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South Korea succeeds in launching its first domestic space vehicle but fails-

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quekmeister:

--- Quote from: vuzedome on August 27, 2009, 11:21:56 AM ---
--- Quote from: darkjedi on August 27, 2009, 10:35:30 AM ---
--- Quote from: quekmeister on August 27, 2009, 10:30:29 AM ---By the way, teh tarik pouring/roti canai tossing in space = fail.

--- End quote ---

What's this lol, some new previously unknown English words? xD What's that mean?

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Teh Tarik basically bubbled tea and Roti Canai being flat burned dough, I don't really know any other way of describing it.
Use Google images and you'll understand.

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They are examples of Malaysian food that are made in slightly unusual ways, teh tarik is poured between two steel mugs with four feet of somewhat vertical separation, and canai is tossed a little like pizza. Our government wanted experiments done in zero gravity on the behaviour of these two foodstuffs when they sent our first 'astronaut' up into space on a Russian Soyuz. The Russians said 'No.', thankfully. Think of what really hot tea or oiled dough would do to an instrument panel!

I shudder when I think that we're trying to build a nuclear power plant.

boxer4:

--- Quote from: darkjedi on August 25, 2009, 11:49:31 AM ---It's not because we don't have the skills to achieve that technology but it's just that we don't need to achieve it. We don't have a use for interstellar drives yet so we didn't spend money for it.

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The technology needed to get from star to star doesn't exist, and nobody even has an idea how to do it yet - at least safely move a human from star to star (and back).  It's also not like we don't have a need for it -- just think of all the trouble that could be saved if people who hate each other could be spread further apart (GET OFF MY PLANET)... or get more resources so that one planet could support more people...  Just that it's ridiculously expensive to do the research where we don't know what the goal is yet - or the big thing is, whether we can profit from it.  What is "dark energy" and "dark matter"?  What can it be used for?  We haven't even scratched the surface of what can and can't be done.  The basic problem is that no matter what, a lot of this research will likely provide the person funding it no good in his/her lifetime; so by definition, is not worth the effort to research.

Not to mention humans and life in general _must_ get off the planet in order to survive at some point.  Though life can still live on Earth for possibly 500 million years - it is short compared to cosmological time.  What would happen to life when the Sun grew to a red giant and burned off all the water from the planet?  Or something that will happen sooner -  big meteor smashes into Earth again?  As the only species on the planet that have the capability to actually build things, we have the possibility to stop the ultimate fate of the planet and it is worth it to invest in atom smashers and propulsion technology in hopes to figure out how to save ourselves if somehow Earth becomes uninhabitable.

darkjedi:
I think it's more economical to build an artificial habitat than going to another star for another habitable planet. We have plenty of room and resources in our solar system; a red giant Sun's size will be a non-issue if we decider to settle in the outer moons of Jupiter.

I think we already had the technology to move an unmanned space vehicle to another star, but we chose not to use it, because we didn't need it. And it's not really a good idea to spread thin your civilization because communication will be difficult.

relic2279:
Propulsion wise we do. Logistically we don't. We'd have to navigate through the Oort cloud to leave our solar system. Micro-meteorites the size of sand pulverizing the hull, and undetectable smaller asteroids, comets + possibly unknown forms radiation frying equipment beyond the oort cloud would make navigation incredibly difficult if not impossible. It would have to be an auto-piliot system as well due to the distance. There are too many variables to consider unless someone wanted to drop a few trillion into a project that only has a less then 50-50 chance of succeeding. Though, 30-70 years from now? Might a whole different story.

darkjedi:
Lol we just need to send a hundred probe instead of just one. Some of them will reach their destination eventually.

But if you mean that the manufacture of hundred probes is the problem with logistics, then you are right.

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