[LINK] Why do we need scout ships, again?
Oct. 24th, 2005 08:14 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rfmcdonaldAs is his wont, ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
pompe demolishes an unconsidered convention of science fiction by pointing out that with the development of ever more powerful and capable telescopic systems on and around Earth, it's unnecessary to send expensive probes on interstellar voyages. All that you have to do is pay attention and almost certainly, you'll get at least as much information about your target planetary system as you would if you actually launched the British Interplanetary Society's Project Daedalus flyby probe. The only exception to this tendency, as james_nicoll notes in the comments, would be if the target planetary system was very far away from home. Even then, the probes would tend to be unmanned.
So, yet another reason not to expect the Enterprise in our future. This is almost certainly a good thing, but yet.
pompe demolishes an unconsidered convention of science fiction by pointing out that with the development of ever more powerful and capable telescopic systems on and around Earth, it's unnecessary to send expensive probes on interstellar voyages. All that you have to do is pay attention and almost certainly, you'll get at least as much information about your target planetary system as you would if you actually launched the British Interplanetary Society's Project Daedalus flyby probe. The only exception to this tendency, as james_nicoll notes in the comments, would be if the target planetary system was very far away from home. Even then, the probes would tend to be unmanned.So, yet another reason not to expect the Enterprise in our future. This is almost certainly a good thing, but yet.
