Editing 786: Exoplanets

{{comic
| number    = 786
| date      = August 30, 2010
| title     = Exoplanets
| image     = exoplanets_2010.png
| titletext = I'm just worried that we'll all leave and you won't get to come along!
}}

==Explanation==
[[Beret Guy]] runs to wake up [[Cueball]], who is probably under the covers in bed, with his potentially middle of the night revelation that Humankind is discovering "{{w|exoplanet}}s" or planets that exist outside of our solar system. The indication is that these planets are habitable enough for humans, even if just for a visit. 

Then Beret Guy takes it a bit further thinking that one of the countries on Earth could restart {{w|Project Orion (nuclear propulsion)|Project Orion}}. As Beret suggests, Project Orion was an early project to produce a spacecraft that would ride the shockwave from a series of nuclear bombs it dropped in order to travel very, very fast. However, the one major downside of Project Orion was the fallout that the launching of any such craft would present on Earth. One could try to boost the Orion spacecraft into orbit with conventional rockets, but Orion spacecraft are heavy — being composed of giant pusher plates and rows upon rows of nuclear bombs, they are hard to lift. On top of this, the {{w|Nuclear Test Ban Treaty}} means that the craft would be flatly illegal to build and launch on Earth, no matter what you did. However, if an asteroid mining project were to be started, the Orion drive spacecraft, the nuclear bombs, and all the infrastructure needed to man, build, and crew it could all be built safely in space, well away from the Earth's fragile biosphere, where little harm could be done. Some commercial spaceflight programs are interested in starting asteroid mining in the future, or even now: For example, see: https://www.planetaryresources.com.

In summary, Beret is very excited that we can see (with the Hubble telescope and other earth-bound telescopes) and find exoplanets. Then with some advances in space technology we can create nuclear propulsion in space to reach these planets, and it will all be happening quite possibly within a few decades. He is thus worried that Cueball will miss all of this ongoing excitement.

Cueball would just rather snooze, as he is not impressed. Beret Guy gives him only one snooze because as is apparent in the title text he is afraid that Cueball will be left behind if he snoozes too long! Giving the fact that he just stated that it may take hundreds of years this is of course silly but fits well with Beret Guy's behavior.

Exoplanets have been discovered starting in 1996, but there are still only a few confirmed {{w|List of habitable planet candidates|planet candidates}} in the habitable zone at a distant star. This did change fast after that time since new ways of finding planets are created — see [[1071: Exoplanets]], which was posted with the same title. At that point, there were exactly 786 Exoplanets confirmed — the number of this comic - probably not a coincidence when it comes to [[Randall]].

Part of the humor of this particular strip is that Beret Guy seems to have a sense of urgency and immediacy about something that is actually occurring at a snail's pace over decades, where Cueball finishing sleeping, or hitting snooze twice, couldn't possibly make one crystalline erg of difference.

[[1624: 2016]] is similar to this comic in that in each case, one character wakes up another character in order to inform that character about an event that is neither immediately relevant to that character nor short/urgent enough that that character could miss it if he slept until the morning.

==Transcript==
:[Beret Guy runs into a bedroom arms up calling to someone who is in the bed under the covers. Only part of the bed is visible. The person under the covers speaks. Later part of his face can be seen, and it could be Cueball.]
:Beret guy: Wake up! Wake up!
:Cueball (under the cover): What is it?

:[Beret Guy stands with his arms out talking to Cueball hiding under the covers of the bed now completely inside the panel.]
:Beret guy: We're alive during the time when they're first discovering other planetary systems! They're finding them as fast as they can build new instruments to look for them!

:[In this frame-less panel only Beret Guy is shown standing with one arm out and one arm up looking left away from the off-panel bed.]
:Beret Guy: And if one of Earth's cultures advances its space program enough to start enriching uranium on asteroids, we'll lose the main barrier to restarting Project Orion and building nuke-riding city-ships!

:[Beret Guy bends down, hands on his knees, to eye level with Cueball in the bed, who is finally peeking out from the covers, only showing part of his face (so it could be any character, as any hair could be hidden, and the hat could be on the bed stand).]
:Beret Guy: The only known technology capable of fast interstellar travel could be operational within just a few generations, and we're discovering all these destinations to pick from! 
:Beret Guy: Come ''on!''
:Cueball: Can I hit "snooze"?
:Beret Guy: Okay, but ''just once!''

==Trivia==
*This was the first time Randall released a comic with the exact same name as a previous comic. Since then, he has done so [[:Category:Comics sharing name|a few times]]. When the next exoplanet comic was released, it caused problems on xkcd as the title of the image file were the same for the two comics. This was resolved by renaming this comic's image, adding the year of its release to the title: <code>explanets_2010</code>. This was two years before the next one.

* The number of this comic ([[786: Exoplanets]]) is the same number of planets featured in the comic [[1071: Exoplanets]] (786 planets) with the same title. It isn't clear whether this is a coincidence or Randall purposefully waited for the number of discovered planets to be the same as this comic's number.

*Cueball is not completely visible in this comic, and the last image only shows a face. Given that almost all characters without a beard have the same face, this could be any character, including one with a hat (which could be hidden or outside of the frames) or hair (several of the usual styles). The comic's official transcript refers to this person as "bed man", meaning it isn't intended to be a female character. As it is easier to explain the comic using Cueball's name, and given that he is the usual guy to draw when no particular features are added, it still makes sense to call him Cueball in this comic.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Beret Guy]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Astronomy]]
[[Category:Exoplanets]]
[[Category:Comics sharing name|Exoplanets01]]
[[Category:Nuclear weapons]]