/sci/ - Science & Math

>>2353173
Actually that may be easier, no vibration, no need to compensate for the natural instability of pushing engine.

>>2353246
Doing actual shit on the planet and asteroid inside the system is better than putting insane effort for 10year of acceleration only interrupted by a turnover maneuver.

>>2353319
The point of this design is to save mass while protecting cargo from radiation, even at the interplanetary scale.

Also, I can count a few other practical use for it on an airless planet, most of them being "awesome air...void-drop operation"

>>2158243
Soft SF ? Hohoho, you should see me explain why there is no space-fighter in space. Obviously the Comic wasn't hard-SF, but the point was. Once you've killed everybody included yourself through racist war or an error of your own probe they will be no freedom of choice, because I doubt you are going to give AI something like a consciousness if you even bother researching that.

> And as for transhumans and machines
Yet transhuman are likely to see YOU as less than an animal. As stimuli go in the creation of the personality, being uploaded in a machine and listening to alien emission will put some xenos in you. Because you WILL keep information to know "the enemies", you WILL learn to think like him.

> There would be no thoughts like our thoughts in their heads, no feelings like our feelings in there hearts. Alien minds are alien
Until you do some research and realize that

What you don't understand is that discriminating will LOGICALLY get you as far as killing anybody who aren't you. (first human (btw : kill all animal), then human that aren't "Xenophile", then human that are more like you than other)
And then you
You'll discovers later that you are being made of the same particle of the same universe than alien, will you try to search your soul ? What if you realize Aliens soul are made of the same thing than you ?

> only survival matters.
Actually since we acquired "intelligence" we searched to understand our world in order to do that.
Wasting energy to keep people from working on that too is less efficient than working together on it.

There some error

And some moron even managed to invert the name of the Interstellar vessel type (the Valkyrie)
And the one stage shuttle type (probably inspired by the Venture Star)

Dammit everybody, try to deepen the discussion.

We know Avatar is a commercial advertisement of for next 3D movie. And who expected hard-SF ?
It's a Miracle they used the Valkyrie design for the interstellar ship (a moron inverted the name with the shuttle), though the length isn't big enough but I'm sure they were afraid some people wouldn't recognize it was a spaceship. The only thing unrealistic about it is that to produce easily enough AM to reach 0.70C you would better be a Type 2 civilization.
They used credible helicopter design.
The AMP could be better but isn't bad.

As all for the mystical thing.
1) It's not taking itself too seriously, just playing with tech.
2) Think of the planet as an organic hivemind.

With all that I can forgive it being Pocahontas IN SPACE.
People here need to remember that they aren't going to make suddenly diamond-hard-SF before passing through a nuance of soft-SF.

Take the movie Supernova as an example.

As long as going into space is occasional : rocket.
When we will have to transport small mass like food or crew to a LEO station we'll probably use reusable shuttle, maybe scramjet plane.

And when will go massively into space, THEN we will thing about space fountain launcher or the space elevator.

>>1528520
HELL NO !
Space is all about moving mass, there is several way to do it and usually we try to avoid unnecessary mass like :
- Jet engine that don't work in space, only on the ground. (with the atmosphere efficient fuel)
- VASMIR or Plasma thruster than don't work in atmosphere (with the reactive mass adapted)
- Wing, because that HEAVY when you talk about space travel.
This is also common sense if you plan to get back into orbit anyway, just let the space thruster up there.

And having to make a rocket aerodynamic is a technical nightmare. You can't make centrifugal gravity ring, you can't have solar panel or large heat radiator for the possible inboard nuclear reaction
It's like trying to make a boat capable of going on road.

Please also remember that all space thruster aren't powerful enough to lift from a Earth-like gravity field. And those who are are usually also radioactive.

For example : just try to make this capable of landing.

For more information on that topic : see this link.
http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3ay.html