space(time), the final frontier...

forget the space shuttle for a moment. I watched "Planet of the Apes" last night w/the boys. as I explained to them, "it is a classic, meaning old but good". thought it was funny how it starts out w/Charlton Heston smoking a cigar and philosophizing in his little spaceship. really, what kind of scrubbing/filtering technology would be required to maintain breathable air on a spacecraft so that smoking would be no problem? hey, maybe thats why the air leak in Stewarts chamber caused her to age prematurely :) ...I then expounded on the possibility of time travel via near light speeds - Einsteins relativity theory in a nutshell. "no, nobody has ever done that yet" I claimed, "and it may not be possible anyway". the problem, as I recall, is the decceleration from near light speed - that is where you would lose all the big jump forward you made. but what do I know? the really laughable part of the movie was the idea that in 2000 years from now anyone (much less apes) would still be speaking and writing 20th century English. I'll stop there; I realize it's science fiction which requires a suspension of belief. it's just that good science fiction doesn't require you to suspend too much...