I remember that dudes story in Hyperion. Poor guy.

Yeah, I've read books about space travellers that get put into "the deep sleep" when they journey between planets. As a result there are 400-year old teenagers, and grandchildren who are old men while their grandparents are still youthful.

In Hyperion, one section of the book deals with a young space-pilot who sneaks off-planet during a break he has for a few days. He meets a young girl and falls in love with her, and they end up having a baby. Anyway... he comes back maybe 5 or 6 times, and everytime he comes to visit her she's like 15 years older whereas for him the difference is like 10 days. So realistically he's seeing her as much as he can, but in what seems like a few months for him, spans her whole life, and the last time he comes back, he has to attend her funeral and his son is as old as he is. Plus he had to deal with loving a woman who was so much older than him, but LOVE KNOWS NO BOUNDARIES. He has sex with an 80-year old woman. hahaha

I think it depends on the sci-fi material being viewed. Some media portray suspended animation as going into a field which is isolated from time and therefore what seems like a second or what ever time increment for you ends up being a longer time increment for the observer. While in other media suspended animation is more akin to a long "sleep" were the bodies natural functions have slowed down. You still age but at a much reduced rate.

Cryogenics is just the most plausible thing we have to go on right now. Though the thought of freezing yourself like a popsicle to slow down or halt the natural ageing of your body seems crazy.

i thought... in most of the scifi i've seen... that there was a difference between suspended animation and cryogenically freezing people... such that suspended animation still allowed people to age.

(which, i know, defeats the purpose, but still... that's what i thought.)

besides, you can't put people in suspended animation for 20 000 years and have them still be, oh, say 20 years old at the end... they'd need to procreate.

Uh, why not? (Unless you're talking about the fact that it's not feasible today.)

yeah, i know, Albert... i thought of that too... but it seems to me that it would still be an issue....


besides, you can't put people in suspended animation for 20 000 years and have them still be, oh, say 20 years old at the end... they'd need to procreate.

i dunno... i can see it going horribly wrong so easily, like any stranded on a deserted island scenario - someone eventually gets shoved off on a raft (and if that happens once per generation... that's a lot of rafts...)




oh, and AD, it really sucks that America's so paranoid. sorry to hear that.

Sorry to hear that news AD. No going away party for you. On the other hand all those supplies for the party can go towards Par's going away party.

Alison don't you read any science fiction novels? These questions have been pondered ever since man has looked up into the sky and decided: "Damn those stars look a long way off! Well better make sure the kids have alot to do it's going to be a long trip!"

A common way to solve this generation ship problem is suspended animation. Though the systems could fail. It's not going to be an easy task to go 20,000 years on a ship but I believe we have to do it. The Earth is humanities cradle but one one day we must grow up and leave... Well if we don't destroy each other first.

You could always just use a hyper drive to get there in less than 6 months.

That's fucking lame, AD. We should go after those Al Qaeda fuckers.

(Also, Beck's news is lame as well.)