• Question: will humans be able to fly with no support

    Asked by anon-209817 to Verity, Sergio, Nick, Maria, David, Annette on 12 Mar 2019.
    • Photo: Sergio Adan Bermudez

      Sergio Adan Bermudez answered on 12 Mar 2019:

      It took millions of years for primitive creatures to be able to fly. Humans have never got the necessity of flying really. Therefore it is very unlikely that humans will develop such potential. We could use passive supporting systems such as air-gliding and the use of a membrane to catch wind waves and currents.

    • Photo: Nick Werren

      Nick Werren answered on 12 Mar 2019:

      Gravity is your enemy if you want to fly, so that’s what we’re going to have to fight if you want to be like a bird and soar through the sky!

      Can humans fly on Earth with no support? To do this we would need wings or a jet pack or some kind of technology that would allow us to do this. Maybe in the distant future we could modify people’s genes to allow them to fly but then they wouldn’t be human! So the answer is probably not unless you develop anti-gravity technology.

      BUT

      Can humans fly in space with no support? Yes! If the gravity is very low then we can fly whenever we want, just by jumping.

    • Photo: David Whitworth

      David Whitworth answered on 12 Mar 2019:

      With no support would probably either mean gravity needs to be turned of somehow, or we grew wings. Now if gravity got turned off, bad things would happen, everything, including our atmosphere would slowly float away into space. If we grew wings we would have to try really hard to force evolution to allow us to do that, which would take millions of years.

    • Photo: Annette Raffan

      Annette Raffan answered on 13 Mar 2019:

      There is the effect of gravity, but the major problem for humans is that our bones are far too dense and our muscles are not designed for it. Birds have very light bones by having lots of air spaces in them. This makes them light and their wings don’t need to be too big. Plus they have very strong flying muscles which can allow them to move their wings around.
      Because we are so heavy comparative to birds for our size, we would need a wing span of 6.7m to fly! Whilst in theory this could be possible to make for example, you would not have the strength to move them or manipulate them for a successful flight because they’d be too heavy and the wind resistance on them too much.

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