Do you think that man will ever leave our solar system?
Please, answer, comments.
I invite you to the discussion.
Best wishes
Dear Dr. Dariusz Prokopowicz the answer to this question is not that straight. First is that the world is experiencing the pace of technological advancement that never been experienced before. A century back no one imagined that man will ever be able to live in space. But since 2000, the international space station is manned. So it is possible that one day man will be qualified to leave the solar system. the second thing is important that will we survived to that date? The rate at which the human population is growing is gigantic so the pressure on natural resources has increased multifold. The third is more or less political as we are observing that the world leaders are being less tolerant and pushed the world at the edge of WWIII. Every second nation is capable of nuke power and is threatening others. At the last, I can say that 'yes' man will leave the solar system if only he 'survive'.
regards
Bahadur Singh
Not so easy, but quite possible in the near future due to technological advancement.
Dear Dr. Dariusz Prokopowicz the answer to this question is not that straight. First is that the world is experiencing the pace of technological advancement that never been experienced before. A century back no one imagined that man will ever be able to live in space. But since 2000, the international space station is manned. So it is possible that one day man will be qualified to leave the solar system. the second thing is important that will we survived to that date? The rate at which the human population is growing is gigantic so the pressure on natural resources has increased multifold. The third is more or less political as we are observing that the world leaders are being less tolerant and pushed the world at the edge of WWIII. Every second nation is capable of nuke power and is threatening others. At the last, I can say that 'yes' man will leave the solar system if only he 'survive'.
regards
Bahadur Singh
At this point in our science and understanding, it seems unlikely unless Einstein''s gravitational/time theory can be utilised somehow for space travel. At the moment, no, too far, but in the future...perhaps.
It can mostly be done with significant advances in current technology, a reasonable schedule would be to launch the seeds of a Von Neumann fleet of small, unmanned probes by the end of this century. A credible target would be a speed of 0.5% of the speed of light but not much more. Those probes would have to construct large communications hubs, one orbiting each star,to build an interstellar network, and local orbiting habitats.
At 2 centuries per light year, we would have ample time to sort out the problems of using cryonics to freeze people then finding a way to scan them at a sub-molecular level so they can be reconstructed at the destination. Essentially a 'teleport' but without the crazy ideas about using quantum techniques.
Some of Clyde Tombaugh's cremains were aboard New Horizons, which will eventually escape the Solar System; it is now somewhere in the far reaches of the Kuiper Belt. Once costs go down, embalmed bodies will no doubt be next. And then maybe cryogenically frozen bodies, which Frankensteinian aliens 👽 can reanimate in the distant future.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clyde_Tombaugh
Volatiles (and thus, energy via controlled fusion) in abundance exist beyond the worlds of our Solar System.
There are no theoretical barriers to our expansion into the Oort cloud - merely engineering challenges.
If we don't blow ourselves back to the stone age, or cook ourselves to oblivion, there's every chance that we'll spread.
It is very difficult for man to leave the solar system as it's very remote.
I don't think it is imaginable. But anything can happen.
BTW, we need not have a planetary destination for colonization. An intergenerational starship that is a self-contained colony with advanced ore processing and manufacturing capability might do. It could keep on adding to itself from materials encountered along the way until it reaches a desirable size and finds a nice star to orbit. A starship can become a planet.
If one could beat gravity (somehow with some magnetic arrangements) we could.
I think smart living organisms lived in the universe and before us. It is believed that we moved to the earth from Mars.
Not very soon, it seems. Humans will become a multi-planet species by making it to Mars, but no farther. That is, they will never travel beyond Mars.
I cannot imagine this with present technology. But "never say never" - this is a task for rather far future. The first condition for such a great achievement: the mankind has to survive to this "far future". And this is not an easy task: we can be killed from space (asteroid, comet, close supernova), we can be killed by enormously agressive virus, we can be killed by ourselves (wars, weapons, climatic changes). Only then the far future is "opened". The classic approach (to accelerate the massive objects close to the speed of light) is probably not the right way. But we still do not know the deepest fundamentals of the space and time. So perhaps...
Certainly not at any time in the next few centuries, and probably never.
As noted in another answer, there is a good chance that 'von Neumann' type probes may be sent to other stars (there is even a proposal to do just that with lasers and credit-card spacecraft with meter-wide solar sails that might succeed within our lifetimes, if the several trillion dollars required to do it can be secured). But with such 'robotic' probes, there is no need to provide living quarters or the materials required to keep people alive, or to achieve speeds fast enough to reach anywhere else anytime soon (though science fiction writers used 'generation ships' almost a century ago, I can't imagine anyone wanting to take that kind of trip unless it was the only way for the human race to survive). And odds are that any probes we send out will tell us that there is no place any more interesting than our own Solar System, so I think that the only way that we will ever bother to send anyone elsewhere is if it does mean life or death for our species.
I believe that we can do research outside the solar system with the asteroid mining technologies reaching the targeted level.
It's possible but very slim! We really have to weigh it's worth, especially if 'life' is not likely to be natural, then, it is not worth it.
No, our solar system is so huge. I think man is unable to leave it with the technology that currently exists.
Of course with the current technology it's almost impossible even without 'life'. In future we never can say! My point is: do we really have to undertake that adventurous uncertinity, especially with artificial life? It doesn't worth it.
Thierry De Mees
RE: "using cryonics to freeze people then finding a way to scan them at a sub-molecular level so they can be reconstructed at the destination"I think any form of reconstruction is a bad idea. Spatiotemporal discontinuity = death. A reconstruction using a scan as blueprint will be a mere copy. And if there can be one copy, why not two, three, or indefinitely many?
TDM: The question should be: When will man leave the Earth above 1000 km and pass the Van Allen Belts? (I speak about the case with man-made technology)
We've already been to the Moon, that's ~384,400 km.
KP: I think any form of reconstruction is a bad idea. Spatiotemporal discontinuity = death.
That's why it is dependent on cryonics, you can't have your blood flowing while being dismantled and even thermal motion may cause problems.
KP: A reconstruction using a scan as blueprint will be a mere copy. And if there can be one copy, why not two, three, or indefinitely many?
Or just one replicated through time which makes you immortal if you can transplant the brain from an aged copy to a new one, but that technique would also cure any disease by reverting to the state of your body before it developed.
Yes, there are significant ethical problems that will be raised if we develop that technology but that is true whether we then use it for interstellar transport or not.
I think there is a conceptual problem with using a scan as a blueprint beamed to some remote location to recreate an individual from local matter. What I am suggesting is that a scan can be used as a blueprint to create multiple copies simultaneously, which leads to an issue about identity. Clearly the copies at creation will be momentarily similar (qualitatively identical) but not the same (not numerically identical). If I were one of the copies I would not consider myself immortal just because other copies forever lived on after my death. I would want it to be me that survives, not them.
Moreover, with the scanning technique the original doesn't have to be dead but can continue its existence on Earth; that alone entails than no copy created at the destination can claim to be the same as, or a survivor of, an individual back on Earth.
Bottomline: there must be spatiotemporal continuity for survival. This does not mean, however, that parts can't be replaced throughout the life cycle, which is what normally happens anyway as cells are replaced over time. Just keep a brainless cloned body handy for that eventual brain transplant and keep rejuvenating small bits of the brain by integrating lab-cultured tissue, but keep the tinkering at a small enough scale so that there are no major psychological discontinuities or disruptions.
If the man is death of course!
This question proves: We are more or less dominated by science fiction like 'Star Wars'.
It is impossible to build a space ship of such large dimensions to ensure the life of peoples for dozens of years. The mankind has only one Earth to live and to survival. The material base of our live is limited. This leads to certain consequences.
The next step is to reach possibly the Mars. I'm quite safe convinced that this is a suicide mission. We say in German sarcastically: 'Himmelfahrtskommando' = 'ascension command'.
TDM: Why does the NASA engineer say at 3:35 in this video about the Orion project, concerning the Van Allen Belts radiation: "We must solve these challenges before we send people to this region of space", which is, passing the Van Allen Belt?
Going "to" a region isn't the same as passing through it, and the belts are an orbiting disc, to get to the Moon you can fly above or below them.
Here's another map, note that all the geosynchronous satellites have to sit on the edge of the outer belt.
https://www.space.com/17248-nasa-radiation-belt-storm-probes-mission-infographic.html
For what I suggested though, only unmanned probes would be travelling to the stars and they need to be launched from a close flypast of the Sun. The closest approach would be limited by the maximum temperature the probes could withstand.
Thierry,
The doses absorbed, I gather, in traversing the belts were of the order of 0.2 to 1 rad.
(https://history.nasa.gov/SP-368/s2ch3.htm)
Where do I sign up?
who know that , it is possible but we need unnatural force to do that, like prophet muhammad, who did that before.
Thierry,
The work I linked to detailed the total dose over the course of the Apollo missions - it does not break down the exposure rate per unit time (as that would undoubtedly vary greatly according to where the crew were).
A DOE radiation worker has an annual limit of 5 rem or so - the report I linked to (naturally) describes the dose in rads. If we hand-wave away the weighting factor, then the nine days at 0.4 rad (average exposure of an Apollo mission) is ~ 0.05 rad per day.
This is somewhat more then the dose-per-unit-time for a DOE radiation worker (5 rem per 350 days) = 0.014.
I factor of
Definitely Yes. Humans will be able to leave our Solar System.
Will humans ever cross the ocean? Will humans ever take to the sky and fly? Will humans ever land on the Moon? Yes, Yes and Yes. We've done it.
Not only will we leave our Solar System, we will reach Alpha Centauri and go beyond our Milky Way.
It will be difficult, it will be hard, we will fail, we will stumble and fall. But as long as we keep trying, the possibilities are endless.
Regards
One of the ways to get the highest escape velocities is sending a spacecraft skimming above the surface of Jupiter. This might be one of the toughest parts of radiation protection. The Van Allen belt is nothing compared to that region.
Regards,
Paul Gradenwitz
Definitely, not. Leaving the solar system is beyond human abilities.
Hazim,
The question referred to an unbounded timescale. On what basis do you think that we will *at no time in the future* have the technology to accomplish this feat?
You have stated that this can never be achieved twice now - I asked for an explanation earlier, but I have yet to learn from you how any law of physics or principle of engineering rules this feat out.
I suggest to you that, with a little focus and effort, the Orion project could have made this task perfectly achievable - many decades ago.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_(nuclear_propulsion)
George Dyson writes up the history and process of that project's development in a rather enjoyable read: much of it is still classified as the project devised rather cunning ways to build shaped *nuclear* charges that were able to direct their exhausts into tightly collimated beams.
The technology, with very little extrapolation, allowed for Mars to be reached in a few weeks with payload mass fractions in the dozens of %, with outer-planet round trips being viable in year-span durations.
All with 1960s technology.
Dear Paul,
PG: One of the ways to get the highest escape velocities is sending a spacecraft skimming above the surface of Jupiter.
A low density solar sail could reach speeds 2 order of magnitude higher and that would still be around a century per light year.
Certainly, man will leave solar system after discovering a suitable place for living outside this solar system. Then, man will immigrate to the new discovered solar system without hesitation.
Thierry,
The document I linked to shows the dosage accumulated from Apollo missions that went to the Moon (11 through 17) as well as those that did not.
> No man has even been through the Van Allen belt with classic rockets.
The evidence strongly suggests that they did.
I will refrain from discussing this topic further with you, if you think that Apollo did not send people to the Moon.
My experience is that no amount of evidence will shift your view: and mine is equally unshakeable.
Well, human beings will soon land on the moon again-but this time Spilberg has been appointed to film it and, it is said, introduce a large Moon Shark into the narrative to spice it up. Should he somehow die before filming rather than after Tim Burton, who after all filmed the now forgotten Martian attack on Earth, is next in line.
This time, rather than engage unknown actors as the astronauts, Denzil Washington, Christian Bale, Tom Cruise and Ann Hathaway have been signed up with at least Helen Hunt and Nicolas Cage in reserve. Filming will start next week in the Arizona Desert and selected desert regions around the world. The results will be discussed at next years Oscars.
Dariusz Prokopowicz Of course. The nearest exoplanet and star are only fours years away a light speed, somewhat more at somewhat less. There are people who would gladly take the trip today. I'm surprised and disappointed we don't already have a probe on the way.
Dear Colleagues and Friends from RG,
I agree with many opinions above. The conclusion of the above discussion is another question: Will man ever build, or will he be able to build spaceships that will be able to develop speed similar to the speed of light? If it succeeded, it would be one of the greatest steps in the progress of civilization in humanity, because it would allow a man to reach the nearest exoplanets, where there may be conditions for their colonization. Will man manage to achieve this big step in the progress of civilization? Will man manage to accomplish this, for example, against a large increase in temperature on Earth, which is likely to appear on Earth in the perspective of the next several decades due to the growing greenhouse gas emissions and the ever-faster global warming process? It would be very sad for humanity, if it were to prove in the future that it was possible, but humanity would run out of time.
Do you agree with me on the above matter?
Please reply
I invite you to the discussion
@darius (Speaking as someone building one of the spaceships), I don't see any problem there. Even if we ran out of time on Earth, by then we will be well-planted at Mars, the Moon, and Earth orbit. Separately, I don't buy that we will wreck ourselves so quickly in the manner you mention.
The desire to leave the solar system is motivated by 2 major factors: (1) man's natural inclination to explore the cosmos; and (2) theorists predicting that the sun, which is progressing from middle age to old age, is now expanding and will at some time in the future, contract, first getting hotter, then growing colder. These 2 concerns are "dovetailing" during this epoch when a concern to assure the survival of the human race into the unforeseeable future is illuminating the mind, imagination, and intellect of humanity on a global order of magnitude.
Let us hope, pray, and work, to avoid mistakes we made during the last great age of exploration. Personally, I would prefer to safeguard Earth; instead of leaving Earth, might it not be more feasible to take it with us somehow?
Fifty years ago, the USSR sent a dog and a man into space, and the USA sent three men to land on Earth's Moon. It was the low gravitational field that ultimately prevents humans, such as the first woman astronaut who lost significant bone and muscle mass, probably causing premature death, from accomplishing any enduring project to inhabit any other orb than Earth, which epitomizes God's love, but, whose natural resources unfortunately tempt opportunists to engage in utilitarian materialist capitalist imperialist exploitation. If scientists and mathematicians can continue to devoutly pursue research and unlock the mysteries of God's omnipresent love and intelligence, then humankind may begin to fulfill Old Testament prophetic visions of an archetypal "Second Coming" (I quote William Butler Yeats's poem), interpreted as the survival of the human race beyond the bounds of planet Earth as we now know it.
(Excerpt from my reply to a similar question about the relationship of the planets in the solar system to climate earlier today, July 24, 2019) - Nancy Ann Watanabe
When Will the First Human Leave the Solar System? - Futurism
https://futurism.com/when-will-the-first-human-leave-the-solar-system
Even if leaving the Solar System was possible, but for a man to reach the nearest constellation Alpha Centauri, it is necessary to create new generations of propulsion technologies, materials, spaceships, etc. capable of flying for hundreds of years and maintaining the living conditions of people on board. Currently, according to our knowledge and technology, which is available to man, this is not possible. Will man manage to create such spaceships in the future? This is also unlikely.
What is your opinion on this topic?
Please reply
I invite you to discussion
Dear Colleagues and Friends from RG, Thank you very much for participating in this discussion. I would like to add the following question to this discussion: Considering the pace of technological progress, is it possible to predict when man could embark on a manned mission of conquering space to other planets of the solar system besides Mars? Can man ever create technologies that will enable him to leave the solar system?
What do you think about it?
I am asking for an answer and invite you to a discussion,
Thank you very much and best regards,
Dariusz Prokopowicz
Well, with presently available technology this is not possible. Moreover, in future with advancement in technology such things can be tried. But Would man be able to survive for such a long to travel hundreds of years?
There is an assumption that knowledge and technical ability will increase exponentially but we have no reason to believe that apart from the apparent evidence over the past 100 to 200 years. It is equally likely that the development of technical knowledge will stagnate and the progress made will be as far as we get.
Sonika Kumari Time travel is real and can make that possible. But unfortunately, we still don't have enough information which can help us make time-travel possible in next few decades.
DP: Considering the pace of technological progress, is it possible to predict when man could embark on a manned mission of conquering space to other planets of the solar system besides Mars?
We already have the ability to send craft to all the planets in the Solar System, the problem is creating a viable habitat to live in when we get there.
DP: Can man ever create technologies that will enable him to leave the solar system?
In my opinion, we could achieve the launch of a first tranche of unmanned probes by the end of this century but they would take around 2000 years to reach even the nearest star. They could build communications hubs in orbit allowing us to study the systems and even build habitats like those we might use within our own system but transporting human data by EM techniques is still a long way off. We have basic gene splicing technology and 3D bio-printers are now able to make simple organs for transplant purposes.
Who can say how that might develop in the next 2000 years though.
Dear All, I am glad that an interesting discussion has started. If a space mission to the nearest constellation outside the solar system were to last 2,000 years, would man be able to build such spacecraft and equip them with such technology that would allow him to reach there as a fully automated research vessel, equipped with artificial intelligence, unmanned or manned? , containing e.g. frozen human embryos? What is the likelihood of such a technology being developed by the end of the 21st century? What is the probability that such a spacecraft flying through space for 2,000 years will reach its target without being physically damaged by external factors (comets, meteorites, rock particles, ice particles, etc. dispersed in space)? How can a probabilistic model be constructed to compute this probability?
What is your opinion on this topic?
Is there any research being done on this topic?
Thank you very much and best regards,
Dariusz Prokopowicz
Dear Prabhakar Raj, Yes, unfortunately. Thank you for your response. Too bad it's impossible, never. It is a pity that the technological progress on the planet Earth is probably too weak to make it ever possible. What if new space supernova propulsion technologies were developed for spacecraft? Will these kinds of issues forever remain just an inspiration for science fiction novels and movies?
Please reply
What do you think about it? Best wishes, All the best,
Dariusz Prokopowicz
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