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Old 15th August 2016, 13:24     #81
Lightspeed
 
Oh, sweet! I really hope the EM drive pans out.
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Old 15th August 2016, 13:50     #82
Ab
A mariachi ogre snorkel
 
Since my teens we've gone from "no exoplanets anywhere" to "found some gas giants" to "found some rocky planets" to "found some Goldilocks planets thousands of lightyears away" to "fuck me there are planets everywhere" and now "there might be a rocky Goldilocks planet orbiting our next-door neighbour star".

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Old 15th August 2016, 15:57     #83
DrTiTus
HENCE WHY FOREVER ALONE
 
It's still too far away.
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Old 15th August 2016, 16:38     #84
Ab
A mariachi ogre snorkel
 
Dafuck, Proxima Centauri is literally the closest star to us that's not called the Sun. If the shit hit the fan we could conceivably get there.
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Old 15th August 2016, 16:54     #85
CCS
Stunt Pants
 
How long do you think until we have the technology to get us there?
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Old 15th August 2016, 16:57     #86
blynk
 
Just randomly. When I got to "New posts" and "Go to last post" it takes me to the end of page 2, rather than this page.

Did it for all 3 comments. Weird.
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Old 15th August 2016, 17:10     #87
crocos
 
^^^
Ditto.

EDIT:
Call me when they've confirmed an Oxygen/Nitrogen atmo.
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Last edited by crocos : 15th August 2016 at 17:11.
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Old 15th August 2016, 17:32     #88
MadMax
Stuff
 
so ... why hasn't this been discovered before?
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Old 15th August 2016, 17:42     #89
CCS
Stunt Pants
 
o_O

Gee I dunno, I guess someone just didn't point his binoculars in the right place.
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Old 15th August 2016, 20:59     #90
Ajax
Architeuthis
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ab
Dafuck, Proxima Centauri is literally the closest star to us that's not called the Sun. If the shit hit the fan we could conceivably get there.
It's not even vaguely realistic at the moment. We need a major propulsion breakthrough and many other tech discoveries. Hundreds of years away.
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Old 15th August 2016, 21:54     #91
CCS
Stunt Pants
 
Ab must have found a wormhole in the back of his wardrobe.
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Old 15th August 2016, 23:24     #92
pkp|ex
 
o_O

Some drunken calcumalations on that shit;

Distance 4.24 light years is about 3x10^8 * 60 seconds * 60 minutes * 24 hours * 365 days * 4.24 = 40.114 x 10 ^ 15 meters

Which is 40.114 trillion kilometers.

Fastest man made thing in space appears to have been Juno when it got pulled towards Jupiter at around 265,000 km/hr. Thats 6.36 million km per day, and 2.3214 billion km per year.

So taking that very generous velocity as the present day tech, it would take a space taxi over 17,000 years to reach there.

Seems slightly out of reach.

Last edited by pkp|ex : 15th August 2016 at 23:27.
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Old 16th August 2016, 01:25     #93
Lightspeed
 
It would be a matter of sustained acceleration over a long period of time. The only thing limiting speed is our ability to accelerate and if/how the ship stops once it gets there.
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Old 16th August 2016, 01:49     #94
MadMax
Stuff
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by CCS
Gee I dunno, I guess someone just didn't point his binoculars in the right place.
No dickhead. They've been monitoring countless stars for this phenomenon for decades, yet it's only now they notice the same effect on our closest neighbour?
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Old 16th August 2016, 02:26     #95
Ab
A mariachi ogre snorkel
 
1950s technology.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proj...ear_propulsion)
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Old 16th August 2016, 02:33     #96
Nothing
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lightspeed
The only thing limiting speed is our ability to accelerate and if/how the ship stops once it gets there.
Thing is, those are both pretty fucking serious limitations.

Having said that, I still really like localroger's Passages Into the Void, which, if you read the whole thing, gives some interesting scenarios for humans colonising the galaxy. Dreams are free, I suppose.
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Old 16th August 2016, 04:31     #97
CCS
Stunt Pants
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by MadMax
No dickhead. They've been monitoring countless stars for this phenomenon for decades, yet it's only now they notice the same effect on our closest neighbour?
Begging your pardon sir, but its a big ass sky
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Old 16th August 2016, 05:16     #98
pkp|ex
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ab
'technology' which has not been tested ( with nukes ), nevermind perfected.
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Old 16th August 2016, 05:16     #99
pkp|ex
 
edit: for some reason it double posted. Perhaps some correlation with double vision, double shots, or something.

It's Ab's fault.

Last edited by pkp|ex : 16th August 2016 at 05:17.
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Old 16th August 2016, 07:12     #100
Ajax
Architeuthis
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lightspeed
It would be a matter of sustained acceleration over a long period of time. The only thing limiting speed is our ability to accelerate and if/how the ship stops once it gets there.
Stopping is a significant problem - it requires sustained decceleration equal to the acceleration time. And another headache is that we'd need highly exotic shielding to protect from particles of dust etc in the interstellar medium . When you're travelling at a decent fraction of c, colliding with such stuff would be disastrous.
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Old 16th August 2016, 09:43     #101
blynk
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by pkp|ex
Some drunken calcumalations on that shit;

Distance 4.24 light years is about 3x10^8 * 60 seconds * 60 minutes * 24 hours * 365 days * 4.24 = 40.114 x 10 ^ 15 meters

Which is 40.114 trillion kilometers.

Fastest man made thing in space appears to have been Juno when it got pulled towards Jupiter at around 265,000 km/hr. Thats 6.36 million km per day, and 2.3214 billion km per year.

So taking that very generous velocity as the present day tech, it would take a space taxi over 17,000 years to reach there.

Seems slightly out of reach.
Yes, but I don't think we are talking about todays technology. Within 10-20years, we could have that down to 100 years, and another 10-20 we could have that down to 3 years.
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Old 16th August 2016, 10:42     #102
Cyberbob
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by blynk
Yes, but I don't think we are talking about todays technology. Within 10-20years, we could have that down to 100 years, and another 10-20 we could have that down to 3 years.
As far as near-future tech goes, VASIMR is a great contender, as is NEXT.
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Old 16th August 2016, 12:02     #103
Lightspeed
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ajax
Stopping is a significant problem - it requires sustained decceleration equal to the acceleration time.
What I wonder is could a ship be captured by the gravity of the star, so complete deceleration isn't required?

A flyby wouldn't require complete deceleration either.
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Old 16th August 2016, 12:32     #104
Cyberbob
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lightspeed
What I wonder is could a ship be captured by the gravity of the star, so complete deceleration isn't required?

A flyby wouldn't require complete deceleration either.
Not quite the same, but:
What is Aerobraking?
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Last edited by Cyberbob : 16th August 2016 at 12:35.
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Old 16th August 2016, 12:41     #105
Ab
A mariachi ogre snorkel
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by blynk
Yes, but I don't think we are talking about todays technology. Within 10-20years, we could have that down to 100 years, and another 10-20 we could have that down to 3 years.
I'm picturing a scenario in which the Earth faces some sort of existential external threat at a solar-system level - Melancholia-style wandering planet, for example - and it comes down to "we have to get a group of people and a whole bunch of genetic material not only off-planet but out of the solar system or everything on Earth is rendered extinct".

Those are the sorts of situations where I like to imagine the resources and brainpower of the Earth would come up with a get-us-to-Proxima-Centauri solution within years or decades.
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Old 16th August 2016, 14:50     #106
pkp|ex
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by blynk
Yes, but I don't think we are talking about todays technology. Within 10-20years, we could have that down to 100 years, and another 10-20 we could have that down to 3 years.
So in 40 years we can exceed the speed of light you reckon?
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Old 16th August 2016, 16:00     #107
Lightspeed
 
I noticed that too and well, maybe. I wouldn't anticipate it happening, but it's could.

I can't imagine the state of science and tech in 40 years, given the last 40.
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Old 16th August 2016, 16:14     #108
crocos
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by blynk
Yes, but I don't think we are talking about todays technology. Within 10-20years, we could have that down to 100 years, and another 10-20 we could have that down to 3 years.
Acceleration technology isn't accelerating that quickly.
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Old 16th August 2016, 16:55     #109
[Malks] Pixie
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ab
I'm picturing a scenario in which the Earth faces some sort of existential external threat at a solar-system level - Melancholia-style wandering planet, for example - and it comes down to "we have to get a group of people and a whole bunch of genetic material not only off-planet but out of the solar system or everything on Earth is rendered extinct".
Yep - anything less than a solar system scale event will just force us off planet ala the first 3/4 of Seveneves. If we are going to leave the system in the next couple of hundred years it'll be generation ships getting up to maybe 1%c.
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Old 16th August 2016, 16:56     #110
Lightspeed
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by crocos
Acceleration technology isn't accelerating that quickly.
Yeah, but we're experiencing a massive acceleration in science and technology.

Consider this question for Fyneman and his response in a lecture in Auckland in 1979 (part 2 of the video pkp|ex linked), and then the question that follows.
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Old 16th August 2016, 17:27     #111
Caesar
 
Didn't Stephen Hawkins say that if we didn't find the ability to get off the planet in the next 100 years we'd be fucked?

This was a few years ago I believe...
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Old 16th August 2016, 19:29     #112
MadMax
Stuff
 
Like that moment you realise you've already failed unrecoverably in Civ
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Old 17th August 2016, 10:39     #113
blynk
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lightspeed
I noticed that too and well, maybe. I wouldn't anticipate it happening, but it's could.

I can't imagine the state of science and tech in 40 years, given the last 40.
Ok, fair enough, I should have kept it at 4.25 years, so it wasn't breaking the speed of light. (but I do believe there will be other ways to get places without breaking the speed of light)

But as LS said, things will advance quicker and quicker.

You all know the story of computers and their advancement.
And their advancement will speed up the advancement of science.

Imagine what we knew about space in 1976, and what we know now.
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Old 17th August 2016, 11:58     #114
Ab
A mariachi ogre snorkel
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Caesar
Didn't Stephen Hawkins say that if we didn't find the ability to get off the planet in the next 100 years we'd be fucked?

This was a few years ago I believe...
Seems to me that Elon Musk is working as hard as he can on that problem.
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Old 17th August 2016, 15:00     #115
CCS
Stunt Pants
 
Elon Musk is just trying to go home to his people.
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Old 25th August 2016, 13:26     #116
Lightspeed
 
Some more info on the Proxima Centauri b exoplanet:
http://www.ice.cat/personal/iribas/Proxima_b/
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Old 26th August 2016, 16:36     #117
Ab
A mariachi ogre snorkel
 
Quote:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/ar...W_ENGYSUS_NEWS

Scientists have engineered a bacterium that can take carbon dioxide from the air and turn it into fuel in a single enzymatic step.

The process draws on sunlight to produce methane and hydrogen inside the bacterium Rhodopseudomonas palustris, in essence reversing combustion.
fuck yeah science
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Old 26th August 2016, 20:00     #118
crocos
 
Science: Turning one greenhouse gas into a stronger greenhouse gas since ages!

But real - that's pretty sweet.
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Old 12th December 2016, 00:35     #119
Lightspeed
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lightspeed
Looks like it's been a successful year:
Germany’s Wendelstein 7-X ‘Stellarator’ Is Operating As Expected
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Old 12th December 2016, 01:01     #120
Ab
A mariachi ogre snorkel
 
saw that earlier and I've been "not getting excited not getting excited" all day 🤘🏼
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