It is just that humanity is not very good at consensus to even not suffocate in our own home.
It is just that humanity is not very good at consensus to even not suffocate in our own home.
We are missing the technology to build anything in space, and to create small (dozens to hundreds of km of radius) ecosystems capable of sustaining people. We really do not have the technical means for space exploration.
The good news is that people are researching both, as improvements on them lead to profits here on Earth. So I do think we'll get there reasonably quickly.
This is mainly because no one tries to do it. If the biggest countries decided that they want to build it - I am sure humanity will solve all technical problems.
Isn't this "I'm sure" more wishful thinking than actual practical certainty though?
We made no contract with anyone that we can build anything we want as a species...
The hard part is making them habitable for mammals which aren’t very hardy, need a lot of food, and reproduce slowly.
On the other hand several known designs mostly worked for humans to the point where using them would dramatically reduce the supplies needed for a long trip. But, none of them where operating on a zero G interstellar mission.
Biosphere 2 for example depended on sunlight which would be missing, but they provided sufficient calories across several months which means it was also generated enough oxygen assuming it had been setup properly to begin with. They had a huge range of other their issues, and you would need a vastly larger population and much higher efficiency for such a trip. But, from what amounted to a publicity stunt it was surprisingly close to a working solution.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BIOS-3 on the other hand was a far less ambitious project that was much closer to a practical design even if they imported food and the longest experiment was 180 days, it was actually using artificial lights.
PS: A more significant question is how to design hardware systems that could last for such a trip and what it would take to sustain things at the other side.
I'm not betting on the current human race being capable of this, though-- in my opinion, we will need to more or less become a different species for anything like civilization as we know it to survive over the very long term. Otherwise we will inevitably keep wasting too much energy on emotionally driven, incredibly stupid and violent conflicts with each other.
Yes, the British Interplanetary Society did do a study on what a manned mission might be like, but they always seem to underestimate the biological problems of space flight.
If you wanted to colonise a planet around a nearby star it would be a truly staggering undertaking, even getting the fuel for an unmanned probe probably require H3 mining of Jupiter.
Dust is taken care by an ice shield in front of the craft.
Radiation is taken care by a water jacket. Radiation is only a real problem in the vicinity of the star. The atmosphere we have on Earth is only necessary to block radiation that comes from Sun either directly or through solar winds. The radiation from sources outside solar system might be high energy particles an photons but has very low flux.
The funny thing is, everybody focuses on technical issues where the biggest issue is most likely non technical and it is mostly about human health, physical response to lack of gravity and psychological to isolation.
The water jacket is intriguing, but doesn't it require a tonnage that's never been lifted into space yet? Had me thinking about a space elevator taking water up into space and also alleviating sea levels (to the point where much more water would be exported to something other than the shield).
It surely may be possible but involves risks and costs that no one is willing to take. Perhaps that balance of risk will change in the future.
Water would be a good candidate for both shield and jacket for the simple reason it is readily available in space in huge amounts and doesn't have to be lifted from Earth. What is necessary is a single remotely controlled ship that will go far enough from Sun to be able to capture and steer one of the watery asteroids. The further you go the slower the orbits the less energy you need to dramatically alter course of any astronomical body.
We don't even need to bring all that water to Earth. Instead, it might be cheaper to fly half-finished craft out, finish assembly by robotic means and then turn it into center of solar system. The craft could then gain velocity, use as many gravitational assists as possible on the way in and then back and pick up the crew before it leaves solar system for its journey.
This calculator says it would take 80 years when I approximate a solution where max velocity is .1c: https://www.omnicalculator.com/physics/space-travel?advanced...
.1c isn't fast enough to cause significant time dilation for the travelers so they end up spending nearly the same 80 years on the ship as well.
That's part wishful thinking, part hand-waving. There are tons of practical limitations that prevents us from leaving the solar system based on the nature of space and physical laws.
At best, we could get some "generational ships" out going to nowhere knows where exactly (it's not like we have some habitable planet to even aim to in mind, and the various "atmosphere-making" schemes are pie in the sky and require tens or hundreds of years, plus tons of resources in that "generational ship"), but even that is less likely than regression or extinction here...
[1] https://www.airspacemag.com/daily-planet/ultimate-space-tele...
This is just a case go get a budget and build it.