zapatos

Because it is included in your plan. I'm just changing the timing of the launches.

No, that hasn't always been your point. They are your contingencies, they are your backups, they are your redundancies, they are your supplies. I don't have a separate plan from yours. All I am suggesting is a modification to your plan. Anything you launch early, you instead launch at the same time the people launch. The only difference I am suggesting is that instead of placing things far away from you, you instead have those things close to you.

I swear I think you are not reading what I am writing. What would be better, to have an emergency duplicate spacecraft positioned 100,000 miles away, or to have an emergency duplicate spacecraft positioned 1 mile away?

No, you are still misunderstanding me. I want exactly the same number of backup contingency plans that you want. I want multiple alternate options just like you. I want two baskets, just like you. The only difference in our plans is the distance between the people and the baskets. I want the baskets to be close by. You want the baskets to be far away. If it turns out due to some unforseen circumstance that I need something in one of the baskets, I can get to it quickly. If it turns out due to some unforseen circumstance that you need something in one of the baskets, you are going to have to wait 100 years for it.

So do you think your way would be better because ultimately, you would have even more supplies available to you than I would?

In what way do you think I am arguing against your idea of redundancy?

With all due respect in return, I think you are missing my point. I am suggesting that anything you may have pre-positioned, you instead take with you. Any redundancy is with you instead of somewhere ahead of you. There is no limit to how much I can take with me. Anything you would have sent out early, I would send out at the same time the people left. Any supply that you can get to in 100 years, 200 years, or 1000 years, I can lay my hands on today. They left them behind because they could not possibly take the supplies with them. They had a limited carrying capacity. You don't have that same limit in space. How many explorers died because they couldn't get back to their pre-positioned supplies in time? If the supplies had been with them they would have survived.

No, the fuel consumption will be the same. Let's say we send out the supply vessel now at 0.1c. It will take x amount of fuel to get it to that velocity. Later on we send out the people at 0.2c. For simplicity let's say it takes an amount of fuel equal to 2x. When the people overcome the supply ship, in order to get the supplies, they need the supply ship to be going the same speed as the people. So they speed up the supply ship to 0.2c from 0.1c, using an amount of fuel equal to x. That is 2x in fuel the supply ship has now used. They could have used that exact same 2x in fuel to leave at the same time the people did, and cruised along at the same velocity. Therefore there is no difference in fuel consumption. Well, you only mentioned one (the fuel). What is the other? But you said "Sending supply ships out years and years ahead of the actual manned missions has to be looked at as an investment in the future survival of humanity." You can't argue that both sides of the socio-economics issue support your argument. Also, why is it 'doubtful' that we can store it without grumblings, but ok with the population if we send it? Is the socio-economic issue what you had in mind all along when you said we should send out supply ships ahead of time? Just wondering because this is the first time you brought it up. Actually this is an argument in favor of taking all of the supplies with you instead of sending them out ahead of time. You have the same amount of supplies either way, and will consume the same amount either way. If the journey gets sidetracked or takes longer than expected or consumes resources faster than expected while at a dangerous mid-point between stars, you are going to be glad you have the extra supplies with you, rather than hoping that you don't starve to death before you reach the extra supplies that are at the pre-positioned supply points. Exactly the opposite is true. If the food is with you then you can eat it and arrive alive. If the food is not with you and you mis-calculated, that is when you're dead before you even get there. And to quote a very wise person:

It will take exactly the same amount of fuel to move a supply ship from point A to point B whether the ship leaves today, tomorrow, or 1000 years from now. There will be no fuel savings. If I put together supplies and launch them ahead of time for use in 10,000 years, or if I put supplies together and hold in a staging area for a later launch, still to be used in 10,000 years, there will be no difference in failures, breakdowns, etc. Let's say it takes 1000 years to get those supplies together. There is no difference between sending out a supply ship every hundred years with one 1/10 of the supplies and then sending the people after the 1000 years, or saving up the supplies for 1000 years and sending them all together. The rate you put the supplies together is exactly the same, so no change in impact to the population. Or, just gather the supplies for years and years ahead of the actual manned mission, but send them out at the same time the people leave. You do not have to change anything about the production, fuel, or anything else, to launch them at the same time you launch the people. Unless there is some other factor not yet mentioned, I see no added benefit to sending out the supplies prior to sending out the people.

I can see you might want to send some supplies afterward to allow you to begin the journey sooner. You still haven't said though why you need to send them ahead of you.

But what benefit would you gain by sending them ahead? It seems to me that having the supplies close by gives you options that you do not have if the supplies are sent ahead. For example, changing destinations, having ready access in an emergency, using the supply craft for a lifeboat, etc.

You lost me here. Basically you want to make a point, but not allow someone to make a counterpoint. Seems like your own version of limiting freedom of speech...

I've been thinking about the unmanned support ships and have gone back and forth between 'what a good idea' and 'not necessary'. I think I've settled on 'not necessary'. Why not just bring the support ships with you? Energy requirements shouldn't change significantly, and it leaves you the option to change your plans later if during that 19,000 years something unexpected happens. Should also help with your disaster recovery planning.

No, this has not descended into the realm of Star-Trek. It started out that way by you in your first post and we are trying to bring it back back down to earth. Lightspeed travel will never be the solution. You will never be able to supply the necessary energy. No, he didn't read yours or mine. Not at all. This place is usually a great place to kick ideas around as long as people are logical and ready to support any assertions they make. Actually I suspect that mimicking gravity would be relatively easy. Imagine if a ship were built like a barbell. If you started the ship were rotating like a twirling baton you could make whatever 'artificial' gravity you like at either end.

My primary focus on entering this discussion was to find out why high speed travel was either 'needed' or 'important', and following that why it was considered 'lazy' if moving at a slower speed. If we travel to another star via any conventional means via any conceivable energy source developed, no one who starts the trip will end it. It will take multiple generations to get anywhere. Which is no big deal. As I said, humans have been travelling through space since humans have been around. It's not as if we'd be sitting at the window seat waiting to arrive at our destination. We would continue to live and work just as we do now. You also don't need to fuel this giant ship for billions on years for travel. It is not like being in a car with your foot on the gas peddle the whole time. Once you are up to speed, other than things like course corrections, you turn the engines off. If you are talking about travelling a significant portion of the speed of light, you will need much more energy that just what is needed for day to day operations. Also, being hit by a giant meteor is much less a problem at low speeds than high speeds. At 1/2 c I'd hate be be hit by a grain of sand. I'm not sure what it means to 'fold space' or whether or not it is possible to make any reasonable predictions about how we can travel from one specific location to another by doing so. As I'm not familiar with it though I obviously can't say much about it. Talking about travelling by worm holes may be fun, but if we were told we had to leave the earth in the next 100 years, no one would be working on the worm hole method.

Ok, I can see I'm in the wrong thread when space travel via wormholes and folding space should be our concentration, due to the fact that infinite energy sources and lightspeed vessels aren't yet in our grasp. Just for the record though, if we can manage to get there in 100 years rather than 100,000... You'll still be dead. Just sayin'.

So let's say we leave right now, travelling at 6 miles per second, heading for another star. That give us 5 billion years to get there before our star's energy is used up. On the other hand, we won't be using any energy from the sun after a fairly short amount of time anyway. After 100 years, do we really care if the sun has run out of energy? In the event of a collission of galaxies, it is unlikely there will be any actual physical contact. So again, why is it important to get there quickly?

So the reason we need to travel near light speed is because it is important? Ok, so I have another question. Why is it important to travel near light speed?

You didn't tell us why we need to travel close to light speed. Why is it a problem if it takes a long time to get somewhere? You got something else to do? Shoot, we've been travelling through space for billions of years now without even trying. Why does travelling in a (more or less) straight line toward another location require a higher velocity than going around our star in a circle?

The square root of 69 is 8 something.

I just checked with my wife and she said that men think of women WAY more than women think of men. She said a woman may have 10 things going on in her mind at once: Work, school, the car, dinner with her friends, men, remember to call my sister, clothes, the baby shower, clean the bathroom, get home in time for the baseball game. Men may also have 10 things going on in his mind at once: Women, women in swimsuits, I'd like to see that woman in a swimsuit, is that a woman up there?, I'm getting a bit randy, get the oil changed, boy I'd like to change her oil, who is that new woman at work?, swimsuit issue of sports illustrated, women. She told me some more things but the Victoria Secrets commercial came on and I missed what she was saying...

Yes, by law. Culture can change. Cultures can vary from place to place. What protects our freedoms if it is not laws?

This common practice has nothing to do with freedom of religion in the US. Our freedoms are protected by law.

Yes, I understood what you were saying. I wasn't questioning that. I was just pointing out that in your post you said, among other things: 'Atheism is not about evidence, it is about wanting evidence.' I just thought it was an interesting way to say it.

Well, maybe on paper, but not in reality. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declaration_of_war_by_the_United_States