SpaceBanter.com - View Single Post - Once and for all...are humans or robots better for Mars?

**Jeff Findley**

In article 6555a6f0-bf56-48dd-9e0d-
, says...

Add ARTIFICAL INTELLIGENCE, to the rover operations, and watch
productity soar...

Can we add some magic fairy dust to the rovers too?

Seriously though, there is no such thing as artificial intelligence
which is smart enough to handle rover operations on Mars. It's not been
invented yet. What you want is something as smart as Data from Star
Trek, which is science fiction.

FACE FACTS WE DONT HAVE THE MONEY TO SEND PEOPLE TO MARS, or even back
to the moon

Not the way NASA is doing it, which is to require the most expensive HLV
they think they can afford. The version they're pitching right now
still uses the unproven 5 segment SRB's and the still in development J2-
X. This thing will still be billions more expensive than Direct.

Jeff
--
"Had Constellation actually been focused on building an Earth-Moon
transportation system, it might have survived. The decision to have it
first build a costly and superfluous Earth-to-orbit transportation
system (Ares I) was a fatal mistake.", Henry Spencer 1/2/2011