.  Once more and I’ll have to let you go from Universe Time Central.  Is everything back to normal now?

“Yes sir,” said Maria, “All 18,492 Captain Tillman’s are back in their proper universes and time periods.  

Noel
 

Edited April 20, 20233 yr by n4gix
Sanitized language

For a journey to Mars, I wonder if there is a point of no return like the ETP in ETOPS, up to which point the spaceship could divert back to Earth, or is that not feasible? Earth is travelling at about 67,000 mph in its orbit and the Mars spaceship will be travelling at about 24,000 mph in its trajectory, according to one source.

Maybe the spaceship speed is relative to the Earth since it will have to match the orbital speed of Mars as it approaches, which is about 54,000 mph.

Edited April 19, 20233 yr by dmwalker

It would take about the same amount of fuel or reaction mass to brake to a stop and then accelerate back towards Earth as it would to complete the flight to Mars before returning to Earth. So, in short the answer is no... 

4 minutes ago, n4gix said:

It would take about the same amount of fuel or reaction mass to brake to a stop and then accelerate back towards Earth as it would to complete the flight to Mars before returning to Earth. So, in short the answer is no... 

The Earth is gradually moving ahead of the spaceship so it would just be a diversion but eventually the Earth would be too far ahead for the spaceship to catch up:

22 hours ago, n4gix said:

It would take about the same amount of fuel or reaction mass to brake to a stop and then accelerate back towards Earth as it would to complete the flight to Mars before returning to Earth. So, in short the answer is no... 

That is the perfect propulsion system for space travel, a constant 1G Acceleration to the halfway point to Mars, and then turn the ship around and have a 1G Deceleration for the last half of the journey, yes completely not possible with our technology but anyone that remembers Microsoft Space Simulator will remember doing that, it also makes the journey short enough for humans to properly colonize Mars

I would love it if Microsoft did another Space Sim

29 minutes ago, Matthew Kane said:

a constant 1G Acceleration to the halfway point to Mars, and then turn the ship around and have a 1G Deceleration for the last half of the journey,

I haven't found a calculator for the solar system but here is one for interstellar travel. You can change the acceleration and see how it affects travel time. Advanced Mode gives more data:

https://www.omnicalculator.com/physics/space-travel

This is helpful for Mars, though:

https://www.psatellite.com/doing-the-mars-run-with-fusion-propulsion-at-1-g/

Edited April 20, 20233 yr by dmwalker

23 minutes ago, dmwalker said:

I haven't found a calculator for the solar system but here is one for interstellar travel. You can change the acceleration and see how it affects travel time. Advanced Mode gives more data:

https://www.omnicalculator.com/physics/space-travel

This is helpful for Mars, though:

https://www.psatellite.com/doing-the-mars-run-with-fusion-propulsion-at-1-g/

Yes that is similar concept to MS Space Sim

2 hours ago, Matthew Kane said:

I would love it if Microsoft did another Space Sim

Instead, they should focus on reworking reality to make astrogation as simple as Space Sim... 😄