

Interstellar travel: Starship troupers - dynofuz
http://www.economist.com/news/science-and-technology/21588349-if-starships-are-ever-built-it-will-be-far-future-does-not-deter

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sherr
If people are interested in this stuff (and I hope a lot are), the Planetary
Society [1] do weekly podcasts and events and talk about this and other areas.
The Benford's are always good to hear because they're articulate, clever and
so enthusiastic (the Economist cartoon has a Benford present as well I think).

A recent event was recorded in Pasadena "Is this the Starship Century?", a 90
min video with some great discussion about spaceships [2]. A book is out as
well. It's good to dream, isn't it?

[1] [http://www.planetary.org](http://www.planetary.org) [2]
[http://www.scpr.org/events/2013/09/25/1153/next-the-
starship...](http://www.scpr.org/events/2013/09/25/1153/next-the-starship-
century/)

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Beltiras
That article was way too conventional for my taste.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcubierre_drive](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcubierre_drive)
is my dark horse tech in this field.

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neotoy
Non-Newtonian locomotion is the only viable form of manned Interstellar
travel.

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jonmrodriguez
On the contrary, we could get to about 30% of the speed of light with a
Bussard Ramjet
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bussard_ramjet](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bussard_ramjet)

Combine that with life extension and you can travel the stars within one
lifetime. Lots of nearby planetary systems would be within only a few decades
of travel.

Read Vernor Vinge's "A Deepness in the Sky" for a great sci-fi exploration of
the culture that would arise around this form of travel.

-

Also, if you believe your "soul" / "mind" is represented by a pattern of
matter rather than the particular matter itself, you could travel at 100% of
the speed of light by 3D scanning yourself to cell-level resolution,
destroying the original body, and beaming the data to a biological 3D printer
on the destination planet.

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deletes
May I inquire where did you get information on 30% c? Wikipedia states 70% but
provides no reference. I'm honestly curious.

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jonmrodriguez
Hm, it was just a memory, probably either misremembered Wikipedia or maybe
it's in "A Deepness in the Sky". Sorry

\--

EDIT: Found it. It was indeed from "A Deepness in the Sky", which is fiction.
There's a sentence in chapter 17 that says "The _Reprise_ reached ramcruise,
0.3 lightspeed, and sailed endlessly across the depths."

~~~
deletes
I prefer the Tau Zero ramjet version where they almost reach lightspeed.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tau_Zero](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tau_Zero)

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kristianp
Reminds me of one of my favourite reads, "Are Black Hole Starships Possible",
[http://arxiv.org/abs/0908.1803](http://arxiv.org/abs/0908.1803)

