[mperham]

I think realistically we have to reduce our body mass by 99% if we want to go interplanetary, much less interstellar. It's extremely expensive to drag around 70kg of meat and minimizing weight is key to making solar sails work.

[samus]

The mass of the actual meatsacks inside the spaceship is barely anything compared to the rest of it. A true step forward would be to rengineer ourselves to be way smaller. Santi-like.

[mperham]

That’s what I mean, reduce us and the entire ship can be reduced too. We can’t go interplanetary with humans as evolved today. Solar sails can only push a very small payload.

[JumpCrisscross]

> reduce us and the entire ship can be reduced too

You may enjoy "Gentle Seduction" by Marc Stiegler [1].

TL; DR Leave the meat part in place and project your consciousness through offboard sensors.

[1] http://www.skyhunter.com/marcs/GentleSeduction.html

[owenpalmer]

We definitely don't need to reduce it for interplanetary travel.

[jandrese]

I kind of suspect that working out suspended animation would be easier than trying to shrink humans. You can save a lot of mass by minimizing the amount of space you need via keeping the humans dormant for the entire trip and while also reducing food and water needs. Tightly pack them in, surround them with cargo to help with radiation shielding, and keep them hibernating for the entire trip.

[downrightmike]

Embryos are small, and data is free.

[deadbabe]

I think we’ll just probably convert ourselves into data and beam ourselves across space at the speed of light and install ourselves into machines deployed at various sites.

[ASalazarMX]

Copy, not convert. The copies will be the ones exploring the new worlds while the originals continue their mundane life.

[deadbabe]

That’s just short term thinking. Imagine being a copy, you will know no difference.

[ASalazarMX]

Except I'd be the one left behind, so I'd really know the difference, and if my copy was good, it would also know it's the copy and the original was left behind.

[cobalt60]

Quantum/Jump/Warp drives and portals?

[knowitnone]

Sure, let's remove 70kg. That'll get the ship moving...not.

[mperham]

You’re missing the fact that most of the weight of a spaceship is to support that 70kg and accelerate the whole thing. Watch this discussion about getting to Alpha Centauri.

https://youtu.be/uZN5xjoS6TU?si=05xuUdWsWADrZY-i

[dmonitor]

that's a fun thought experiment, but not at all practical