Why Colonize Space?

On Jul 27, 1:44*pm, "Rod Speed" wrote:
darwinist wrote:
On Jul 27, 12:32 pm, "Rod Speed" wrote:
darwinist wrote:
On Jul 27, 11:33 am, "Rod Speed" wrote:
darwinist wrote

Rod Speed wrote
darwinist wrote
Rod Speed wrote
darwinist wrote
There are more problems to solve when trying to set
up such a station in space, so the principles learned
can be applied to more diverse environments.
Wrong when the problems with space arent seen on earth.
Things like gravity, air and water have to be taken care
of, for example.
And we dont need to bother on earth.
We do in deserts,
Nope.
highly polluted areas,
Nope.
Yes, if we're talking about "self-contained" environments,
that don't rely on easy access to water, (clean) air, etc.
Nope. Its completely trivial to clean any of the air here on
earth to make it useable in a self contained environment.
The bulk of deserts have water available too, it just needs to
be desalinated at most.
underwater,
Even you should have noticed that we dont bother to colonise
there.
No but we could.
And arent that stupid.
One day we might need the space.
Then we can colonise it then, if that ever does make sense.
- To create a "backup" of humanity in case
something destroys the earth or makes it unlivable
Makes a lot more sense to just freeze enough humans etc
for that.
If earth becomes unlivable and there is no one
in space, what good is a bunch of frozen people?
You put them on mars or the moon etc.
And then what?
Hope that by then it will be possible to thaw them into
something useful.
how do you repopulate the species with frozen people?
Thaw them out, stupid.
They would be dead.
Even you should have noticed that sperm and eggs can be
thawed and used fine.
By who?
Those on earth who say were sterilised by some fairy story
catastrophe on earth.
That's if they're only sterilised. I said if something makes the
earth unlivable.
Much cheaper to ensure that that cant happen.
Its never going to be as unlivable as the moon.
Space stations could also be moved away if - for example
- a large asteroid storm was going to hit both the earth
and the moon and we were unable to prevent it.
Makes a hell of a lot more sense to make that survivable on
earth.
They're not mutually exclusive.
No one ever said they were.
We should work on both.
Nope. It makes a lot more sense to just ensure that life will
survive on earth.
Such a thing can't be 100% certain,
Wrong. Its vastly cheaper to make it 100% certain here on
earth.
You can't make something like that 100% certain.
Corse you can. You can make sure that we can live in an
environment thats as bad as the moon, and do that on earth
much more cheaply than actually doing that on the moon.
Not when an asteroid a few kilometres across could
have an impact equivalent to millions of nukes.
We can still ensure that we can live on the other side of the
earth that did not get impacted by that, much more cheaply than
colonising the moon or mars.
That depends on the size of the impact,

Nope, its never going to be as unlivable as the moon.

or how many there are.

Nope, its never going to be as unlivable as the moon.

It's not impossible that something could make the earth unlivable,

Its never going to be as unlivable as the moon.
For several days or weeks after a large impact
event it could be much less livable than the moon,

Wrong.

if there are sufficiently large earthquakes, etc.

Its completely trivial to make it earthquake proof.
Trivial up to what magnitude?

Any magnitude.

An asteroid on the scale of the one thought to have created
the chicxulub crater and possibly wiped out the dinosaurs,
would have created an earthquake stronger than any
we've recorded.

Trivial to make it earthquake proof to anything that could happen.

So you are saying we couldn't be hit by anything bigger than what our
earthquake proofing could handle? That seems like an unrealistic
claim. If there is certain sized impact that we couldn't handle, what
makes you think such an event couldn't happen?

Much easier to do that than to colonise the moon.

in which case it would be better to have a backup habitat.
Nope, because the moon will ALWAYS be much worse.
Preferably one that can be moved away if necessary.
Not even possible.
A movable space-station is impossible?

It cant be big enough to provide sufficient genetic diversity
for viable survival of the species and still be movable.
If a smaller, movable space station would be possible,
at what size do you think it become impossible?

Far smaller than would be needed to provide sufficient
genetic diversity for viable survival of the species.

Based on what? I'd be interested to know how you decided what size was
too big to be movable.

And it would have to have enough genetic diversity of all the other animals too.

Why would you need all other animals as well? It would be nice to
preserve as many species as possible but just preserving enough to
support human life would be better than nothing.

Completely impossible to make that moveable.

In article ,
said:

In sci.physics William December Starr wrote:

The goal here, as I understand it, is a breakthrough in our
knowledge of physics that we can exploit to develop useful human
interstellar travel, where "useful" means, roughly, the ability
to travel from one system with the possibility of Earthlike
planets to another in no more than, say, five years.

[...]

And reaching any but the nearest star in a reasonable time means
travel at several times the speed of light. Just getting to a
fraction of c doesn't cut it.

Yeah. I thought I was clearly implying that the kind of breakthrough
I was talking about would be FTL, but upon rereading I see that I
should have come right out and said it.

-- wds

In article ,
"Giga" "Giga" just(removetheseandaddmatthe said:

"William December Starr" wrote

What reason is there to believe that the colonization of space
using today's pre-breakthrough propulsion technologies is a
necessary step in bringing the above-described breakthrough
about?

Like I said that developement normally seems to work like
that. For instance a long-term colony on Mars may stimulate the
search for faster than light communication, which might lead to
ideas for faster than light travel. This is just an example of how
it might go in steps.

What possible reason is there to expect that a long-term colony on
Mars would stimulate the search for faster-than-light communication
any better than would a long-term colony at CalTech or Oxford or
MIT?

Also if useful mining operations can be established then there
will be a profit motive to increase speed of transport, maybe
better hybernation techniques, radiation shielding etc etc All of
which technologies might be needed for any kind of longer journey.

That I can agree with, but it still avoids the question of *what*
would be more useful to mine in space or on a non-terrestrial planet
in the Solar system than here on Earth.

Most likely any faster than light engine would need to be lauched
from space rather than from the ground.

No, most likely any faster-than-light engine will have operating
properties which no human alive today can make any "most likely"
predictions about.

-- wds

Wayne Throop wrote
Rod Speed

Sure, if say a Mars sized body did collide with the earth,
we would indeed have a problem, but there isnt any way
to protect against that by colonising anywhere else.

Well... sure there is. If an independent ecosystem were
established on space habitats, or on Mars, that would
protect against a planetary sized impactor.

I doubt it. Mars itself would end up pretty ****ed
by the impact of a Mars sized object with the earth.

And its just not practical to have all the animal and insect species
on Mars in enough numbers to provide useful genetic diversity anyway.

Of course... the effort put into establishing such a thing
is better spent elsewhere, for the foreseeable future, IMO.

Forever in fact. The possibility is so remote that it isnt worth
worrying about, because at the ultimate you would also need
to protect against say a sun sized object hitting our own sun
too and a colony on mars wouldnt survive that.

I mean, given how many planet-sized impactors go whizzing by per
million years lately, and all. You can get much better survival bang
for your preparation buck worrying about other threats, just now. IMO.

And it makes a lot more sense to protect against the impact of stuff
on the earth that would not make the earth as unlivable as the moon
or mars that it would to try to colonise mars or the moon.

darwinist wrote:
On Jul 27, 1:44 pm, "Rod Speed" wrote:
darwinist wrote:
On Jul 27, 12:32 pm, "Rod Speed" wrote:
darwinist wrote:
On Jul 27, 11:33 am, "Rod Speed" wrote:
darwinist wrote

Rod Speed wrote
darwinist wrote
Rod Speed wrote
darwinist wrote
There are more problems to solve when trying to set
up such a station in space, so the principles learned
can be applied to more diverse environments.
Wrong when the problems with space arent seen on earth.
Things like gravity, air and water have to be taken care
of, for example.
And we dont need to bother on earth.
We do in deserts,
Nope.
highly polluted areas,
Nope.
Yes, if we're talking about "self-contained" environments,
that don't rely on easy access to water, (clean) air, etc.
Nope. Its completely trivial to clean any of the air here on
earth to make it useable in a self contained environment.
The bulk of deserts have water available too, it just needs
to be desalinated at most.
underwater,
Even you should have noticed that we dont bother to
colonise there.
No but we could.
And arent that stupid.
One day we might need the space.
Then we can colonise it then, if that ever does make sense.
- To create a "backup" of humanity in case
something destroys the earth or makes it unlivable
Makes a lot more sense to just freeze enough humans
etc for that.
If earth becomes unlivable and there is no one
in space, what good is a bunch of frozen people?
You put them on mars or the moon etc.
And then what?
Hope that by then it will be possible to thaw them into
something useful.
how do you repopulate the species with frozen people?
Thaw them out, stupid.
They would be dead.
Even you should have noticed that sperm and eggs can be
thawed and used fine.
By who?
Those on earth who say were sterilised by some fairy story
catastrophe on earth.
That's if they're only sterilised. I said if something makes
the earth unlivable.
Much cheaper to ensure that that cant happen.
Its never going to be as unlivable as the moon.
Space stations could also be moved away if - for example
- a large asteroid storm was going to hit both the earth
and the moon and we were unable to prevent it.
Makes a hell of a lot more sense to make that survivable
on earth.
They're not mutually exclusive.
No one ever said they were.
We should work on both.
Nope. It makes a lot more sense to just ensure that life
will survive on earth.
Such a thing can't be 100% certain,
Wrong. Its vastly cheaper to make it 100% certain here on
earth.
You can't make something like that 100% certain.
Corse you can. You can make sure that we can live in an
environment thats as bad as the moon, and do that on earth
much more cheaply than actually doing that on the moon.
Not when an asteroid a few kilometres across could
have an impact equivalent to millions of nukes.
We can still ensure that we can live on the other side of the
earth that did not get impacted by that, much more cheaply than
colonising the moon or mars.
That depends on the size of the impact,

Nope, its never going to be as unlivable as the moon.

or how many there are.

Nope, its never going to be as unlivable as the moon.

It's not impossible that something could make the earth
unlivable,

Its never going to be as unlivable as the moon.
For several days or weeks after a large impact
event it could be much less livable than the moon,

Wrong.

if there are sufficiently large earthquakes, etc.

Its completely trivial to make it earthquake proof.
Trivial up to what magnitude?

Any magnitude.

An asteroid on the scale of the one thought to have created
the chicxulub crater and possibly wiped out the dinosaurs,
would have created an earthquake stronger than any
we've recorded.

Trivial to make it earthquake proof to anything that could happen.

So you are saying we couldn't be hit by anything bigger
than what our earthquake proofing could handle?

No, I was rather carelessly saying that while its certainly not possible
to protect against say the impact of a Mars sized object, its certainly
very possible to make it earthquake proof of something that would not
turn the earth into more unlivable than the moon and mars already are.

That seems like an unrealistic claim. If there is certain sized impact that
we couldn't handle, what makes you think such an event couldn't happen?

I never said it couldnt happen.

Much easier to do that than to colonise the moon.

in which case it would be better to have a backup habitat.
Nope, because the moon will ALWAYS be much worse.
Preferably one that can be moved away if necessary.
Not even possible.
A movable space-station is impossible?

It cant be big enough to provide sufficient genetic diversity
for viable survival of the species and still be movable.
If a smaller, movable space station would be possible,
at what size do you think it become impossible?

Far smaller than would be needed to provide sufficient
genetic diversity for viable survival of the species.

Based on what?

Based on how big it would need to be to provide viable
genetic diversity of the species and all the other animals.

I'd be interested to know how you decided what size was too big to be movable.

See above.

And it would have to have enough genetic diversity of all the other animals too.

Why would you need all other animals as well?

Because without them the species would be a pretty pale immitation of what it currently is.

It would be nice to preserve as many species as possible but just
preserving enough to support human life would be better than nothing.

I'd rather be dead than a vegan.

Completely impossible to make that moveable.

In article ,
"G. L. Bradford" said:

Now we have produced an environmentally livable habitat in space
(an unlivable environment). Increase the numbers over ONE! Evolve
the habitats beyond primordial from brute increase. Grow the
frontage on space. Begin accessing, using and exchanging ever
more, and ever more varied, frontier resources.

"I have some vacuum."

"Hey, I have some vacuum too!"

"Let's exchange vacuum!"

-- wds

Wayne Throop wrote:

An impactor the size of the one that created the moon

You dont know thats how the moon was created.

There's really not all that much that's "known" with absolute certainty.

That is just one of the obvious possibilitys for the
formation of the moon and isnt even the most likely.

The impactor theory of the moon's origin is very nearly as much
"known" as the fact that there was a large impactor at the K/T boundary.

Irrelevant to how it was actually formed.

On Sun, 26 Jul 2009 21:22:47 -0500, Pat Flannery
wrote:



John Stafford wrote:
Like I said that developement normally seems to work like that. For
instance a long-term colony on Mars may stimulate the search for
faster than light communication, which might lead to ideas for faster
than light travel. This is just an example of how it might go in steps.


Don't you suspect that we are more likely to break time symmetry or
exploit another completely unknown (for metaphorical example, learn
how to exploit so-called Dark Matter) before FTL travel? FTL strikes
me as an archaic aspiration. It's just so, ah, ballistic-like,
steam-engine mentality.

Every time I look at the lack of success of SETI...and the Drake
Equation, I keep thinking that there's a way to do FTL communication
that any civilization finds in fairly short order after developing
radio...say a few hundred years.
And I'm willing to bet it involves instantaneous communication
point-to-point in the whole universe somehow using the collapsed
dimensions.
Even a very pessimistic interpretation of the Drake Equation should have
left hundreds, if not thousands, of civilizations that would have been
picked up via SETI by now if radio wavelengths were being used.

Except of course that we couldn't actually make them out unless they
somehow knew that we were there and actively trying to talk to us.

On Mon, 27 Jul 2009 05:10:21 +0100, "Giga" "Giga"
just(removetheseandaddmatthe wrote:


"John Stafford" wrote in message
om...
Giga Giga wrote:
"William December Starr" wrote in message

What reason is there to believe that the colonization of space using
today's pre-breakthrough propulsion technologies is a necessary step
in bringing the above-described breakthrough about?

Like I said that developement normally seems to work like that. For
instance a long-term colony on Mars may stimulate the search for faster
than light communication, which might lead to ideas for faster than light
travel. This is just an example of how it might go in steps.


Don't you suspect that we are more likely to break time symmetry or
exploit another completely unknown (for metaphorical example, learn how to
exploit so-called Dark Matter) before FTL travel? FTL strikes me as an
archaic aspiration. It's just so, ah, ballistic-like, steam-engine
mentality.


I must admit haven't thought much about how one might acheive FTL. The only
really useful thought, IMHO, I think I've had is that mass is the real
problem, and obviously anything we would want to send, like people etc have
mass. AFAIK there is nothing stopping something without mass from travelling
at any speed, given a bit of a push.

How Doc Smith of you. But the behaviour of massless particles says
otherwise.

"William December Starr" wrote in message
...
In article ,
"Giga" "Giga" just(removetheseandaddmatthe said:

"William December Starr" wrote

What reason is there to believe that the colonization of space
using today's pre-breakthrough propulsion technologies is a
necessary step in bringing the above-described breakthrough
about?

Like I said that developement normally seems to work like
that. For instance a long-term colony on Mars may stimulate the
search for faster than light communication, which might lead to
ideas for faster than light travel. This is just an example of how
it might go in steps.

What possible reason is there to expect that a long-term colony on
Mars would stimulate the search for faster-than-light communication
any better than would a long-term colony at CalTech or Oxford or
MIT?

Also if useful mining operations can be established then there
will be a profit motive to increase speed of transport, maybe
better hybernation techniques, radiation shielding etc etc All of
which technologies might be needed for any kind of longer journey.

That I can agree with, but it still avoids the question of *what*
would be more useful to mine in space or on a non-terrestrial planet
in the Solar system than here on Earth.

Most likely any faster than light engine would need to be lauched
from space rather than from the ground.

No, most likely any faster-than-light engine will have operating
properties which no human alive today can make any "most likely"
predictions about.

-- wds
****ing ignorant clueless idiot.
--
Match the caption to the gif:

A) http://tinyurl.com/lv2fl7
B) http://tinyurl.com/njgouh
C) http://tinyurl.com/klkfc9
D) http://tinyurl.com/l6lt4g
1) applies to light (in vacuum) and sound (in air)
2) applies to light but not sound
3) applies to sound but not light
4) applies to neither light nor sound.


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