Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible. – Lord Kelvin, 1892

NASA is about to launch a probe that will capture data and imagery from Pluto. The “New Horizons” Spacecraft will travel more than 10 times faster than a bullet, at 47,000mph once it reaches it’s top speed and will take 10 years to reach Pluto. The launch has been delayed several times, today being the latest. It will now attempt to launch on Thursday between 1-3pm EST.

Ok, this is all great, but what exactly is happening here? A 10-year trip to get pictures of Pluto? I understand the fact that Pluto is a long ways away, and may give us information about the outer region of the Milky Way… but… it seems like this should have been done long ago. Now, God forbid I start raking on NASA engineers… they’re all briliant. I mean, they partnered with Google for Pete’s sake. Who the hell is “Pete” anyway?

What I’m getting at… there’s a galaxy 2.5 million lightyears away from us called Andromeda. Not the TV Show, an actual galaxy – bigger than the Milky Way. Now, it seems to me, if we put our back into it, in 10 years, we should be striving for some type of hyper-speed vehicle that could get to Pluto in a few hours. Am I way off base here? I know developing a faster-than-light (FTL) probe is a far-fetched idea today, but the rate that technology is advancing in the last 20 years – imagine where we’ll be in another 10?

The future cannot be predicted, but futures can be invented. – Dennis Gabor, 1963

I feel like yesterday’s generation, though having a great work ethic, lacks the ability that our generation has to make things happen with little to no means – almost ignoring the rules as the general population knows them. I wouldn’t be suprised if the first FTL vehicle is developed by an independant company… there seems to be no possible way for a group of old government-endorsed engineers to think far enough in advance for something like this.

Evidently, to achieve FTL travel, it may be easier to slow the speed of light, rather than propel an item faster than it. Interesting. Not to get into an X-Files-type conversation, but I’ve heard people say that “If aliens really came to earth, that means it took them at least 2.5 million years to get here – thats’ impossible.” Ok… if the life that surely exsists in Andromeda or another galaxy beyond that has the technology to travel to earth – don’t you think they’ve figured out FTL travel already? Don’t be f-ing stupid talking about 2.5 million years to get somewhere.

FTL travel needs to be developed… that is, if it’s not already in some 16 year old genius’ garage.

I probably sound like a crazy coo-coo with this post, but whatever.

Where there is no vision, the people perish… – Proverbs 29:18