[extropy-chat] thank evolution for the interstate highway system

Spike spike66 at comcast.net
Tue Dec 2 07:18:10 UTC 2003


> Don Dartfield
> 
> On Mon, 1 Dec 2003, Spike wrote:
> 
> > If all tax dollars were spent as well as they are on the good old
> > interstate highway system, well then, even *I* would be in favor of
> > taxes, and this is *me* talking.
> 
> OK, so here's a question I was pondering briefly the other 
> day: if all of the money spent on the Interstates since their
inception had 
> been instead pumped into R&D for several companies like Moller, would
we have
> competitively-priced flying cars yet?

No.  Moller and others aren't struggling against a lack of 
research, they are struggling against physics.  There is a
good reason why those designs don't fly.  The military has
dumped cubic tons of money into flying cars, but the power
requirements keep pushing us towards the flying cars that
we have had for fifty years: helicopters.  

The equations for power requirements as a function of rotor
length are well understood Don.  Textbooks on VTOL design
are available at your local university.  There is a very 
good reason why choppers have long rotors, and why sailplanes
with long skinny wings have a more efficient glide slope
than high powered aircraft.

spike 





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