UFO's

[Defiant]

Originally Posted by Incognitas

I don't think there are UFO's as you are thinking of them.After all thinkng of the resources required to just get to the moon or to Mars and think what it would take to get from this star system to the nearest star system to us.Who's got the time?Who would waste the resources?And yes if they have FTL travel because they are so superior to us why would they come unless they want something.Possibly some of our resources to get home again.

I don't see us ever leaving our own star system personally.

That's the wrong way of thinking about it though. You never know what's going to be developed in the next 50/100yrs. There may be civilisations thousands of years ahead of us. That far ahead infact they wont to stay hidden and just spy. Some recon the human race may just be an alien experiment.

Anyway think back in the 30/40's. If someone was to tell them there will be a passenger plane that can go twice the speed of sound they would have laughed at you but this was done (and gone)

Originally Posted by zovat

Just like most people so far, I look at the size of the universe and have to assume that there must be other lifeforms out there, and some of them may be advanced enough to travel this far.

I also think that a lot of he "UFO" sightings can be proved to be experimental aircraft and the like, and it serves most governments needs to allow this to continue rather than admit whatever secret project they have going...

Very good point, If you do a little digging the stealth Fighter F117, entered operational service in the late 1970's!!!!!!!

Imagine what that looked like to people back then.

I believe in alien life, I am hesitant to say they have managed to conquer the vast distances in space but I dont see any reason why they havent.

It's the power source that will be the biggest problem.We are still trying to find a cheap power source that converts easily obtainable renewable resources(therefore cheaper)that aren't toxic(who wants to be irradiated before the final destination) and gives out enough output to get up to speed so as to get somewhere within living memory.Then having got up to speed we have to make sure that we don't smear ourselves across the windscreen in a bloody pulp before we work out how to stop.Also before we go any distance away we want to be sure we can get back with whatever we discover or the whole experience will be wasted for those left back here on earth.

I'm not saying it's impossible I'm just saying we may run out of resources (renewable or non renewable) long before we get to the stage of discovering a means to reach the stars.

How wonderful if we achieve it,but we have a lot to learn and discover before that day.I think we will be a much different society to the one we now have when we do discover how to FTL,so much so that we may not WANT to go to other star systems.

[ian@huth]

When you consider how many different life forms there are on our planet it is impossible to think that there are no other life forms elsewhere.

We can only judge what is possible regarding inter planetary movement with our existing knowledge which may be very limited. Just think about how our ability to travel has changed in the last 100 years or so. The impossible today will be commonplace tomorrow.

For all we know we may be from a planet far far away that ended up on Earth either accidently or deliberately. Were Adam and Eve aliens and was the Ark a spaceship?

[Defiant]

Originally Posted by Incognitas

It's the power source that will be the biggest problem.We are still trying to find a cheap power source that converts easily obtainable renewable resources(therefore cheaper)that aren't toxic(who wants to be irradiated before the final destination) and gives out enough output to get up to speed so as to get somewhere within living memory.Then having got up to speed we have to make sure that we don't smear ourselves across the windscreen in a bloody pulp before we work out how to stop.Also before we go any distance away we want to be sure we can get back with whatever we discover or the whole experience will be wasted for those left back here on earth.

Who's to say we don't already have another power source now. Do you know how many millions/billions they'd get paid to keep there mouth shut. Not just by the oil and fossil fuel company's either but by Government's who use this with taxe's to keep the economy running. Its off topic but on the along the same lines with the cure to the common cold. do you have any idea how much all those different medicine's generate in cash.

Well Defiant if you think that little of our species ability to see beyond it's collective nose then we won't be leaving the planet will we?

[Defiant]

Originally Posted by Incognitas

Well Defiant if you think that little of our species ability to see beyond it's collective nose then we won't be leaving the planet will we?

I think we will thats if we dont blow ourselve's up or the extremist country's blow us up

technology is already being investigated and has been for a long time.
NASA are developing an ION engine that produces constant acceleration.

as pointed out, we need to know how to stop, and stop fast in these circumstances and in the vacuum of space thats gonna be problematic.
Engery resources wouldnt be THAT important provided we had enough fuel for a burn to get us coasting back to Earth.

Distance is the problem, we are talking light years, we cant accelerate anything above particles to the speed of light so 50 light years is gonna take over 50 years to get there.

Still jsut because WE dont have the technology doesnt mean another life/race doesnt. Perhaps they perfected the ION engine hundreds of years ago?

The USA even investigated a Nuclear powered aircraft for long term recon missions. But decided it wasnt feasible.

Originally Posted by Incognitas

It's the power source that will be the biggest problem.We are still trying to find a cheap power source that converts easily obtainable renewable resources(therefore cheaper)that aren't toxic(who wants to be irradiated before the final destination) and gives out enough output to get up to speed so as to get somewhere within living memory.Then having got up to speed we have to make sure that we don't smear ourselves across the windscreen in a bloody pulp before we work out how to stop.Also before we go any distance away we want to be sure we can get back with whatever we discover or the whole experience will be wasted for those left back here on earth.

If we were to commit the effort to it we could make a reasonable stab at it within a relatively short space of time. Daedelus was a proposed spacecraft in the 1970s that would use nuclear explosions to propel a craft. You wouldn`t need to use this method on its own, once your craft is up to a reasonable speed you can collect interstellar hydrogen in ramscoops to use as fuel, although for that it would be handy if you had a stable fusion reactor on board. As for the bloody pulp business, any GSCE science student should be able to tell you the answer to that one, just keep your acceleration within reasonable limits. Unfortunately this would most likely require a global effort, so don`t expect to see it happen any time soon.

As for concerns about toxicity, I wouldn`t care about that if you are wizzing through space. You're going to need enough shielding on your craft as it is, a bit more if required isn`t going to be a problem.

While not practical for us at the current time, you shouldn`t dismiss energy sources that may not require a vast supply of resources. If a civilisation is advanced enough to get here then it would be a fair bet that they would have things like zero-point energy sources, or some other exotic equivalent.

Originally Posted by timewarrior2001

Distance is the problem, we are talking light years, we cant accelerate anything above particles to the speed of light so 50 light years is gonna take over 50 years to get there.

Time of travel would only be a major concern for those people left behind on Earth, for those on the space craft dilation effects would come into play once you got up to a suitable speed, so they`ll make it there in much less time.

Originally Posted by dr wadd

Time of travel would only be a major concern for those people left behind on Earth, for those on the space craft dilation effects would come into play once you got up to a suitable speed, so they`ll make it there in much less time.

Oh yes, isnt that the old.....At the speed of light time slows for those travelling at that speed, yet on earth time would be normal. There for 10 years travelling at the speed of light could see someone age 10 years there, but on earth someone would age 20 years. (example figures).

Still as a human species we measure time as time on earth, so lets stick with that for now huh? lol dont wanna fry brains here.

Mind you, time travel is theoretically possible once exceeding the speed of light, as you would arrive at your destination before the light you were in when you left got there?????? still we cant so it dont matter.

Originally Posted by timewarrior2001

Still as a human species we measure time as time on earth

Which is a mode of thinking that we would have to abandon once we head out to the stars.

I think it's the time issue that could be the problem in a global effort.It could take a lot of precious resources but without being able to see the final result how many people(and short term governments) would think it was worth the effort?

This is nice! A sensible discussion without any sniping for once.

Incog.

[ian@huth]

Originally Posted by Defiant

Who's to say we don't already have another power source now. Do you know how many millions/billions they'd get paid to keep there mouth shut. Not just by the oil and fossil fuel company's either but by Government's who use this with taxe's to keep the economy running. Its off topic but on the along the same lines with the cure to the common cold. do you have any idea how much all those different medicine's generate in cash.

When I worked for the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research in the 60's we held the NACA and NASA reports in secure storage and they made interesting reading. You could never guess how much was kept out of public view.

[Xaccers]

I believe there is life else where in the universe.
It developed here, so it's pretty unlikely to not occur elsewhere, especially when the universe seems to have loads of amino acids floating about in space.
Have we been visited? Probably not.