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Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?

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Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?

#51

Post by eru »

azeemba wrote: post #42

The funny thing is that an oxygen-rich environment is a hell-hole! Oxygen is insanely reactive and will corrode anything. Even early life on earth found oxygen toxic. It was released as a waste product by early life and they were so successful that all that oxygen accumulated resulting in the Great Oxidation Event ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Oxidation_Event ). That likely resulted in many species going exti…

Yes, first everything rusted, and then the excess oxygen collected in the atmosphere.

Many of our iron ore deposits we still mine today are from that rusting. (That iron used to be mostly dissolved in the oceans.)

Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?

#52

Post by refactor_master »

bigyabai wrote: post #33
pizzathyme wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agree. But my understanding is the main idea is Mars is supposed to be a "backup" for humanity in the event of a very-low-probability catastrophic event on earth (total nuclear war, solar flare, meteorite collision). In our lifetimes, unlikely. Over the next 1 million years? Maybe.

If humanity develops the need for "burner planets" then maybe we don't deserve to expand past our solar system...

It's funny that you're using the word "deserve". Based on whose moral framework? I'm not sure current moral frameworks on Earth would be against colonizing the Universe if it was possible.

Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?

#53

Post by WalterBright »

tasty_freeze wrote: post #35
pizzathyme wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agree. But my understanding is the main idea is Mars is supposed to be a "backup" for humanity in the event of a very-low-probability catastrophic event on earth (total nuclear war, solar flare, meteorite collision). In our lifetimes, unlikely. Over the next 1 million years? Maybe.

Thinking about wild scenarios is fun and sometimes even prudent. But acting on it at this point is tragic premature optimization. Musk isn't a stupid person so I have to think in his heart he knows his story is more about PR and being seen as a visionary as something that will actually be done in the next thousand or ten thousand years. Even if there is some climate catastrophe that causes 99% of the population to di…

The crazy ones are the ones that get sh*t done.

Musk was initially written off initially as crazy for every one of his successful business ventures.

And it's his money to spend as he sees fit.

Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?

#54

Post by eru »

codq wrote: post #24
kulahan wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mars, interestingly, was just determined to have a core almost identical to Earth’s as I understand it. This is not the sole determinant of course - you still need enough volatiles, enough gravity to maintain a hold on the lightest elements across billions of years, and tectonics to keep refreshing the atmosphere. Unfortunately for us all, Mars has none of those. There may be other significant factors as well.

Without tectonics, is terraforming Mars even possible as a long term solution? This "Mars colonization" strategy seems like a pipe dream, no?

The lack of tectonics would only be a problem if you want your terraforming to be 'one and done'.

If you admit that terraforming, even after it's 'done', will require an ongoing maintenance effort, it's simple (but not easy). Eg you can use satellites to spin up an artificial magnetic field to shield against solar wind.

However, I suspect terraforming planets is a waste. Far more bang for your buck to build habitats in space from scratch (eg out of asteroids), than to go down another gravity well. You can spin them for artificial 'gravity'. And you can situate them close to earth where logistics of resupply and communication and trade are much more favourable.

Otherwise, Mercury is the planet to colonise, not Mars.

Mercury gets extremely hot in the sun, and extremely cold at night. So if you dig a bit under the surface it all evens out. Pick the right latitude, and you can get basically any average temperature you feel like, including a comfortable 20C.

(Otherwise, even on the surface it's easy to get comfy temperatures, if you bring retractable parasols. Just don't expect to stroll around outside the base.)

Mercury has the benefit compared to Mars that solar power is extremely plentiful.

Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?

#55

Post by eru »

pizzathyme wrote: post #28
SJC_Hacker wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tectonics isn’t the issue There would be little point in terraforming Mars. There’s plenty of places on Earth to terraform

Agree. But my understanding is the main idea is Mars is supposed to be a "backup" for humanity in the event of a very-low-probability catastrophic event on earth (total nuclear war, solar flare, meteorite collision). In our lifetimes, unlikely. Over the next 1 million years? Maybe.

If you want a backup, why use Mars?

You can create habitats from scratch, or you can have colonies on the moon.

Even Mercury is better than Mars.

Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?

#56

Post by [deleted] »

codq wrote: post #24
kulahan wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mars, interestingly, was just determined to have a core almost identical to Earth’s as I understand it. This is not the sole determinant of course - you still need enough volatiles, enough gravity to maintain a hold on the lightest elements across billions of years, and tectonics to keep refreshing the atmosphere. Unfortunately for us all, Mars has none of those. There may be other significant factors as well.

Without tectonics, is terraforming Mars even possible as a long term solution? This "Mars colonization" strategy seems like a pipe dream, no?

[deleted]

Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?

#57

Post by kulahan »

eru wrote: post #54
codq wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without tectonics, is terraforming Mars even possible as a long term solution? This "Mars colonization" strategy seems like a pipe dream, no?

The lack of tectonics would only be a problem if you want your terraforming to be 'one and done'. If you admit that terraforming, even after it's 'done', will require an ongoing maintenance effort, it's simple (but not easy). Eg you can use satellites to spin up an artificial magnetic field to shield against solar wind. However, I suspect terraforming planets is a waste. Far more bang for your buck to build habitats…

It's worth mentioning that one of the more sane ways to terraform a planet is to redirect specific comets to crash into the planet. It would be "free" in the sense that redirecting an orbit is already actively being studied by NASA for planetary defense reasons. To actually terraform a planet in this method would be unreasonably affordable compared to anything else I've ever heard.

edit: Plus, it's nice to split our eggs into multiple planetary baskets. And I suspect people would feel a bit happier living on the surface of a chilly Mars than to become mole people on Mercury, even if it is easier. Maybe summer and winter homes?

Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?

#58

Post by ozb »

SJC_Hacker wrote: post #25
codq wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without tectonics, is terraforming Mars even possible as a long term solution? This "Mars colonization" strategy seems like a pipe dream, no?

Tectonics isn’t the issue There would be little point in terraforming Mars. There’s plenty of places on Earth to terraform

Heh, apparently ChatGPT gets touchy when you explore creative ways to make earth less inhabitable than Mars, especially around pathogens and grey goo

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Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?

#59

Post by taneq »

westmeal wrote: post #18
taneq wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, so this is all leading to one very specific place: An anarchic society of steampunk airships harvesting Deuterium from the shirtsleeve zone in Venus’ upper atmosphere.

What would they want with it?

They'd export it to Earth in exchange for other necessities. Airship parts, water, protein bars, TV shows. Earth would then use the deuterium for its 'free unlimited energy' fusion reactors.

Re: Why is Venus hell and Earth an Eden?

#60

Post by dismalaf »

fuzztester wrote: post #47
dismalaf wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole point of Mars (or any other second planet) is redundancy. If something happens to earth we have a backup plan, as a species.

>The whole point of Mars (or any other second planet) is redundancy. No. It's some combination of cowardice, greed and ego, by those involved. You can bet your ass those guys are not thinking about saving the species. Lol. Furthest thing from their minds. Solve the Earth's problems on Earth instead, no need to run off to Mars. That's just kicking the can down the road.

> those guys

Who do you think are "those guys"? Talking Musk? NASA? All the people who have dreamt of traveling the stars the last 100 years?

Remember, we landed on the moon before Elon Musk was born. He's also not the first to talk about landing or living on Mars.

And it's not to hedge against us destroying the planet. It's to hedge against an asteroid or other occurrence we can't control.

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