How to get yourself a vacation on another WORLD !!!
giveitawhirl2008
missions. Since I'm also trying to gather support for high-speed
exploration of the Outer Planets - Saturn's worlds, etc. - selling
seats on missions to Titan, etc. was also proposed. Here is a proposal
that might let YOU get to go for FREE!
First, BTW, while not trying to encourage gambling, I've also proposed
Lottos with a space trip as a prize. Actually, I suspect such Lottos
will not do well unless their are big CASH prizes, also. That way
people are motivated to play even if they think they might ultimately
be too chicken to go into space. Nothing is more attractive than just
plain old MONEY. You could win a big cash prize AND a space trip, and
if you freak about the trip just before signing the contract with its
"death and dismemberment" clauses, etc., you could be allowed to GIVE
the trip part to any qualifiable person of your choice.
But here's the main idea: the gov't could SELL some seats for millions
and maybe even billions of dollars. But any citizen of any country
participating in the exploration program could enter a lottery for
FREE, simply by registering online. One entry per citizen; you must
qualifiable to be trained as an astronaut, a la Russian tourist trips
to the ISS. Some seats will be filled by people who just win drawings!
All drawings controlled by the governments involved, of course. That
way, no gambling but public interest might be very strong!
So the Billionaires and the Commons all have a chance!
This could encourage people to join this effort to have the government
fund the human solar system exploration program!
bob haller
wrote:
>
> RE:http://groups.google.com/group/rec.travel.misc/browse_thread/thread/6...
its a great way to raise at least some of the needed funds
giveitawhirl2008
>
> - Show quoted text -
Yes, the Lotto conceept and the seat-selling concept could raise some
of the needed funds. But the national drawing proposal is not designed
to raise the funds directly; the gov't still pays for everything,
except what a millionaire may be paying for his or her seat! But the
winner of the national drawing does not have to pay a cent to enter
the drawing! That is intended to raise public interest in and support
for the program, because some Regular Guy or Gal gets to go to another
world! Not just once, but every once in a while, on an ongoing basis!
The idea is that many members of the public might be willling to
petition Congress (or the British or another European parliament), or
otherwise join in to support this, if they realize there is a chance
they themselves could go! It costs them nothing to support the effort
to sway Congress. If the program is established, it costs them nothing
to enter the lottery. And yet, a few of these who paid nothing but
attention and interest, suddenly find themselves with a ticket to
Titan! Or Ganymede! Or wherever! (Including Mars and Lunar excursions,
of course.)
Sylvia Else
How many people would actually want to go once they realised it involved
years spent without enough room to swing a cat?
I think I'll wait until fusion rockets have been developed.
Sylvia.
BradGuth
wrote:
>
> RE:http://groups.google.com/group/rec.travel.misc/browse_thread/thread/6...
Offer those more affordable one-way tickets to ride, whereas the
terminally ill or those on death row or doing consecutive life terms
but otherwise wealthy enough (like Ponzi Madoff and a number of
politicians) should be given that opportunity of going one-way to the
sorts of destinations that would otherwise be too spendy, demanding of
too much R&D time and resource consuming or just matter of fact
downright technically impossible within whatever we currently know.
At least that way some of those folks (dead or alive) will have
managed to contributed to our knowledge, and there's always a remote
chance that a few might actually make it back, but no great surprise
or loss for those which don't.
Brad Guth, Brad_Guth, Brad.Guth, BradGuth, BG / “Guth Usenet”
BradGuth
>
> > RE:http://groups.google.com/group/rec.travel.misc/browse_thread/thread/6...
>
> How many people would actually want to go once they realised it involved
> years spent without enough room to swing a cat?
>
> I think I'll wait until fusion rockets have been developed.
>
> Sylvia.
Start off with giving the most paraplegic or physically dysfunctionals
a shot at it, because they obviously can't "swing a cat" as is.
~ BG
giveitawhirl2008
>
> > RE:http://groups.google.com/group/rec.travel.misc/browse_thread/thread/6...
>
> How many people would actually want to go once they realised it involved
> years spent without enough room to swing a cat?
>
> I think I'll wait until fusion rockets have been developed.
>
>
> - Show quoted text -
(Also responding to BradGuth, on swinging cats, etc. - Schrodinger
didn't like cats, either, did he?) :-)
Sylvia Else wrote: " I think I'll wait until fusion rockets have been
developed."
That's one my most key points; the idea is to develop a FAST system.
It might be fission, fusion, antimatter, or whatever. The idea to me
is to have CONGRESS MANDATE acceleration of 1G and cruising speed of 1
million mph.
You reach 1MMPH in like 14 hours, + or -, at 1G ; approx. 20 mph/sec/
sec - you go 21 mph. or 32 ft/sec, FASTER, EACH SECOND, at 1G. Since
1G is what you are experiencing right now (the earth's crust is
pushing up against you at 1G, while the earth's MASS wants you to move
toward its center; walk into an empty elevator shaft and the earth's
mass wins - until you hit bottom, at which point the ground is winning
the struggle again) then it will be a comfortable ride.
So, you reach cruising speed of 1 MILLION MPH in well less than one
day. Very roughly speaking, Jupiter and its orbiting wonders are a
half billion miles away; Saturn and ITS worlds are a billion miles
away. [Really, less than that.] That's 500 hours-ish to Jupiter and
1000 hours-ish to Saturn. Again, roughly, it's THREE WEEKS to Jupiter
and SIX WEEKS to Saturn! (Each way.) No need for prisoners or other
doomed people to accept this trip! Anyone willing to go on a 'round
the world curise has enough time to visit these awesome worlds!
As to cats and accomodations: With a poweful enough propulsion system,
like the Orion Project type and others, accomodations could be quite
nice! Maybe even arificial G, as on the rotating crew habitat on the
"Discovery" spacecraft in the movie "2001: A Space Odyssey:"
giveitawhirl2008
wrote:
>
> - Show quoted text -
first link no workie; trying this:
giveitawhirl2008
>
> > - Show quoted text -
>
> first link no workie; trying this:
>
>
> - Show quoted text -
That worked. click on see full image. rest of site looks interesting
also
Sylvia Else
> On Aug 2, 8:08 am, Sylvia Else <syl...@not.at.this.address> wrote:
>> I think I'll wait until fusion rockets have been developed.
>>
>> Sylvia.- Hide quoted text -
>>
>> - Show quoted text -
>
> (Also responding to BradGuth, on swinging cats, etc. - Schrodinger
> didn't like cats, either, did he?) :-)
>
> Sylvia Else wrote: " I think I'll wait until fusion rockets have been
> developed."
>
> That's one my most key points; the idea is to develop a FAST system.
> It might be fission, fusion, antimatter, or whatever. The idea to me
> is to have CONGRESS MANDATE acceleration of 1G and cruising speed of 1
> million mph.
Once you've reached the point where propellant mass is not significant
compared with payload, you might as well run a constant acceleration all
the way (including during turnover), even if that's only, say, 0.1g.
This also reduces the power requirements, resulting in a lighter power
generator.
Sylvia.
giveitawhirl2008
A gradual acceleration that gets us there and back in a time frame
similar to what I'm talking would be fine for any particular mission.
The reason I use 1 G and 1 MMPH is that the craft is intended for use
to go to at least the entire TRADITIONAL solar system, including
Neptune and Pluto. But it would also be nice to be able to go to
Sedna, etc. By having a craft that alway performs (speed and time of
travel - wise) at least as well as one having a typical or cruising
speed of 1 million mph, the whole traditional solar system, at least,
is within reasonable reach.
Sylvia, looking at your profile, I see I don't need to explain basic
physics to you, afer all! :-) Sorry, I should have looked first before
that last post. I also checked and see the Jupiter can be up to 600+
million miles from earth, whereas I said half a billion miles , but
that's close enough for government work. Ha! Ha!
Earth <--> Neptune is in the area of 2 - 3 billion miles (of course,
these distances vary as the planets orbit the sun). That's 18 weeks
one way. Sedna is about 8 billion miles away: 48 weeks! See why I
want a craft that waste's no time getting to 1 MMPH? But any
acceleration that keeps the SAME time frames, should be acceptable.
The whole point is keeping trip times down to these that I'm talking
about.
Sylvia Else
Even modest accelerations get you places fast if you can maintain them.
Your trip to Sedna, at 0.1g. 12.8 billion km. But you need to turnover
half way, which is 6.8 billion km, or 6.8 * 10^12 metres. At 0.1 g, that
gives 1034 hours, or about 43 days. Double it for the deceleration time
and you've done the trip in about 3 months.
Mind you, the power requirements are horrible.
Sylvia.
BradGuth
wrote:
You should have our bipolar William Mook on your team. Of course he'd
have to be 100% in charge of everything, but at least that way Mook
would get you safely there and back with nuclear fuel to burn.
giveitawhirl2008
>
> - Show quoted text -
Sylvia wrote:
Even modest accelerations get you places fast if you can maintain
them.
Your trip to Sedna, at 0.1g. 12.8 billion km. But you need to
turnover
half way, which is 6.8 billion km, or 6.8 * 10^12 metres. At 0.1 g,
that
gives 1034 hours, or about 43 days. Double it for the deceleration
time
and you've done the trip in about 3 months.
Mind you, the power requirements are horrible.
Sylvia.
Brad wrote:
You should have our bipolar William Mook on your team. Of course
he'd
have to be 100% in charge of everything, but at least that way Mook
would get you safely there and back with nuclear fuel to burn.
Brad Guth, Brad_Guth, Brad.Guth, BradGuth, BG / “Guth Usenet”
*****:
If a gradual acceleration gets one there at least as quick as a quick
one, I'm all for it. I would think that to have an average speed of
one million mph, but to accelerate as slow as possible such as to keep
accelerating to midpoint and then immediately turnover and begin
decelerating, the top speed would have to be TWO million mph. Zero
(starting speed, of sorts) + 2 million mph (top speed), divided by
two, gives average speed of ONE million mph. If this is about right,
then if gradually accelerating to TWO million mph is cheaper than
quickly accelerating to ONE MMPH, then I'm all for the gradual
acceleration.
The idea, to me, is to have one million mph be the standard: how long
does it take to get somewhere at an average speed of one million mph?
That is how long the trip should take. Any propulsion system and
acceleration/speed curve that meets that bottom line criteria would be
accepted.
Speaking of Mook, Sylvia, Brad and everybody: pretend I am Congress
and you are NASA. I say: "The craft has to perform according to the 1
million mph average speed criteria, be able to go at least to the
traditional nine planets with an eye on being able to visit the Kuiper
Belt ASAP after that, and return safely, just as fast. I [Congress]
will provide funding in the hundreds of billions to maybe even the
trillion-dollar range (over, say two decades or whatever). 'Can't' is
NOT an acceptable answer. Anyone at NASA who says "Can't" will be
FIRED!"
Now, dudes and dudesses, based on those conditions, build me a system!
So, Mook has a job! And Sylvia, Brad and others who are willing, do
too!
giveitawhirl2008
>
> - Show quoted text -
http://projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3u.html
THAT is the link to the image of the centrifugal habitat on Discovery
in "Space Odyssey" that I was trying to link to. (Keep forgetting the
way google images and maps operate. So I went directly to the website
itself that I found thru Images.) Also, it's an interesting site for
sci-fi writers and directors and gamers to access to figure out ship
designs, etc.!
giveitawhirl2008
>
> - Show quoted text -
New addendums to idea:
- Smaller, unmanned versions built and flown first, sending robotic
rovers to some of these same places.
- For those flying as Free Lottery Winners, and possibly as Pay
Lottery Winners (bought one or more $100 tickets and won a Lottery or
Lotto which accumulated, say, $1 billion), to be covered by "The Space
Tourist Law." As with veterans, their employer MUST rehire them when
they return, even after months or a year or more! The Lot Winners are
considered "national symbols" and represent the Regular Guys and Gals
who are paying for this. PAYING TOURISTS, that is, the billionaires
who BUY SEATS OUTRIGHT, for say, $1 billion, for, say, trips to
Saturn, Neptune, etc.,: are not covered by the "Space Tourist Law," as
to rehiring. Billionaires hire themselves!
giveitawhirl2008
>
> - Show quoted text -
I THINK the above will work; general collection of Google images of
Discover spacecraft.
BradGuth
Noticed you and I are about it, as the only two willing and/or crazy
enough to go the distance (so to speak).
Oddly our all-knowing William Mook is also nowhere in sight, even
though he knows more than most anyone alive.
Actually, William Mook has already posted 99% of what you're looking
for.
Search for U235 U238 and Mook or nuclear rocket and Mook, or under any
number of his other Usenet account names, and it'll turn up.
~ BG
giveitawhirl2008
>
> - Show quoted text -
Hi, Brad! Well, I didn't expect you all to seriously think I was
offering you a job, literally :-) [I don't have the $1 trillion in
hand, yet.] But I was making a point: those of us interested in such
possibilities should put our heads together and in general keep in
touch. And I was amking the point that often, when some say,
"impossible," others go ahead and do it.
giveitawhirl2008
(Posting a second time; first one did not appear)
You don't even want to run into a micrometeorite at one million mph.
With net resources also available, I'm refering to "The Starflight
Handbook: A Pioneer's Guide to Interstellar Travel," by Eugene Mallowe
and Gregory Matloff (1989)
http://search.barnesandnoble.com/The-Starflight-Handbook/Eugene-F-Mallove/e/9780471619123
, at the moment.
In the chapter "The Interstellar Medium," pp. 161-171, hardcover
edition, the authors discuss the problem of "starship erosion." Some
of this is relevant to high speed, solar system travel. Without
refering to anyone else, I can think of avoiding damage by contacting
things in space as being divided into three parts: 1 - fine grains
that can be redirected 2- larger objects that must be pulverized 3-
even larger objects that must be detected well enough in advance and
navigated around.
1 - redirecting fine grains: if you could magnetize or charge them and
redirect them with a magnetic field or have them scattered away
harmlessly by some other type of shied - that would be good. (The
authors also mention "screens" of different materials.)
2 - maybe some kind of particle beam to zap larger objects (say
visible to the naked eye but still low enough in mass to be
neutralized this way). Maybe even the propulsion technology for the
engine could be used on a small scale with a beam in front; on
deceleration. Engine exhaust itself might useful, but these objects
may have to be specifically detected and have part of the exhaust
partticle stream (or whatever) directed at them.
3 - For large/massive enough objects, including undetected planetoids,
etc!: must detect them far enough in advance to temporarily alter
course.
"Handbook:" Another interstellar navigational hazard was postulated by
radio astronomer john Wolfe of the NASA Ames Research Center. As well
as the more common 0.1 micron and lesser dust grains, it is possible
that rare hailstone-size particles (about 100 gram) exist in regions
of interstellar space. Because the collision of such objects and a
speeding starship would be catastrophic, and because PASSIVE
protection via as massive forward shield would be prohibitive, ACTIVE
measures might have to be provided. Perhaps a forward-pointing
millimeter-wave radar coudl be used to watch for these interstellar
'golfballs.' If one was found to be approaching, a high-power beamed
energy device - a light or X-ray laser or a neutral particle beeam -
coould be used to disintegrate or deflect the potential interstellar
mine." (p. 170)
Again, the authors are talking about INTERSTELLAR whereas I'm talking
about PLANETARY. But the problem is somewhat shared between a one
million mph planetary ship and a relativistic interstellar ship. Note,
again, also, that radar and beam also have to point REARWARD during
decelaration.