When will I be able to buy a personal spacecraft?

[Qfwfq]

Non combistion? Not very practical for escaping Earth's gravity. Hydrogen combustion is clean enough.

Now all we need to to is figure out how to make it work. To date this problem has not been solved,

A very fundamental problem. I believe we don't have even a clue as to how it would work at all.

but I'm hopeful that new advances in this technology will produce a solution.

New advances? Have there been any advances at all, so far?

[paultrr]

Gravity drives and what we sometimes term Field Propulsion drives are all strickly theory based at this time with little if any actual experimental support for such, outside of perhaps experiments being conducted on the Woodward effect by some labs. The problem is partly a tech one. Even with the Woodward effect most of the equiptment tends to burn out before one can get results above the noise level as it is often termed. When it comes to the rest of the theoretical systems we simply at the present do not even begin to have the right stuff to make something that, while theoretically possible, requires advances way off in our future. Another problem in all this is there is no concise quantum gravity model at present. What eventually turns out to be a correct quantum gravity model will itself dictate how much of this theory is actually possible in the end run. Marc Mills out of NASA and the old BPP program rather set the field when it comes to all of this and theory. Its also still rather an open speculative case at the present. :o

[paultrr]

New advances? Have there been any advances at all, so far?

 

Not any that I actually know of and considering I belong to one of the NASA/other organizations groups that regular email each other on the subject I'd tend to think there have been no real advances yet, outside of polishing up the theory behind such. Its all theory based at present, with some experiments on the Woodward effect ongoing and nothing conclusive out of that one either.

[Qfwfq]

If the Woodward effect is true, then I'll switch from hoping for that jackpot to building a perpetual motion machine and producing free energy!!!

:o

[Stargazer]

It could easily be availible within 50 years from now, even though it would be horribly expensive for the ordinary person.

[Queso]

*sigh

i want to go to space before i die. infact...i want to die in space. a life trapped on a single planet in the entire universe seems so pathetic. then i look around, my perspective changes, and it's all good again.

[Stargazer]

Within 50 years you could buy a trip to the Moon and back, don't have to buy the actual spaceship. I'm not sure if I dare to predict when we can buy a ticket to Mars though. Current plans for NASA and ESA would suggest they would want to go there in 30-40 years from now. Anything can happen in the private sector though...

[Queso]

do you think nasa is working their hardest? i think we seriously need to space exploration and colonization down as fast as possible. maybe i'm a little too paranoid...

[Stargazer]

I believe it is necessary too. We can't sit around here, stuck in illusions and trapped in war, when there are other worlds to explore. It will be beneficial for the technological civilisation on Earth, I am sure. The economy, technology and science will advance. Our safety can increase if we live on more than one world, and if we learn how to deflect comets and asteroids heading our way. It will broaden our horizons.

 

I'm somewhat of an enthusiast when it comes to space colonisation...

 

I think NASA is working as hard as they can with the little funding and support they manage to get from political leaders.

[Jay-qu]

without trying to sound completely clueless can someone explain (or recommend some reading) what the woodward effect is and how we can use it?

[Qfwfq]

I wouldn't count on that effect.

[paultrr]

without trying to sound completely clueless can someone explain (or recommend some reading) what the woodward effect is and how we can use it?

 

James F. Woodward, Foundations of Physics Letters 9, 247-293 (1996). The effect is something based upon Mach's Principles. Mach attempts to connect inertia with gravitation by suggesting that inertial mass comes from the long-range gravitational forces on a massive object from all the other masses in the universe. Woodward's theory can be tested because it predicts a testable effect: if the mass-energy density of a system is made to change with time, the mass of the system should vary by an amount that is proportional to the second time derivative of the density change.

 

Also, in answer to another responce, Woodward assumes that the interaction of the isolated object with the other masses of the universe is nonlocal, in analogy with the nonlocal character of quantum mechanics as demonstrated by the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen experiments. That non-local aspect does rather bring up a lot of questions in my own mind as well. However, it does stand as one of the few actual cases where experiments are at least ongoing at the present weither or not they ever produce results.

[Qfwfq]

If I Woodward an object as it goes up and de-Woodward it as it comes down, what would the energy balance be?

[Queso]

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