Colonization...

[Lago PARANOIA]

The simplest answer is: Humans can do things probes can't. They can improvise.

Which is why sending people up to Mars to colonize becomes a dumber and dumber proposition with each passing year; computer and robotics technology is advancing extremely rapidly. Like, sure, back during the 70's I think that it would be a reasonable use of resources to get a team of people living on Mars. But by 2040 and beyond it's a waste of time.


Because seriously, what is there actually to do on Mars? It's just a big hunk of rock. Yes, being able to interact in person would be important in a Star Trek or Jetsons universe when there is stuff needed to be done. But as far as I can see, there's nothing to do there but hunt for water, hunt for primitive lifeforms, and look at the shiny rocks. Why people physically need to land on Mars for this is beyond me.

[erik]

Why people physically need to land on Mars for this is beyond me.

1. Just in case. Shit. Happens.

2. Weaker gravity well. Makes for an easier launching point to elsewhere, and ought have sufficient collectible natural resources such that we actually could have industry and society over there.

3. Reasons we don't know yet.


The moon would be spiffy and we ought colonize that too, but it would probably be more like an Earth-dependent outpost/space station. The moon it isn't nearly as good for mining as Mars. It also has no real bodies of water and is smaller so temperature changes are much more severe than on Mars.

[MfA]

If we really start making grandiose plans which would require putting megatons of equipment in orbit wouldn't it make more sense to capture asteroids in Lagrange points? (Probably don't want to capture the living and mining asteroids in the same point, slightly risky.)

[Lago PARANOIA]

1. Just in case. Shit. Happens.

Like WHAT? If there's a problem, you can send a different robot. That has to be a lot cheaper and faster and safer than physically setting up a colony and providing people with the life support required to have people there 'just because'.

and ought have sufficient collectible natural resources such that we actually could have industry and society over there.

That's still dodging the question. Why WOULD you want an industry and society over there?

Moreover, that's some extreme wishful thinking. Okay, you found some natural resources like iron ore or whatever the fuck. Then what? You are not going to have an extraction and refinement industry on Mars without a sufficient population base (as in the tens of thousands) and the required machinery unless you want to do things like frickin' peasants.

3. Reasons we don't know yet.

Reasons we haven't thought of yet. That's certainly a good reason to take the lives of at least dozens of people into our own hands. We might come up with a reason to put your asses there, we might not.

[Meikle641]

Well, having enough humans to be a safety net in the event of an Earth Extinction event (or merely a 'near' one) would be a good idea. Plus the weaker gravity well and proximity to the asteroid belt would make mining appealing.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Plus the weaker gravity well and proximity to the asteroid belt would make mining appealing.

Huh? Mining? How is this supposed to work with our current technology in the near future and how is this supposed to be remotely profitable?

[Meikle641]

We could conceivably do it with our current technology, at least within a 10 year time-frame.

Why? "Rare" metals like platinum. At least 3/4 of most catalysts I see for fuel cells and various technology use it and we're gonna have a crunch. I'm sure there's plenty of others as well to look for, but that's a glaringly obvious one.

I'm sure it'll become profitable eventually. Having a nearby outpost/colony using some of it might help. Hell, that'd likely be part of its own local economy, sending the rest/most of what they mine back to us, assuming they're sending minerals in demand.

[Lago PARANOIA]

We could conceivably do it with our current technology, at least within a 10 year time-frame.

Sure, as long as you handwave the exploration time, the need to have a hundreds-of-people strong mining staff (with a proportionate number of astronauts), the cost of getting the degree of mining equipment up there, and of course the money required to send vessels back and forth.

It's like flying cars. Sure, the technology might be there, but that in no way makes it profitable or even feasible.

[Meikle641]

Well, fabrication technology has come a long way. There's little reason why most of it couldn't simply be built there. Hell, you could likely do most of the mining using robots and remote control, since you'd be relatively close by.

This page had some links regarding travel mechanics.

Yeah, there will need to be hundreds of miners and shit. So what? How many people are on large oil rigs? I'd wager the numbers wouldn't be that out of line, it'd more be a matter of having the infrastructure built to support them. For buildings that's pretty easy, but the rest will be a bit trickier.

[erik]

Yah, like Meikel said, my #1 was in case of human extinction events, not "just in case the robots break".

Extinction events may include things such as:
Meteor/Bolide impact. Subsea-methane release. Supervolcano. Pandemic. Environmental collapse. Nuclear war.

Or just the massive inconvenience of having our planet enshrouded in debris (which would make life difficult for any satellites or future launches).

Likely none of these things will happen in our lifetimes, but given a long enough timeline, one of them will certainly happen to humanity on Earth.


#2 was more aimed at that such a colony could be viable thanks to mining and other low gravity advantages on what is a nearly hospitable planet.

As for the risk of losing dozens of lives... that doesn't even matter. We lose more people to bullshit like drunk driving and people toppling vending machines on themselves than we'd ever lose on Mars. What's more, we'd have a line fucking miles long of volunteers asking to be the next for Mars. I'd rather have informed volunteers willing to die in the line of duty doing something marvelous than just about anything else.

And it isn't like people are just going there to die, it is simply that they won't be coming back so of course they are going to die there. I expect by the time we are ready to go we will have some top notch medical technology where we can grow replacement organs for starters. Naturally there would be great incentive to prolong people's lives as it will be incredibly expensive to replace them.

The real issue isn't danger, it is cost. It would take a huge chunk or wealth from Earth to accomplish this, and almost no government or business is really concerned with the very long term benefits and payoffs.

Hell if we wait too long to move off then we may never be able to justify moving off. At some point we cannot sustain growth of humanity any further on just one planet and then humanity has basically decided to punch their ticket on this planet only.

[Crissa]

I pointed out that we have robots on Mars right now. They've run far longer than anyone had dared expect. But... They still can't just improvise and experiment with a simple patch of cracked dirt and find out what it was. We literally don't know - and will have to send up an entirely new robot to even try.

A human could simply deviate and figure something out. Maybe they could call home and ask. But they'd probably poke it with a stick, blow on it with a gas tank, or whatever. But the robot cannot do that. The robots can pathfind by themselves, but they can't make decisions, or even reach around for anything sitting in the dirt.

Lago's assertions of what robots can do is seriously skewed.

We learned more by putting guys on the moon about the makeup of the dirt there than by all the robots that have visited since and before. Only a human would have spotted an orange rock and decide to go grab it, even though it was outside his parameters. No one would have paid for instruments that would have detected the lunar atmosphere, or to do the stupid gravity tricks.

And only humans could have made that first landing on the moon - because it was an instant decision to move the landing area because there were undetected boulders at the first one.

-Crissa

[Count Arioch the 28th]

I can understand the expense argument, but if you can convince someone to strap on a dynamite vest and run into an Israeli discotheque for glory, immortality, and your family being taken care of I don't understand why you couldn't get someone to go to Mars for the same reasons.

[Lago PARANOIA]

They still can't just improvise and experiment with a simple patch of cracked dirt and find out what it was. We literally don't know - and will have to send up an entirely new robot to even try.

For the third time, Crissa, yes it is barely worth it now but will in the future become more of a waste of time and money as robotics and computer technology advances.

I can understand the expense argument, but if you can convince someone to strap on a dynamite vest and run into an Israeli discotheque for glory, immortality, and your family being taken care of I don't understand why you couldn't get someone to go to Mars for the same reasons.

What's more, we'd have a line fucking miles long of volunteers asking to be the next for Mars. I'd rather have informed volunteers willing to die in the line of duty doing something marvelous than just about anything else.

... because THOSE guys tend to be on the bottom rung of society after being fed both a steady combination of political and religious propaganda along with having genuine grievances over dozens of years?

You are basically trying to gather a bunch of astronauts together to do something much more complex and trying. The astronaut part is important. A homeless derelict is just straight up easier to convince to endure massive inconvenience for a reward that they may not see than a millionaire. You could probably in the United States find 200 blue collar workers on the out-and-out willing to undergo such a grueling project for no physical reward in the near-future and almost no glory (because everyone remembers Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, not most the people who came afterwards) because you could probably find that many desperate people. But astronauts? Not unless you gave them like half-million-dollar a year salaries or you really lower your standards for an astronaut. Which hey, you might actually make happen. I just don't buy it being an easy handwave.

[Crissa]

Ahh, it's barely worth it, but some undefined point in the future, we can let robots do everything. Just like the endless productivity gains from technology 'allows' more and more of us to not work.

-Crissa

200 astronauts? Well, we have 144 right now... Although I don't know where on the NASA sites to find this, this jives with what I know from talking to friends who have applied. But I do know this to be true: Astronauts don't make the big bucks, even when they do fly. So, it's about like being a lawyer, except the pay scale ends abruptly even though the hours do not.

Basically, I'm done listening to Lago go on about things he doesn't have a fucking clue about. I was wondering how many people would be willing to sacrifice their life, not whether he thought it was a good idea or not. He doesn't have to go.

[erik]

I think you underestimate competent people's willingness to do something awesome Lago.

Hell, people have historically been quite willing to brave extreme hazards to colonize new lands.

If it won't be American astronauts, it could well be Chinese. I'm sure they would be delighted to have a red planet.

[Maj]

Hell, people have historically been quite willing to brave extreme hazards to colonize new lands.

Taking a casual walk through history in my head, it seems to me that people are mostly willing for one of two reasons: To get rich, powerful, and famous; or to escape a situation they felt was so bad that the risk was worth it.

Even though there are people who will go on adventures for the sake of adventuring, they don't seem to be in the majority. And the greater the risk, the fewer people are willing to go.

If we're going to send people to Mars, the reward is going to have to be pretty big unless their life really sucks or Earth becomes an uninhabitable hell-hole.

[Crissa]

Why must it be some sort of individual payoff, if we have people right now willing to die in a heroic venture?

-Crissa

[MfA]

We have no one willing to pay for it ... I honestly don't think it's worth the money either.

Until we have an economic reason to be in space or we can truly create self-sustaining colonies (and both the moon and asteroids make more sense than Mars) I don't see any value in manned space missions any more, scientific or otherwise.

[Crissa]

Why does any discussion of space always involve the 'not worth the money' crowd? What do you have to contribute to the conversation?

We'll never have the technology to create self-sustaining space endeavors until we try. So waiting to try until we do is a catch-22.

And the economic value will always be astronomical until the technology is developed.

At that point, you're in the same seat that is holding trillions of dollars in liquid assets from participating in the economy. Eventually growth will be there, but there will be no growth until there is spending.

-Crissa

Stupid spelling.

[Maj]

Why does any discussion of space always involve the 'not worth the money' crowd?

Have you not noticed that our country is largely driven by commercial interest? Science for the sake of Science died decades ago - that's no longer the predominant motivator anymore.

We'll never have the technology to create self-sustaining space endeavors until we try... And the economic value will always be astronomical until the technology is developed.

I actually disagree with this. The article I pointed to earlier about mammalian reproduction and space demonstrates that we are trying to identify and address problems we are going to have to worry about as a species when we get into space. And we don't have to be in space to do it.

I consider that a good thing because the preparation can only increase our chances of success once we're ready. But we're not anywhere near ready yet.

What do you have to contribute to the conversation?

A different point of view. And in the context of a thought experiment, that's a good thing.

[MfA]

We'll never have the technology to create self-sustaining space endeavors until we try. So waiting to try until we do is a catch-22.

We are trying ... better launch technology, suspended animation, self-reproducing machinery ... all being developed on earth.

What does that have to do with putting people in space now? No matter how ingenious humans are, sending a couple up there to die with a roll of ductape won't make them magically engineer a viable colony.

[Wesley Street]

The future is SeaQuest, not Star Trek. There are plenty of places for humanity to spread out right here on Earth that don't involve exposure to lethal doses of radiation or trying to squeeze water out of rocks.

[Parthenon]

We had a similar discussion about this a while back on this forum. It was suggested that the most likely candidates would be mining conglomerates- two or three mining companies (or even one of the very biggest) would have enough money floating around that they could finance NASA a couple of times over with their loose change for the ongoing future.

The plan would be to move asteroids closer to Earth then remove the batshit insane amount of valuable metals from them. However, since that would take a long time, it might be worth setting up a colony on Mars for less travel time, then whenever the distance between Earth and Mars is smallest move several asteroids at once. People who presumably had some idea of what they were saying had the opinion that the mechanics of matching orbits with asteroids then moving them wasn't that difficult.

The only problem is that they'd be unlikely to finance it for the whole thing, possibly leading to the point where any Mars colony gets left out there to die alone. And the political hassle of moving extinction level asteroids towards Earth and if theres a mistake...

But on the positive side the whole idea is based on regular travel back and forth between Mars and Earth, so going out there to die isn't an issue; its like an extreme version of going to Antarctica for a couple of years.

[Crissa]

Look, the people who say 'we shouldn't try' don't get to bring in 'a different point of view' until the question is, 'can we borrow your money?'.

It's a big shit pile-on against every plan or question that doesn't involve their money. It doesn't involve their fucking money to ask how many people are willing to sacrifice themselves for an endeavor.

The big mining companies mine hydrocarbons. They won't be looking or caring about space exploration.

-Crissa

[Maj]

Look, the people who say 'we shouldn't try' don't get to bring in 'a different point of view' until the question is, 'can we borrow your money?'.

Is this some sort of internet rule that I'm not aware of? Like Godwin's Law only for innovation, science, and technology?

Not like it really matters, though. No one is saying this except maybe Lago - who gave a whole bunch of reasons other than not being economically feasible. The main one seems to be that sending humans onto Mars will be unnecessary because of robotic improvements. My personal view is that we're not ready - going will be a waste, but I don't care if we actually go or not. Wesley's saying there's enough stuff to do on Earth.

So I don't even understand where you're coming from with your complaint.

The big mining companies mine hydrocarbons. They won't be looking or caring about space exploration.

How much hydrocarbon mining disqualifies a company from being interested in going off-planet? For example, Vale, the world's second largest mining company, reports the following earlier this year:

SteelOrbis[/url] {OK, mining, orange}]Revenues generated from the sales of ferrous minerals accounted for 69 percent of first quarter operating revenues, 65.9 percent being iron ore and pellets. Non-ferrous minerals contributed 23.9 percent to the revenues, logistics services 4.5 percent, coal 1.8 percent and other products 0.8 percent.

I wish I were able to find more revenue breakdowns online for BHP, Rio Tinto, and Anglo American because I would have liked to compare numbers.