“Well, it sounds crazy, but they’ve figured out that a space ship would be going faster than anyone could think.”
“But you think instantaneously,” I objected.
“Oh, no. It takes a fraction of a second, even for the fastest thinker. Let’s say the ship was making a hundred miles a second—and that’s slow compared with what they expect eventually. Everything would happen faster than your nerve impulses could register it. Your comprehension would always be lagging a split second behind the space ship’s operation.”
“I don’t see why that’s so serious,” I said.
“Suppose radar or some other device warned you a meteorite was coming toward you head-on. Or maybe some instrument indicated an error in navigation. By the time your mind registered the thought, the situation would have changed.”
“Then all the controls would have to be automatic,” I said. I told him that I had heard about plans for avoiding meteorites. “Electronic controls would be faster than thought.”
“That’s probably the answer,” he agreed. “Of course, at a hundred miles a second it might not be too serious. But if they ever get up to speeds like a thousand miles a second, that mental lag could make an enormous difference, whether it was a meteorite heading toward you or a matter of navigation.”
One of the problems he mentioned was the lack of gravity. I had already learned about this. Once away from the earth’s pull, objects in the space ship would have no weight. The slightest push could send crewmen floating around the sealed compartment.
“Suppose you spilled a cup of coffee,” said the flight surgeon. “What would happen?”
I said I hadn’t thought it out.