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Why Elon Musk Wants To Bring People to Mars—and Go There Himself

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Re: Why Elon Musk Wants To Bring People to Mars—and Go There Himself

#31

Post by pjscott »

Cushman wrote: post #11

I'm with Carl Sagan. Visit? Yes. Settle? Not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand. Not that there's anything wrong with wanting to go to Mars as a hobby, as a tourist-- if that's how you want to spend your billions, fine. But I worry that too many impatient sci-fi lovers see space travel as some way to escape from the problems of Earth, which it will never be. If we can't figure ou…

Is that just a fancy rhetorical flourish, or do you actually expect "living unsustainably" to potentially cause our extinction? If so, I would be interested in hearing a mechanism.

Re: Why Elon Musk Wants To Bring People to Mars—and Go There Himself

#32

Post by didgeoridoo »

chc wrote: post #27
ramidarigaz wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Insurance for humanity against disaster is a small ROI? Not trying to offend, but how do you define ROI of a colony on Mars?

As far as I can see, there are very, very few disasters that would render Earth less inhabitable than Mars but not also destroy Mars in the process. Even if Earth were reduced to a cold, lifeless rock with almost no atmosphere or water, high radiation levels and almost all sources of energy gone (including geothermal and wind energy and things as simple as burning wood), that would just put it in the same ballpark as…

The scenario that comes to mind is a massive asteroid impact, but your final sentence sums up the objection nicely: identifying and redirecting a space rock seems at least an order of magnitude less difficult & technologically distant than building a self-sustaining colony on Mars.

Re: Why Elon Musk Wants To Bring People to Mars—and Go There Himself

#33

Post by ramidarigaz »

chc wrote: post #27
ramidarigaz wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Insurance for humanity against disaster is a small ROI? Not trying to offend, but how do you define ROI of a colony on Mars?

As far as I can see, there are very, very few disasters that would render Earth less inhabitable than Mars but not also destroy Mars in the process. Even if Earth were reduced to a cold, lifeless rock with almost no atmosphere or water, high radiation levels and almost all sources of energy gone (including geothermal and wind energy and things as simple as burning wood), that would just put it in the same ballpark as…

What about virulent plague? Chemical warfare? Disasters don't have to come from far away.

Re: Why Elon Musk Wants To Bring People to Mars—and Go There Himself

#34

Post by chc »

ramidarigaz wrote: post #33
chc wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as I can see, there are very, very few disasters that would render Earth less inhabitable than Mars but not also destroy Mars in the process. Even if Earth were reduced to a cold, lifeless rock with almost no atmosphere or water, high radiation levels and almost all sources of energy gone (including geothermal and wind energy and things as simple as burning wood), that would just put it in the same ballpark as…

What about virulent plague? Chemical warfare? Disasters don't have to come from far away.

If you're going to survive on Mars, you already need the ability to sustainably disconnect yourself from the surrounding atmosphere (we don't know of any virus that's as lethal as lack of air), so just apply your putative Mars tech to Earth.

Re: Why Elon Musk Wants To Bring People to Mars—and Go There Himself

#35

Post by pjscott »

_gd3l wrote: post #30

Why don't we focus on the shit here first? I'm sorry, but I just get frustrate with all these wondrous predictions that always seem to be about 30-50 years in the future. Short enough away to be enticing, but long enough away where no one making these predictions will really he held accountable for their ridiculousness. It just seems that every single generation a) has some "new threat" for "how the world will end" a…

We can do both. Hell, even Elon Musk can do both; he also runs Tesla Motors, which makes electric cars on Earth.

Also, I notice that people are much more likely to condemn space development as frivolous than they are to criticize, say, football or whittling. Does that seem like a double standard to you, too?

Re: Why Elon Musk Wants To Bring People to Mars—and Go There Himself

#36

Post by ramidarigaz »

chc wrote: post #34
ramidarigaz wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about virulent plague? Chemical warfare? Disasters don't have to come from far away.

If you're going to survive on Mars, you already need the ability to sustainably disconnect yourself from the surrounding atmosphere (we don't know of any virus that's as lethal as lack of air), so just apply your putative Mars tech to Earth.

Air is just one of many possible infection pathways. You would also need to quarantine people, food shipments, water supplies, equipment.

Re: Why Elon Musk Wants To Bring People to Mars—and Go There Himself

#37

Post by samstave »

rbanffy wrote: post #5

Mars is a very harsh environment - and it's very far from Earth (6 months best case with current propulsion technology). I'd suggest a permanent base on the Moon as a useful first step - it has some water, abundant energy, plenty of Aluminum, Magnesium, Titanium and a lack of atmosphere that makes metallurgy easy. Radiation is worse than Mars, but, in both cases, buried housing structures make sense and the Moon's lo…

We need to develop remotely operated building machines first. Test them on the moon and succeed in building a sound, sealed, safe environ for humans to enter before we try to get to mars.

If I were Elon, I would focus on the building of the delivery system to get materials and equipment to the moon - then have an X-prize for people to develop the robots to build stuff.

Get a heavy payload like that to the moon, assemble some stuff and test it. Then make money off moon tourism Parlay this to mars research, funding and experience.

Re: Why Elon Musk Wants To Bring People to Mars—and Go There Himself

#38

Post by paparoger »

jpdoctor wrote: post #10
paparoger wrote: post #3

Mars, sounds great! I am still amazed that the Rovers are still operational.

> I am still amazed that the Rovers are still operational. A lot of people are. I had the pleasure of chatting with the NASA program manager in charge of one of the rovers. She was a bit hilarious: When it came time to set the height of one of the mission cameras, someone whipped out a ruler and measured the distance from the floor to her eyes -- and then wrote it in the spec. Her comment on the first manned mission:…

Ha, now that's comical!

Re: Why Elon Musk Wants To Bring People to Mars—and Go There Himself

#39

Post by ceejayoz »

greeneggs wrote: post #28
ceejayoz wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right now, an asteroid could wipe out humanity with pretty minimal warning. There's something major to be said for at least a small self-sustaining colony somewhere else.

Except we can defend the earth from an asteroid for probably five orders of magnitude less money than establishing a self-sustaining colony somewhere else. And if self sustaining is all you need, setting up a self-sustaining colony a mile underground is also five or six orders of magnitude cheaper. I can't think of any risk to humanity where going to the moon or Mars makes sense as insurance.

> Except we can defend the earth from an asteroid for probably five orders of magnitude less money than establishing a self-sustaining colony somewhere else.

If we find out about it decades or centuries out. If it's a year out when we spot it, there's very little we can do with current technology to head it off (asteroid disaster movie plots notwithstanding).

> And if self sustaining is all you need, setting up a self-sustaining colony a mile underground is also five or six orders of magnitude cheaper.

It's also much more accessible by desperate refugees trying to get in as the planetary disaster approaches.

Re: Why Elon Musk Wants To Bring People to Mars—and Go There Himself

#40

Post by ceejayoz »

rbanffy wrote: post #19
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say that with authority. Care to share your reasoning? Folks went as far (in terms of travel time) to desolate places to make a future before. You are likely descended from some of them.

None of them had to take their own air.

Mars colonists won't need to, either.
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