Mars is further away from the Sun.... so the electro-magnetic influence is much less.
Kim Stanley Robinson
Cal, define 'ultimately fail'. I don't think you mean 'fail to go there'. Fail to make a living there?
If the rewards are large enough, we will succeed. As trappers in the Canadian wilderness succeeded, to mention just an example.
The whole concept of the US of A is a prime example of having the guts to go where no one has gone before and settle, make a living and become the most powerful settlement in existence.
I can't believe your lack of imagination and the smallness of your thinking. If we all thought like that we would still be in Tanzania, all 100.000 of us.
Jan
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That's up to us, really.
Just as the African Tribes Elder said: 'our place is here on the lake shore, and nowhere else, literally'. Boy was he ever wrong!
As you are.
Jan
I think a big question is when.
At the rate we are using up the earth's resources, there may well come a time at which we no longer have the resources necessary to colonize an other body besides earth. To me, that is the whole reason to go now. Get to the asteroid belt, moons of other planets, etc to mine them.
At the rate we are using up the earth's resources, there may well come a time at which we no longer have the resources necessary to colonize an other body besides earth. To me, that is the whole reason to go now. Get to the asteroid belt, moons of other planets, etc to mine them.
There is no evidence that man kind are capable to survive in an environment other the one we have adapted over a very long time.
Thus the colonialisation of America by the European is a bad example.
Otherwise we should have settled on the ground of the sea or in the holes of volcanos before considering other planets.
Thus the colonialisation of America by the European is a bad example.
Otherwise we should have settled on the ground of the sea or in the holes of volcanos before considering other planets.
and every single living creature, every tree, every mountainside, every body of water, the earth's atmosphere, the entire planet earth would be better off....
has your imagination taken you there?
Failing to live there for an extended period.
I fail to see any reward in leaving a perfectly good environment and replacing it with one that at the very least is considered hostile.
A little bit of cold compared with a planet or moon with little or no atmosphere, I think is not a fair comparison.
Realism can be a b!tch sometimes Jan.
I thought it was clear that my point was that I believe even the harshest environment on which we’d eked out an existence were under the unimaginably fortuitous conditions on Earth; not the least of which is the rotation of the still molten iron core that provides the magnetosphere protecting us from the constant bombardment of cosmic radiation.
The way to save the planet is to get rid of the people. They ARE the problem. Go back to the Stone Age and the natural balance will be restored. If people are to survive in the numbers that they have become, they need to figure out ways to survive under harsh conditions. Ones that are far removed from the fragile balance that was struck four billion years ago, and humans have now outgrown. Or re-make the conditions to their liking. None of that will come without effort, and staring at a little screen mesmerized by a world that doesn’t exist isn’t going to help anything. The younger generation has been trained how NOT to fix the problems or figure out how to get to Mars and make it useful. That’s what brains are for - to solve these engineering problems, not to sit and watch useless YouTube videos.
Well, since the solar storms of which we speak were the reason Mars no longer has a significant atmosphere, I'd hate to think what they might do to any settlement we attempted. If you consider the cycles of strong vs weaker are consistent, I'm sure glad no one was there this year, which happens to be the strongest part of that cycle.
Anyone is welcome to dream but to me it is a nightmare of which the required technology and logistics do not yet exist. I don't believe we will be able to rationalize an attempt at settlement for perhaps another century. Who knows?
You don't need per se a planet with a rotating molten core to protect you from cosmic radiation. All you need is a provision that attenuates cosmic radiation sufficiently at your position. An engineering problem. I can solve that for you. Just wire me 1 billion US and I'll start on our cost+ contract.
Jan
@Cal Weldon, if I would have told you on New Years Day 1960 that Americans would be walking on the moon before the decade was over, you'd have put me in one of those great white buildings, dress me in a white gown and call me 'patient'. Yet we did (or they did, rather).
You guys wallow in the problems. I prefer to think about solutions.
Jan
You guys wallow in the problems. I prefer to think about solutions.
Jan
without a problem, there is no need for a solution.
If the solution is moving to Mars, there must be a problem associated with it.
So, what is the problem? Life on earth is unbearable?.....seems to me that brilliant minds could fix that very easily, much easier than modifying an entire planet for us to inhabit
If the solution is moving to Mars, there must be a problem associated with it.
So, what is the problem? Life on earth is unbearable?.....seems to me that brilliant minds could fix that very easily, much easier than modifying an entire planet for us to inhabit