Joshua A.C. NewmanMar 4

@thomasfuchs @harry_karadimas
Your distinction (ignoring that we use “flight” as a common metaphor for space travel) is apt, as flight is a negotiation between aerodynamic forces, and spaceflight is a negotiation between thrust, mass, and gravity.

Interstellar travel is necessarily as different from rockets as rockets are from airplanes and birds.

Show threadHarry KaradimasMar 4
@JoshuaACNewman @thomasfuchs True, and after all, rockets are just glorified planes that carry bottles of liquified atmosphere !
Show threadJoshua A.C. NewmanMar 4

@harry_karadimas @thomasfuchs

I can’t tell what level of sarcasm this is.

Show threadHarry KaradimasMar 5
@JoshuaACNewman @thomasfuchs Mild sarcasm ; I only know little of space physics, but my view is that it requires much more advanced technology than what we have now. A good read to get a feel for the physical barriers for such a travel is the book Tau zero from Poul Anderson ( https://www.amazon.fr/dp/1504054563?psc=1&th=1&linkCode=gg2&tag=galaxypcom-20 ) where a lot of the space travel hypotheses are backed by real scientific theories, you can imagine then how far away we are from the reach to another star
Amazon.de : Tau Zero

Show threadJoshua A.C. Newman
@harry_karadimas @thomasfuchs
It’s not even necessarily a technological matter. It’s paradigmatic. The sentence “We will one day travel the stars” requires us to carefully assess what we can mean by “we”, “one day” and “travel”.
Mar 5 at 5:32pmWeb