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No one will pony-up the millions of dollars it will need to design, build, test and launch a satellite based on (possibly) unconfirmed science.
by huragok 10y ago
No one will pony-up the millions of dollars it will need to design, build, test and launch a satellite based on (possibly) unconfirmed science.
- ComputerGuru 10y agoYet they will gladly throw away ten times that amount investing in a silly app idea on the off-chance it will be the next facebook or snap chat...
- roywiggins 10y agoIn fairness, we know Facebook is physically possible. Not so reactionless drives. If a Facebook is unlikely, a reactionless drive is spectacularly so. If they are possible, the question of where all the aliens are becomes much more acute. If it's actually cheap to accelerate mass around the universe we ought to be crawling with visitors.
- dragonwriter 10y agoIf it's cheap to accelerate mass around the universe, spreading beyond one planet is easy, but provides less insulation against non-natural disasters, like species-ending war.
- arcticfox 10y agoCouldn't you theoretically take one of these way out from Earth, turn it 180, and wait for a massively powerful kinetic energy weapon to return? "Cheap to accelerate mass" just sounds like a crazy weapon
- headcanon 10y agoPerhaps we are 0.o
- imglorp 10y agoI don't think the claim is free energy. The claim is no propellant. So you might still need tons of energy to get a decent acceleration. If it's working, it's just not clear by what mechanism the energy is being converted to momentum.
- DuskStar 10y agoOr it might just be that reactionless drives can make nukes look like firecrackers, while presumably also being a lot harder to restrict access to. And thus would make a very good 'great filter' candidate.
- throbaway339 10y agoYou have left out the part about the vast distances we still need to cover. Accelerating mass could very well be cheap enough, but HOW fast we can accelerate to still matters. Perhaps they're on the other side of the galaxy, or in a different galaxy altogether and the EmDrive will only ever reach top speeds near that of a Ford Pinto.
- bertiewhykovich 10y agoI believe that if the EmDrive produces real force its top speeds are, in a vacuum, only limited by relativity and the amount of energy it can carry.
- grzm 10y agoThat's true of any propulsion system, isn't it?
- bertiewhykovich 10y agoyeah
- evgen 10y agoNo, most other systems run out of reaction mass first. With this and a good fission reactor you are halfway to everywhere.
- grzm 10y agoSo I don't get any points for E = mc² ? :) In all seriousness though, I was noting the parallel "limited by … the amount of energy it can carry" and "limited by the amount of mass it can carry" in the sense that, yeah, you're going to be limited by what you can take with you.
- hossbeast 10y agoNo, real propulsion systems also require propellent
- bertiewhykovich 10y agoThere are still incomprehensible numbers of stars, and awe-inspiring distances between them. Even if acceleration is cheap, there are only a few thousand stars that would have been reached by any human-produced signal yet -- and the chances of one of those containing intelligent life, the chances of those containing intelligent life that happens to detect our signal, the chances of those containing intelligent life that detects our signal and also has a space program, the chances of those containing intelligent life that detects our signal, has a space program, and decides to mount a voyage to Earth, the chances of those containing intelligent life that detects our signal, has a space program, decides to mount a voyage to Earth, and would have been able to get anywhere close by now...
- imglorp 10y agoedit - bad math deleted. thank Tossrock for the correction.
- Tossrock 10y agoNo it wouldn't. At a constant 1g acceleration, you're in the .9c range in less than a year. So to get to Alpha Centauri would take < 6 years, accounting for acceleration and deceleration. And because you're constantly accelerating, and accelerating to relativistic velocities, you would experience dramatic time dilation as well, meaning the amount of time passed for the ship would be even less.
- IanCal 10y agoPeople are at least claiming to be sending them up: http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/energy/a22678/em-drive-cannae-cubesat-reactionless/ http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/energy/a22678/em-dri...
- nsxwolf 10y agoIf I won the Powerball Lottery today I would do it.