Jose Canseco has many talents -- slugger, author, whistleblower -- but today he revealed that he's a visionary in the field of space travel:
Comet Transport is the key to our survival .
— Jose Canseco (@JoseCanseco) November 13, 2014That's a pretty bold statement, Jose. Normally I'd be skeptical, but you can turn anything into a spaceship as long as you strap some kind of an engine to it (and radiation shielding, and shielding from micrometeorites, and oxygen, and so on), so I'm going to keep an open mind.
Galactic Beings have used comets as star taxis for eons
— Jose Canseco (@JoseCanseco) November 13, 2014OK, well, I think I'm going to need to see your sources on that one.
Comets are faster than anything we could ever build and have their own power solving are two problems
— Jose Canseco (@JoseCanseco) November 13, 2014Well, it's true that the majority of comets actually do move faster than our fastest spaceships. Voyager 1 is one of our fastest ever, and it's moving at only 10 miles per second. That sounds like it's pretty fast, but space is very, very big -- Voyager will take about 40,000 years to even come close to another star. Some comets move at almost 300 miles per second -- still way short of, say, the speed of light, but definitely an improvement. Comets are generally "powered" by gravity, although they do tend to release gas and dust, much like an actual spacecraft would use a thruster. You lost me with the alien thing, but you're back on track, Jose.
Opens up new business like galaxy touring cruising, asteroid mining, interstellar trade, and planet colonies
— Jose Canseco (@JoseCanseco) November 13, 2014Love it. I'm a sucker for all this futuristic space colony stuff. It's pretty cool that you are, too, actually. I'm still not totally sold on using comets. It'd be a bit tough to, you know, land on a comet and then make that comet habitable for humans and then somehow harness that thrust in order to turn the comet into a usable spaceship. In fact, the effort we put into that might be better directed toward creating a more powerful engine, or exploring more exotic methods. Still, it's good to see you've got your priorities straight.
If Earth can control the comet transport system we will run the Milkyway. Think about that
— Jose Canseco (@JoseCanseco) November 13, 2014This is honestly a bit too optimistic. Remember when we said space was big? The nearest star system to our sun is Alpha Centauri, which is 4.37 light-years away. That translates into about 25 trillion miles, which is, like, a lot. Even the fastest comet would take thousands and thousands of years to get there.
That's to say nothing of the danger of running into aliens. What if they're mean aliens? Dial it back a bit, Jose.
hug for u NASA #cansecomet
— Jose Canseco (@JoseCanseco) November 13, 2014Strong finish. I'm sure NASA is grateful for the hug. Might want to circle back on the whole #cansecomet thing, though. Seems a little vain, you know?
Overall, I rate this proposal INCOMPLETE, but I'm glad to know that you're still reaching for the stars, Jose. Even if we might be better off with an Alcubierre warp drive or maybe a solar sail than this whole comet thing.
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