World's First Single-Atom-Thick Fabric

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I think this is also one of the first steps to building a space elevator... which is a pretty crazy concept in itself!

 

Cool

 

It's much more practical than chemical rockets and I think you will be eating the same crow that the geniuses who "proved" heavier-than-air flight to be mathematically impossible dined on the day the Wright bros. flew at Kitty Hawk.

 

I have a supercomputer on my desk, I've seen the dawn of privately supported spaceflight,and the fall of the Berlin Wall and the evil empire that built it. I carry a phone in my pocket, I can send messages to anyone on the planet in seconds, and the ethics of human cloning are now a practical consideration. When I was born, these were all the subjects of science fiction, they are now part of everyday life.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,Than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

--From Hamlet (I, v, 166-167)

 

wooo, thank you halo, someone noticed!!lol


and personally i think that the space elevator is a good idea... it just requires some concerted effort and funding, and would be a pretty cool thing for multiple space agencies to cooperate on. We pretty much have the science for it, afaik, unlike fusion technology... and its pretty efficient too

 

in the 50's, his computer wouldnt be recognised as a computer at all. (Actually, im assuming he has no valves and punch cards in his computer, but yeah). Just becuase gov't's have legislated against human cloning doesnt mean it can't and won't happen. Hell, they legislate against people stealing, but that still happens. I can look around me, and see huge amounts of things that could not have been made in the 50's, because they didnt have the materials, the precision, or the know-how how to build them. Just because the space elevator is 'science fiction'... so what? You could say that about a lot of things before you see them in action.

Imagine what it would be like to go back a couple of hundred years, and see images being formed on paper where there was a few chemicals on there, and all that had happened was that it had been exposed to light for a certain period of time. It would appear to be magical, if you didnt know how it worked.

 

Economically, a "space elevator" would be completley possible. In comparison to huge great rocket engines fighting against the earth's gravity... millions of pouds (or dollars) every second ... not the most effient way to do the job, but it works.

I see it as a stepping stone, just like any technology. It's just another means of getting to the next stage in development and understanding, which is (theoretically) infinite. Its not the destination, but the journey that makes it worthwhile. The path you take changes how long it takes to get there and what you find when you get there