There is no gravity on ISS, so other than protection from radiation afforded by the earth's magnetic field it is not that different from traveling outside of our gravity well. A serious malfunction renders you just as dead.
Last time I heard water evaporators were operated based on demand, some water is stored.
If we had both the will and the imagination and also populations willing to do the difficult we'd already have Habitat One and Habitat Two partially completed.
Apart from the minor radiation and gravity issues the psychology has been studied for decades in nuclear submarine crews and solutions/partial solutions are apparently well known. I have a good mate who was RN and spent years on nuclear subs on 6 month rotations and I'm basing my statement there on direct personal communication. A two year mission is nothing compared to the early European voyages of discovery and trade in the middle ages etc
Everything else is just engineering and money.
The future is approaching so rapidly it's scary for someone who grew up reading Issac Asimov, A C Clarke and Bob Heinlein
Apart from the minor radiation and gravity issues the psychology has been studied for decades in nuclear submarine crews and solutions/partial solutions are apparently well known. I have a good mate who was RN and spent years on nuclear subs on 6 month rotations and I'm basing my statement there on direct personal communication. A two year mission is nothing compared to the early European voyages of discovery and trade in the middle ages etc
Everything else is just engineering and money.
The future is approaching so rapidly it's scary for someone who grew up reading Issac Asimov, A C Clarke and Bob Heinlein
I do have a clue.
My old boss was a Navy Lt. Commander. A US Navy nuke engineer when he got out ( like me, a physicist, hence one of the "good guys" ). He told me that the nuke ships have so much power that making potable water is not an issue. Their reactors have so much potential power that even if they were to make bubble baths for the entire crew on a daily basis it would make no dent to the power plants.
Remember that the nukes only need to be recharged measured in decades or so.... I believe it's like 50 years or so. Thus, those ships/boats can do top speed all day and the crew can enjoy their Mr. Bubbles whenever they feel like it.
Heck, it's quite likely that the nuke is good for the life of the ship/boat.
Non nuke ships have to use fuel to make water, so they tend to be stingy with it.
He, my old boss, also told me that it was the same issue with nuke boats. They got plenty of power. LOTS of power.
In the case of boats, the only restraining parameter is how much noise their machinery makes.
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Asimov's "last book" in his chronology, Foundation and Earth... one of the best books I've ever read... but you got to start with the R. Daneel Olivaw ( The Caves of Steel ) and then Foundation series books... then, it's a MASTERPIECE.
I would hope I could convince them that it was what I liked and what I thought was a good thing to to.
A bit like current astronauts or soldiers tell their families, although of course they hope to get back in one piece.
But people have said goodby to loved ones on dangerous missions throughout the centuries, it's what we do.
In any case, it should not be a reason for not going!
Jan
Mars ain't the kind of place to raise your kids
In fact, it's cold as hell
And there's no one there to raise them if you did
And all the science, I don't understand
It's just my job five days a week
In fact, it's cold as hell
And there's no one there to raise them if you did
And all the science, I don't understand
It's just my job five days a week
Well, I grew up reading that, and the future is very, very late... Not even a proper space station, no moon colonies (or even penal ones like Heinlein's "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" - a great AI story).
I can remember James Burke's Connections series. It brought home to me the big interdependencies between apparently unrelated fields across science & engineering. How an idea can lay semi dormant for decades because there's not the engineering capability or scientific knowledge to manufacture the parts. Babbage's difference engine being a case in point, all those pesky gears were expensive to make to the tolerances required because the manufacturing machine tools didn't exist. Many of the principles of modern AI were being actively researched in the 50s and 60s but it was all hamstrung because the compute power just wasn't available...
Anyone remember Alvin Toffler's Future Shock? Seems dated now. The future is rarely what people think it will be.
Anyone remember Alvin Toffler's Future Shock? Seems dated now. The future is rarely what people think it will be.
Because humans are incompatible with space. That this needs to be exemplified is an example of its absolute truth, and of the capacity for human delusion 😢
Humans are also incompatible with large areas of the planet we live on as well as the oceans we sail on or even the deep ocean we occasionally visit. So we researched, learned, experimented and invented houses, clothes, boats, food preservation & storage and a bunch of other stuff to make life both possible and tolerable all over the planet.
We'll need to invent solutions for extended space travel. It might be beyond us, but given that we haven't really tried yet, I think it's premature to write it all off as impossible.
Yes. And humans are incompatible with deep water. All those pictures we saw about divers and submarines are fake, it's all a conspiracy. Everybody knows we can't breath under water! Never gonna happen! Absolute truth!
Also, it should be clear by now that humans can't breath in a vacuum! All those pictures we saw about astronauts and space stations, it's all fake, it's all a conspiracy! We asphixiate, bodies will explode! Never gonna happen! Absolute truth!
Jan
Also, it should be clear by now that humans can't breath in a vacuum! All those pictures we saw about astronauts and space stations, it's all fake, it's all a conspiracy! We asphixiate, bodies will explode! Never gonna happen! Absolute truth!
Jan
All we need are multiple Klein bottles full of tachyons.
We should have that triple necklace of geostationary satellites that Clarke had visions of but we don't seem to dream big at the moment.
Then Ringworld; next Habitats 1 & 2 and then the rest of the local cluster The asteroid belt is our obvious place to mine what we need, all the science fiction writers knew that.
If we can survive the next few decades
We should have that triple necklace of geostationary satellites that Clarke had visions of but we don't seem to dream big at the moment.
Then Ringworld; next Habitats 1 & 2 and then the rest of the local cluster The asteroid belt is our obvious place to mine what we need, all the science fiction writers knew that.
If we can survive the next few decades
I find it hard to believe that supplying potable water for a nuclear warship is so much easier than on a conventional ship, therefore it can be wasted. Providing the power is just the first step in the process.
https://www.navytimes.com/news/your...t-tainted-on-the-carriers-nimitz-and-lincoln/
I'm guessing that the reactor needs water for cooling, I could be wrong, but I don't think that untreated sea-water is used for that purpose. Again, I'm just thinking out loud.
https://news.usni.org/2023/05/17/pr...board-carriers-uss-nimitz-uss-abraham-lincoln
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To put it another way, it used to be steam engine time, that faded into jet engine time, we are gradually transposing into wind and solar time and we've been living in the background information age for a long long while.
Yes I'd always hoped to see people on the moon in my lifetime
Yes I'd always hoped to see people on the moon in my lifetime
Yes, yes, the “information age”. But it did seem to come to a STOP there, didn’t it? Now that 90+ % of all internet traffic is spam and ads there seems to be a LOT of useless information out there. Talk about being WASTEFUL…. Probably the biggest example on the planet, considering how much of our resources go into the internet worldwide. Now technology can’t seem to move beyond what’s needed to run the internet.
Mr. Bubbles doesn’t require that the water be desalinated to the point where you can drink it either. You can sort of come half way to making it potable, then it’s suitable for most other uses. Probably the biggest issue with showers is the queue time. SPACE is what is at a premium on a nuclear wessel.
Mr. Bubbles doesn’t require that the water be desalinated to the point where you can drink it either. You can sort of come half way to making it potable, then it’s suitable for most other uses. Probably the biggest issue with showers is the queue time. SPACE is what is at a premium on a nuclear wessel.