Everybody knows space is awesome. That’s why aliens and the sun
live there. The one draw back is that space is huge. Annoyingly,
impractically huge. The nearest planet is 24 million miles away.
It even takes eight minutes to reach the earth from the sun. The
sun could have just blown up, and you wouldn’t know it until
you’ve finished reading this post and three others. And the rest
of space is just… space. It takes a long time to get to the good
stuff. Almost too long. That’s why NASA (along with the pocket-
protector warriors of DARPA) is spending some real time and
money designing plans for space colonists to take one-way trip
to spread the human species to far-flung space locales. The so-
called “Hundred-Year Starship” program is building the
foundation for an interplanetary version of the Mayflower. Space
colonists would head off into the cosmos, with no real
anticipation of returning to the Earth. The program isn’t some
theoretical message board either. NASA is kicking in $100,000
for the project, while DA