Where's my bloody rocketpack

This isn't actually a post about rocketpacks, I just stole that phrase from an Australian comedian (unfortunately I can't remember his name) about his dislike of the 'future' (AKA the present). He was promised that the future would have hover cars and rocketpacks, and it had better damned well deliver!

Rocket packs were his beef. Mine is space travel.

The more I think about it, the more I think there are three requirements before mankind really starts traveling through space.


1. Commercial viability.

It's a horrible fact, but Fight Club is right. It will be the commercial companies that first explore other planets. This isn't the age of discovering "the new World" with the Aztec cities of gold hanging around on the horizon. No government will fund an incredibly costly mission to colonise other planets while there's need for that money on Earth, and no company will do it unless there's potential for profit.

So, before any space exploration stuff can happen, we need to find some commercially viable substance to seek out in space. Either some amazing mineral that's awesome to build stuff out of, some incredible powersource that justifies the power cost of getting into space and then some, or even just some kind of space moss that cures cancer, dandruff and erectile difficulties, all at the same time. Until we find that commercially viable substance, space will be explored at a snail's pace.


2. Space Elevator.

By now most nerds know what a space elevator is. It's a building (or even just a cord with the elevator attached) made of super-tough materials linking the surface of the planet with the outer atmosphere. The space station it's linked to in the outer atmosphere is where space ships dock and take off from, avoiding the difficulty of trying to break atmosphere as they take off, saving them immense amounts of energy.

Of course, the energy required to lift an elevator that high into the air would be about the same as it takes to get a space ship to lift off. The reason the Space Elevator is genius is that it has two elevators in place. Once mining, or intergalactic trading, or space moss collecting starts out in space, the minerals need to be returned to earth. This means that there would be a second elevator. As one elevator is lowered to the ground containing the produce, this energy is transfered into lifting the other one up. Clever, huh?

Of course, to get this sort of thing we need to start making more regular trips into space, yada yada. Plus there's the issue of control of the space elevator, which country owns it, do other countries have to pay to use it, is it in fact only owned by a company and they charge the government and other companies for it's use, etc etc.


3. F-T-L travel

ALL nerds know this one. Faster then Light travel. Of course alot of sci-fi has them actually somehow traveling faster then light, but this is pretty ridiculous. You'd need some way in which the various pieces of debris and massive amounts of matter (such as, you know, planets, suns, asteroids etc) don't interfere with the travel or cause any kind of danger.

In general the more practical (wow, that word is so inappropriate there) solution would be to 'jump', or teleport between locations. Blah blah blah, complex physics stuff, blah blah blah. Executive summary: Not in our lifetimes.



Next time someone gets kidnapped by Aliens to be anally probed, be sure to ask them when they plan to share some technology with Earth. We could use a leg up in the journey to outer space. After all, the sooner we get into outer space, the sooner our militaries become filled with giant robots. And who doesn't want that?

Seriously, put your hand up if you don't want giant robots.

You, the prat at the back with your hand up, get the hell out of my house.