Earth-Like Planet Around Proxima Centauri Discovered[W:17]

Goshin said:

Kim Stanley Robinson and other skeptics aside, some version of "FTL" is not necessarily impossible. We already know of a couple of potential theoretical loopholes, even though we lack the means (as of yet) to exploit them.



Many things that were considered impossible 200 years ago, or had not even been imagined as yet in fiction, are today commonplace. That we sit in our homes (or in a park far from any outlet) and access much of the collected knowledge of humanity, and hold discourse with persons around the entire globe in text, or voice, or video, and do so cheaply and easily, was not even a fantasy in 1816. Yet here we are...

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Yeah but the problems with these theoretical loopholes are things like "requires more mass-energy equivalent than exists in the observable universe." Or "requires arranging matter on a level that is orders of magnitude smaller than electrons." Or, my personal favorite, "you have to have a warp drive to build your warp drive."

This is decidedly different from just not having a concept of how to send a radio signal.

Re: Earth-Like Planet Around Proxima Centauri Discovered

It's not often that news really excites me but this is epic news. Humanity really has a golden opportunity here!

One thing that troubles me about the grandiose postulations of space travel is that we really don't know the physical dynamics of travel beyond our solar system. The Voyager space probe has given some preliminary impressions that there might be different forces at play at the outskirts of our Sun's gravitational field, which is hard to account for when making a huge voyage to a nearby star.

The other thing is that, although I appreciate human intelligence, in some ways we are still very infantile. Would it be wise to travel to a potentially inhabited solar system, with life that may be more advanced than us or just different than us?

I think there are some ethical issues with announcing our presence to the known universe. On the other hand, advanced civilizations probably already know about us. I just wish there were full disclosure from our governments so we could work as a collective humanity towards something meaningful.

Kal'Sang said:

This is based on human experience and knowledge. And even then, Asimov's postulation hasn't come true yet for us humans has it? For all we know it was nothing but fear talking.

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I enjoy reading Asimov but really he doesn't know what he's talking about. He writings come across like how a physics professor would codify physical laws of nature, but they aren't the same thing at all. There are way, way too many variables about outer space. There are the known unknowns, and the unknown unknowns. We are still a very child like race.

Wouldn't it be awesome if one day humanity could get past its material myopia and work towards an epic voyage into the universe? One can only dream...

Deuce said:

Yeah but the problems with these theoretical loopholes are things like "requires more mass-energy equivalent than exists in the observable universe." Or "requires arranging matter on a level that is orders of magnitude smaller than electrons." Or, my personal favorite, "you have to have a warp drive to build your warp drive."

This is decidedly different from just not having a concept of how to send a radio signal.

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Serious obstacles, granted.


However, most of my life there was no, none, ZERO serious theory of how to bypass the C limit.


Then suddenly, there was.


Then a few years later, a theory was found to reduce the energy requirements by an order of magnitude.



To me, this is very encouraging. I probably won't live to see it, but it suggests that a smidge of optimism is not entirely unreasonable.

Goshin said:

Because we may well find exoplanets considerably more hospitable than Mars.


Granted, I wouldn't personally sign up unless there was data (possibly from a "nano probe" as some propose) indicating that the planet was indeed rather habitable by humankind. Some would take a larger chance no doubt.

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Nah, too risky for me, especially if we dont even know if the planets in question are habitable. Mars is close and doable, I would rather support a colony there first.