A Discussion about reactions

[Hopeless]

... how would her invention be viewed until they got confirmation it was actually successful!

I think it would mostly be ignored until then, as just another one of the many experimental projects going on somewhere around the world, probably only a few specialists would be
interested.

Hmm if someone suspected she was going to be successful would they try to blow up the probe as it launched or wait until it passed out of sensor range behind the moon thinking that would escape notice?

Would current day technology be able to detect if a probe either blew up or crashed on the dark side of the moon?
In theory, yes, but only if someone would allocate the resources to take a look.

I'd assume they have the means to check the area but maybe not immediately.

Oh, and please, the moon has a far side, but it is not at all dark. :wink:

Would be funny if there were prospectors on the moon who witnessed the probe jumping but had no idea what was going on so you eventually got these odd stories about seeing a rocket vanish like out of star trek except from the perception of those watching it engage its warp drive!

More importantly what would be likely detected when they pick up a jump signature for the very first time?
It depends on whether someone already has invented the instruments required to detect a jump signature, which is unlikely because until the first signal there would be nothing to detect.

Was wondering if such a thing as jump drive truly existed what would likely be detected if something like that jumped out in full view of a satellite scanning that area of space?

Would it be likely she could hide the fact she had included another prototype in the probe...
Well, not really, because she will hardly build and outfit the probe alone, and I suspect that the prototype would not be small enough to just hide it among some other stuff. In my view the entire engineering team working on the probe would have to be involved.

Now I'm wondering how big her team would have been and whether they would have kept quiet if she didn't want all of the details about what her probe could do being revealed before they were ready.

 

[Hopeless]

The ESA has a budget of over $4 billion Euros contributed by the 20 member nations and the European Union with Canada and prospective new members contributing a small amount too.

In the case of ESA it may be interesting to know that its budget covers the science projects only, the European launchers are developed, marketed and operated by the commercial enterprise
Arianespace.

Interesting, maybe T2300 isn't that far out as I thought!

European Space Agency

So assuming this isn't the first such test bed launch, but is the first maneuver drive propelled probe maybe it should be called Ariane 6 or X by then?

Still would they take her seriously if she asked them for any reports of anything unusual in or near Mars orbit after a week or so?

I'd assume they'd move her out so they can prepare the next mission, would they have her return to the lab with her team or another installation with the means to scan the area of Mars where she estimated the probe would jumped back in or focus on the maneuver drive since it was evidently successful?

My original idea was set decades down the line from here and this is sounding more and more like something worth exploring, albeit would it be more along the lines of each agency trying to get access to her work but also herself and her team, how likely would it be if they agreed to a joint mission and more importantly how long would they debate before doing something about it?

Assuming it would be eight days before any transmissions would be received back on Earth, how long before anyone outside of her team and whoever funded her project would realise she had not just successfully field tested a maneuver drive but also a working jump drive?

More importantly would that change the likelihood of a joint mission if they knew she could vastly shorten the amount of time needed to travel between any of the planets in the solar system and maybe even other star systems?

I wonder what if the saboteur learned of the true mission of the probe and panics realising her invention is likely to far outstrip their own plans and would they be willing to take steps to steal her invention for their own benefit?

Hmm this started out as a precursor to another campaign intended to explain where all of this started and now I'm wondering whether the first season is going to start off with the probe launch and then the inventor being targetted for assassination and kidnapping for what she knows let alone stealing the secrets behind her creation (by that I mean several different parties getting involved).

 

[rust]

So assuming this isn't the first such test bed launch, but is the first maneuver drive propelled probe maybe it should be called Ariane 6 or X by then?

I think it would get one of ESA's nice abbreviations, something like
FAST or SWIFT or so.

Still would they take her seriously if she asked them for any reports of anything unusual in or near Mars orbit after a week or so?

She would only have to have a friend among the community of radio
astronomers, there are dozens of radio telescopes scanning the sky
all the time, and even an amateur radio telescope (3 meter-disk or so)
should be able to pick up the transmission if the person operating it
knows where the signal will come from, and on which frequency.

... how likely would it be if they agreed to a joint mission and more importantly how long would they debate before doing something about it?

The space agencies would jump at the opportunity without hesitation,
the problem would be the politicians and their quarrels about the fun-
ding. Depending on the political and financial climate at the time, it
could take from months to years.

Assuming it would be eight days before any transmissions would be received back on Earth, how long before anyone outside of her team and whoever funded her project would realise she had not just successfully field tested a maneuver drive but also a working jump drive?

Difficult to guess, but I think it would take only days from the moment
the signal from Mars is received on Earth. The question is more whether
the scientific community would believe the right conclusion to be plausi-
ble.

More importantly would that change the likelihood of a joint mission if they knew she could vastly shorten the amount of time needed to travel between any of the planets in the solar system and maybe even other star systems?

Most probably, yes.

I wonder what if the saboteur learned of the true mission of the probe and panics realising her invention is likely to far outstrip their own plans and would they be willing to take steps to steal her invention for their own benefit?

I have a problem with the sabotage part and the ideas of assassi-
nation or theft, this is a bit too much Hollywood for my taste. In
the real world the laboratories, launch systems and thelike are ve-
ry well guarded, in the case of ESA the spaceport at Kourou is guar-
ded by elite units of the Foreign Legion. Any illegal activity would
have to be an insider job only, and an extremely difficult one at that.

 

[Hopeless]

So assuming this isn't the first such test bed launch, but is the first maneuver drive propelled probe maybe it should be called Ariane 6 or X by then?

I think it would get one of ESA's nice abbreviations, something like FAST or SWIFT or so.

Certainly would be interesting

Still would they take her seriously if she asked them for any reports of anything unusual in or near Mars orbit after a week or so?

She would only have to have a friend among the community of radio astronomers, there are dozens of radio telescopes scanning the sky all the time, and even an amateur radio telescope (3 meter-disk or so) should be able to pick up the transmission if the person operating it knows where the signal will come from, and on which frequency.

Ala Contact which in itself would be interesting especially if its initially thought someone's idea of a joke until it reaches someone who know her particular sense of humour... well that would extend the amount of time before it finally filters through it isn't a hoax after all... :roll:

... how likely would it be if they agreed to a joint mission and more importantly how long would they debate before doing something about it?

The space agencies would jump at the opportunity without hesitation, the problem would be the politicians and their quarrels about the fuding. Depending on the political and financial climate at the time, it could take from months to years.

More importantly to avoid the Hollywood feel would it make more sense that Corporations would take more notice than Governments if they caught wind of something like this or would that security insure they'd be honest about it?

Assuming it would be eight days before any transmissions would be received back on Earth, how long before anyone outside of her team and whoever funded her project would realise she had not just successfully field tested a maneuver drive but also a working jump drive?

Difficult to guess, but I think it would take only days from the moment the signal from Mars is received on Earth. The question is more whether the scientific community would believe the right conclusion to be plausible.

Is it possible they might try to cover up the incident and try to keep this revelation a secret from anyone outside of say the Governments and big businesses?

More importantly would that change the likelihood of a joint mission if they knew she could vastly shorten the amount of time needed to travel between any of the planets in the solar system and maybe even other star systems?

Most probably, yes.

Assuming helium 3 is just being explored as a means of power just how unlikely is cold fusion I mean stripping water of hydrogen as a means of power and yes I don't know if thats even feasible or practical even if it could be done.

I wonder what if the saboteur learned of the true mission of the probe and panics realising her invention is likely to far outstrip their own plans and would they be willing to take steps to steal her invention for their own benefit?

I have a problem with the sabotage part and the ideas of assassination or theft, this is a bit too much Hollywood for my taste. In the real world the laboratories, launch systems and thelike are very well guarded, in the case of ESA the spaceport at Kourou is guarded by elite units of the Foreign Legion. Any illegal activity would have to be an insider job only, and an extremely difficult one at that.

So what if there was a deliberate effort made to discredit her leaving her outside of the protection as mentioned above?
Still it would still require some appropriate reasons to back up why she is expelled from the program perhaps the revelation that she has links to a war criminal and may even be suspected herself through the simple fact that she grew up alongside others considered a threat to world peace?
Should I keep the focus on the first successful test of a working maneuver and jump drive or broaden this out to how would they react if someone seriously fumbles this event resulting in the deaths of her entire team and all of their research materials barring her because she had been kicked out and now they think she was responsible even though she will have no idea what has happened due to operational security?

 

[CosmicGamer]

While there would be scientific curiosity, so far I've seen no plausible reason for any extreme measures. We put a man on the moon in 1996. Since then the majority of the research, profit, or military concern is orbiting quite close around our planet. There hasn't been much motivation, other than scientific curiosity and discovery, to drive research out farther even though we have and could readily expand upon the capability.

Until environmental factors or lack of resources get much more critical than they currently are and drive people to colonize elsewhere why would governments or corporations feel the need to gain "the secret". So the ship can get from point A to point B in a week. Where is the profit or military need for a ship that still needs to go 1000 times farther out from Earth than anybody other than scientists care about before it can engage it's drive?

Disclaimer: I am relying on possibly incorrect data from the web in regards to orbital distances and diameters.

 

[Hopeless]

While there would be scientific curiosity, so far I've seen no plausible reason for any extreme measures. We put a man on the moon in 1996. Since then the majority of the research, profit, or military concern is orbiting quite close around our planet. There hasn't been much motivation, other than scientific curiosity and discovery, to drive research out farther even though we have and could readily expand upon the capability.

But what if they found there was a way to get your probes and eventually even manned missions to explore the other worlds?
What if someone found a way to do all that through a process separating hydrogen from water?
Watched Stargazing live on bbc iplayer and they mentioned hydrogen being the most common element found in the universe, what if that proves instrumental to the power source that could take humanity to the stars?

Until environmental factors or lack of resources get much more critical than they currently are and drive people to colonize elsewhere why would governments or corporations feel the need to gain "the secret". So the ship can get from point A to point B in a week. Where is the profit or military need for a ship that still needs to go 1000 times farther out from Earth than anybody other than scientists care about before it can engage it's drive?
Disclaimer: I am relying on possibly incorrect data from the web in regards to orbital distances and diameters.

What would be the government's reaction to something that could revolutionise space travel even space exploration actually make it possible to establish a base on Mars before those born in the 1980's reached retirement age?

How would the rest of the world react to any one of the developments involved in making that possible?

I had assumed helium 3 would be a more likely fuel source but what if cold fusion or whatever the process would be called was actually possible, would space exploration be more important than the other applications?

Could they stop themselves turning it to military applications or fear the possible results and try to prevent it being put into use until several decades down the line?

 

[CosmicGamer]

But what if they found there was a way to get your probes and eventually even manned missions to explore the other worlds?

What would be the government's reaction to something that could revolutionize space travel even space exploration actually make it possible to establish a base on Mars before those born in the 1980's reached retirement age?

It's literally light years faster but there is still a cost. Governments reaction: How much you charging for us to use it? The US scrapped the space shuttle program and stopped work on their own space station and instead moved to international programs. The benefits did not justify the expense. It's your game but I still think you need some profit or military reason to drive demand.

And if there is so much demand, other than being super rich so that you don't need to profit, extremely modest so that you don't want the fame, and extremely evil because you don't want the tech to be made use of; what is the reason to keep it a secret?

I guess a governments reaction to someone having some advanced mysterious tech and trying to protect and keep it from others might be construed as trying to hide some military capability and efforts to figure out what is going on might ramp up from being polite inquires to threats, raids and seizures, imprisonment (if things are hidden then you failed to file taxes properly), espionage, sabotage, and so on up to bombing earth side installations and nuking mars if things like information on advanced power plants is mistaken for weaponry.

By the way, if and when the tech does get out you will have completely lost it since you didn't patent any of it.

What is the mad rush to build a base on Mars about? If this was a legitimate goal and there was a strong enough desire to do this and the money and resources was put into it from the beginning of the space program we would already have done it. It's not beyond our current or even historic tech.

In an age where the latest computer game is enough to get people to stand in line for hours to get it the instant it comes out where is this line of people waiting to go to Mars and insisting we get there faster?

Now, getting into the advanced power plant needed as a power source for the jump drive is another issue entirely and only helps point out that inventing jump drive would be a combination of numerous scientific advances and it's quite a miracle that they all were developed simultaneously and in secret directly under peoples noses. Are you sure someone didn't just get their hands on some ancients technology?

I'm afraid this might be perceived as a negative or argumentative post and hope you don't take the comments poorly. I'm trying to help your premise be solid and if you don't care for the critique, just ask and I'll desist.

 

[Hopeless]

But what if they found there was a way to get your probes and eventually even manned missions to explore the other worlds?
What would be the government's reaction to something that could revolutionize space travel even space exploration actually make it possible to establish a base on Mars before those born in the 1980's reached retirement age?

It's literally light years faster but there is still a cost. Governments reaction: How much you charging for us to use it? The US scrapped the space shuttle program and stopped work on their own space station and instead moved to international programs. The benefits did not justify the expense. It's your game but I still think you need some profit or military reason to drive demand. And if there is so much demand, other than being super rich so that you don't need to profit, extremely modest so that you don't want the fame, and extremely evil because you don't want the tech to be made use of; what is the reason to keep it a secret?

So far I figure the developments involved i making this work come down to;

1)A working cold fusion reactor small enough for an Ariane type rocket capable of not just powering a prototype maneuver drive and the very experimental jump drive but also a separate one in the satellite its carrying to deliver in Mar's orbit,

2)A fully operational maneuver drive that removes all of the problems of rocket propulsion and provides greater improvements in speed and stability,

3) An experimental jump drive developed through a primitive teleportation-style invention that allows for transference between points the one restriction is that it has to be programmed very, very carefully so that it enters jump where there's no obstructions and exits in empty space where its destination lies ahead but that part should be easy enough as its done with the normal satellites sent out to explore the other worlds and edge of the solar system, (please note this is assuming she has help identifying the best place for the probe to jump back into normal space)

I'd say 3 would be the hardest part and I figure the one most likeliest being kept secret since most of the rest of the world being confronted by a new power source that runs on the most abundant fuel source imaginable would be the main focus of all of their attention especially the group funding her project.
Potentially devastating to those with interests in the oil and gas industries alone, which is why I think that would be kept quiet until after the launch and most likely reason for the accident that almost wipes out all of the research and those who know the secret behind it (Not sure I really need to bring up Chain Reaction and Keanu Reeves... hope that doesn't offend anyone reading this!)

The maneuver drive can be explained away as part of a much larger research group but the power source would have had to have been developed around the same period but rather than kept secret it simply wasn't anywhere near ready until it was announced that the team was being split up thereby forcing her to speed up the testing which wasn't completed until after the project team separated.

However I figure even with a perfected power source the drive was still being perfected and this research led to the discovery of jump technology albeit very, very crude.

By that I mean she accidentally caused the minature duplicate of her prototype probe to jump outside of the research lab and land several meters outside the lab facility only being discovered and returned by a passerby to a facility guard and from him back to her over a week later.
Learning where it had been found it was initially thought to have been a hoax until she managed to duplicate the event this time with an operating minaturised sensor system that recorded the event and by that I mean that although over a week has passed before it returned its internal clock indicated no time had passed for it inside jump space, which she duplicated once again this time making sure to be waiting nearby for it to arrive and witnessed the toy probe jump back into normal space.

At this point all her team would be aware is that she's perfected cold fusion and other than an alarming habit of keep losing a toy probe outside the facility was with their help beginning to solve the problems of the maneuver drive. When she had perfected both the power source and the maneuver drive she focused on her new discovery sufficiently enough to work out she needed two reactors for the probe, one for the satellite as it couldn't rely on the probe upon arrival and larger one for the probe to accomodate the power usage of both the maneuver and the jump drive.

It was after she demonstrated the working cold fusion reactor with the early model probe that effectively only allowed it to hover a few inches off the ground for as long as the power source kept operating that they gained their funding, back just after the original project team was split apart that eventually results in a working prototype probe which I figure still means they have to wait about another two years to wait before an opening at ESA so it can be launched at which time the jump drive is ready (and even if its fails the drive alone will complete the trip much faster but wouldn't solve the acceleration problems required to reduce a manned mission to Mars appreciably).

The presence of a working cold fusion reactor alone would merit the secrecy, whether they'd actually do anything about it until they have proof that it works with the launch of the probe but eight days later they start getting proof the jump drive also worked might either make things far worse or make her work that much more important.

What is this mad rush to build a base on Mars about? If this was a legitimate goal and there was a strong enough desire to do this and the money and resources was put into it from the beginning of the space program we would already have done it. It's not beyond our current or even historic tech.

I'm actually inclined to run it from just after its launched and disappears, but if pushed I figure she plans further drone launches to deliver supplies and automated means of developing a site suitable for a base once the satellite tethered to Deimos completes it examination of the surface follwoed by a second probe to get a rover on the surface to communicate its findings up to the satellite to speed things up.

But that still leaves making sure they don't impair the planet's ecology which is why I figure that would make it a couple of years at least before anything is even decided provided the world power's can agree to work together.

In an age where the latest computer game is enough to get people to stand in line for hours to get it the instant it comes out where is this line of people waiting to go to Mars and insisting we get there faster?
Now, getting into the advanced power plant needed as a power source for the jump drive is another issue entirely and only helps point out that inventing jump drive would be a combination of numerous scientific advances and it's quite a miracle that they all were developed simultaneously and in secret directly under peoples noses. Are you sure someone didn't just get their hands on some ancients technology?
Please don't take the comments poorly. I'm trying to help your premise be solid and if you don't care for the critique, just ask and I'll desist.

No problem part of my reason for this is to have holes poked in my ideas, I'd rather have something concrete than find out later I missed something blindingly obvious!