O/T Stephen Hawking backing $100m dollar space travel project to Earths nearest star

https://www.theguardian.com/science...wking-and-yuri-milner-launch-100m-star-voyage
Seems like the old-fool is up to no good again...

“Gravity pins us to the ground but I just flew to America. I lost my voice but I can still speak thanks to my voice synthesiser. How do we transcend these limits? With our minds and our machines.

“The limit that confronts us now is the great void between us and the stars. But now we can transcend it, with light beams, light sails, and the lightest spacecraft ever built we can launch a mission to Alpha Centauri within a generation. Today we commit to this next great leap into the cosmos, because we are human and our nature is to fly.” Stephen Hawking
Truly a great man

 

Go for it.

****ing ambition or what?

Isn't human ingenuity brilliant?


The Universe is lunacy large but let's give it a go.


A hundred years ago our flight was laughably pathetic - apart from the fact that we'd eventually achieved powered flight after 3000 years of trying.

A couple of years ago we reached the edge of the solar system - albeit unmanned.

In a hundred years I honestly believe we will be achieving things that we currently consider impossible.


I'm so frustrated that I won't be around to see it.



Go human race, you are Kings of the Universe.

When you are not being earth-bound ****.

 

Are you sure Alpha Centauri is "Earths nearest star"?

 

It's a binary star, so it's actually two of the nearest stars.

 

Sigh!

What about thay bright yellow thing in the daytime sky?

And to be pedantic.. Alpha Centauri consists of three stars, Alpha Centauri A and Alpha Centauri B are the binary pair, with their red dwarf companion Proxima Centauri being the second nearest star to Earth.
You are welcome!

 

Well none of you will be around long enough to be proved correct.
30 years till launch and thousands of years till reaching its destination.
Makes stonehenge look new by comparison

 

The craft will travel at a fifth the speed of light. Proxima Centauri is less than five light years away. So less than 25 years to get there and less than 5 years for the signal to get back. Less than 30 years total. Some of us might be alive to be "proved correct".

 

I dont think any of us will be around to see this even if this is possible

 

Exciting news this.

But would this craft be able to do anything, other than travel really, really fast.

Wouldn't it just fly right through the star system, without actually seeing much.

I don't see how they could slow down and maneuver the thing, so it could actually do any exploration.

Obviously there are some serious boffins that will work all that stuff out.

 

Yeah, I know. I realised as I typed. Ah well.

 

I tell you what geekily excites me: graphene. The changes the stuff could bring to the world are amazing.

 

New Horizons was 'only' a flyby of Pluto, but we gleaned a vast amount of information.

 

I tell you what geekily excites me: this.

 

Aye, that's true. A flyby of the suns is possible but there's talk of imaging planets. Solar systems are big things. That's going to be a long shot, without knowing where to point them.

Though I've just seen that these things will cost the same as a smartphone, after R&D costs. Could send thousands of them.

 

**** is my wife driving this thing? She hasn't told me, but sounds like her driving!

 

Can't be long before rocket-flight for humans is possible either, surely it's got to be better for the planet than most forms of transport. I bet it's health and safety issues that are stopping that.

 

It's all a bit silly.

they'll never get a message back because the rockets will fall off the edge of the universe, what with it being flat.

 

SpaceX are working on a crewed capsule that should be available in a couple of years. For it to pass safety tests, the capsule has to remain intact, even if the rocket explodes on the launch pad. Reusing the first stage after landing should half the cost of spaceflight.

 

They've already thought of that.

The rocket will be made of rubber so it'll just bounce back off the turtle's shell.

If it misses the first turtle it'll bounce back off the second one.

Or the next.

Or the next.


It's bound to bounce back off of one of them because it's turtles all the way down.

 

Rincewind, is that you?