tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2719106859199422273.post5139242874338391119..comments2024-03-26T07:43:42.434+00:00Comments on Beautiful Stars: UFOs in Portsmouth?Karen Mastershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12941003369342300418noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2719106859199422273.post-32331173841955722782014-09-24T12:07:48.275+01:002014-09-24T12:07:48.275+01:00Story about the people behind faking the above &qu...Story about the people behind faking the above "UFO" picture: http://www.teamlocals.co.uk/sci-fi-event-in-portsmouth-promoted-through-fake-ufo-sighting-makes-national-headlines-28492Karen Mastershttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12941003369342300418noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2719106859199422273.post-49931230865637768612014-09-23T10:38:00.789+01:002014-09-23T10:38:00.789+01:00I don't agree the argument was valid for discu...I don't agree the argument was valid for discussing travel to the Moon in the 1920s. The leap from trains, and early flight in the 1920s to being able to send a rocket to the Moon is many many orders of magnitude less than the leap needed between our current tiny tiptoes into spaceflight and interstellar travel. <br /><br />For interstellar travel we either need to spend thousands of years enroute, and/or use an almost infinite energy source, along with magic protection for interstellar dust, or a magic method to bend space time (which also needs almost infinite energy). Karen Mastershttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12941003369342300418noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2719106859199422273.post-79808879420436522672014-09-23T10:32:36.912+01:002014-09-23T10:32:36.912+01:00My mistake - @TheVixxster points out she did not s...My mistake - @TheVixxster points out she did not say @Matthometown did the photoshopping, just that he knows more about it. Certainly more than I do! Karen Mastershttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12941003369342300418noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2719106859199422273.post-45266883712349536242014-09-23T10:22:17.284+01:002014-09-23T10:22:17.284+01:00With our current technology -- today -- right now ...With our current technology -- today -- right now -- if only we had the financial incentive to do so, we are capable of building staged fission and fusion propulsion systems which could propel a ship to the nearest star-systems, and then return it to Earth, all in less than the average life-span of a human being. Do you happen to have a spare few billion pounds sterling you wouldn't mind parting with? Because, if you did, we could start in on that project first thing tomorrow morning. Seriously, yes. We could do that -- today -- right now. But, there's just no way that any possible alien species, which might belong to a civilization perhaps as much as a billion years, or more, older than our own could ever develop a means of deep-space travel significantly beyond our current abilities, and discover means for effectively dealing with and getting around everything that presents itself as a problem to our primitive technologies, huh?<br /><br />All of your arguments would be absolutely equally as valid, and equally as logically sound, had you made them back in the 1920's about the possibility of traveling to the moon. You know? Right at the same time that Professor A. W. Bickerton of Canterbury College was making pretty much all of the same arguments in support of why man would absolutely never, ever travel to the moon using rockets as a means of propulsion? It may surprise you to discover that, as it turned out, Professor Bickerton was wrong. <br /><br />Tell me: Did NASA engineers 'invoke magic' in order to come up with ingenious solutions which very effectively got around all of the, at the time seemingly insurmountable problems, that Prof. Bickerton had previously foreseen and pointed out?<br /><br />By the way, do you know what Prof. Bickerton said about those crazy enough to speculate on the impossibly fanciful notion of future rocket flights to the moon? He said:<br /><br />"This foolish idea of shooting at the moon is an example of the absurd length to which vicious specialisation will carry scientists working in thought-tight compartments."<br /><br />Except that, of course, less than half a century after he said that, we did exactly what he claimed would always be impossible.<br /><br />Let me wrap up by leaving another quote -- one of great wisdom, this time:<br /><br />"If an elderly but distinguished scientist says that something is possible, [s]he is almost certainly right; but if [s]he says that it is impossible, [s]he is very probably wrong."- Arthur C. Clarke<br /><br />There's great wisdom and great truth in that statement. ...And, I'm not sure why anyone would ever want to be 'very probably wrong.'VanHammerslyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07380342066382750409noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2719106859199422273.post-61303147754162934852014-09-23T09:06:42.372+01:002014-09-23T09:06:42.372+01:00Someone on Twitter (@TheVixxster) tweeted me this ...Someone on Twitter (@TheVixxster) tweeted me this morning claiming the whole thing was faked to raise interest in a SciFi conference happening in Portsmouth this weekend. Guess I was wrong that it looked like a cloud. @TheVixxster claims the image was photoshopped by @Matthometown. Karen Mastershttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12941003369342300418noreply@blogger.com