Well... I just vacumed out my head... so now it's a vacum... I wonder... are we all in someones imagination?

In a perhaps futile attempt to get all this vacuuming back to the thread subject can I ask several questions and give my own thoughts.

1. Why are we concentrating so much on 'local' travel? - The only benefit we will get from our own planets, in the long term, is to use them as slings to accelerate a craft out into deep space.

2. Will USA ever take space travel seriously instead of purely a way to develop the means to control the world? - Doubtful, because they appear hell-bent on diving headlong into a major religious world war where we all lose, especially the planet. The cost of the war against the Islamic world alone would have put a usable staging post in orbit. Instead we rely on Russia to maintain the only outpost in space and they, as a nation, are almost bankrupt!

3. Will we be 'saved' by a group of intelligent beings from another star system who will show us where we are going wrong? - Hopefully, but I doubt it in my lifetime. Perhaps it is our own addiction to war that is putting others off!

That'll do for starters - hopefully we'll get some decent responses which will encourage more questions! Not neccesarily from me! I would love to hear other peoples views.

WORK? Oh yeah, that stuff - isn't it a pain when it gets in the way of life!! (note my profile - retired!)

Is Time Travel Possible?
The theory of relativity suggests that it might be, in certain unusual circumstances. However, Stephen Hawking once pointed out that the absence of tourists from the future constitutes a strong argument against the existence of time travel. While the latest research in physics and cosmology may provide answers, travelling in time is likely to require more than a TARDIS or a Delorean.

1.But nobody is working on a 'moon base' The most we appear to be looking at is sending a manned flight to Mars. This provides no advantages for 'serious' space travel, i.e. a mission to Alpha Proximi, or even further. but purely the desire to take lay claim to a planet that has no possibility of sustaining normal human life. My understanding of the ISS was it would be used as a base where craft could be built and launched without the need for all the fuel it takes to escape earth gravity.
Does anyone know what research is being done on Tachyon Drives, or other 'new' technology to permit us to travel serious distances in a short enough time to make it feasible? I say 'new' because this subject was first looked at during the 1950's!

2. Since when did the US Government ever listen to what 'people' actually want? Can you imagine the good research that could have been done without the 'Star Wars' initiative or the $1m spent on every cruise missile that was launched at Iraq! Of course one is connected to the other.

3. Sorry, my use of the word 'saved' was obviously mis-read. I meant 'saved' by another race of intelligent beings, not by humankind. Who knows what the economic beliefs of an, as yet unknown, civilisation might be?

Thanks for the response pond scum, this may develop into one of the best topics raised on the forum. I have not brought your points down as quotes to try to keep page lengths down. Sorry if it makes it a bit more difficult to follow.

Evodude - good job. I feel guilty of initiating the topic and then ignoring your resposne for a while. Sorry ... No excuses - I know.

Ad1. I see this from three different perspectives:

1 - we are always looking for new resources ( be it fuel, raw materials or just a stack of gold)
2 - I believe that we are finally starting to realise, that f we want to fund such R&D from public funds (like NASA's budget) then we have to take the value of the passengers seriously - so spacecraft that are unmanned are going to be more popular, inspite of hight cost to operate ( theyare cheaper to build - I believe)
3 - the budget - these are public funds - so what we are dealing with is the exploration at the expense of the tax payer ------ IS THIS NOT THE CHEAPEST SOURCE OF FINANCE FOR HIGH RISK PROJECTS?

I personally believe, that todays politicians will be written down in history as visionary people who realsied that the future of mankind is to explore and utilise the resources available for his own use.

I am not sure about the constraints you refer to, but hey!!!! Man has always explored things beyond his visual scope - e.g. Spaniards America!

Ad2 - For as long as we have politicians deciding on what is good for us (btw - we elect those politicians democratically), they are actually doing what we gave them the mandate to do - ...... hmmmmm so we probably need to elect someone else next here - question is WHO???!!! D XXXXX M! - YES .... can I have some please?

Ad3 - agreed.... who knows?