# Feasability of Interstellar Travel **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 23, 2000, 6:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasability-of-interstellar-travel/17379 "2000-01-23T06:58:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasability-of-interstellar-travel/17379/61 "2000-02-01T04:49:00Z")
George: A 36,000 kilometer long tether capable of lifting a ton of material into abort, the Skyhook, would in fact weigh quadrillions of tons. There is no material, known or conceived of, that could get around this. You would need a strength to weight ration of unfathomable proportions. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasability-of-interstellar-travel/17379/62 "2000-02-01T04:54:00Z")
Atreal: New elements? The periodic table shows all the elements possible in nature, up to a certain point. One proton and one electron equals hydrogen. two protons, two electrons equals helium. Etc. etc. up through all possible combinations to the transplutonium elements. Hypothetically you could posit stable elements further on up the periodic table, but there is nothing to suggest that they would be likely to be found on another planet. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasability-of-interstellar-travel/17379/63 "2000-02-01T04:58:00Z")
Forgot who said it: The moon sucks as a place for setting up a colony becuiase you don’t have ready access to water, or atmosphere from which you can derive basic materials, and fuel. Despite the distance, Mars would be easier. ---
**Author:** ![hardcore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5a626/32.png) [@hardcore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hardcore)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasability-of-interstellar-travel/17379/64 "2000-02-01T05:32:00Z")
Riboflavin: In reference to going to Mars, you stated: > [@](#): > > Exactly why should we do it NOW? A lot of what I’d call ‘space advocates’ insist that we need to undertake huge long-term projects NOW, but there don’t really seem to be any reasons for them. “Because it is there” just not good enough for you, huh? 😛 There have been many reasons advanced in this thread for going to Mars, not the least of which is the “really cool” factor that you so readily discount. The advancement of science, avoidance of extinction, exploitation of resources, investigation into the origins of life, and my personal favorite, mankind’s need for a frontier are just a few of the excellant reasons for a Mars settlement. However, I agree that a one-shot approach is not as desirable as a permanent one. The self-sustaining permanent approach is the one championed in the book I referenced in a previous post. > [@](#): > > Because there are better ways to spend the $6 billion. This appears to be _your_ only objection to a Mars mission, despite the lack of proposed alternatives AFAIK. This _seems_ to imply that an investment in a Mars settlement would be wasted, somewhat like putting $6 billion into a rocket and blasting it into space. Nothing could be further from the truth. Every penny of the money would go directly into our economy to pay for the salaries of everyone involved. And it is not like we can’t afford to do this and whatever pet project you support. I wish that everyone shared my passion for the Mars settlement. Alas, I fear this is not the case, despite the support it has from many in this thread. Evidently, we are not vocal (or convincing) enough with our representatives. And without a space-race with the “evil communists” to motivate us, I may never realize my dream to become the Grand Poobah of Mars. 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/original/2X/e/e489c3b7d8fce19c4b355dd4fc3f88cc39c34b87.png) [@system](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 8:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasability-of-interstellar-travel/17379/65 "2000-02-01T08:09:00Z")
> [@](#): > > I must learn how to use that quote thing properly. I picked up the habit on Usenet, but I find it makes web bboard discussions easier to follow too. There’s no jumping back through a couple of dozen screens of text and guessing which point is being discussed. > [@](#): > > It occurs to me that your basic argument here is that there are better things to do with the 7 billion than send a person to Mars. Correct? I really have 2 basic arguments. The first one is, in fact, that there are much better ways to spend space program dollars than shooting 2 people to mars for 1.5 years. The second one (which I haven’t voiced, since I was giving people a chance to chime in first) is that space advocates generally cannot put forth any real argument for spending money on space travel. Although you say that the Mars mission has ‘obvious’ benefits, you don’t really list any real benefits. You say something that I disagree with about needing a frontier, but don’t explain why using Antarctica or the oceans would not provide the neccessary frontier. You mention some things that we won’t need to worry about for centuries or longer (lack of resources, sun going nova, etc), but don’t explain why we need to deal with them right now. And so on. And I’m in favor of space travel; the people you really need to convince are the ones who don’t think that space travel is really worthwhile, and who are going to be decidedly unimpressed by an argument that it would be really great to have someone on Mars. > [@](#): > > Since you didn’t comment on my thoughts concerning the International Space Station, is it safe to assume that you agree that it’s a white elephant too? Although I haven’t been following the ISS all that closely, I’m generally extremely unimpressed with it. It doesn’t really attempt to do much of anything for all of the money being sunk into it. > [@](#): > > If so, here’s the deal. I’ll take 10 billion and do a couple of trips to Mars. You know get the base set up, and stuff. You can have the other 10 billion and create a virtual world. Ok? So you’re personally qualified to be an astronaut? Although I don’t know much about you personally, I doubt that you’re really astronaut material; how many PhDs do you have, how long have you been in the air force, etc. Somehow I doubt that you, personally, will be doing a couple of trips to Mars. Whereas once the software and hardware for a virtual world has been worked out, within a decade or two it will be cost-efficient for most everyone (at least in first world countries) to experience, if not own. Of course, I only mentioned creating a virtual world as an example of another technological achievement to rebut the idea that sending a few people to Mars right now is the only way that future generations will remember us well. > [@](#): > > We’ll see who gets the girls This seems to indicate that you just think the idea of the Mars mission is pretty cool, not that there are any obvious benefits other than it being cool. And it’s not just this comment; you don’t list any real benefits that a trip to Mars will provide, and your response when I listed another technological achievement was basically that it wasn’t cool enough. > [@](#): > > Seriously, am I to believe you think the space station is a better idea than Mars? Experimentation leading directly to lower ground-to-orbit costs and an understanding of how to live in the long term outside of Earth’s environment are neccessary to having a sustained presence in space. I don’t see how rocketing one or two people to Mars is going to lead in that direction, so I don’t see what good such a trip does towards having a sustained presence in space, much less what ‘obvious benefits’ it provides for anyone else. > [@](#): > > Did you honestly think that I was referring to the standard of living when I said that The British Emire had been in decline since the end of its expansionist phase? No, I figured that you weren’t, but I’ve always though of it as rather silly to say that a country is in decline when the population of said country lives longer and better than in the era of their ‘ascendancy’. You see, I’m much more concerned with the state of people than with countries and I don’t think that a country filled with people constantly experiencing longer, healthier lives, more wealth, greater or equal security, and continued technological advancement can really be said to be in decline. > [@](#): > > I think you know what I mean. We are talking about land yes, and economics, and military power. Britain has more raw military power than at any time during her history. While she has lower relative military strength than she did during the Trafalgar-WW2 stage, she is more secure from attack than at any time during that period. The only country with the capability to actually threaten Britain is the US, and the US is a strong ally with her (and Britain was always been dependant on alliances to maintain her dominant position). Britain has vastly more wealth than at any previous time in her history, and while not the dominant force in world markets still does quite well (witness, for example, Glaxo-Wellcome-ThatOtherBigBritCompany). I don’t think you’d really say that I was in economic decline if I was getting raises at 10% a year just because some people I know are getting 20% raises a year. So I guess Britain can’t lay claim to more land, which is why I said what I did before. Unless you’re thinking in the context of a strategy game, Britain is in far better shape than at any time in her history. > [@](#): > > I agree that artificial hearts and computer chips did not spring forth whole from the brow of the lunar program like Athena from Zeus. Clearly the lunar program helped. I never disputed that the Apollo program HELPED in a wide variety of areas, what I disputed was the claim that it resulted in the personal computer (and by extension, similar claims that Apollo research was what resulted in a whole host of other advances which some people claim it was directly responsible for). The way basic science works is somebody investigates or invents something and somebody else does something new with it. But you knew that. > [@](#): > > If you are going to argue that the space program didn’t advance sciences and new technologies to a large degree we might as well quit now. Do you really want to quit now? Because the fact that advances in science and technology came from the Apollo program does not mean that it produced ‘large’ gains in those areas, and especially that it didn’t directly result in things like the PC (as you earlier claimed). Certainly, the Apollo program developed useful technologies, but how much more advancement could the same money have bought if it was spent directly on said technologies? Also, and this is the critical point for me, the Apollo program didn’t really do a whole lot for a sustained presence in space. Since it concentrated on just getting a man to the moon, the project never developed any sort of infrastructure for keeping a man on the moon or getting more men on the moon. > [@](#): > > Actually humanities use of resources and energy has been expanding exponentially for the past two centuries. While usage of resources is still expanding exponentially i ---
**Author:** ![Riboflavin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Riboflavin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riboflavin)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 8:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasability-of-interstellar-travel/17379/66 "2000-02-01T08:35:00Z")
(Quick addition to my ‘what should we do’ in my last post to Scylla - I also think we should be using automated probes for information gathering while we’re doing all of the near-earth stuff I was talking about) Hardcore, > [@](#): > > “Because it is there” just not good enough for you, huh? There have been many reasons advanced in this thread for going to Mars, not the least of which is the “really cool” factor that you so readily discount. The ‘really cool’ factor only works when you’re preaching to the converted. It’s a completely worthless way to convince someone who doesn’t already think that your idea is ‘cool’ that it’s a good idea. Personally, I find the idea of having an infrastructure in place so that space travel is fairly routine to be much cooler than just slapping a base onto Mars for the Hell of it. [quote] The advancement of science, Which can be done cheaper, more quickly, and more safely close to Earth for most of the technologies involved. If you’re talking about basic science, unmanned missions get you a lot more data a lot more quickly without risking people dying (which, aside from the obvious problem, also creates a reluctance of people to support further space travel). > [@](#): > > avoidance of extinction, Which is either thousands or millions of years off or would include Mars, and which Mars Direct does nothing to protect against. > [@](#): > > exploitation of resources, Mars Direct isn’t going to be exploiting resources, and for the near future transporting resources from outside of Earth to Earth will be far more expensive than mining them on Earth itself. > [@](#): > > investigation into the origins of life, Which can be done with unmanned probes (I meant to mention this a bit more in my reply to Scylla). > [@](#): > > and my personal favorite, mankind’s need for a frontier What need for a frontier are you referring to? As I’ve said before, these ‘declining’ civilizations enjoy more wealth, more security, higher standards of living, an healthier lives than at any time in history. Furthermore, you haven’t explained how near-Earth space would not qualify as a ‘frontier’ for these purposes. > [@](#): > > are just a few of the excellant reasons for a Mars settlement. It doesn’t appear that any of these excellant reasons provide any justification for Mars Direct, or indeed for putting a man on Mars NOW. > [@](#): > > However, I agree that a one-shot approach is not as desirable as a permanent one. The self-sustaining permanent approach is the one championed in the book I referenced in a previous post. And the research for a self-sustaining space colony can be done more cheaply, more quickly, and more safely near Earth than on Mars. Until we have the capability for a self-sustaining colony, nothing we send to Mars will be self-sustaining for obvious reasons. > [@](#): > > This appears to be your only objection to a Mars mission, despite the lack of proposed alternatives AFAIK. No one asked for alternatives before Scylla’s last post, so I didn’t provide any. > [@](#): > > This seems to imply that an investment in a Mars settlement would be wasted, somewhat like putting $6 billion into a rocket and blasting it into space. More like spending your money on building a steam vehicle across the US back in the railroad days (as opposed to developing the basic technologies and infrastructure for a transcontenental railroad). > [@](#): > > Nothing could be further from the truth. Every penny of the money would go directly into our economy to pay for the salaries of everyone involved. Why don’t we just pay people to dig holes and fill them back up again if that’s all the benefit we’ll recieve? > [@](#): > > And it is not like we can’t afford to do this and whatever pet project you support. Since there’s only so much money in NASA’s budget, or in the budgets of all of the space programs worldwide, this is a patently untrue statement. It’s very rare that you’re working with completely unlimited money in any field, and space travel is especially constrained by this. And getting more money into space programs would require either getting more people psyched on space travel, or convincing people that there is some real benefit to spending more on space programs. Arguments like ‘it’s cool’ or ‘the sun will go out in a million years’ tend to fall on deaf ears. > [@](#): > > I wish that everyone shared my passion for the Mars settlement. Alas, I fear this is not the case, despite the support it has from many in this thread. Evidently, we are not vocal (or convincing) enough with our representatives. An argument that ‘it’s cool’ is not exactly convincing to anyone who doesn’t already think it’s cool. The other reasons given don’t really hold water (I’ve gone into that above), so the problem might be that space advocates in general are good at convincing each other about the desirability of projects but lack even the concept of how to sell space travel to anyone who doesn’t already agree with them. * * * Kevin Allegood, “At least one could get something through Trotsky’s skull.” - Joseph Michael Bay ---
**Author:** ![Riboflavin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Riboflavin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riboflavin)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 8:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasability-of-interstellar-travel/17379/67 "2000-02-01T08:43:00Z")
Atrael, > [@](#): > > It’s been asked several times what we would get out of a manned mission to establish a base on another planet/moon. While I don’t believe there would be any immediate benifit, what about the discovery of new elements? What is special about a manned mission to Mars that an unmanned mission couldn’t accomplish quicker, cheaper, and safer? If there’s a new element to be discovered, a robotic probe can cover a lot more ground for the same cost than a manned probe can. Especially in the context of the Mars Direct discussion, which is not about establishing a colony on Mars, but about a near-term mission to send a few people to Mars to build a base that will require constant resupply from Earth. * * * Kevin Allegood, “At least one could get something through Trotsky’s skull.” - Joseph Michael Bay ---
**Author:** ![Riboflavin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Riboflavin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riboflavin)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 8:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasability-of-interstellar-travel/17379/68 "2000-02-01T08:49:00Z")
Scylla, > [@](#): > > A 36,000 kilometer long tether capable of lifting a ton of material into abort, the Skyhook, Why does everyone come up with these Rube Goldberg contraptions to do everything? Even the old rockets can lift a ton of material and abort. Man, if you want to have a failed mission, you can do it much easier than using a skyhook. (On a serious note, while there are some materials that might be strong enough for some kind of skyhook, they’re well beyond our ability to make now, leaving skyhook-style contraptions purely in the realm of SF. The materials research being done is pretty much independant of space research, so the funding for what needs to be done now for building a skyhook is pretty much unrelated to the space program). * * * Kevin Allegood, “At least one could get something through Trotsky’s skull.” - Joseph Michael Bay ---
**Author:** ![Riboflavin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Riboflavin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riboflavin)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 9:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasability-of-interstellar-travel/17379/69 "2000-02-01T09:06:00Z")
Zor, > [@](#): > > It is also my opinion that ZPE cannot even be remotely compared to cold fusion. It is also a fact that you’re wrong. > [@](#): > > Furthermore, I also feel that you will agree with me on both issues if you have access to the same information as I do. Yes, yes, yes, this is all pretty snobbish, but it’s my opinion damnit A. You haven’t bothered to cite anything other than a web site that says, basically ‘ZPE is neat, and study of it might lead to interesting stuff at some point’. Such citations, while sometimes interesting, don’t show anything other than ‘theory X is what we’re looking at right now, and we don’t know what we’ll get out of it’. B. If I had the same lack of access to information that you do, I would probably also come to the same erroneous conclusions that you do. I mean, you’re not even familiar with the rocket equation and how it can be applied to a variety of drives, yet you sit around trying to pass yourself off as some sort of font of knowledge we should all be glad to drink from. It’s not snobbery you’re displaying, it’s pride in your own ignorance. > [@](#): > > Now about my definition of practical, I think it’s as clear as any English word can be defined. If I say 10 years is practical, you can argue for 11…The point is we’re not going to get any where with this kind of argument. And it is intellectually dishonest on your part to imply that I was trying to get us involved in such an argument. I asked you what timeframe you were using for ‘practical’ so that I could figure out whether your dismissals of various drive types were realistic or not, not to justify whatever definition of practical you were using. Intellectual dishonesty and pride in ignorance do tend to go together, though. > [@](#): > > The link to the NASA BPP lab’s tour is here, which I have already linked to in my earlier posts. Perhaps it just escaped your attention. I sincerely and humbly beg that you forgive me for not rereading every post in the thread before responding to you. It was such a horrible thing for me to do. > [@](#): > > p.s. Your calculations to the upper limit of anti-matter propulsion are still incorrect. No, I’m not going to explain that and try to convince you. Probably because I have what we call ‘science’ on my side, and you have your wonderful ignorance of basic science. You don’t provide a cite, any calculation, or any reasoning for you figures for antimatter propulsion, yet you expect everyone to believe that you’re right. * * * Kevin Allegood, “At least one could get something through Trotsky’s skull.” - Joseph Michael Bay ---
**Author:** ![Riboflavin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Riboflavin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riboflavin)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 9:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasability-of-interstellar-travel/17379/70 "2000-02-01T09:19:00Z")
Inertia, > [@](#): > > I believe Riboflavin’s problem with the proximity to the Sun is that even way out here in Earth orbit out astronauts take great precautions against being fried Krispy Original by solar radiation. While being fried just from proximity and so having the brainpower of Krispy Original would be a problem, the real problem is that you’ve got a very definate limit on how far you can use gravitational slingshotting for braking or accellerating because you can’t go closer than the surface of the body. While 1500 m/s (.05c, what Scylla was talking about later) is probably within the outer limits of what you could do without hitting atmosphere, it’s not really significant compared to the .43c you’d need to get to AC in the 10 year time frame we were talking about earlier. I think I was mixing up the 2 discussions. > [@](#): > > If we decide instead to build a reliable space infrastructure, the thought of going to Mars in the future will be little more than an after thought. Something along the lines of “Hey, ya’ wanna’ go to Mars?” “Sure, lets go.” My point exactly. > [@](#): > > Both you guys keep repeating that going from producing single atoms of anti-matter to producing tons of the stuff is along the lines of 10^23 magnitude more difficult. Correct me if I’m wrong, but 6.023 \* 10^23 atoms of antimatter would produce 1.0079[the atomic mass of an average H atom] GRAMS of antimater (remembered from my chemistry degree.) Therefore we get (# grams in a 4 tons of matter [or anti-matter, it all has the same mass]) \* (6.023 \* 10^23 atoms [the definition of a mole if anyone is paying attention]). 10^23 was just a rough estimate that I used because I was sure it would be lower than the actual size of the scale-up required, and was much greater than the 10^3 engineering scale-up Zor throught was impossibel. However, if we assume that present techniques can build 1000 atoms of antimatter/day (generous, but not totally out there AFAIK), then scaling up by 10^23 means we can make about a sixth of a kilogram per day, which means we could manufacture the ton of fuel being talked about in under 20 years, which is acceptable for a one-shot project. * * * Kevin Allegood, “At least one could get something through Trotsky’s skull.” - Joseph Michael Bay ---
**Author:** ![Zor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/848f3c/32.png) [@Zor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zor)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2000, 12:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasability-of-interstellar-travel/17379/71 "2000-02-01T12:53:00Z")
Riboflavin, neither of us have cited anything from a renowned scientific journal, so that’s a moot point. If you still think your rocket equation can properly describe an anti-matter drive, then fine, you win. If you think anti-matter isn’t worth a crap, then fine, you win too. If you weren’t dwelling on the definition of practical, then fine, that’s my fault for not explaining myself clearly. I’m sorry I pointed out something that I thought had escaped your attention. I just assumed you’ve read everything I’ve presented since you grilled over every single word of my posts. Spare me the ad hominem attacks will you? I’ll leave your thread if it suits you. And Inertia, my comment on fuel acceleration was in regards to the ejecta from rockets. The basic assumption of the rocket equation is that fuel and ejecta (which can be one) are carried along the rocket during its entire travel. This premise, however, does not necessarily hold true for the designs of all propulsion systems. Whether or not chemical, fission, and fusion drives can escape this requirement happens to be of little consequence, since they all demand far too large an amount of raw fuel to be carried along as an energy source. Anti-matter propulsion systems differ significantly since they are extremely energy efficiency, and they do not have to carry along all their fuel and ejecta for the journey. This allows anti-matter drives to break through the confines of the normal rocket equations, and is also why, in my humble opinion, they will become the choice of space travelers. I am fully aware that anti-matter has mass, so I think this is just a misunderstanding between the two us. Nevertheless, I do appreciate you for not ripping me apart and insulting my character on this occasion. Thank you. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2000, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasability-of-interstellar-travel/17379/72 "2000-02-03T01:50:00Z")
Riboflavin: Concerning the English (for the last time.) THE ENGLISH EMPIRE NO LONGER EXISTS. How people in England are doing today doesn’t really matter. Essentially England has been economically colonized by the U.S. They have gone the way of the DOdo, the Ming Dynasty, The Spanish and Portugese Empire. I sincerely believe you are either being argumentative for the sake of it or you are entirely missing the point. Since you agree with the necessity of a space program I will not bother with energy and fossil fuel consumption though I have found that Global Power consumption is currently growing at 4.6% a year. Mars Direct accomplishes something immediately. Yes it is showy. So what. It can capture the publics interest and hence, gasrner cash from the public coffers for more mundane and useful space enterprises. It is also a big goal. Big goals breed innovation in a way that baby steps cannot. While your more mundane step-by step program is surely more efficient technologically, it lacks the pizazz to gather enough funding for any follow through. It’ll end up like another ISS and get drawn out over a couple of decades. How do you know I’m not astronaut material? For all you can know I might have “The right stuff.” ---
**Author:** ![Riboflavin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Riboflavin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riboflavin)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2000, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasability-of-interstellar-travel/17379/73 "2000-02-03T13:34:00Z")
> [@](#): > > THE ENGLISH EMPIRE NO LONGER EXISTS. > How people in England are doing today doesn’t really matter. > [@](#): > > Essentially England has been economically colonized by the U.S. I’ll try to dig up the numbers on this, but I think Britain actually owns more property in the US than the US does in Britain. For the sake of argument, I’ll assume that this economic colonization has happened. However, it’s certainly only happened AFTER WW2. What ‘frontiers’ was the US adding in the 20th century; do you think Alaska and Hawaii were responsible for the US economic boom? If the ascendancy of the US has nothing to do with having a frontier, then how does it support your idea that a frontier is neccessary to avoid a decline? Also, in order for the old British Empire to still be around, they’d have to hold down what were former colonial areas by force. Is it really your contention that the massive expenditures in money and lives to hold onto India, British Africa, and the like would mean that Britain would be better off today? After all, you did say > [@](#): > > Europe was at the vanguard of technological development and wealth during the imperial era, and those same countries became second rate powers when their expansion ceased. Yet we see the US becoming the vanguard of technological development and wealth without entering an imperial era. It seems rather odd that you’d say “A frontier society is a strong motivator for innovation,” when the US only began to move to the vanguard of innovation after the frontier areas were settled areas. > [@](#): > > I sincerely believe you are either being argumentative for the sake of it or you are entirely missing the point. Or, perhaps (and it’s not like I haven’t said this before) I don’t agree with the point. If a civilization declining results in more wealth, helathier and longer lives, and less danger of war for the citizens of said civilization, then I’d like to see all civilizations ‘decline’ as much as possible as soon as possible. > [@](#): > > Mars Direct accomplishes something immediately. Yes it is showy. So what. It can capture the publics interest and hence, gasrner cash from the public coffers for more mundane and useful space enterprises. Lots of things can capture the public’s interest; capturing the eye of the public is more a matter of how good you make your propaganda than the underlying goal. Especially since ‘send a man to Mars’ doesn’t seem to garner all that much response from the public that I’ve encountered. Also, capturing money from the public coffers is not always a matter of convincing the public; convincing the budget planners can also work quite efficiently. > [@](#): > > It is also a big goal. Big goals breed innovation in a way that baby steps cannot. Big goals can breed basic ideas on how to do something, but it’s the tedious work of gradually improving the technology that actually breeds results. In the early 1800s, railroads were not developed by trying to slap out a transcontenintal railroad, but by gradually improving the technology. Same with air travel or antibiotics; once you’ve got the basic idea, there’s a lot of work to be done to get it to the point of being routine. > [@](#): > > While your more mundane step-by step program is surely more efficient technologically, it lacks the pizazz to gather enough funding for any follow through. Cheaper ground-to-orbit transit could garner immediate economic benefits, which generally has enough ‘pizazz’ to catch the eye of budget planners. Space travel developed to the point that, for a large fee, basically anyone can have the opportunity for a trip to space would seem a much better way to capture the public imagination than ‘look, there’s a guy on Mars’. So would ‘look, we have people living permanently in space’ as opposed to ‘look, we have people in space that can stay there as long as we send more supplies to them’. > [@](#): > > It’ll end up like another ISS and get drawn out over a couple of decades. Ah, so your program will end up like the Apollo program, getting big press for a little while and then fading into obscurity? The ‘one big nifty but not really practical project’ idea has already been tried and failed to leave anyone in space. > [@](#): > > How do you know I’m not astronaut material? For all you can know I might have “The right stuff.” For one thing, the sort of people who are astronauts don’t tend to spend a lot of time arguing in public fora; NASA very much prefers conservative types to avoid the risk of damage to their reputation. Also, since astronaut-material people are only a very small percentage of the population, it’s a reasonable guess that any given person is not an astronaut. Furhter, since being qualified to be an astronaut for any near-term mission would require rather impressive credentials in the area being discussed, I would expect anyone who does have such qualifications to have mentioned them at some point. Finally, your response is ‘how can you know I’m not astronaut material’ and not ‘I am qualified to be an astronaut with my 2 PhDs and dozen years in the air force’. That tends to reinforce the impression that my educated guess was right. Saying that you’re not suited to be an astronaut by current standards is hardly an insult, BTW; myself, my family, and all of my friends are also similarly unqualified for the endeavor. * * * Kevin Allegood, “At least one could get something through Trotsky’s skull.” - Joseph Michael Bay [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasability-of-interstellar-travel/17379.md?page=3)