> JS>>Then I stumbled upon a book I'd had in the 1970's.
 > JS>>There it clearly stated, in 1972, that in the 1960's NASA had had a
 > JS>>working ION engine. It ran for 40 hours on a test bed - 30+ years ago.
 > JS>>It was supposed to be the next generation space probe engine. But it's
 > JS>>not.
 > JS>Work on them continued thru the 70s until today where they
 > JS>finally have truely reliable working engines. One is about to be
 > JS>used on NASA's "Deep Space-1" space probe, to be launched this
 > JS>year I understand.
 >         Ion engines are nothing more than improved rockets. What
 > we need
 > is more research into elementary particle physics. Maybe after the
 > superstring theory is completed, batter "engines" will be
 > developed (one
 > that produces gravity and anti-gravity). Until then we'll be
 > always
 > stuck on Earth.
 >         Rockets were already explained by Newtons laws. That's
 > couple hundred years old.
We may be stuck here, but not our machines. Eventually, our probes
will be found by another intelligent species. ...Perhaps captured
by the gravitational pull of some other star or planet, some
unexpecting race is in for a surprize.
The same could happen to us at some point in the future.
Regards,
Jack
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