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Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species

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11–20 of 131 posts

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species

#11
post #7

Imagine the wealth a company could amass if it succeeded in terraforming mars. Rare metals, sale of land etc. This is one of those markets where you have rather high barriers to entry.

It wouldn't be able to hold onto all of that wealth really. Even the East India companies couldn't really succeed at acting as nation states.

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species

#12
post #7

Imagine the wealth a company could amass if it succeeded in terraforming mars. Rare metals, sale of land etc. This is one of those markets where you have rather high barriers to entry.

A high barrier to enter and a high barrier to escape, too. Velocity wise.

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species

#13
post #9
post #7

Imagine the wealth a company could amass if it succeeded in terraforming mars. Rare metals, sale of land etc. This is one of those markets where you have rather high barriers to entry.

Each time I'm hearing about minerals (like in asteroid mining) I'm wondering how do you deal with atmosphere re-entry ? Meteorites made of metal are melting so what's the plan here ? And which country will be ok to receive a ton of unguided metal on its territory ?

There's literally 0 chance that mining anything on Mars and bringing it back to Earth would be profitable. Obviously mining is still going to be important to build things on Mars, but sending any metals over, no matter how rare, is just crazy.

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species

#14
post #9
post #7

Imagine the wealth a company could amass if it succeeded in terraforming mars. Rare metals, sale of land etc. This is one of those markets where you have rather high barriers to entry.

Each time I'm hearing about minerals (like in asteroid mining) I'm wondering how do you deal with atmosphere re-entry ? Meteorites made of metal are melting so what's the plan here ? And which country will be ok to receive a ton of unguided metal on its territory ?

Coat the metal in an ablative shield made of Martian rock (handwaving over how this is done), fire it to earth using a mass-driver, guide it in with an on-board chemical rocket engine, and drop it into the Pacific for recovery (more handwaving).

Of course, this also has other uses [1].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinetic_bombardment

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species

#15
post #9
post #7

Imagine the wealth a company could amass if it succeeded in terraforming mars. Rare metals, sale of land etc. This is one of those markets where you have rather high barriers to entry.

Each time I'm hearing about minerals (like in asteroid mining) I'm wondering how do you deal with atmosphere re-entry ? Meteorites made of metal are melting so what's the plan here ? And which country will be ok to receive a ton of unguided metal on its territory ?

I think the whole idea of space/asteroid mining is to use them eventually in space based manufacturing. The biggest cost of space exploration is actually raising a spaceship into outer space. If you just build it up there it's very fuel efficient to transport between space and to other stations/planets.

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species

#16
post #7

Imagine the wealth a company could amass if it succeeded in terraforming mars. Rare metals, sale of land etc. This is one of those markets where you have rather high barriers to entry.

I'm really not sure I want companies to have the capability to re-format entire planets. That sounds like entirely too much power for any organisation to have, if only given its potential for weaponisation. And land sale? The Outer Space Treaty [1] prohibits governments from claiming ownership of planets, so where would the authority to sell land on Mars come from? Do we really want companies to own planets? Weyland-…

Does the concept of "owning" even exist outside of earth? Interesting times.

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species

#18
post #7

Imagine the wealth a company could amass if it succeeded in terraforming mars. Rare metals, sale of land etc. This is one of those markets where you have rather high barriers to entry.

I'm really not sure I want companies to have the capability to re-format entire planets. That sounds like entirely too much power for any organisation to have, if only given its potential for weaponisation. And land sale? The Outer Space Treaty [1] prohibits governments from claiming ownership of planets, so where would the authority to sell land on Mars come from? Do we really want companies to own planets? Weyland-…

The Outer Space Treaty was written with the party states knowing that it was a medium term measure. Capitalism will come to The Moon, Mars, and Venus. It will start with people just building wherever there is available land, like we did on the frontier, then once a couple thousand or a couple hundred thousand people are in outer space a new treaty will be formed around the political realities of the day.

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species

#19
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Each time I'm hearing about minerals (like in asteroid mining) I'm wondering how do you deal with atmosphere re-entry ? Meteorites made of metal are melting so what's the plan here ? And which country will be ok to receive a ton of unguided metal on its territory ?

There's literally 0 chance that mining anything on Mars and bringing it back to Earth would be profitable. Obviously mining is still going to be important to build things on Mars, but sending any metals over, no matter how rare, is just crazy.

You are thinking what we can do right now. Probably the same thought had the Europeans 500 years ago.

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species

#20

Judging by the preview image for the live stream (yeah, I wish I had more to go on, too), this looks to be a long-haul plan for terraforming mars. I wouldn't hold my breath for the first actual settlements up there. That being said: Yes. Oh yes. Fuck yes. All my yesses.

I love the idea BUT…

If we can't terraform Earth's deserts, do we really stand a chance with Mars?

I might be mistaken in my analysis. Still, the only way a colony might survive seems to be by sending tremendous amounts of resources to Mars yearly. They can never hope to be self-sustaining until either astronomically large amounts of time or astronomically large amounts of energy are spent.

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