55delta

I see they're a scientist too. I would keep an eye on them if I were you.

Well, time for me to make things uncomfortable by pointing out that children are the subject of scientific studies all the time. It's just that there's a big list of ethical obligations that need to met first, likely including the participation of a parent or guardian. I suppose it comes down to how comfortable we are attaching wireless electrodes to monitor a child's heart-rate, pulse, and breathing. I suppose the big question is, can a child survive the g-load? I'm sure there's some data on the affects of g-forces on children. I more think the question is, how do the more intense fair-ground and amusement park rides compare to the g-load of Blue Origin's New Shepard? I say New Shepard specifically because it would be the shortest and most controlled rocket I can think of. Less to go wrong and less to screw up then, say, a week in the ISS.

"At the request to re-purpose members of older industries, the crew for our next moon landing will composed entirely of whalers." "We have made a major breakthrough today. We have successfully increased the speed of light."

My profile picture is the space pirate Captain Harlock. Captain Harlock once fought intelligent space zombies (in the series Endless Odyssey.) Long story short, he won. I think I'm reasonably safe.

So the answers are much simpler than I expected them to be and it defines the difference neatly. Thanks to everyone who answered.

Sorry, I confused mass and momentum there. But to me, this still leaves a bit of a question still and it's a tough one. If a photon drive conserves all quantities, how does EM/Canne drive designs violate the same? Is something different with microwaves? Was the output too big for the input? Or was it that the explanation by the inventor/s was not scientifically sound?

Just to be clear, do all forms of electromagnetic radiation have mass, or just some such as photons?

I'm not sure I'll understand the answers, but I will ask... Does a photon drive violate the theory of relativity? Maybe I need an example here. Someone launches a spacecraft that uses solar panels for power, most of which powers some form of energy-efficient bulb (say florescent or LED here.) This bulb is surrounded by a mirrored chamber to focus the light out of the back of the craft (similar to conventional craft.) I am told that photons can be a source (although very small amounts) of thrust. Yet, until the bulbs burns out, this sounds like one of those 'reactionless' drives. Does that mean this set-up violates either general relativity/special relativity? Or do scientists have something else in mind when mentioning photon drives?

"This new program is to educate the public on how to avoid the dangers of black holes that they encounter in day-to-day life." "This new paper, the result of several weeks continuous work and many liquid lunches, describes a method of accelerating faster than light,"

"...decided that there are significant time and cost saving in focusing our efforts in disproving the theory of gravity..." "The protestors decided to camp underneath the rocket and we decided not to postpone the launch."

"Take a can of your gasoline. Say this can of gasoline is the sun. Now, you spread a thin line of it to a ball, representing the earth. Now, the gasoline represents the sunlight, the sun particles. Here we saturate the ball with the gasoline, the sunlight. Then we put a flame to the ball. The flame will speedily travel around the earth, back along the line of gasoline to the can, or the sun itself. It will explode this source and spread to every place that gasoline, our sunlight, touches. Explode the sunlight here, gentlemen, you explode the universe. Explode the sunlight here and a chain reaction will occur direct to the sun itself and to all the planets that sunlight touches, to every planet in the universe." "After watching War of The Worlds again, we decided to nuke the surface of Mars rather than take any chances."

"We have heard confirmation of a large asteroid on a collision course with Earth, but administration has decided that it is not our concern." "We would like to announce our new contractor for rockets...Rick Sanchez!"

"For the final part of the solar probe's mission, it will use all remaining fuel to increase speed as much as possible. Then it will attempt a 'slingshot maneuver' that we recall seeing once in a movie. "In the interests of international co-operation and because of a massive budget surplus, we have decided to build our own copy of the N1 design..."

"We want to make it clear that no astronauts were lost when the astronaut complex exploded today. They had all resigned yesterday." "We are not cloning our astronauts. It's just that today's sudden explosion of a manned rocket was actually an elaborate simulation and the pilot will be back on the roster in a few hours."

You know, I completely forgot about the world-wide co-operation part. Let's see... ULA could keep using RD-180s for the Delta V. Not exactly advancing anything, but it makes a bit of a difference. Anything else that could use an RD-170 or RD-180 engine, if they could get one?

Hmm...if we assume that all future developments from Take Two will only be marketing decisions, then I wouldn't worry about a 'striped-down, watered-down' KSP in the future. But Take Two might have (my speculation) bought KSP for the Kerbals. What does that mean? It means they might want to sell more Kerbals, and they have more money to do just that. It's up to the community to decide if that's a good, or a bad thing.

Infinite money? I have some ideas. 1. Equivalents of Dawn or New Horizons to every dwarf planet and trans-Neptunian object we can track. 2. SpaceX's ITS, where even Elon doesn't know where the money for that will come from. 3. Revive and revamp the VentureStar shuttle, or go even more crazy and re-design something like Star Raker to complement Vulcan/ACES. 4. Build a new version of the ISS, incorporating new technologies and maybe add some sort of cargo transfer terminal as well. 5. Build SpaceLab 2 at L2, using ACES to move sections, and whatever we have left that's still capable of manned flight and trans-lunar insertion. 6. Look into resolving any remaining issues involving beamed microwave power, so maybe there might be orbiting solar farms in the future. That's all I can think of for now.

It's not a bad idea, even if this thermal camo isn't perfect. In an area with enemy vehicles that could use thermal systems, like tanks, attack helicopters, and AC-130s, something that would cut a thermal profile to less of a human-shaped bright spot is actually pretty handy.

"No, no one has stolen our rocket, we...just...have...a surprise guest pilot, that's all." "So we were having a big party, getting drunk and while watching A Trip to The Moon and we asked why we didn't do that ourselves?"

"We will not support SpaceX's ITS because it's an Illuminati conspiracy to sacrifice a million people the secret Mars space dragon." "Our astronauts asked for some clarification on what the controls did, so we had to hold the launch until they read through the manual."

"Initially, we were dismayed that our $19 billion budget would be put to national referendum. But we are honored and overjoyed that this great nation voted unanimously to keep it." "In the interest of international safety, the state department has asked us to assist the North Korean military's rocket program."

Well, that's an interesting design. Good thing aircraft don't use rotary engines anymore. First thing I thought when I saw that design was, "This airport looks like it was designed to crash WWI airplanes."

"I am certain that CCCP has achieved all their accomplishments with the assistance of hack gravity and hyperedit." "Although one booster prematurely released during at launch, our flight engineers are reasonably confident that they can place the payload into a stable orbit."

(Let me throw in an old TF2 reference.) "The astronaut will deploy the sensor, then extent it to full functionality by swinging their wrench violently in a downward motion." "Frustrated with lackluster budgets and a lack of mandate, NASA launched a take-over of the United States government today."

"We are currently corresponding by e-mail with someone from a planet called Arrakis, calling himself Atreides. He is asking for our help in retrieving a large shipment of something called Melange, which in exchange he is willing to share a part of that shipment. We need to send him some..." "Our newest satellite will include the most powerful spotlight ever built. We intent to use this spotlight to illuminate future night-time launches."