Let’s go, but not live there.
I would take issue with this:
The first astronauts to travel to Mars, perhaps in the 2040s, will need to cope with a nine-month journey cooped up in a tiny spacecraft. Then they’ll need to survive the landing. If they get that far, life on Mars will be harsh. Frequent sandstorms can bury key equipment or solar panels. There’s no soil for growing food, so they’ll have to rely on whatever they brought with them. A hole in one’s spacesuit would mean certain death. Any significant problem on base—like a loss of power, oxygen, water, food or communication with Earth—would probably doom the whole crew. If something goes awry, they’ll be on their own. While the moon is nearly 1,000 times as far away from Earth as the International Space Station and the Tiangong space station, Mars is hundreds of times more distant than that.
The isolation of the Covid pandemic might give us a small taste of the psychological challenges of life on Mars. Those first visitors will be trapped in one or two small structures with the same few people for something like 2.5 years, counting travel each way and around a year on the ground. Just going for a walk outside would be a huge ordeal. They would never see a single tree in any direction, never dip their feet in a river, nor fill their lungs with fresh air in the morning. Everyone will have a good chance of getting cancer (thanks to a high dose of space radiation) or losing bone and muscle mass (thanks to the long flights and the planet’s weaker gravity).
There is no reason that this has to be the case. Yes, there won’t be trees or rivers, but there are ways to deal with radiation and low gravity, and neither the spacecraft or the habitats have to be cramped. Soil can be created from the regolith, after removing the toxic chemicals, and food grown, and even meat from fish and rabbits. I’m not saying that Mars is the best place to do these things, but if a sufficient number of people want to, it will happen.
Such off-world ventures can also seem hard to justify when we Earthlings are plagued by climate change, pandemics, risks of nuclear war, and rampant inequality. Setting up a research station and living quarters for a half dozen visitors—as space agencies might eventually do—would likely cost tens of billions of dollars. (If Musk really intends to send thousands of Starships to Mars, that’s more like a trillion.)
You can always tell that someone doesn’t understand the economics of spaceflight when they try to extrapolate from the current ways of doing things to scale it up. It doesn’t have to cost tens of billions to get people to Mars unless it is done the NASA way, and certainly not a trillion. But now come the “decolonization” people:
Depending on the animating vision behind Mars exploration, the first astronauts could be scientists, poets, tourists, or military officers. They could be viewed as visitors, settlers, cowboys, or colonists. Treviño prefers the term “migrants”—partly to destigmatize migration on Earth—and she favors including an artist to make sense of the existential experience, and enormous culture shock, of living on this ruddy, barren world.
Let’s say it works: Humanity overcomes the cost and practical barriers of settling Mars, and the migrant Earthlings arrive. There’s one thing left to consider: Maybe Mars would be better off without us.
If our treatment of Earth’s atmosphere is any sign, we’ll corrupt the Martian one too. We’ll litter it with junk, as we have despoiled our own world. Maybe we’d geoengineer the atmosphere, or live out Musk’s desire to terraform the world by blowing up nukes to create a “nuclear winter”—something we’ve managed to avoid so far at home—to raise temperatures, initiate a helpful climate change, and melt some of its polar ice. As with geoengineering proposals meant to combat climate change on Earth, such schemes carry huge risks.
We’d also mine the surface, likely reproducing the economic inequalities and unsustainable practices already prevalent on Earth. For example, Treviño says, there’s a limited supply of Martian ice, but no binding rules exist saying who could use it, how much, and for what purpose. Plus, if any Martian life-form lies underground, terraforming and mining attempts may well destroy them and their ecosystem, and who are we to decide their fate? It’s the height of hubris for one species to decide what should be done with an entire planet that’s not their homeworld.
Sigh…
Where to even start? Mining produces “economic inequalities”? No, mining produces “wealth.” And there is nothing intrinsically wrong with economic inequalities, as long as they aren’t produced by force or fraud. People who demand “economic equality” are demanding that everyone share poverty.
If there are lifeforms on Mars, then we should seek them out and attempt to preserve them, but that doesn’t mean that we have to leave the entire planet a biological preservation site. Rocks don’t have rights, and Mars is simply a very large rock. If we can bring life to it, and the rest of the solar system, and ultimately the universe, we should do so. My religion says that it should be our goal, to the extent feasible, to locally reduce the entropy of the universe.
If there are lifeforms on Mars, then we should seek them out and attempt to preserve them, but that doesn’t mean that we have to leave the entire planet a biological preservation site.
Which is why I’m happy every attempt at finding “life on Mars” (or anywhere else) has been a total failure.
My religion says that it should be our goal, to the extent feasible, to locally reduce the entropy of the universe.
How dare Gaia attempt to reproduce by using humanity to spread itself throughout the universe! That these sorts of Gaianists are opposed to that (and humanity in general) shows that they are an heretical death cult. The true believer and worshipper of Gaia wants life to be spread everywhere where it can exist, because life is good.
Without life, sentient life, there are no value judgments such as “pristine” or “unspoiled” much less “economic inequalities” — there is only a sterile void that exists without meaning. How much does the author of that piece secretly hate humanity?
How much does the author of that piece secretly hate humanity?
Not very much since the hatred is quite overt. Demonization is always one of the first steps. One wonders what the end game is. I guess some sort of magic green reversion to nature-loving with a lot of voluntary population reduction.
How much does the author of that piece secretly hate humanity?
Lots and LOTS.
The author seems to hate all Earth life rather than just humanity if he thinks whatever microbes there may be on Mars are more valuable.
I have believed for a long time that humans exist as a way for Gaia to spread further than just one planet. That seems to be Her goal. Spreading. And when she had conquered all of this one planet the next natural step was to develop a life form that could get off the planet, to the next frontier. We are just her servants, doing what she wants us to do. Or we should. Because if She doesn’t get off this rock and manage to conquer wider She is, of course, doomed sooner or later. She needs to get to the stars. So we should get to it instead of wasting our time contemplating our navels and playing with that kind of pseudophilosophical drivel.
Mars is really most sincerely dead. With perchlorates and peroxides in the soil, sub-200nm UV bombarding the surface, and atomic oxygen in the air, no organic molecules can survive long enough to support biology. Mars needs no planetary protection from us, it does just fine all by itself.
It might harbor something underground, though the lack of significant methane production seems a big strike against it.
Rand, clearly you do not understand the Sanctity of the Spheres. On the physical level, if you’d just skim the outline, you’d see the perfection of an oblate zero.
When I see “decolonization” in an essay, I can’t help wondering when the writer will decolonize his head — as in, remove his head from his colon.
Heh!
Double Heh! What a mental image…
“but no binding rules exist saying who could use it, how much, and for what purpose”
Existence, and that is what they are ashamed of.
Inequality is always with us, even in the early days when anthros say it didn’t exist. Much like demand, there is an endless quantity of inequality, latent or realized, and when living with true scarcity, the inequality of who gets what woman/man, seat, tool, creature, ECT is probably felt even stronger than inequities that arise from specialization and larger populations where people don’t interact much with those they are jealous of.
I bet the author of this drivel would happily vote for a politician that promised “Everyone will get an above average job!” Scientific innumeracy…
“If our treatment of Earth’s atmosphere is any sign, we’ll corrupt the Martian one too. ”
Attitudes like this are what Michael Shellenberger called the view of a profoundly depressed person masked as environmentalism.
Artificially depressed.
Oh I believe the depression is authentic. It’s the intelligence that’s artificial.
“The first astronauts to travel to Mars, perhaps in the 2040s, will need to cope with a nine-month journey cooped up in a tiny spacecraft.”
100 tons of cargo could launch from Earth and get to
Mars in 6 month.
Starship with just crew could launch from Earth and get to Mars faster than 6 months.
And/or a Starship with crew only could launch to Mars by first going to Venus, and then Mars which might take say 7 to 8 or as long as say 12 months but don’t to follow the 2.1 year separation of time to get to Mars.
And it seems Starship if works at all, anytime soon, will going to Mars well before 2040 AD.
We could have private joyride to Mars before 2040 AD.
Before 2040, we could have 1 million tons of water mined from the Moon. And this could be possible before 2030 AD. Or the Moon doesn’t have any mineable water in terms of before 2030 AD, though Moon could mineable water later then 2030 AD- mineable lunar water depends on what is discovered on the Moon, and could be discovered after 2030 AD, and mineable lunar doesn’t depend on what found on the Moon- or mineable lunar water depends many things. Or broadly speaking mineable lunar water could depend on what is found on Mars or any kind of activity done on Mars.
It could also depend on techology and could depend on governmental laws.
And lunar water can be mined even if not mineable- which seems like NASA’s plan, because NASA is quite dumb.
Or seems currently China is mining unmineable China coal which costs $400 per ton.
China is at Peak Coal- though Peak Coal depends more than the amount of coal somewhere in the ground.
Or it’s possible China has more mineable coal than US or Russia has- but paying $400 per ton, indicates it doesn’t.
https://tradingeconomics.com/commodity/coal
oh, just dropped to about $390, but $390 is still not mineable coal.
Mineable lunar water could have price at $400 per kg [which depends how much is mined per year] and within 2 decades lower to $10 per kg [again because how much is mined per year], and if then go back up to $400 per kg- then you have past Peak lunar water- it appear to not be mineable.
Though it could cause by governmental laws, or simply having cheaper lunar rocket fuel, somehow.
Likewise, Coal in past, could be cost more in today’s dollar than $400 per ton. But yesterdays is not the issue.
People who say that humans cannot handle long trips with extreme privations should read about the expeditions of Amundsen, Scott and especially Shackleton.
Or travel by urban commuter rail.
If this is the best Wired can do, they would be best to close up shop, disband its staff and go out of business. Not everything has positive value.
If this is the best Wired can do, they would be best to close up shop, disband its staff and go out of business.
That was my take two decades ago. Good to see that they’ve improved so much since. It reminded me of the shifty dotcom businesses they used to fawn over. Maybe there’s some alien brain devouring fungus in the building somewhere?
Cynically, the classic business plan of the Wired era was: 1) climb into a dumpster, 2) set it on fire, 3) ???, 4) profit! The excellent burn rates such businesses would brag about would naturally be part of step 2.
“…Then they’ll need to survive the landing. If they get that far, life on Mars will be harsh.”
Well could be less harsh than Alaska or in middle of northern Atlantic ocean.
Or some places on the Moon.
Lunar polar regions can be very dangerous, and also fairly safe, mostly. Lunar polar regions are going to be far more alien looking than Mars- but planet Earth could be always in the sky- which might be comforting and provide significant Earthshine.
“Frequent sandstorms can bury key equipment or solar panels. There’s no soil for growing food, so they’ll have to rely on whatever they brought with them. A hole in one’s spacesuit would mean certain death.”
Sahara desert sandstorm would be far more significant in all aspects. To uneducated, you be in worse global Mars dust storm, and not notice it. No one can not notice a sandstorm. You can grow food in water.
A hole in spacesuit could be lessen significantly with a finger or a hand. Duct tape could be used. Running about without enough oxygen could be a problem- but same could be said about diving in the ocean. If needed 5 min of it, I would want at least an hour of it- unless there was no choice in the matter. Or having tight margins, would seem quite reckless.
Double Heh! What a mental image…
People who demand “economic equality” are demanding that everyone share poverty.
To use gamer terminology, I’ve noticed that libertarians tend to encourage everyone to level up, while “progressives” generally want everyone else to level down.
And, yup, there it is – the old, tired argument about fixing things here, on Earth, before going off to the Moon or Mars…
Has anyone ever added up NASA’s budget since 1958 vs all the other US gov’t agancies “War on Poverty” budgets? I’m sure NASA’s is a drop in the bucket in comparison.
And there’s the “We’ve done terrible things to Earth, so we shouldn’t be allow to muck up any other planets…” That’s just a gentle nudge away from the argument that humanity is a horrible disease on this planet, and we just put ourselves out of Gaia’s misery.
And Wired doesn’t label the piece as an “OpEd”, or “Opinion” (few do, anymore). Another reason I don’t subscribe to Wired, nor do I have the site bookmarked.
“And, yup, there it is – the old, tired argument about fixing things here, on Earth, before going off to the Moon or Mars…”
It is the argument of, “I don’t like what you spend your money on, you need to let me spend your money on things I want to do.”
Remember when Musk was attacked as not wanting to save the world because $44 billion would end world hunger? Trillions have been spent by governments, activists, and NGOs since then and their spending priorities are apparently above reproach by the globalist Marxists and these groups have spent more than that $44 billion on leftist causes, including ending world hunger, and not solved any of those problems.
At what point do people stop and think if their actions are beneficial or not?
“Maybe Mars would be better off without us.”
Wha..?
What would that even mean?
Is there anything at all that it *could* mean?
I mean, I can at least understand (though violently disagree with) people who say that about the Earth. There’s an ecosystem here that would adapt to our removal and perhaps flourish in ways it cannot with us here. But Mars is a rock. How can a rock be better or worse off?
The Mars rock might to happier if another Mars rock hit it.
Humans might stop that from happening
Why 2040’s?
Why not early 2030’s?
For simple hohmann [+8 months] from Earth to Mars:
Feb 22 3031
April 11 3033
May 5 3035
Not sure what they are if taking 6 months to go to Mars
Earth to Venus [simple- 145.9 days]
Oct 8 2029 arrives March 3 2030
Next simple Venus to Mars:
June 9 2030 which if simple arrive at Mars Jan 14 2031
{simple Venus to Mars about 217 day- considering one would be at high Venus orbit [highly elliptical] , it does not take much delta-v to do a faster trajectory than simple}
To leave Mars to Earth [simple]:
Dec 16 2030- which works if shave month off coming from Earth to Venus to Mars
[Or do something faster than simple hohmann from
Mars to Earth- any crew would not be using a simple.]
Next one from Mars to Earth is:
Feb 5 2033 arrives at Earth Oct 20 2033
If want to go Mars to Venus for some reason:
Feb 5 2031
Jan 4 2032
Dec 3 2032
Musk seems to suggest getting to Mars with 100 tons payload in 6 month- but I would guess he means less payload and crew. There is not much sense sending cargo that fast. But maybe 7 month with crew and 100 tons total with cargo.
Before 2030:
Jan 1 2029 departs Earth to Mars simple hohmann cargo to Mars arrives Sept 19 2029.
Using same Earth to Mars window, you send crew to Mars a month or two later, on faster trajectory to Mars.
Then have the Earth to Venus to Mars option which could send crew and/or cargo, which depart later in 2029 [Oct 8 if doing simple hohmann] and send something, after cargo and crew have got to Mars.
And crew gets earlier to Mars and can it leave Mars to Venus Mar 3 2030 with simple arrive Oct 10 2030- And use whatever sent to from Earth to Venus mission in Oct 8 2029 launch window- it trade out a crew, medical needs, or rocket fuel return to Earth or can solve anything known about before or after cargo and/or crew first arrive at Mars. Or they just wait for it at Mars, for whatever it is, that coming to them.
All Whats and Whens, but no Hows.
Let’s wait until SpaceX finishes it’s Starship orbital test flight.
{hopefully in next two weeks}
“Such off-world ventures can also seem hard to justify when we Earthlings are plagued by climate change, pandemics, risks of nuclear war, and rampant inequality.”
And there it is, what I knew was coming. “Stay home and help build Trantor like a good little work unit.”
And the failure to understand that the solution to the problems on Earth IS to go to orbit permanently, the moon permanently, Mars, the asteroid belt …… We will so vastly increase the wealth of all humanity that the problems we struggle with today will fade away. There will be new problems, of course, but they will be new and different issues to tackle.
There’s one thing left to consider: Maybe Mars would be better off without us.
How? It’s a dead planet! How much more dead can we make it?
This is misanthropism on stilts.
The desolation is pristine.
There is an argument for preserving some things off Earth and since space is big, some preserves would be rather large compared to your local Earth park but that is not the same as forbidding any activity off our planet.
The silly navel gazing bint who wrote this has even worse sentiments:
https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2022/12/07/i-dont-want-a-sci-fi-future/
I gather this smarter, wiser, more enlightened humanity would ruthlessly cull the Caitlin Johnstones among us? Careful what you wish for, right?
I just read that piece. She’s a silly utopianist, who thinks sitting around meditating and taking psychedelic drugs will make us a conscious species and bring about the world she wants to see.
She also doesn’t know a damn thing about writing fiction. At its core every piece of fiction requires some kind of conflict. And violence is the easiest form of conflict to write about. If it wasn’t, all Hollywood movies would be rated G.
I always wonder how many of these armchair idealists would really be happy eking out a precarious existence as a subsistence farmer using all the properly sustainable agricultural techniques. And the planet would probably only support a few million people.
A lot of them if it was like YouTube. Not very many if they had to knap their own tools, have no access to hobby farm tractors, and had to produce their own seeds.
I don’t want to live on Mars.
But no one should want to live on Mars unless there
is mineable water. Mineable water is related to the price of water and simple way to talk about it, is Mars water price being $1 per kg [$1000 per ton].
This is very expensive compared to water on Earth,
but you can’t expect Mars water being cheap, but in the beginning the highest price of Mars water should be $1 per kg or less. And you would have to mine millions of tons of water per year, to allow Mars water to be $1 per kg or less.
And I suggest making lakes which could hold billions of tons of water- and selling real estate near these lakes.
But I might prefer to live in Venus orbit. To live in Venus orbit, it seems min price of water should be around $100 per kg. In time, water in Venus orbit might be cheaper than water on Earth, that could easily take a century of time or more. And in 100 years the population in Venus orbit could millions of people and could allow a population of over 1 trillion people- though seems very unlikely human population could trillion in less than 500 years.
Some people could live in Venus orbit, if water was $100 per kg or less.
Venus is the best hub of our solar system, and you could bring space rocks to Venus orbit. If one is getting billion of tons of water from space rocks per year- the price of water could be as cheap as $1 per kg. But in near term, one could import water from Earth, it’s Moon, or Mars.
If Mars has water at $1 per kg, it could ship Mars water to Venus orbit, allowing Venus orbit water price to be $100 per kg or less.
But that seems like it’s going take quite a long time, so I would prefer to live in ocean settlements on Earth.
If people want to go live on Mars, it would require ocean settlements on Earth, which could happen within a decade or two- if Mars has mineable water.
If govt encourages: sells ocean areas as cheap as farm land in the US. And you make cheap floating breakwater- less than 1 ton of metal per foot. And only long lasting metal in the ocean is titanium [quite pricey now, but a lot cheaper now, that it was]
then you make ocean settlement near coastal land cities. And since you stopping waves, ocean settlements should have manmade surfing areas- which can provide cheap access to these surfing areas to the populations living on land- of course if living in ocean settlements, you can also surf, have access to public beaches in the ocean settlement. Though you also have a private small beach.
And also you have freshwater lakes in the ocean, have a freshwater lake with beach front property.
No cars in ocean settlement, but people living could own cars, use cars [Uber, etc] in land area. And need short distance ferry service to land areas. One should also have helicopter [and/or flying cars] access in ocean settlement for emergency medical use [use hospitals on land].
With freshwater lake in ocean, they can also use to for waste water management and it good place to have powerplant, including nuclear. And powerplants and water treatment would not close to where people are living [but say within 5 km nearest residential area- and residential area is suburb- just place where people live, with parks, bike paths, etc.]
At no point in all of human history were there as many as 1 billion people on Earth until after a century of the Enlightenment and Industrial Revolution. Before that, not only did humans live in squalor and disease, but there just weren’t very many of us. And we were ruled over by “nobility” ….. men and women that were frankly a bunch of savages exploiting everyone else for their own personal gain. And yet, the typical modern human lives better than those noble savages lived.
This is the world that these literally insane people worship and wish to return to.
“I gather this smarter, wiser, more enlightened humanity would ruthlessly cull the Caitlin Johnstones among us?”
???
We’ll just leave them behind.
Reeking of cat piss and despair.