Take to warp speed, Sulu.

[Nutz]

Maybe if America still had the attitude of the 60's for the next 100 years... I'd say maybe. Thanks to the anti-government tea party = we will be lucky not to be a third world nation by 2100.

The TEA party is not anti government, nor anti science. They are anti waste. Something you have no clue about.

The TEA Party is supposedly about everything good. Yet they have accomplished nothing.

 

[Uncensored2008]

Maybe if America still had the attitude of the 60's for the next 100 years... I'd say maybe. Thanks to the anti-government tea party = we will be lucky not to be a third world nation by 2100.

The TEA party is not anti government, nor anti science. They are anti waste. Something you have no clue about.

The TEA Party is supposedly about everything good. Yet they have accomplished nothing.

They exposed the Solyndra fraud.

Your partisan hatred should not be confused with reality.

 

[TheJedi]

NASA's budget and interest in 'warp drive' isn't new. Been getting funding for it for over a decade. Always nice to see it in the news though as means of getting to other planets and stars should be figured out eventually. And since we're no where close to having the energy to fuel such craft, but can at least lay the groundwork and formulae down, we should.

'Warp drive' or similar 'make space move instead of the ship' might well turn out to be the only way of travelling interstellar distances. Going fast tops out at just short of light speed (full light speed being impossible oweing to infinite mass,) and of course what then happens at that speed when you hit a micrometeorite? Trip over.

What we might face is the reality getting to other star systems is a bit-by-bit proposition. Establish bases, mine for resources on asteroids and nearby planets moving along gradually.

When we finally make contact with an alien race (and we will I have no doubts) one of the first things we need to ask is "how the heck do you get around?"

Fusion energy isn't too far off. 20-30 years and we should start seeing some prototypes. Once we get to that point, the universe becomes our playground.

http://www.wired.com/2014/02/fusion-power-not-yet/

 

[Uncensored2008]

NASA's budget and interest in 'warp drive' isn't new. Been getting funding for it for over a decade. Always nice to see it in the news though as means of getting to other planets and stars should be figured out eventually. And since we're no where close to having the energy to fuel such craft, but can at least lay the groundwork and formulae down, we should.

'Warp drive' or similar 'make space move instead of the ship' might well turn out to be the only way of travelling interstellar distances. Going fast tops out at just short of light speed (full light speed being impossible oweing to infinite mass,) and of course what then happens at that speed when you hit a micrometeorite? Trip over.

What we might face is the reality getting to other star systems is a bit-by-bit proposition. Establish bases, mine for resources on asteroids and nearby planets moving along gradually.

When we finally make contact with an alien race (and we will I have no doubts) one of the first things we need to ask is "how the heck do you get around?"

Fusion energy isn't too far off. 20-30 years and we should start seeing some prototypes. Once we get to that point, the universe becomes our playground.

http://www.wired.com/2014/02/fusion-power-not-yet/

That would be nice, but they were saying the same thing in 1960.

We may someday crack the riddle of fusion, or we may not.

 

[TheJedi]

NASA's budget and interest in 'warp drive' isn't new. Been getting funding for it for over a decade. Always nice to see it in the news though as means of getting to other planets and stars should be figured out eventually. And since we're no where close to having the energy to fuel such craft, but can at least lay the groundwork and formulae down, we should.

'Warp drive' or similar 'make space move instead of the ship' might well turn out to be the only way of travelling interstellar distances. Going fast tops out at just short of light speed (full light speed being impossible oweing to infinite mass,) and of course what then happens at that speed when you hit a micrometeorite? Trip over.

What we might face is the reality getting to other star systems is a bit-by-bit proposition. Establish bases, mine for resources on asteroids and nearby planets moving along gradually.

When we finally make contact with an alien race (and we will I have no doubts) one of the first things we need to ask is "how the heck do you get around?"

Fusion energy isn't too far off. 20-30 years and we should start seeing some prototypes. Once we get to that point, the universe becomes our playground.

We?re One Step Closer to Nuclear Fusion Energy | Science | WIRED

That would be nice, but they were saying the same thing in 1960.

We may someday crack the riddle of fusion, or we may not.

We have already. The link I posted is about how the NIF Lab was able to get more energy out of the hydrogen than what was put into it. This is a huge step but there is still a lot of work to do in the the area of refining the ignition process which won't be too hard but the real challenge is finding a way to contain the millions of degrees of heat and massive pressure created by the self-sustaining reaction.

France is building a facility that will use a different approach to ignition. This is promising to say the least and I think I will at least live to see fusion power become reality so that's pretty cool.