• Question: Can humanity get to the stars

    Asked by leejoradan to Arlene, David, Paul on 22 Nov 2012.
    • Photo: David McKeown

      David McKeown answered on 22 Nov 2012:

      We can get to the Sun which is out nearest star (or at least get within a few million km of it before the heat becomes too much and melts everything). All the other stars are too far away for us to reach at the moment, but it doesn’t mean we won’t get to a new star someday.

    • Photo: Paul Higgins

      Paul Higgins answered on 22 Nov 2012:

      The nearest star is 4 light years away and is called proxima centauri (proxima meaning close or next to, and centauri is from the greek mythological horse-man hybrid). I heard an estimate that with current technology it would take 50 years at best to get to Proxima Centauri.

Comments