The 100 Year Journey to Proxima Centauri B

[HiFlyer 9,363]

When I was younger, I thought I would volunteer for such a trip in a heartbeat.

Filled with science fiction dreams, and lacking my current knowledge of some of the technical and other challenges, I saw only adventure, with the downside of leaving all I knew behind forever, a price believed I was willing to pay.

Nowadays, I would only propose a toast to the brave adventurers (and probably martyrs) setting out on their epic journey.....

Barring a fast FTL drive, earth will have to be enough, for me.

But it is awesome to think about; humans becoming a galactic species.

 

Edited November 7, 2023 by HiFlyer

[n4gix 4,949]

Fascinating! Thanks for sharing this little Sci-Fi adventure.

[dmwalker 610]

21 hours ago, HiFlyer said:

I would only propose a toast to the brave adventurers

Especially the parents of the 300 children:

 

[Peter Webber 340]

First world mentality: "Let's go out and loot, plunder and destroy another planet....".

Hope they don't have an equivalent of Africa there.....😉

Edited November 8, 2023 by Peter Webber

[martin-w 3,244]

1 hour ago, Peter Webber said:

First world mentality: "Let's go out and loot, plunder and destroy another planet....".

 

Or keep all your eggs in one basket and wait for the big asteroid to wipe out humanity and all of its history. Or of course we could learn from past mistakes and create a sustainable existence on a second planet. I would think that if were were capable of creating something as advanced as the ship in question, then by that time we would have also developed the ability to live on a planet in a sustainable way. 

Some are pessimistic, some are optimistic, some are in the middle, lest be in the middle. 

[Peter Webber 340]

29 minutes ago, martin-w said:

 

Or keep all your eggs in one basket and wait for the big asteroid to wipe out humanity and all of its history. Or of course we could learn from past mistakes and create a sustainable existence on a second planet. I would think that if were were capable of creating something as advanced as the ship in question, then by that time we would have also developed the ability to live on a planet in a sustainable way. 

Some are pessimistic, some are optimistic, some are in the middle, lest be in the middle. 

Then again on this planet, which countries have been "looted" for their raw minerals, their populations in starvation, minerals shipped out and stolen, to be able to construct that type of starship? Not pessimistic, just reality, my earth brother....let's 1st learn to live in a sustainable way on THIS planet, and equal resourses for all.....just saying.

Edited November 8, 2023 by Peter Webber

[martin-w 3,244]

1 hour ago, Peter Webber said:

let's 1st learn to live in a sustainable way on THIS planet

 

Its a future time though, when the capability to create such incredible technology as a generation ship that can travel at relativistic velocity has been realized. So by that time, 100 years, 200, 300  years into the future we, hopefully, will have managed to achieve just what you say. If we haven't, then its doubtful we will have much of a civilization at all, certainly not one capable of creating such technology.

As for less ambitious plans, like Moon or Mars colonization, then that's a very good idea. Worth remembering that existential threats are a thing. 

 

 

 

 

[Peter Webber 340]

54 minutes ago, martin-w said:

 

Its a future time though, when the capability to create such incredible technology as a generation ship that can travel at relativistic velocity has been realized. So by that time, 100 years, 200, 300  years into the future we, hopefully, will have managed to achieve just what you say. If we haven't, then its doubtful we will have much of a civilization at all, certainly not one capable of creating such technology.

As for less ambitious plans, like Moon or Mars colonization, then that's a very good idea. Worth remembering that existential threats are a thing. 

 

 

 

 

Well said...I'm in Africa and I see the deprived communities.. Try bush flying!...even MSFS has no Africa World Updates...

[dmwalker 610]

What happened to the spacecraft between 0:01 and 0:07 of the video?

Also, why couldn't they continue 1G acceleration up to 50% light speed and get there in 10 years?

Edited November 8, 2023 by dmwalker

[stans 704]

Ever consider that humans might actually be the real Ferengi?  Maybe that's why aliens don't want to make themselves known to us.

[HiFlyer 9,363]

On 11/8/2023 at 11:54 AM, dmwalker said:

What happened to the spacecraft between 0:01 and 0:07 of the video?

Also, why couldn't they continue 1G acceleration up to 50% light speed and get there in 10 years?

Well it turns out that interstellar travel may be quite a bit harder than we thought. Which is what I meant when I said if I knew then what I know now, I would be less sanguine about such trips.

It's not exactly impossible, but it turns out we might wind up having to pretty much limp from star to star at relatively low speeds until maybe some far future technology provides something that can protect us from a universe that seems determined to  make it extremely difficult for any would be interstellar civilization.

 

[dmwalker 610]

13 hours ago, HiFlyer said:

Well it turns out that interstellar travel may be quite a bit harder than we thought.

So, not quite hopeless. I don't think multigenerational at 4.24% light speed is the way to go, at least, not the one in the video. Although they start with 1800 passengers, they have to have a spacecraft with enough space and resources to accommodate the final population of 4500. And why do they start out with 200 elders?

I don't know if this is assumed in the video but they would first need to know every detail of the planet's magnetic field, soil composition, atmosphere, etc. They would need to know that they can actually grow healthy food crops. For example, soybeans and, I think, other legumes need specific bacteria called rhizobia in the soil in order to take in nitrogen from the air. Maybe future space probes will be able to establish that. 

Edited November 10, 2023 by dmwalker

[HiFlyer 9,363]

4 hours ago, dmwalker said:

And why do they start out with 200 elders?

Probably a cadre of accumulated experience in various fields to pass on, rather than simply expertise. Think of as "flight hours" in life. Plus their eventual and relatively quick deaths will immediately begin to make room for population expansion after hopefully getting the trip off to a good start.

4 hours ago, dmwalker said:

I don't know if this is assumed in the video but they would first need to know every detail of the planet's magnetic field, soil composition, atmosphere, etc. They would need to know that they can actually grow healthy food crops.

They probably had (or should have had) faster and more survivable probes make flybys of or establish orbit around the potential colony world, plus they mentioned carrying seeds and other equipment. I would expect them to also have biotech that would allow them to modify crops and maybe even themselves for adaptation to their new home.

They already apparently know they will have to adapt to higher gravity, and I would hope some biotech was involved there as well, since human conception and later life are pretty narrowly adapted to earth's precise conditions....

[dmwalker 610]

34 minutes ago, HiFlyer said:

Probably a cadre of accumulated experience in various fields to pass on, rather than simply expertise.

I keep thinking of elders as old folks like me with failing memory and various other age-related issues but, by definition, they could be as young as 65 with 15 to 20 good years ahead of them. However, all this talk about "relatively quick deaths" sounds a bit ominous.

38 minutes ago, HiFlyer said:

They probably had (or should have had) faster and more survivable probes make flybys of or establish orbit around the potential colony world

Mars experience with perchlorates shows that they would need to land and sample the soil for chemical analysis as well as biological analysis. Then, after the probes, there should be a small spacecraft with, say, six passengers who would spend a year on the planet's surface to confirm its suitability before sending the larger population. This would work based on 50% light speed and a 10 year journey for the probes and the people. Just basing everything on flybys is too risky and taking 100 years to complete each step is too long. I think you would want the probes to keep functioning until people arrive. What would they do if the probes show the planet to be completely unsuitable? It might be several hundred years before they would have the technology to reach the next nearest inhabitable planet.

In any case, if they can manage only 4% light speed, they may not be as advanced as we assume.

[HiFlyer 9,363]

2 hours ago, dmwalker said:

In any case, if they can manage only 4% light speed, they may not be as advanced as we assume.

They might feel forced to make the journey if Earth is in some sort of danger....

Meanwhile, at the rate AI is advancing, by the time we're making Starships, robots should be more than capable of landing and surveying a planet, taking soil samples..... etc.

If we were really smart, the colony would be mostly assembled by the time humans even got there.

EDIT: Something else occurs to me. What would the human lifespan look like by the time we are making Starships? This video might be a bit too much an artifact of its time.

I wouldn't be surprised if 100 years from now, 80 years old is considered middle aged, in which case the whole concept of a "generation ship" has to be revised a bit.

Heck, humans might be biologically immortal by then, or able to load digital images of themselves directly into ships memory.....

Whatever.

In any case, we can be pretty certain a lot of our base assumptions will be obsolete by then.

Edited November 11, 2023 by HiFlyer