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Liquid water 'lake' revealed on Mars

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Liquid water 'lake' revealed on Mars

#301

Post by hutzlibu »

omegaworks wrote: post #276
civilitty wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's very tough to explain to someone who hasn't worked on large multidisciplinary projects with mandates to push some sort of boundaries like in exploration, science, and technology. This isn't some theoretical discussion by futurists, there is ample evidence that these kinds of ventures have systemic effects that touch literally every person, socioeconomic class, and daily activity. Academia and private industry ha…

We need a mandate to solve the climate issue and create a sustainable economy on this planet. We humans have a biological human desire to remain alive and eat food. I would argue that that is a stronger innate, biological human desire needed for basic evolutionary survival then that for exploration.

" I would argue that that is a stronger innate, biological human desire needed for basic evolutionary survival then that for exploration"

I would argue both is interconnected. With exploring new areas, whether on earth or on mars, new potential spots for human life gets found/get made inhabitable. And even though human sustainable colonisation on mars is far away, we need to start sometimes. Maybe just to make it a serious vision, to give people perspective whi say humankind is doomed anyway as we cannot grow indefinitely ... we can.

But for sure there is lots of potential on earth, like the deserts or the sea (ground), before mars becomes a serious alternative ... nut it is all interconnected. Progress in one area of sustaining life in extreme conditions, benefit other areas.

Besides, there never was a time, when there was no hunger on earth. Now while it would be nice to achieve this, I don't think it is smart to stop everything else until we get there ... if we even can get there.

Re: Liquid water 'lake' revealed on Mars

#302

Post by evanlivingston »

thaumaturgy wrote: post #286
omegaworks wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're presenting an either/or scenario where none was proposed by the poster you were responding to. The thread began begging the wealthiest countries on the planet to contribute a significant amount of that wealth toward space exploration. No one here is making the argument that we should spend no money on space exploration. People are simply arguing against spending significantly more on it when we have more press…

The person I responded to, in the part that I quoted, brought up people without electricity and plumbing as a contrast to spending efforts on exploration. It looks like an either/or to me. > People are simply arguing against spending more on it when we have more pressing issues to contend with. But this argument happens every time the issue of funding space exploration comes up. Every single time. Without fail. Not a…

I think that you have associated my comment with different lines of reasoning presented by other individuals.

I made no argument against funding space exploration. I even said "I'm not arguing here for not exploring other planets". Nor did I discuss prioritizing spending in other ways. Please don't assume an argument against exploration is being made whenever a concern about exploration is raised. We can conduct science and also be seriously critical of it's impacts simultaneously.

I was attempting to critique to the narrative presented by pc86 used to frame our approach to exploration, namely exploration for exploration's sake and to interrogate what progress means to us, particularly because the example used included a comment about colonizing the new world. Sure, it's dangerous to litigate the past but also one of the best teachers about how to go about constructing out future.

Re: Liquid water 'lake' revealed on Mars

#303

Post by ChuckMcM »

stickfigure wrote: post #300
ChuckMcM wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a false dichotomy that always annoys me. It is entirely possible that by spending $400B to safely send people to Mars and live there, especially in a moderately high radiation environment, that we will discover EXACTLY the mechanisms that send cells into cancer states and how to reverse that so they stop. Otherwise we're going to have colonists getting cancer and dying too quickly. Then not only do we get to…

You have that precisely backwards. The humans don't get sent to live in a high-radiation environment until we figure out hot to prevent the cancers. We're not just going to send a bunch of people to their death. This is what irks me about "send people to Mars!" - we aren't anywhere near high enough on the technology tree to even contemplate the endeavor. Or to quote Bruce Sterling: I'll believe in people settling Mar…

I like this image, although when I think about deserts I think about the Mojave desert and the people who died crossing it to get to the gold that was in the Sierra's. Or the oceans people crossed to get to the Americas. While there is 'hospitable' there is 'hard to survive' and I think surviving a journey across the ocean with 16th century tech might have some parallels.

I get the mindset of staying at home around the known campfire and the known wildlife and the known hazards. But I observe that it has never been a winning strategy for humans.

Re: Liquid water 'lake' revealed on Mars

#304

Post by SiempreViernes »

wastedhours wrote: post #188
SiempreViernes wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CERN isn't the crazed rush that the moonshot was, it's mostly just stable funding to a certain facility.

True - it was probably a stretch to include it alongside the VC analogy, but CERN's also delivering projects with unsure outcomes a la most investments [0]. If they turned the LHC on for example and found precisely nothing of note, it'd have been a failed investment, but was certainly worth the punt. I think one of the issues with space exploration for people is that it just feels so pointless and intangible - its pe…

Failed in terms of science spending maybe, but even if they found everything they wanted the intrinsic value of this new knowledge to society is not really valuable in the same sense that the steel needed for the construction is valued.

It is now more than 20 years since the top quark was discovered, has society profited enought from knowing the mass of the top quark that the Tevatron is paid off?

Or is this way of thinking of science funding just destructive?

Re: Liquid water 'lake' revealed on Mars

#305

Post by tw04 »

remote_phone wrote: post #43
ryanmercer wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For any exploratory drilling, or covering any real amount of ground, you need humans. For reference, Opportunity Rover has only traveled 45 km/28 mi in 14 years. A human can collect more specimens in a day than ALL of the rovers have to date. If we remove this year's launch window, you have 10 minimum-energy launch windows in the next 21 years. 2020, 2022, 2024, 2026, 2029, 2031, 2033, 2035, 2037, 2039. If we could g…

I was talking to an oncologist yesterday. Her biggest frustration is that Silicon Valley billionaires are spending billions upon billions to send things to space, when there are serious problems on Earth that could be fought, most importantly cancer. It’s hard to argue with her. $400B/yr would fund a lot of research that would benefit humanity a lot better than a coordinated mission to Mars, even though it would be v…

We won't have to worry about cancer if we get hit by a big enough asteroid and have no backup plan...

I hate to break it to you, while cancer is horrible and I'd never wish it upon anyone, it's not even in the top 10 list of things that threaten our entire species. Hell, it's probably not in the top 100.

Re: Liquid water 'lake' revealed on Mars

#306

Post by Gravityloss »

AstralStorm wrote: post #117
Gravityloss wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or better robots. Not more expensive ones but more launches and faster progress. One would need to iterate and tolerate some failure.

The problem is that any launch to Mars is going to be really expensive, even if you adopt the cheapest known means (currently owned by SpaceX). It might be actually cheaper to solve ancillary problems and actually send humans one than say try 20 unmanned missions... With more benefits too.

The payload cost dwarfs the launch cost. These big missions end up "battlestar galactica" (an actual term used) - a big fail would be a disaster so more money must be spent to really ensure success - meaning it's even bigger - meaning risk must be still lowered.

It's a growth spiral leading to stagnation.

Re: Liquid water 'lake' revealed on Mars

#307

Post by colemannugent »

anonytrary wrote: post #291
colemannugent wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Being able to see the red of Mars at night is strange. Since I (and probably most of us on HN) live in the worst area for light pollution it's not too often you can see other planets like this unaided.

Jupiter and Venus are incredibly bright, you'll be able to see them with the naked eye at night even if you're in a city.

I should clarify: I have seen the planets before, but I can't remember being able to see this much detail without a telescope or binoculars.

Jupiter and Venus look like regular, although very bright, stars. Mars is currently a very visible red circle that is unmistakably a planet.

Re: Liquid water 'lake' revealed on Mars

#308

Post by squarefoot »

remote_phone wrote: post #43
ryanmercer wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For any exploratory drilling, or covering any real amount of ground, you need humans. For reference, Opportunity Rover has only traveled 45 km/28 mi in 14 years. A human can collect more specimens in a day than ALL of the rovers have to date. If we remove this year's launch window, you have 10 minimum-energy launch windows in the next 21 years. 2020, 2022, 2024, 2026, 2029, 2031, 2033, 2035, 2037, 2039. If we could g…

I was talking to an oncologist yesterday. Her biggest frustration is that Silicon Valley billionaires are spending billions upon billions to send things to space, when there are serious problems on Earth that could be fought, most importantly cancer. It’s hard to argue with her. $400B/yr would fund a lot of research that would benefit humanity a lot better than a coordinated mission to Mars, even though it would be v…

Sending stuff in space is a lot more than just loading weight into a rocket and blast it in orbit. The research involved in space missions is huge and involves materials, fuel, energy, health, etc. potentially benefiting every possible field, including those unrelated with space. Even if cancer cure research isn't directly affected, good chances are that cancer detection is.

Re: Liquid water 'lake' revealed on Mars

#309

Post by omegaworks »

hutzlibu wrote: post #301
omegaworks wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need a mandate to solve the climate issue and create a sustainable economy on this planet. We humans have a biological human desire to remain alive and eat food. I would argue that that is a stronger innate, biological human desire needed for basic evolutionary survival then that for exploration.

" I would argue that that is a stronger innate, biological human desire needed for basic evolutionary survival then that for exploration" I would argue both is interconnected. With exploring new areas, whether on earth or on mars, new potential spots for human life gets found/get made inhabitable. And even though human sustainable colonisation on mars is far away, we need to start sometimes. Maybe just to make it a s…

>Besides, there never was a time, when there was no hunger on earth.

We produce enough food, now, to feed every human being on this planet. In fact we make 17% more food per person today then we did 30 years ago, even with the population increasing over that time period. [1]

Ending hunger is an achievable goal.

>I don't think it is smart to stop everything else until we get there

Again, no one is saying we "stop everything else until we get there."

1. https://www.oxfam.ca/there-enough-food-feed-world

Re: Liquid water 'lake' revealed on Mars

#310

Post by orthecreedence »

adventured wrote: post #237
endymi0n wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then again, for the 700 billion dollars defense budget you'd get free universal healthcare and higher education for all of the US — AND would still have a few dozen billions to spare on cancer and Mars expeditions... but who in their right mind would want that?

You're underestimating the cost of US healthcare per capita by an extreme amount. Universal healthcare would cost a minimum of $3.6 trillion (that's an ideal scenario where the US gets its per capita spending down to other high spending nations), and a more likely ~$4.5 trillion. Higher education for all would cost at least $600 billion (close to the existing spending for all post secondary institutions annually), mo…

> You're underestimating the cost of US healthcare per capita by an extreme amount. Universal healthcare would cost a minimum of $3.6 trillion (that's an ideal scenario where the US gets its per capita spending down to other high spending nations), and a more likely ~$4.5 trillion.

I think you're forgetting that right now, the cost of healthcare is externalized to the citizens. So, yes, we'd pay more in taxes for socialized healthcare, but we get more in our paycheck because our companies don't have to deal with private health insurance anymore. Especially with the mandate...everyone is aalready paying for health care in some form or other.

Not to mention that many projections show socialized healthcare would be a net gain as far as money being spent goes.

In other words, socialized healthcare would more than pay for itself, if US citizens weren't so fucking stupid about labeling things "socialism" when it has nothing to do with the workers seizing the means of production.

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