Why Colonize Space?

In article , Jack Tingle writes:
Michael Stemper wrote:

If you want to live someplace where survival is difficult, you could go
to someplace like Nunavut or the Sahel today. No selection to pass. They
have the additional advantage that you don't need special equipment in
order to breathe.

ever been to nunavut at night in feb?

I don't need to; I live in Minnesota. It gets cold enough here; I don't
need to go there -- or to Mars -- to see what it would be like to live
someplace where you don't unnecessarily go outside for days at a time,
and never without proper protective gear.

don't breath the air unequipped.
it's painful.

Yeah, but at least it's possible on Earth.

occasionally applies further south, too.

Got the tee-shirt.

--
Michael F. Stemper
#include Standard_Disclaimer
You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him talk like Mr. Ed
by rubbing peanut butter on his gums.

Giga Giga wrote:
That to me would just the adequate life. Space could potentially give us the
resources for everyone to have their own planet!


Might be fairly small though, like that one The Little Prince got.
IIRC, good Mormons not only get their own planet, but get to be a god on it.
I'd settle for Mongo and wear a cool skullcap. :-)

Pat

wrote:

One can safely assume the next generation of robots sent will be much
improved.


It will certainly cost a lot mo
http://www.atomicmpc.com.au/News/150...er-budget.aspx


Pat

In sci.physics Pat Flannery wrote:


wrote:

One can safely assume the next generation of robots sent will be much
improved.


It will certainly cost a lot mo
http://www.atomicmpc.com.au/News/150...er-budget.aspx


Pat

Yes, there is that.

One would think that if anyone at NASA had any sense these days, the second
generation rover would be exactly that, a second generation, not a do-all,
end-all, whiz-bang rover to end all rovers. Mars isn't going anywhere.


--
Jim Pennino

Remove .spam.sux to reply.

stfuudork wrote:
Immortalista wrote:
Today I was reading some opinions of people who believe that there is
no reason for humans to leave earth. Are all arguments for moving into
space and onto other bodies in space really that weak and irrelevant?

I think it best (in my opinion) that humans fix Earth before going to
other planets. Everyone has a right to a safe and happy life. A right
to have dreams and have them fulfilled, to study and learn. The expense
involved with leaving Earth just isn't justified when so many people
live without hope and die of such stupid and simply fixed problems like
hunger. But I do understand the people who say that Humans should have a
bet both ways in case of an asteroid impact or similar extinction type
event.

The "First we have to fix every problem on Earth" argument is a common
one. Its also a false choice. The amount spent on space exploration is
a tiny fraction of what is spent already on issues such as literacy,
famine relief, etc. It also ignores the fact that many of the advances
that help "fix Earth" are spin-offs _from_ space exploration. Not to
mention ignoring that most such problems are cultural and the solutions
are rejected by those suffering from them.

It is not a choice _between_ feed the hungry and explore space. We can
easily do both and each helps advance the other.

--
Things I learned from MythBusters #57: Never leave a loaded gun in an
exploding room.

Giga wrote
Rod Speed wrote
John Stafford wrote
Quadibloc wrote
Giga just(removetheseandaddmatthe end) wrote

I'm sure there are other sheilding methods than just great big
lumps of lead. Surely one can generate something of a magnetic
field around the spaceship (loads of free electricity after all).

Not all forms of radiation consist of electrically charged particles.

John, but aren't the uncharged particles harmless to us?

Nope, most obviously with Xrays.

I'm probably confused regarding ionized and not.

Just very confused.

OP: How about surrounding the craft with water tanks (of ice).
Water will be necessary anyway.

Doesnt stop plenty of things.

Maybe this is why they are considderring the moon first as staging post.

Nope, they are doing that because its clearly possible
to put humans there and return them to earth.

To lauch the 'necessary' shielding from there, perhaps collected on the moon itself,

Soorree, no such animal there.

would save a lot of lauch weight from earth. You could probably just use a load of basalt?

Nope, that doesnt stop everything either.

Giga" "Giga wrote:
wrote in message
...
In sci.physics "Giga" "Giga" just(removetheseandaddmatthe
wrote:

wrote in message
...
In sci.physics "Giga" "Giga" just(removetheseandaddmatthe
wrote:

"Immortalista" wrote in message
...
Today I was reading some opinions of people who believe that
there is no reason for humans to leave earth. Are all arguments
for moving into space and onto other bodies in space really that
weak and irrelevant?

To say on the one hand that there is no reason and on the other
'it is too
expensive' is a kind of a contradiction. This means that if it
was a lot
cheaper then it would be justified, and that means there must be
some reason
for doing it, and the persons putting forward such an argument
obviously
recognise that. So if it just a question of allocation of
resources, rather
than fundamental value of the enterprise, then fine, it should
recognised
as
a financial discussion, not really a philosophical one.

Depends on who you are talking about doing it and what you are
talking about doing.

Governments do lots of things for no other reason than enough
people think it is a "good idea" both directly and indirectly
through grants.

i.e, the voters and tax payers who are going to pay for it?

Yeah, through the elected representatives funding things like NASA.

Yep. I noticed Obama was talking pretty positively, during
campaigning at least, about his support for the space programme. I'm
sure this is because most of his employers feel the same way.


Commercial enterprise doesn't do anything that doesn't have a ROI.

Potential and hoped for ROI at least.

What's your point?

There is little in life that is a sure thing, but if your business
plan doesn't show a good ROI, the bean counters won't fund you.

I just meant that businiess is often involving quite high risk
especially if the potential is large.


The only government colonies have all been penal colonies.


America wasn't a penal colony.

I didn't say it was.

It was a British colony. So was India, Malaysia, Burma (now Myanmar),
Australia (partly a penal colony for some time), Hong Kong, Singapore,
America (as you say yourself not a penal colony), Canada, New
Zealand, South Africa etc etc etc.


The colonies in North America were not government colonies either.
They were funded by private enterprise.

They were funded by the crown initially,

Nope, just given a license by the crown.

but I suppose you could say that was not a government in the modern sense

No king paid for a damned thing.

(I suggest you jump on this face saving lifeline).

No need, he's right.

It is estimated that 50,000 convicts were sent to North America by Britain to serve as slaves or endentured labor.

So what was America a penal colony or not, you seem to be contradicting yourself in this struggle to warp history.

Nope, just rubbing your nose in the fact that it was never
a penal colony, even tho some from jails were sent there.

Australia had many government colonies, all penal colonies.

That is just plain wrong. Quite a few of them never were.

While there were some "free settlements" in Australia, the population
was predomanitly convicts and their decendants until the gold rushes
of the 1850's.

So this one example means all government colnies....I can't even be bothered.

trag wrote:
If you filled the space shuttle's cargo bay to capacity with something
cheap--let's say lead. Launched it into orbit and magically
transformed it into gold. Then brought it back. You would still
lose money on the operation.

Let's check this out mathematically; the total payload capacity of the
Shuttle to LEO is right around 22,700 kilograms:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle
A kilogram of gold costs $30,604 at the moment...so that means that
22,700 x 30,604 = $694,710,800 total gold.
Lead costs $1.68 per kilo at the moment, so we have to subtract $38,023
from that, leaving us with $694,672,777 total profit on the operation.
A Shuttle flight, according to NASA's reckoning (probably low) costs
around $450,000,000:
http://www.nasa.gov/centers/kennedy/...le_faq.html#10
So on that basis, you would indeed turn a healthy profit...but other
estimates of the cost put it right up around $700,000,000, and in that
case you break even at best.

Pat

Giga wrote
Rod Speed wrote
Giga" "Giga wrote
Rod Speed wrote
Giga" "Giga wrote
Immortalista wrote

Today I was reading some opinions of people who believe that
there is no reason for humans to leave earth. Are all arguments
for moving into space and onto other bodies in space really that
weak and irrelevant?

To say on the one hand that there is no reason and on the other 'it is too expensive' is a kind of a
contradiction.

Nope, the original is just a loose form of saying that there
is CURRENTLY no reason for humans to colonise space.

I presume by emphasising 'currently' you mean there might be in the future,

Yes, I'm not silly enough to dismiss that possibility completely.

or perhaps there will be.

Nope.

I suppose if you are already living the good life then why bother,
but billions of people are not.

But its MUCH cheaper to improve their life significantly here on
earth than it is to give them a better life on mars or the moon etc.

This means that if it was a lot cheaper then it would be justified,

Not necessarily, most obviously if no one is interested in being
colonists etc.

I think many people would be interested, me for one,

I bet you wouldnt when it came to the crunch and your nose was
rubbed in the downsides.

Perhaps, its difficult to know in advance,

Not for me.

anyway there are many who would.

Nope, just a few loons at most.

but I doubt that I would be chosen.

Dunno, someone may want to get rid of you.

)

and that means there must be some reason for doing it, and the
persons putting forward such an argument obviously recognise that.

Utterly mangled all over again.

So you do not recognise any value human beings exploring space with
manned craft?

No, compare with the much cheaper and more viable alternative of
exploring space with unmanned craft.

That would be an extreme and difficult to justify position.

Wrong, as always. Completely trivial on cost alone in fact.

I read some where recently that the most powerful super computer in the world, which presumably fills a large
building,

Nope, they arent anything like that big.

has only the power of a cricket (insect).

Its much more powerful than any cricket in a hell of a lot of ways.

The delay time to Mars is what 18 minutes x 2, each time your dumb stupid robot needs some guidance.

So you give it enough intelligence to work out the basics for itself
and just tell it general stuff like 'look for signs of water' etc.

We have done that already with those robots.

The oprerator has to rely on the fairly pathetic information
gathering systems of said robot to make decisions as well.

No reason why that cant be as good as is necessary.

And what about the feel of a place, the atmosphere

We can recreate that here is we are silly enough to want to bother
with that much cheaper than sending some human there and back.

(pure materialists will dismiss this as just imagination but I would disagree).

Your problem.

In summary you need people on the spot to properly explore it

No you dont.

and preferably a settlement so they have the time to do it throughly.

Pity about the much higher cost of doing it that way.

It would take thousands of people many years of dedicated work to survey Mars if adequately.

Taint worth the cost. We havent even bothered
to do that with the bottom of the ocean here.

It would take 10,000s of robots centuries I would say,

That number is straight from your arse. We can tell from the smell.

Even you should have noticed that we do in fact use robots to
explore the bottom of the ocean and dont bother to send humans.

We dont even bother to send humans when exporing
enemy territory anymore, we just send a robot now.

so maybe people would be cheaper in the long run?

Not a chance.

So if it just a question of allocation of resources,

It isnt.

rather than fundamental value of the enterprise, then fine, it should recognised as a financial discussion, not
really a philosophical one.

No one ever said it was a philosophical one.

wrote:
How about the space realists who want to explore space but think the
whole concept of the lonely asteroid miner and colonies on Mars are
pure wishfull thinking if not outright fantasy?


Not to mention those space pirates with the parrots in pressure suits on
their shoulders, and hooks instead of hands?
Aargh, here they come matey: http://www.markdery.com/archives/images/flm.gif

Pat