For anyone who is at all interested in writing “Hard Science Fiction Space Travel stories” I highly recommend reading the blog of Charles Stross. I’m not saying that he’s right that people will never travel among the stars, I’m just saying that he brings up valid objections to space travel that should be addressed. Specifically you should read The myth of the starship and The High Frontier, Redux (including all the comments).

FRY: Far out! So, there’s an infinite number of parallel universes?
FARNSWORTH: No, just the two.

An article appeared on New Scientist today: Mystery ‘dark flow’ extends towards edge of universe. Some scientists speculate that we may have a neighborverse.

We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon… we choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.

It is for these reasons that I regard the decision last year to shift our efforts in space from low to high gear as among the most important decisions that will be made during my incumbency in the office of the Presidency.

Delivered at Rice University in Houston, Texas on 12 September 1962 by John F. Kennedy

Yes, I understand that it will take a phenomenal amount of energy to reach even the nearest star in anything approximating an endurable amount of time. But this pronouncement is being made just a bit too soon, given that we haven’t yet been able to send human beings much farther than the Moon, our nearest neighbor. European civilization had hundreds, nay, thousands of years of naval experience before they had the ability to colonize the Americas (even once the Americas were “discovered” it took another 200 years for Europeans to establish permanent residences). Will we reach the next star over in my life-time? I honestly doubt it, but never? That dog won’t hunt.

1. The confirmation of of the hypothesis that there is water on Mars (and hence the potential for life)
2. The report that Earth like planets should be quite common in the universe

All I can say about that is: YeeHa!