[ExI] Breakthrough Starshot - To The Stars!

[Adrian Tymes]

On Fri, Apr 15, 2016 at 5:57 PM, Rafal Smigrodzki <
rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On Fri, Apr 15, 2016 at 6:58 PM, Adrian Tymes <atymes at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> But that's not Putting Some Physical Object There (At Least Briefly),
>> which seems to be the real mission specification, with what you can
>> actually do with it an afterthought.
>>
> ### Well, if you launch a large number of probes flying close together,
> you could make a deceleration system.
>

They said that's not their plan.  They intend to fly by.

On Fri, Apr 15, 2016 at 5:39 PM, Rafal Smigrodzki <
rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com> wrote:
> Peak accelerations in handguns are on the order of 30 to 200 thousand g.

That's bullets, without delicate electronics, and where mass is not at
nearly as much of a premium.  They can be a lot more robust than a
spaceship.  Also, their acceleration lasts a lot less time.

On Fri, Apr 15, 2016 at 5:51 PM, Anders Sandberg <anders at aleph.se> wrote:
> Obvious testing targets would be the local planets. I suspect that
testing would soon become a major activity.

So far as I can tell, their announced plan is straight from the lab to
interstellar.

Though actually, their announced plan is pretty much just lab.  (In other
words, they have no actual plans to launch anything or to actually use this
technology for its stated purpose, though they think it might be nice to do
so someday.)
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