Tsiolkovsky vs. Stapledon [was Jupiter Brain meme]

From: Eugene Leitl (eugene.leitl@lrz.uni-muenchen.de)
Date: Tue Aug 17 1999 - 11:57:07 MDT


Robert J. Bradbury writes:
> I'm not sure whether he dealt with trans-humanism per se but
> he definately included interstellar colonization in his
> "Plan for Space Exploration" (published ~1926).

Blueskyeing is cheap, one of Tsiolkovsky's better points was that his
speculations were based on hard science and real numbers (e.g. he
mentions escape velocity, multi-stage rockets, and lots of other
goodies). (He didn't understand continuous burn rockets, though, IIRC
he suggested fuelling them with a rapid sequence of explosions,
occuring in a conical chamber (not Lavalle)).

I think a lot of his work predates ~1926, where a number of rocket
enthusiasts (GIRD) were already active world wide.

Unfortunately I never came around reading any of his works.



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