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Saturn's largest moon may be the only place beyond Earth where humans could live

blogs.scientificamerican.com

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Re: Saturn's largest moon may be the only place beyond Earth where humans could live

#321

Post by bloopernova »

hutzlibu wrote: post #191
bloopernova wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My big idea for Venus, assuming infinite power, would be to shoot a series of big asteroids past it and use the gravity/inertia drag to make it spin faster. Then, when Venus is spinning fast enough, collide the asteroids together to give Venus a moon and tides. While all that is going on, use some sort of huge electromagnet to spin Venus' internal heavy core to provide a strong magnetic field to deflect nasty stuff f…

I assume, once you have allmost self replicating robots, who can do mining asteroids and building factories to build more of them and mine more and build more .. you would not need ten of thousands of years. Maybe even only some decades.

I figured tens of thousands of years mostly for the crust reprocessing on Venus itself, for the asteroids to coalesce into a big hot blob, and for the moon blob to cool down.

Re: Saturn's largest moon may be the only place beyond Earth where humans could live

#322

Post by baron816 »

The whole idea of colonizing other parts of the solar system just seems like a fool’s errand to me. Colonizing Antarctica or even the bottom of the oceans seems like a more practical endeavor to me.

As uninhabitable as Antarctica is, just think about the advantages it has over a place like Mars or Titan: a breathable Earth pressure atmosphere, 1G gravity, abundant water, not outrageously extreme temperatures, low radiation levels, close to civilization, etc.

Probably most importantly, you don’t have to escape Earth’s gravitational pull to get there. In fact, you can use one of humankind’s earliest inventions—a boat.

If we were really afraid of an extinction level event such as a nuclear war or extreme climate change, humanity could survive by doing the same sorts of things here that we would have to do on Mars—building large underground habitats. Except, we could survive in much larger numbers since it would be so so so much cheaper to build those habitats here.

Re: Saturn's largest moon may be the only place beyond Earth where humans could live

#323

Post by lurquer »

Let's start with a self-sustainable colony at the South Pole. Or, for that matter, a self-sustainable colony in Death Valley.

"But even if we could, why would anyone want to?" you might ask...

And that's the point.

Nobody would want to as there is no economic reason to be there.

My two cents: we'll never colonize a moon or planet. There are, on the other hand, some economic perks to manufacturing in zero-g. Consequently, I'd put my money in massive orbiting space stations.

Re: Saturn's largest moon may be the only place beyond Earth where humans could live

#324

Post by mjevans »

bayesian_horse wrote: post #294

Both Mars and Titan currently lack an economical reason to try and live there. As long as it's just about the science or bragging rights, it will be completely paid for from earth's resources, instead of building on its own. Any idea what tangible "export products" could make a Mars colony sustainable? I don't think space tourism is enough.

Re: Economics

'The belt' would best be mined by automated, semi-remote controlled machines.

The Moon offers a good target to fire those resources at (aim to roughly keep it's orbital momentum the same), a low but not No G fab area with easy access to 'free' vacuum, and is usefully close to Earth orbits.

Mars... I can't really think of any particular thing it does better offhand, that couldn't instead...

Lagrange Points (L4 and L5) offer areas usefully distant from Earth for scientific and world-ending-event backup purposes, have a relatively low escape velocity, and are "safer" in that they draw masses to stay near them. This would be a great place to park a large rock (for shielding) and core out the inside.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lagrangian_point

Re: Saturn's largest moon may be the only place beyond Earth where humans could live

#325

Post by njarboe »

baron816 wrote: post #322

The whole idea of colonizing other parts of the solar system just seems like a fool’s errand to me. Colonizing Antarctica or even the bottom of the oceans seems like a more practical endeavor to me. As uninhabitable as Antarctica is, just think about the advantages it has over a place like Mars or Titan: a breathable Earth pressure atmosphere, 1G gravity, abundant water, not outrageously extreme temperatures, low rad…

People don't dream of traveling to other planets to create a backup civilization for Earth. That is what those people tell the ones who don't understand their dream and why they should support it. People want to explore because a certain segment of the population would love the adventure, danger, excitement, thrill, and exotic experience. One also has the chance of creating new places outside of existing governance structures. A group of people who start building a city on Antarctica would likely be kicked off by force in a short period of time. On Mars, who knows?

Re: Saturn's largest moon may be the only place beyond Earth where humans could live

#326

Post by abdullahkhalids »

njarboe wrote: post #325
baron816 wrote: post #322

The whole idea of colonizing other parts of the solar system just seems like a fool’s errand to me. Colonizing Antarctica or even the bottom of the oceans seems like a more practical endeavor to me. As uninhabitable as Antarctica is, just think about the advantages it has over a place like Mars or Titan: a breathable Earth pressure atmosphere, 1G gravity, abundant water, not outrageously extreme temperatures, low rad…

People don't dream of traveling to other planets to create a backup civilization for Earth. That is what those people tell the ones who don't understand their dream and why they should support it. People want to explore because a certain segment of the population would love the adventure, danger, excitement, thrill, and exotic experience. One also has the chance of creating new places outside of existing governance s…

"We began as wanderers, and we are wanderers still. We have lingered long enough on the shores of the cosmic ocean. We are ready at last to set sail for the stars." Carl Sagan

Re: Saturn's largest moon may be the only place beyond Earth where humans could live

#327

Post by scrumbledober »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #317
palisade wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A floating habitat on Venus is actually more attractive. Venus (upper atmosphere): -human livable temperatures with modest temperature control -Earth-like pressure (Himalayans) leads to slow leaks that can be patched, and pressure can be increased inside to stop the leaks inward -protected by thick atmosphere from radiation, meteors, asteroids -strong magnetic field against radiation -atmosphere still thin enough for…

> the escape velocity from Mars requires a massive rocket equivalent to the one we use to leave Earth and therefore more fuel leaving less payload for delivering other resources or supplies Wait, what? Isn't escape velocity from Mars lower than that from Venus? The surface gravity is far lower on Mars. I also note that you list "no surrounding breathable atmosphere" as a negative for a rotating space station, but the…

i'm not sure how the math works out but you would be launching from a much much higher altitude than ground level on venus, whereas on mars you would be launching from roughly ground level.

Re: Saturn's largest moon may be the only place beyond Earth where humans could live

#328

Post by JoeAltmaier »

JdeBP wrote: post #302
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've often wondered if crashing a metropolis-sized piece of ice into Venus might help? Deflected from Saturn's rings or some such. The water vapor could cool it/reflect sunlight.

Have you considered how much kinetic energy it would have, coming all of the way down the well from Saturn?

Enough to ionize the water molecules into H and O? Which returns hydrogen to the atmosphere, which is the missing component causing the runaway greenhouse effect?

Re: Saturn's largest moon may be the only place beyond Earth where humans could live

#329

Post by scrumbledober »

Fjolsvith wrote: post #318
beefman wrote: post #201

The dangers of radiation on Mars are greatly exaggerated. The dangers of low gravity on Titan and elsewhere are greatly understated, as is the immense distance between Mars and Titan. A floating habitat on Venus is harder and less attractive in every way than a rotating space station, which is clearly our next milestone in space. In terms of planets though, there's a reason Mars gets the most attention: it's obviousl…

The distance would be mitigated with a 1g thrust drive. It would reduce the transit time between Earth and Mars to three days, with the ship accelerating to midpoint and decelerating from there. We just need a craft that can thrust that strength for three days straight.

A craft that can sustain a 1g thrust for three days straight is the most outlandish idea in this entire thread.

Re: Saturn's largest moon may be the only place beyond Earth where humans could live

#330

Post by magduf »

rootbear wrote: post #230
beefman wrote: post #201

The dangers of radiation on Mars are greatly exaggerated. The dangers of low gravity on Titan and elsewhere are greatly understated, as is the immense distance between Mars and Titan. A floating habitat on Venus is harder and less attractive in every way than a rotating space station, which is clearly our next milestone in space. In terms of planets though, there's a reason Mars gets the most attention: it's obviousl…

I, too, have concerns about how well humans will thrive in low gravity (the moon, Mars, etc). Over time, we could evolve a branch of humanity, "Homo ares", for Mars, but it won't be easy. Venus is just a tragic waste of a planet. So close to Earth in size, so wrong in every other way.

Maybe we should work on terraforming it: use various processes to change the atmosphere and stop the runaway greenhouse affect, shed the excess heat into space, and build an earth-normal atmosphere.

However, it does seem like building rotating space stations (like O'Neil cylinders) is much more feasible.

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