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Humans Will Never Colonize Mars

gizmodo.com

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Re: Humans Will Never Colonize Mars

#121

Post by dahdum »

mr_crankypants wrote: post #35
nolok wrote: post #7

The way I see it, there are two goals to human space travels. The first, very distant one, is to seed ourselves among the stars to avoid being erased from existence by anything that would threaten our existence on earth, from man made cataclysm to natural event. The second, with much more immediate result on a human scale, is that every time we face such a challenge it's only an opportunity for us to develop a new te…

I honestly think that both of those are weak reasons. The first is a problem for other generations; on our own time scale we should focus on the problems that affect us on our own time scale. The second is just not compelling; space exploration is hardly the only endeavor that produces spinoff technology, and it's far from certain that it's the best or most productive way to do so. There has only ever been one goal t…

> There has only ever been one goal that has actually driven us to push our horizons further out into space, and I think it's the only one that really makes sense: We do it for the challenge and for the adventure.

Individuals may think like that, but I think you're downplaying the Space Race. There was immense fear of the Soviet space domination, it was seen as an existential threat. If there could be only one goal driving us to those furthest horizons, it'd have to be conflict.

From the same speech as your quote:

"For the eyes of the world now look into space, to the moon and to the planets beyond, and we have vowed that we shall not see it governed by a hostile flag of conquest, but by a banner of freedom and peace. We have vowed that we shall not see space filled with weapons of mass destruction, but with instruments of knowledge and understanding:

JFK to Congress

"If we are to win the battle that is now going on around the world between freedom and tyranny, the dramatic achievements in space which occurred in recent weeks should have made clear to us all, as did the Sputnik in 1957, the impact of this adventure on the minds of men everywhere, who are attempting to make a determination of which road they should take. . . . Now it is time to take longer strides—time for a great new American enterprise—time for this nation to take a clearly leading role in space achievement, which in many ways may hold the key to our future on Earth"

Re: Humans Will Never Colonize Mars

#122

Post by just_myles »

I will say that there are +7 billion human beings on this planet all requiring their share of resources. We need to do this. Nothing wrong with a dissenting pov in good faith. That is part of the process and how these kinds of things work.

Re: Humans Will Never Colonize Mars

#124

Post by Armisael16 »

Balgair wrote: post #114
nolok wrote: post #7

The way I see it, there are two goals to human space travels. The first, very distant one, is to seed ourselves among the stars to avoid being erased from existence by anything that would threaten our existence on earth, from man made cataclysm to natural event. The second, with much more immediate result on a human scale, is that every time we face such a challenge it's only an opportunity for us to develop a new te…

To get a self-sustaining Mars base working and to be able to leave the base and go back to Earth would require some real nifty engineering and automation. Stuff that would transfrom the Earth before lift-off. Think about it. To get off of Mars, you have two options really. Land the take-off rocket with the fuel in it or land it dry and then fuel it up. Landing a take-off rocket wet is super hard, especially on what a…

...or you don’t dig your fuel out of the ground but rather extract it from the atmosphere. Methalox rockets use CH4 + 2O2 -> 2H2O + CO2

The carbon and oxygen needed can be extracted from the atmosphere; the rocket only needs to bring the hydrogen - just 1/12th of required fuel mass.

Re: Humans Will Never Colonize Mars

#125

Post by randyrand »

Mikeb85 wrote: post #41
adamsb6 wrote: post #32

One possible motive for large numbers of people to colonize Mars: escaping the control of Earth governments. It’s like seasteading except that when you get up to something the governments really don’t like the cost of intervening is extraordinarily high. On Mars we can build our society of genetically engineered supermen that engage in plural marriage, ritual funerary cannabilism, and telekinesis.

Only problem is that the only entities that will be able to colonize Mars as well as project power will be those same Earth governments.

The USA was colonized by the British but is no longer ruled by it.

Re: Humans Will Never Colonize Mars

#126

Post by solveit »

s_r_n wrote: post #98

The author is listing facts about Mars that are pretty basic and well-known in the first two paragraphs and proceeds to talk in generalized terms about how we will never get around these obstacles. These are all basic facts about Mars that the engineers working on these problems know very well. Simply listing these facts as proof that colonizing Mars will never work seems overly pessimistic.

I agree. This is basically every pessimistic article on every subject by a non-expert and almost all of them should be ignored.

Re: Humans Will Never Colonize Mars

#127

Post by b_tterc_p »

ars wrote: post #90
b_tterc_p wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

help me wrap my head around that. If you’re in -40 in a low pressure atmosphere, it doesn’t cool you down faster because there’s less mass for your heat to transfer to? Does that mean things don’t cool down in a vacuum? Is there a weird curve where by at some point having less cold gas arounds you means you’ll cool down faster instead of slower?

> help me wrap my head around that Think about when it's cold, and when it's cold and windy. Low pressure air is like "anti" wind, even less cold then no wind on earth.

So windchill is better interpreted as you will lose body heat as if it were this temperature without wind, but the actual temperature is still the same?

Re: Humans Will Never Colonize Mars

#128

Post by frabbit »

solveit wrote: post #126
s_r_n wrote: post #98

The author is listing facts about Mars that are pretty basic and well-known in the first two paragraphs and proceeds to talk in generalized terms about how we will never get around these obstacles. These are all basic facts about Mars that the engineers working on these problems know very well. Simply listing these facts as proof that colonizing Mars will never work seems overly pessimistic.

I agree. This is basically every pessimistic article on every subject by a non-expert and almost all of them should be ignored.

Absolutely: there is literally _nothing_ about blockchain in this article.

Re: Humans Will Never Colonize Mars

#129

Post by keiru »

s_r_n wrote: post #98

The author is listing facts about Mars that are pretty basic and well-known in the first two paragraphs and proceeds to talk in generalized terms about how we will never get around these obstacles. These are all basic facts about Mars that the engineers working on these problems know very well. Simply listing these facts as proof that colonizing Mars will never work seems overly pessimistic.

Well, I agree there is not that much merit in the article for pointing out the obvious, but if the emperor has no clothes someone needs to say it.

The engineers working on these problems will never solve them in a cost-effective manner. Never. A lot of new cool tech will come out of the space race, but never will (current versions of) humans live in a self-sustained Mars. And I'm not counting exporting scientific research and souvenir rocks as being self-sustainable.

PS: I'm not rejecting the idea that eventually big actors like states might compete for automated resource extraction and production of war commodities, nuke tests, etc. It's just human habitability that I question.

Re: Humans Will Never Colonize Mars

#130

Post by keiru »

jnurmine wrote: post #113

Robert Zubrin figured out a plausible plan to put a colony on Mars, yet the article fails to mention Zubrin and his Mars (Semi-)Direct plans. Colonizing Mars with a small team of experts is possible and within our technological and financial means to do so within a decade or so. However, the interesting question to me is not "can/how can Mars be colonized" but rather why would people move to Mars in the first place.…

>Colonizing Mars with a small team of experts

Like the thousand people in Antartica right now? I just wouldn't call it colonization.

>The lack of a plausible business model which could profit from having people live on Mars is the main gating factor.

Right on the money here. Save for space research, what could you possibly do on Mars that you couldn't do more cheaply and comfortably in the crowded Earth? Resource extraction only becomes cost-effective if its self-sufficient and automated enough, and which point human presence there would be more comparable to an oil rig than a colony.

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