Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species [video] • Hacker News Board

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species [video]

#451

Post by ElComradio » Tue, Sep 27, 2016, 9:17 PM UTC

monk_e_boy wrote: post #441

ElComradio wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, this is coming from a guy who apparently thinks the height of subversive humor is naming cars to spell SEX and sending people into fits of giggles that it's called the BFR. A frat house environment does not seem all that out of place in this context.

Isn't that just a part of having a personality? In the planning stages you give something a silly name and it kinda sticks, especially when it's the big boss who came up with the name. Kinda like the "heart of gold" -- it tickles Elon.

There's nothing wrong with any of that, but you can't complain if your audience follows your lead. Not that Musk was complaining (to the best of my knowledge) but others on his behalf.

If I chair a board meeting wearing a clown nose, I can't complain when the members pull out squirt guns.

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species [video]

#452

Post by wyager » Tue, Sep 27, 2016, 9:18 PM UTC

kchoudhu wrote: post #443

wyager wrote: post #425

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Who gets to go? According to Musk, whoever pays. > Who rules? Not to be flippant, but who cares? The worst case scenario is that we repeat British colonialism and the martians overthrow the despotic earth government in a few generations. Same as always, the colony is too far away for the motherland to effectively maintain control. The important thing is getting humans to Mars; all the short-term stuff is important,…

> Whoever pays So Mars is going to be a colony of the developed world elite. > Who cares A million people generate is not short term or small scale. Property rights, criminal law and all of these other things that make civilization civilization will need to be hashed before we get out there. > Musk clearly wants to This is pristine, unspoiled nature we're talking about. There are immense ecological concerns here that…

> So Mars is going to be a colony of the developed world elite.

Sounds awesome! Decreases the chances of them being politically abused.

> will need to be hashed before we get out there.

They probably will be for the most part, but why do you say "need" to? Should we screw around here on earth until we figure out some utopian system that's going to make everyone happy (good luck), or should we accept that it's OK to be adaptive and figure some things out as we go?

> This is pristine, unspoiled nature we're talking about.

That's one way of putting it. Another is "lifeless, barren, frozen, useless desert".

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species [video]

#453

Post by moosey » Tue, Sep 27, 2016, 9:19 PM UTC

pdabbadabba wrote: post #410

3minus1 wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bingo! Aside from his dot-com successes, his other ventures are still in the early stages with uncertain futures. History could prove him a visionary or merely foolhardy. I don't get the hero-worship.

This seems unfairly negative. It may strictly be true that his ventures are "still in the early stages with uncertain futures." But the ambition and degree of difficulty of those ventures is also relevant. If you look at Tesla and SpaceX, I'd say the degree of success so far, relative to the degree of difficulty, is quite remarkable.

In addition, I'll bet that if he ended up broke, but having significantly pushed forward various technological ideas, he wouldn't consider it a failure.

Some folks who only focus on wealth would call it foolhardy regardless, though.

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species [video]

#454

Post by DrNuke » Tue, Sep 27, 2016, 9:19 PM UTC

Miserable sods are not an exception in the human history but, until now, doers have always had the last laugh. Steps may be faster without them but, you know, the higher the target, the more substantial the effort to get rid of miserable sods. It must be noted that it often happened that miserable sods' arguments helped improve the process overall, so I'm pretty sure SpaceX is taking note of the most intelligent arguments over here to improve their products.

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species [video]

#455

Post by joeyspn » Tue, Sep 27, 2016, 9:20 PM UTC

dudus wrote: post #277

Watching live the announcement and presentation by Elon on https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1YxNYiyALg Where the hell did they get this audience from? Is this hosted on a frat house with some academic invites? There's a dude jokingly saying that burning man felt like mars with a lot of shit and no water, there's a guy plugging his comic book, there's a guy making a joke on how we should send Michael Cera to Mars, a g…

Let's hope some of the people from the Q&A session will be banned from getting a ticket to Mars, or soon we'll make humans a specie of multiplanetary idiots.

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species [video]

#456

Post by MaxfordAndSons » Tue, Sep 27, 2016, 9:21 PM UTC

ythl wrote: post #334

brey wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a phrase I'm fond of: The man who says it can't be done needs to get out of the way of the man who's doing it.

At least in my case, I see trying to start a Mars colony as a death trap. It's the illusion of carrying on the human race, but it's really just dooming a bunch of pioneers to a grim fate in an extremely hostile environment. I think making a south pole colony would be hard enough, let alone a Mars one.

I mean, Musk himself is very upfront about the risks involved, especially for the first few waves of colonists. And indeed, there would likely be very little personal upside for them, even if they survived the grueling initial period. But you're making a false equivocation: considering the colonists personal risks in leaving against the species shared risk in staying. If there's even a small chance of success in establishing a self-sustaining colony off of Earth (and I don't think you can argue that success is inconceivable/vanishingly improbable), then any degree of personal risks levied on individual colonists are "worth it" from the species level perspective, which is precisely the perspective taken to justify the mission.

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species [video]

#457

Post by hmate9 » Tue, Sep 27, 2016, 9:21 PM UTC

cs702 wrote: post #447

To the US Federal Government: PLEASE. FUND. THIS. Loan the money to SpaceX, or partner with private investors, or increase NASA's budget and have NASA pay for it. Just make it happen. Even if this project fails, the benefits from having a lot of smart people trying to get to and establish a colony on Mars will pay dividends for a long time. Please make it happen!

If I recall correctly Elon said they have the money. That the project is costing them <5% of SpaceX.

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species [video]

#458

Post by tomrod » Tue, Sep 27, 2016, 9:22 PM UTC

Florin_Andrei wrote: post #371

wmccullough wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're my hero! This attitude is why I quit regularly contributing to this site. Any time any single person does something positive, some armchair "expert" comes out the woodworks to tell you how it won't work or can't work.

> Any time any single person does something positive, some armchair "expert" comes out the woodworks to tell you how it won't work or can't work. All public forums go bad once they reach a certain size. Since everything is on a gaussian curve (fat mediocre middle, and two asymptotes, one for greatness, the other for the opposite end), it's just pure statistics that junk comments will start creeping in once the popula…

Pedantic point: not everything is Gaussian. Income, for example, doesn't go below zero. It may not even be log-normal, but rather a power distribution.

Pedantic point aside, you bring up an important point. Can behavioral incentives be aligned to avoid the bottom side of participation?

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species [video]

#459

Post by microtherion » Tue, Sep 27, 2016, 9:22 PM UTC

BurningFrog wrote: post #187

cbau wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Musk just addressed this. Mars has an atmosphere of CO2 and Nitrogen, so we can grow plants, a day length similar to Earth's (24.5 hours), and is larger.

To me, the 2 day vs 6 months commute outweigh that. Then again I haven't done the math. In the long run, there should of course be settlements on both bodies.

The commute may be long, but at least there is an abundance of lanes.

Re: Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species [video]

#460

Post by mrfusion » Tue, Sep 27, 2016, 9:22 PM UTC

wmccullough wrote: post #184

mikeash wrote: post #148

Some of the comments here make me think of crabs in a pot pulling down the ones who try to climb out. Nobody's making you participate in this venture. If you don't like it, then you're free to go do whatever it is you do like. You might think Musk could better direct his efforts and resources elsewhere, but most other billionaires don't do anything all that interesting, they just invest their money in mundane stuff,…

You're my hero! This attitude is why I quit regularly contributing to this site. Any time any single person does something positive, some armchair "expert" comes out the woodworks to tell you how it won't work or can't work.

Yeah check out today's electric airplane thread for another example. Apparently the concept is impossible.