Last month's "100-Year Starship" conference, backed by NASA and the Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency?, threw a huge spotlight on the idea of sending spacecraft far beyond our solar system — but how realistic is that idea? Check out what one of the world's top experts on the subject has to say on "Virtually Speaking Science."
Marc Millis, the researcher behind NASA's Breakthrough Propulsion Physics Project and the nonprofit Tau Zero Foundation, was my guest on tonight's show, which is available as a podcast via BlogTalkRadio and iTunes.
Millis estimates that it'll take 200 years to get in position for the first missions to stars beyond our own, but he says there are lots of small steps we can take starting tomorrow to "chip away" at the challenge. Experiments with solar sails have already started, and Millis says the next step there is to figure out the business case for more ambitious light-powered trips.
Once again, we are led to believe that we must crawl on our knees to the stars. Bull biscuits. To read more, click here.
"I disagree with Millis totally on this. We had a short exchange about it at the DARPA-NASA Starship Orlando Hilton Conference Oct 1, 2011. Doug Trumbull agreed with me on Oct 2, 2011 at closing session that UFOs are evidence for real ET craft flying through our airspace with impunity. That means Millis is wrong about the prospect for low power warp-wormhole technology. It already exists but we don't control it. That's my view." - Jack Sarfatti