So Close Yet So Far

I guess this question depends on how it is viewed. One could describe the universe based on what we’ve come to learn from it, what we’ve always thought of it, and various cosmic adjectives for it. Another way would be to express how a person stands in opposition to its offerings. 

I’m going with a tone of opposition. After partaking in several courses which break down the cosmos into its universal address, star creation, dark matter and solar flares, I ask myself what this really means to me, besides a lot of common knowledge many have taken part in. 

Excuse a seemingly dark attitude, but apparently, as I rehearse my thoughts before I type them, I see the universe, outside of earth, as a bit of a prison. You’ll typically find me watching any sci-fi film I can get my hands on. I love all the fantasy and dream of what it would be like to be doing what they “do”. But outside of a few more robotic rover missions on Mars, or perhaps some deeper, visual space exploration from something like Hubble’s cousin, I don’t see anything more magnificent happening. 

I feel our means of exploration are primitive. Blasting off, using an immense amount of rocket fuel, which costs millions and has the potential to be extremely disastrous on each attempt, doesn’t seem like stuff of the future. I think what we’ve done is monumental, but I’d put a hold on anything else human leaving the planet by way of gas and fire. We seem, and I say this with regard to automobiles, stuck in a stubborn circle of fossil fuel. I’m sure there are those working furiously on new ideas, such as solar rockets, neutron engines, light particle high elevation space balloons, you name it, and that’s where I believe our focus should be. We have an intense amount of free energy to utilize and we should make that leap our new primary endeavor. Until then, I feel this is the first of our prison doors. 

We have passed through one of the Van Allen belts by sheer speed, which basically consists of two enormous belts of radiation which surround the earth. They are very dangerous, if not deadly, to circuits, equipment, humans and other delicate matter. Being completely shielded by them apparently requires an immense thickness of lead and complex layers of other substances, so much so that it would be too bulky and weight deficient to have within a rocket for lift off. This being another prison door which is open to pass through, yet we have no key for.  

Going back to our present means of interstellar thrust, rocket fuel, we don’t have the capability to move fast enough or sustain life long enough, to venture very far at all. Even if we were able to put humans on Mars, for example, there’s no telling what could go wrong to get them back. There are no fix it shops out there, the ships have typically no free space for spare parts, and we’d be riding around with a couple of fingers crossed and a bald spare tire. 

Again, I am all for what we have done and what we are still trying to do, but sadly, I just feel that for many generations to come, we will just have to appreciate the universe from afar, and be content with the fact that we’re not going to be getting any closer any time soon.