We need to dedicate ourselves to the construction of lunar and asteroid bases. They are essential to any operation going to Mars.
[QUOTE=Drury;51195810]Musk talked about it recently. Moon is cool, but it's empty and has no atmosphere. Mars has actual resources on it and can be terraformed.[/QUOTE]
Not the point. Terraforming within the next few decades or hell, even a century is a pipe dream for the time being. Not to mention the kind of resources/costs it would take to conduct such an endeavour, setting up habitats and hydroponics facilities in the meantime would be a cheaper and more efficient method in the meantime.
The Moon is (relatively) close by and has a much lower level of gravity than Mars, which is essential for launching spacecraft from the surface as it means we wouldn't need to expend as much fuel/energy to do so for return missions. Also means that if we needed to send in supplies it wouldn't be exceeding costly/risky when compared to a Mars mission and it would arrive within a sooner period of time. There's also resources on the moon (Helium-3 iirc) that we can extract and utilise which again is equally important.
Also, consider how the Moon could be used as a staging point for launching future missions. It'd be a hell of a lot easier to prepare a craft in lower gravity conditions and again, would expend less energy to launch.
Once we've got a base on the Moon, that's when Mars should be our focus. Until then it's just gestures which, despite having their own merits and potential for expanding our understanding of that beyond our homeworld, is largely sentimental. Need to be practical when it comes to space exploration.
Now traveling to mars, wouldn't it be about comparable to how long it took for the pilgrims to make it to America? Barring the extreme hostility of the environment and having enough fuel, colonizing mars would be a little similar to colonizing the new world.
[QUOTE=JoeSkylynx;51197593]We need to dedicate ourselves to the construction of lunar and asteroid bases. They are essential to any operation going to Mars.[/QUOTE]
Not according to the US government right now.
[QUOTE=JoeSkylynx;51197593]We need to dedicate ourselves to the construction of lunar and asteroid bases. They are essential to any operation going to Mars.[/QUOTE]
Why? Getting to Mars is the easy part. Having to refuel on the moon is an unnecessary step when you can do it in LEO.
[QUOTE=OvB;51198133]Why? Getting to Mars is the easy part. Having to refuel on the moon is an unnecessary step when you can do it in LEO.[/QUOTE]
Not a matter of refueling, a matter of straight launching.
I would imagine with the moon's lower gravity, it would be easier to launch a larger vessel to Mars from that point than from Earth's orbit.
i don't have any hopes on this
i don't think mars is going to be any good and i don't think we can even terraform it, we cannot change the atmosphere of a planet nor its composition
i don't think there is going to be a human colonization of the universe
and if we do, those objective are so far away in time we're not even sure if the scientist working on it will still be working. Anything can happens before 2050 and 2030- even the collapse of society is possible today, making those objective completely impossible to reach.
Make me wrong.
[QUOTE=ApertureXS200;51198197]i don't have any hopes on this
i don't think mars is going to be any good and i don't think we can even terraform it, we cannot change the atmosphere of a planet nor its composition
i don't think there is going to be a human colonization of the universe
and if we do, those objective are so far away in time we're not even sure if the scientist working on it will still be working. Anything can happens before 2050 and 2030- even the collapse of society is possible today, making those objective completely impossible to reach.
Make me wrong.[/QUOTE]
I wouldn't be so pessimistic, we will get there. But currently there is no reason to even think about Mars other than as scientific curiosity. The most hostile environments are still more suited for humans than best ones Mars has to offer. Also Mars should be a global project like ITER or LHC and not a dick waving contest of governments or private corporations.
[QUOTE=OvB;51198133]Why? Getting to Mars is the easy part. Having to refuel on the moon is an unnecessary step when you can do it in LEO.[/QUOTE]
Less resources wasted when launching off from the moon, establishment of moonbase means loadsa rare minerals to mine, and setting up asteroid bases allows for establishment of better communication equipment.
[QUOTE=Sims_doc;51196018]Didn't the Obama already have a plan for this and had announce this already? Seems awfully familiar.[/QUOTE]
Yep, he announced this policy [url=http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/16/science/space/16nasa.html?_r=0]in 2010[/url]
[QUOTE=OvB;51195762]IMO NASA need's to stop wasting money on launchers and contract out to commercial launch services to do the lifting for their manned science/exploration payloads. This isn't the cold war anymore, the Government doesn't need a rocket when the private sector can do better for less. Throwing away billions for Saturn V symbolic nostalgia.[/QUOTE]
I would rather its a government and not private companies that go to space so that at least space starts out as a public good instead of privatized horseshit.
[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;51198151]I would imagine with the moon's lower gravity, it would be easier to launch a larger vessel to Mars from that point than from Earth's orbit.[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=JoeSkylynx;51198253]Less resources wasted when launching off from the moon[/QUOTE]
There are legitimate reasons to develop a presence on the Moon but this isn't it. The Moon is no more hospitable an environment than orbit, so there's no reason to spend energy landing on it and taking off again as opposed to just refueling in orbit. A spacecraft built on Earth, launched from Earth, and going to Mars would be best served with an orbital space station; it's a waste of delta-V to go to the Moon, land on it, and take off again.
[QUOTE=GordonZombie;51197730]There's also resources on the moon (Helium-3 iirc) that we can extract and utilise which again is equally important.[/QUOTE]
Helium-3 is, and always has been, snake oil. It's in such tiny concentrations in the lunar regolith that it may never be cost-effective to process, we can already manufacture the stuff here as a byproduct of tritium decay easily, and there's no point until we can actually get He-3 fusion working (we don't even have [i]easier[/i] fusion fuels working).
[QUOTE=OvB;51198133]Why? Getting to Mars is the easy part. Having to refuel on the moon is an unnecessary step when you can do it in LEO.[/QUOTE]
Refuelling on the Moon's even more unnecessary if you can leverage ISRU equipment to make fuel on Mars like SpaceX is planning to do with the Raptor's methalox fuel mix.
[editline]13th October 2016[/editline]
[QUOTE=catbarf;51198474]There are legitimate reasons to develop a presence on the Moon but this isn't it. The Moon is no more hospitable an environment than orbit, so there's no reason to spend energy landing on it and taking off again as opposed to just refueling in orbit. A spacecraft built on Earth, launched from Earth, and going to Mars would be best served with an orbital space station; it's a waste of delta-V to go to the Moon, land on it, and take off again.
Helium-3 is, and always has been, snake oil. It's in such tiny concentrations in the lunar regolith that it may never be cost-effective to process, we can already manufacture the stuff here as a byproduct of tritium decay easily, and there's no point until we can actually get He-3 fusion working (we don't even have [i]easier[/i] fusion fuels working).[/QUOTE]
Bingo. I'm all for expanding closer to home as well as going to Mars, but a large station or space habitat is a far more efficient (and in many ways safer) option for building out more with our own SOI.
Plus, given how much water ice and hydrogen/deuterium is easily accessible nearly anywhere off-planet via asteroids, moons, and terrestrial deposits in the polar regions of Mars, even if we do crack fusion power in the next 50-100 years, we don't even really NEED He-3, just lots of water for conversion into reactor fuel.
[editline]13th October 2016[/editline]
[QUOTE=Swilly;51198443]I would rather its a government and not private companies that go to space so that at least space starts out as a public good instead of privatized horseshit.[/QUOTE]
In the past that might have rang true, but Congress is in no shape to properly manage vehicle procurement for NASA currently. I have more faith in SpaceX, Blue Origin and other nascent private spaceflight companies for getting done and getting it done [I]right[/I] (in terms of vehicle design and operation) than NASA as of now, since NASA's Senate Launch System is effectively a modern rehash of the Saturn V that's technologically inferior to the majority of its peers being developed (SpaceX Falcon Heavy+ITS, Blue Origin's New Glenn, etc.) and is highly over-budget and behind schedule. On top of that, Orion's still having setbacks and NASA's on a much more uncertain timetable due to Congress and the election cycle, while the private companies have much more leeway in terms of gettings things done on schedule and safely.
[QUOTE=Swilly;51198443]I would rather its a government and not private companies that go to space so that at least space starts out as a public good instead of privatized horseshit.[/QUOTE]
It wouldn't be a private company going to Space. It would be a Private company providing a launch service to a Government agency. Sort of how we use private commercial airlines to fly soldiers around, or private shipping companies to ship government cargo overseas, and on land. The Government doesn't need to be the one hauling the stuff when the private sector has proven time and time again that it's better at getting stuff from A to B. Part of Elon's speech emphasizes this. SpaceX isn't a space agency. SpaceX is a [I]Transportation[/I] company. Their mission is access to anywhere in the solar system. You can go if you want.
I would rather have a private company running regular liner services to Mars and beyond (which SpaceX claims they can start in 2018 with the Red Dragon), than have a Government waste [I]tens of billions[/I] on a Rocket that they only plan to use [I]four times.[/I] Just so that we can pretend like it's still the Apollo era.
Spend that money on building payloads, not rockets. Leave transportation to the people that can make it cheap.
[editline]13th October 2016[/editline]
I think we need to start treating space like the maritime industry. It's really not all that different once technology reaches a level where getting to space is the easy part, which we are readily approaching. I'm seeing a world where existing companies like Maersk/MSC purchase vessels for charter from SpaceX or others to provide cargo services to Mars and beyond. Really, SpaceX doesn't even need to do the flying if they can build the ships and prove it's a profitable for a shipping company to operate the service. These companies also have the funding to invest in these projects. Maersk for example, had US$47.569 billion in Revenue in 2014. SpaceX needs 10 billion to get us to Mars.
Our laws and regulations are not ready for this future.
[editline]13th October 2016[/editline]
[QUOTE=JoeSkylynx;51198253]Less resources wasted when launching off from the moon, establishment of moonbase means loadsa rare minerals to mine, and setting up asteroid bases allows for establishment of better communication equipment.[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;51198151]Not a matter of refueling, a matter of straight launching.
I would imagine with the moon's lower gravity, it would be easier to launch a larger vessel to Mars from that point than from Earth's orbit.[/QUOTE]
But that would require building a rocket on the Moon, which would require shipping the materials to build it to the Moon, by the end of it all will it really be all that benefitial to launch from the Moon when you're going to need Super-heavy launch capabilities to build your Super-heavy launcher on the Moon anyway.
That's like a ship builder in California saying they're going to ship every piece of steel to Hawaii and build their ship there because it's closer to China. By the time you're done, you could've gotten to China 10 times over in the ship you used to haul the parts.
Little shit. Every president has done this. The president before them has some grand space plan, the first thing they do in office is to ax it, neglect NASA for 3-7 years, then at the very end of their run start blowing hot air about how much they care and setting some far-off goal that'll be axed by the next president. Sick of the cycle.
[QUOTE=SeamanStains;51195801]The thing is, establishing a base on the moon isn't really useful with today's technology. There's not really anything there we could use. The only thing the Moon would be useful for is testing humans, plant life and equipment on a low gravity surface. Most of what a moon base would do, the ISS already provides.[/QUOTE]
The moon actually has lots of resources we could use. There's an abundance of metals available on it (including iron, aluminum, and titanium-- not to mention all the rare materials on it) because of the asteroid impacts that have pummeled it over the eons, there's also water that exists underneath the surface in pockets, there's all kinds of gases trapped in the surface from it being bombarded by solar winds (helium, oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen). These could not only be useful in the actual construction and maintenance of a lunar base, but moreover they could be used to produce fuel for spacecraft.
The ISS is also insufficient compared to what a moon base would offer for the purposes of researching and engineering future advanced space transportation systems (and this is going to be key; we need new, better propulsion systems especially), personnel habitat systems and laboratory environments, surface vehicles and equipment, etc. Moreover, there's also the aspects of simply being able to study the moon itself more intimately with a proper base there and so we can learn more about its formation, geology, and available resources. We've never undertaken something like this before, but we're going to have to eventually if we intend to move out from Earth into the solar system (for that matter, out into the rest of the universe). It's a necessary inevitability. If you can survive in an environment as hostile as the moon's, then you can survive on Mars.
Also, if you look back throughout history when manned Mars missions were proposed, one of the key ideals was that the United States would create and operate a space program fostering decades-- centuries even-- of international cooperation to not only expand our own sphere of influence, but as well to allow our species collectively to focus on the development of peaceful technologies and scientific endeavors. There's political goals to be realized here with great benefits, not just economic and scientific ones.
[editline]13 October 2016[/editline]
I doubt any of this is going to happen though. And that's not just me being a pessimistic asshole, the fact is we've been talking about sending people to Mars for decades now. We've been talking about building moon bases for decades now. We've been talking about doing all these great scientific things that would be unparalleled feats of human ingenuity-- yet nothing has ever materialized out of any of it. If it hasn't been because politics got in the way of science, then it's been clueless people ranting about the economic costs being "not worth it". We've actually gone backwards when you think about it: we haven't sent people to the moon since 1972, we ended our shuttle program when it still had more than enough life left in it, we've let NASA be dominated (as somebody else pointed out) by Congressional politicians.
Humans are pretty terrible at thinking about the long-term picture here, technocratically as well as imaginatively. But whatever, that's nothing new.
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