I'm certainly glad that I am old enough to remember the moon landings. But, the possibility of interstellar travel is one of the areas where I wish I could have been born 500 or 1000 years into the future. If it turns out that we can't use exotic methods such as wormholes - it would be fascinating to see how we overcome some of the limitations posited by special relativity. For example, ground ops would have to send signals to the "craft" in UV if they want the craft to receive something in the radio spectrum. Or the opposite effect when the craft is returning. Or, since the stellarscape is completely different at relativistic speeds - how do you navigate or keep people from going utterly insane from the lack of visual cues? I.e. at relativistic velocities stars are "coned" forward and blue shifted. Stars to the aft are red shifted. So, you have stellarscapes where IR or possibly radio frequencies are moved into the visible range (forward) - or UV stars are in the visible looking to the rear. The real kicker though is that very close to C, the only thing you can see is a bright dot ahead of you from the 2.7K CBR! I find it very fascinating (your mileage may vary <g>) and I wish I could see it become reality. The best we can do right now, of course, is software simulations. But, the only planetarium software that I've seen that does a really good job with special relativistic effects is StarStrider (www.starstrider.com). I think they have 30 day trial downloads. Clear skies, Dale.
-----Original Message----- From: utah-astronomy-bounces+dale.hooper=sdl.usu.edu@mailman.xmission.com [mailto:utah-astronomy- bounces+dale.hooper=sdl.usu.edu@mailman.xmission.com] On Behalf Of Joe Bauman Sent: Wednesday, September 07, 2005 10:51 AM To: Utah Astronomy Subject: RE: [Utah-astronomy] SETI politics
That's an interesting article Patrick posted. A major impediment to interstellar travel that's often brought up in debates about UFOs is the vast distance between the stars. Assuming the speed of light is a limit that can't be exceeded and or even approached very closely, that requires interstellar travel to take years -- sometimes many years.
But what if some aliens live as long as bristlecone pines? Spending 100 years to travel from one solar system to another might not seem excessive to them. It might be 1/40 of a lifetime, equivalent to about two years for many of us. Many folks would volunteer to go -- two years there, two years back. Or what if they have a wonderful form of suspended animation? Or suppose they have mastered wormhole technology and can just zip between the galaxies with ease?
Is there any likelihood that UFOs could be real? Anyone?
Thanks, Joe