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Interstellar Flight: Perspectives and Patience

(www.centauri-dreams.org)
93 points JPLeRouzic | 3 comments | 25 Jun 25 16:35 UTC | HN request time: 0.415s | source
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agentultra ◴[25 Jun 25 17:41 UTC] No.44379920[source]▶
Won't dreams stay dreams?

There's literally nothing there, why go all that way? The distances are so incredibly vast. It seems like we ought to be content with staying put.

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cryptoz ◴[25 Jun 25 17:48 UTC] No.44379983[source]▶
All life on Earth is going die. Humanity has never been content with staying put, why would we start now? And what do you mean "literally nothing there"? The universe has a loooooot of stuff in it.
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1. agentultra ◴[25 Jun 25 18:15 UTC] No.44380296[source]▶
It's mostly empty, isn't it?

By "literally nothing there," I mean there's literally nothing for us. Three stars and a few Earth-sized planets in the habitable zone that are, more than likely, uninhabitable by humans. There's nothing there worth going all that way for.

I like sci-fi as much as the next person but the reality of the situation, it seems to me, is that the universe is mostly empty, vast, and inhospitable to human life.

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2. JumpCrisscross ◴[25 Jun 25 19:23 UTC] No.44380974[source]▶
> It's mostly empty, isn't it?

So is the Pacific Ocean for practical definitions of emptiness. You don't got to the empty places.

3. rbanffy ◴[25 Jun 25 20:18 UTC] No.44381449[source]▶
The difference between a multi-generational interstellar ship and a self-sustaining space colony is the engine. They wouldn’t need inhabitable planets - they would need raw materials to build more ships and habitats.

I’m not sure that after spending a lifetime in an ample space colony its inhabitants would feel nostalgic of the time we spent sitting on round rocks cooking around a star.