The post demonstrates how infeasible it is to travel to a location outside our solar system anytime in the next several generations.
What are some things you would like to see humanity do within our solar system within the next century? When do you think it is feasible to achieve that goal?
I don’t know if it will happen in the next century, but we definitely should focus on moon and Mars colonies before thinking about leaving the solar system. I’m 48 and would love if we had a moon colony in my lifetime. At the very least some station where astronauts have an extended stay like they do on ISS.
The most livable place outside of the Earth is in the upper atmosphere of Venus. It’s way closer to the Earth. And air pirates would sail through clouds of sulfuric acid on their steampunk zeppelins.
49 here, and I was always hopeful that I’d see us make it to another solar system in my lifetime. Another planet in our solar system would still be great, though!
People in general have a hard time conceptualizing how large and empty space is. With our current propulsion technology it will take longer than the human lifespan, barring any absolutely groundbreaking cryonics developments, to reach even the Oort cloud of our own solar system.
I think in the next century, a reasonable goal is to have small sparsely manned mining outpost settlements on Mars. There’s enough financial incentive where I could see a future where it happens.
This is probably the correct answer. I’m a fairly smart guy but the enormity of space is astounding. We aren’t going far anytime in the near future. Probably we’ll kill each other first. Manned Mars is even a stretch even, imo.
