Non Sequitur by Wiley Miller for May 28, 2009

THE MARTIANS ARE COMING! THE MARTIANS ARE COMING!

At the bar it’s…

Just as long as we are not invaded by Dick Cheney in August.

A little mis-information goes a loo-ong way

Okay, I’m gonna watch SPACED INVADERS

I wonder what Valentine Michael Smith would say about this…

Wait a minute - I thought Dick Cheney WAS from Mars.

I watched an episode of NOVA reporting about a meteor of significant size that is on a collision course with earth. Due to hit in 2019 if I remember correctly. Plus there is a ‘key hole’ the meteor could enter and create extra special havoc. Maybe Jeffrey’s transporter could drag the meteor down a bit and change it’s orbit.

So many have complained of the internet hoax aspect – let me be the first to complain of the anti-gravity thing-a-ma-bob!

ANTI-GRAVITY DOESN’T EXIST! Plus, while I’m at it, you can’t exceed the speed of light, so both Star Trek and Star Wars are just plain stupid!

There, I said it!

Valentine Michael Smith would “Grok” this. (viva Robert Heinlein!)

OK DH, you said it, so what’s your point??? It’s a political cartoon, that’s all. Sometimes it sounds like a tutorial on how to gather news the same way as the Big 3 do it.

And by the way, this stuff is all true, don’t you read the National Enquirer and the Weekly World News? I can hardly wait…

Of course anti-gravity exists - why else would astronauts float about in space? As for the speed of light, in 2000 American scientists moved lasers beams at some 300 times the speed of light, albeit for extemely short periods. Here’s the news story “Beam smashes light barrier”. And, no, it’s not the National Enquirer.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/841690.stm.

Looks like another job for the “Men in Black”.

Astronauts floating is free fall. But theoretically even by the laws of general relativity anti-gravity shouldn’t technically be impossible… just pretty much as close to impossible as one cares to get. But who needs anti-gravity anyway. We have mag-lev! And we’ve already invented teleporters…

I wonder how much martians look like squirrels….

My Mom would call me Miss Information :D

@okeedoekee, no, the asteroid Apophis will definitely come close, but miss, in 2029. The thing about the key window is that, if it hits that region, it will return in 2036 to wallop the Earth. However, astronomers consider that not very likely. Under 1 in 5000 at last estimate I could find. (Edited with more precise and more current information.)

Oh hogwash! (Scoffs!)

I don’t know what to believe anymore. NASA says one thing and Danae says another.

, Does Mars have much OIL ?????????????

Is Osama bin Laden really a Muslim Martian ????????

Does Darth Cheney want to invade Mars, before another 9/11 ???????????

My heart can’t stant the excitement !!!!!!!!!

,

“Mars Attacks”!

Thanks bmonk, I knew the thing had a name. A number also. Man, finally someone who knows what I am talking about.

And EMET, there is a passage in Revalation that reminds me of Apophis. I’ll have to look it up later.

It’s all good.

The thing is, you could just as easily say “Joe Beiden” instead of “Dick Cheney”, maybe more so.

Time to build that border security fence.

Oh, is this a political strip now? :{

I read comics–and this one more than most–for laughs, not for this kind of cheap shot.

Dick Cheney??? HA! We have ALREADY been invaded by BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA the tax and spend, tax and spend, tax and spend, take away our rights and freedoms president.

hey we all know star wars is fake and made up science but the star trek stuff is real

also desperately need non sequitur back in the chicago tribune

On another note, Flo and Cap’n Eddie should be somewhere in the title banner.

OK, we’ve got Apophis sorted out; Google NEO or “Near Earth Objects” for more real angst. The ones to worry about are the dark ones we haven’t seen yet, that could make a mess! More eyes needed; see the NEAT project.

Statistically, a 1 in 5000 chance of a multi-megaton explosion is well worth avoiding! How, you ask? How about solar-sail robots patrolling with cameras, engines and cables, to find, capture and nudge an object into an orbit where we could mine it? Worth stopping a war to re-tool? —- Dick Feynman was asked once (at Asilomar) about anti-gravity. He said (I paraphrase) it was very real, happens all the time; he’s standing on it! Floors, tables, chairs work! —- Think of free fall like this: You’re falling toward the center of Earth from low orbit, but you’re traveling sideways fast enough (about 17,000 mph) that by the time you get there, you’re around to the side 90 degrees away. Works every day! —- I suspect the real Martians will be Bradbury’s; reflected in the canal. Fascinating place, but not move-in-ready yet.

Crankbot - Highly intelligent people are rarely intelligent in all ways.

A brilliant theoretical physicist/engineer might be hopeless at personal relationships, or keeping to a budget.

Intelligent people often ardently believe things other people find silly because the WANT to believe them, and never closely examine them.

Beam me up Scotty, there is no intelligent life down here.

Believe or not doesn’t matter. Just to wonder, explore, discover and wonder some more is intelligence.

Ok, yust to clarify… We (physicists) don’t know what gravity is exactly (yet)… There are several competing theories. The presently most accepted is the theory of general relativity. Well, there are several possible interpretations that allow the existence of anti gravity - although it is very unlikely (for instance: one would need negative mass). However one thing is certain, we have not been able to detect anywhere anything similar. On the other hand, what we really need is the ability to manipulate gravity better (even now we can manipulate it extensively, but it is not good enough). According to the present theories - namely the theory of general relativity - again, it is impossible to travel faster then the speed of light. BUT we can cheat. I have seen the math and it is indeed possible. So called warp speed is not so much of a science fiction (but we would need to manipulate gravity better to achieve that)… However there are other possibilities too. Like artificial worm holes and such… I wonder if the human race didn’t waste its resources in pursuit of profit and power where would be now?