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#100 Reply
Posted by
sainbablo
on 20 Jan, 2019 16:39
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Dave, I think you're likely right, tourism to the Moon, especially, could become a big thing, the experience of a lifetime.
If I had the money I would certainly want to do that. Sounds like a really great idea for honeymooning couples too! It would probably generate big bucks.
However, it might be hard to figure out a way to have that fund anything else, like science, under the current situation. I don't know. I just suspect that might be the case.
At 1/6th gravitational pull on moon the reproductive physiology (both male and female) may no work that well as it does on earth.
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#101 Reply
Posted by
cdev
on 20 Jan, 2019 18:27
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At least in the short term tourism context, that sounds more like a feature than a bug!
Dave, I think you're likely right, tourism to the Moon, especially, could become a big thing, the experience of a lifetime.
If I had the money I would certainly want to do that. Sounds like a really great idea for honeymooning couples too! It would probably generate big bucks.
However, it might be hard to figure out a way to have that fund anything else, like science, under the current situation. I don't know. I just suspect that might be the case.
At 1/6th gravitational pull on moon the reproductive physiology (both male and female) may no work that well as it does on earth.
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#102 Reply
Posted by
james_s
on 20 Jan, 2019 19:04
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Word is that it costs about $35 million if you pick up the phone an book a flight today.
Pick up the phone to book a flight on hardware that has not exist, to a destination that has not been developed? What good is it to book a flight now? Who can even say what the cost will be until all of the equipment has been developed? I've seen enough things that never delivered anything close to their promised economy that I remain skeptical.
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#103 Reply
Posted by
apis
on 20 Jan, 2019 19:29
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The effect on human health could be a deal breaker with regard to a permanent human colony on the moon, but there could still be factories with a temporary workforce I suppose. It probably wouldn't be very glamorous work being stuck in a moon bunker though. Living in micro gravity is pretty bad for the health. Is there any research showing the effect of living in the low gravitational field that exists on the moon?
Both China and Roscosmos seems determined to build a research base on the moon. Roscosmos (together with ESA) are also sending a rover in 2023 to see how much water they can find among other things (for a moon base?). So maybe there will really be a moon research base in 2040!
Word is that it costs about $35 million if you pick up the phone an book a flight today.
Pick up the phone to book a flight on hardware that has not exist, to a destination that has not been developed? What good is it to book a flight now? Who can even say what the cost will be until all of the equipment has been developed? I've seen enough things that never delivered anything close to their promised economy that I remain skeptical.
It makes perfect sense to be sceptical. But you can book a flight to the ISS today, so that figure should be accurate. That at least gives an idea about what order of magnitude we are talking about with currently available technology. Considering how much money various countries spends on other less progressive projects it seems like it should be well within the realm of possibility. The US has spent over $1 trillion dollar on the Iraq war for example.
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#104 Reply
Posted by
BrianHG
on 20 Jan, 2019 19:41
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Re: Inhabitating Mars by 2030? What for?
Ok,
1. To get away from closed minded politics.
2. To get away from religious fundamentalist purists.
3. To get away from flat earthers.
4. To get away from gun-nuts.
5. To get away from ultra self centered people.
6. To get away from those deliberately self set ultra low IQ people.
7. To get away from those who fall for all that cheap marketing must have useless crap.
At least, this may be the case in the beginning, hopefully for a good first century, however, eventually, if I know humanity, one by one these problems will eventually migrate to Mars as well.
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#105 Reply
Posted by
cdev
on 20 Jan, 2019 19:48
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Thats how the world seems to be run now.
Word is that it costs about $35 million if you pick up the phone an book a flight today.
Pick up the phone to book a flight on hardware that has not exist, to a destination that has not been developed? What good is it to book a flight now? Who can even say what the cost will be until all of the equipment has been developed? I've seen enough things that never delivered anything close to their promised economy that I remain skeptical.
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The number of wealthy people is growing rapidly.
[...]
Credit Suisse's "Global Wealth in 2018" measured the number of millionaires in the world. According to the report, the US has 17.3 million millionaires, highest in the world.[25]
All things are relative. A person who lives in Manhattan has to be a millionaire to afford to live there. The cost of living drives salaries higher.
Being a millionaire today is not like being a millionaire 50 years ago. I think of millionaires as being individuals who are making over $1 million per year in income... not those who hold $1m or more in tangible assets. Someone who bought a house 30 years ago could easily be a "millionaire" if you use assets as the basis to make the determination.
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#107 Reply
Posted by
cdev
on 20 Jan, 2019 20:37
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Okay, it appears there are approximately
2200 billionaires on this planet currently if we use total value of assets in USD.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BillionaireThats probably a more meaningful number to space tourism.
People who have that money might spend $35 million for an unforgettable experience.
Amazon's Jeff Bezos makes around $210M each day. So, one sixth of that is around $35M
Apis, re microgravity, see this link.
Resveratrol prevents the wasting disorders of mechanical unloading by acting as a physical exercise mimetic in the rat.
Momken I, Stevens L, Bergouignan A, Desplanches D, Rudwill F, Chery I, Zahariev A, Zahn S, Stein TP, Sebedio JL, Pujos-Guillot E, Falempin M, Simon C, Coxam V, Andrianjafiniony T, Gauquelin-Koch G, Picquet F, Blanc S.
FASEB J. 2011 Oct;25(10):3646-60. doi: 10.1096/fj.10-177295. Epub 2011 Jun 29.
PMID:
21715682
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#108 Reply
Posted by
BrianHG
on 20 Jan, 2019 20:54
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I do not think millionaires will be taking a trip to Mars for over a century after we first colonize except for the 2 to 10 who just must go at any price. The first ones on Mars will each need multiple skills in the scientific, mechanical, engineering at all levels, biological, medical, agricultural, management, sociological, psychological "Experience" to even attempts to go there as the actual life of everyone there is in the hands each single individual in an effort to create a functioning colony.
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i think if you did large scale mining with big reactors it would be more profitable then tourism. and you don't want tourists near that thing.
I wonder if making it non-commercial is actually a bad idea.
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#110 Reply
Posted by
cdev
on 20 Jan, 2019 23:18
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There may not be any choice. Its hard to say. In most cases, changes have made new non-profit activities by governments impossible.
I wonder if making it non-commercial is actually a bad idea.
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#111 Reply
Posted by
KL27x
on 21 Jan, 2019 00:47
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Damn, I love sci fi, but this thread is full of strange ideas.
Gold and minerals? Nope.
Second home in case of the destruction of the planet? Sure. To have a self sustaining home, there needs to be energy. Humans need food and water and air. No matter how many babies you make in your bubble, it will cost more energy to keep these humans breathing than their labor can provide. It's a net loss. A bubble colony is going to need to receive energy from the Earth. Through shipments or through uBeam technology, or something. The most important thing that matters is a source of energy in order to recycle the essential minerals and supplies you would bring there in the first place. This kind of life would be super eco-unfriendly. It would need a massive input of energy per human.
Until we find a planet with a massive energy source that we can tap with tech that can be brought or built there, it isn't going to happen. We probably aren't going to find wood and coal and other fossil fuels (and the oxygen to burn it) on Mars no matter how many humans go looking for it. Uranium and plutonium might be the eventual ticket, when we have the ability to transport and build and maintain a nuclear reactor to such a remote and hostile environment. Energy is what we need to find, not gold. Right up there with water and oxygen.
What humans are good at is taking the fat of the land, built up over millions of years of life, and burning it all at once... in order to shove entropy up nature's arse for one brief shining moment in time. What we would need to have a second home is another energy rich planet to rape. Not some hippie solar powered commune that can't even sustain itself.
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#112 Reply
Posted by
cdev
on 21 Jan, 2019 01:26
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"The mainspring of this country, wound up as tight as it is, is guaranteed for the life of the watch"
Its relatively sunny all the time on Mars, except during sandstorms and the Martian night. As far as paying for their keep, air, water, food, education and health care, vouchers would be the way to go, drawn against their future profits at the Company Store.
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#113 Reply
Posted by
KL27x
on 21 Jan, 2019 01:37
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With any foreseeable tech, this is still a solar railway on Mars.
The reason to build a colony is what I said it is. It's the same reason the Egytians built the pyramids. It's for our own vanity. It's a F U to the universe. It's saying, look. We can keep 100 hippies alive on another planet.... at the cost of 60 tons of dead dinosaurs per person per hour.
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#114 Reply
Posted by
apis
on 21 Jan, 2019 01:49
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Humans need food and water and air. No matter how many babies you make in your bubble, it will cost more energy to keep these humans breathing than their labor can provide. It's a net loss. A bubble colony is going to need to receive energy from the Earth. Through shipments or through uBeam technology, or something.
uBeam for space, that's brilliant! :-D
Uranium and plutonium might be the eventual ticket, when we have the ability to transport and build and maintain a nuclear reactor to such a remote and hostile environment. Energy is what we need to find, not gold. Right up there with water and oxygen.
Humans doesn't really provide any energy at all, unless eaten. But yes we need a lot of energy to keep things going, but that isn't a big problem I believe. The moon has better access to the same energy source that we mostly rely on down on earth: the sun. Solar power in space is about 1400 W/m
2. Need a bunch of solar panels though. The ISS has been using only solar power for many years.
There is also lots of uranium on the moon. It would have to be mined and enriched before it could be used though. We could also send some initial uranium fuel if desirable, the energy density of uranium is 8.1x10
13 J/kg so it probably could make sense to ship some from earth initially. (Compare that to e.g. diesel with 4.8x10
6 J/kg). Building and operating a reactor at the moon is probably no more difficult than doing it in a sub which both the US and Russia are doing already.
Oxygen can be generated from oxides or water, and the Chandrayaan-1 probe found water at the moons polar regions in 2009. Roscosmos (together with ESA) are sending a rover there in 2023 to see how much water they can find among other things. If there is enough water it might also be used to generate rocket fuel on the moon.
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#115 Reply
Posted by
rdl
on 21 Jan, 2019 02:33
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I can see solar power maybe working for a Mars base despite the weaker strength of sunlight there, but I think the two week long nights on the Moon might mean nuclear is the better option.
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#116 Reply
Posted by
KL27x
on 21 Jan, 2019 03:27
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we mostly rely on down on earth: the sun.
Big difference. The power of the sun has been stored and concentrated on Earth for hundreds of millions of years through organic carbon based life. We don't use this up just to run cars and lawn mowers. Without it, we work hard just to make clothing and shelter and to harvest and process food. Food that grows all by itself on Earth. Now add all the extra things you need to survive on the Moon. Pressurized atmosphere, oxygen, and water recycling. Burning enough energy/fuel, anything is possible. But you aren't going to have some self-sustaining habitat in such terrible conditions to human life without a huge input of energy. Even after you put up your little biodome or w/e, you don't have no Amazon to deforest, no coal mines or oil wells, no nothin to power the repairs and maintenance and to produce and shape any engineering/construction materials. And an extension cord doesn't quite reach that far. Solar won't cut it, at all, unless you keep it going with resources from the Earth. Spend all that energy on Earth to get the final products to ship to the Moon. The structural stuff, the replacement stuff, the maintenance things, the fuel. A colony would be 100% dependent on Earth to survive at all, let alone even think about growing/expanding.
uBeam for space, that's brilliant! :-D
That's essentially what it would be. These colonies would need fuel, as well as supply of unrenewable resources. And the efficiency after figuring the cost of getting it there would be uBeam level, if you're lucky.
There's zero chance of a self-sustaining human colony on the Moon unless/until the energy thing is figured out. Solar panels and batteries wear out. To make more of them you need a heck of a lot of energy. To refine metals from ore. To extract oxygen from moon rocks. To recycle your water. Lots and lots of energy. To use the word Eco-friendly in this thread (somewhere mentioned) is an oxymoron. Each of the humans living in this colony would have the carbon footprint of 10,000 people on earth, and it doesn't matter how many solar panels you ship up there. This would be like spending the equivalent Earth resources of a king for every space hippie living up there like a pauper. If this were a "second home," it would be a very expensive vacation home.
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#117 Reply
Posted by
sainbablo
on 21 Jan, 2019 16:50
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Re: Inhabitating Mars by 2030? What for?
Ok,
1. To get away from closed minded politics.
2. To get away from religious fundamentalist purists.
3. To get away from flat earthers.
4. To get away from gun-nuts.
5. To get away from ultra self centered people.
6. To get away from those deliberately self set ultra low IQ people.
7. To get away from those who fall for all that cheap marketing must have useless crap.
At least, this may be the case in the beginning, hopefully for a good first century, however, eventually, if I know humanity, one by one these problems will eventually migrate to Mars as well.
Would you rather abandon the fragrances, the flowers, the rainbows, beautiful faces and head for Mars regardless for, we cannot resurrect these alluring scenes there despite all the advances.
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#118 Reply
Posted by
sainbablo
on 21 Jan, 2019 17:03
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The effect on human health could be a deal breaker with regard to a permanent human colony on the moon, but there could still be factories with a temporary workforce I suppose. It probably wouldn't be very glamorous work being stuck in a moon bunker though. Living in micro gravity is pretty bad for the health. Is there any research showing the effect of living in the low gravitational field that exists on the moon
[/quote
The health reports of the early astronauts were not made public.Now and then news used to appear reporting decalcification of bones and
obscure psychological/psychiatric issues suffered by them. But perhaps concentrated search may reveal more
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Ok guys what species is going to go out of control first on terraformed mars? Hogs? Camels? Turtles??
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If you build real big reactors on the moon cant you use processing techniques that would be absurd because of energy demands?
I mean we dont really need uranium for anything other then bombs and reactors. It would be best to put all those on the moon too. You cab make medical isotopes there.
Are there mining methods that could be used economically if absurd sized reactors are made. Like things with plasma, refractory distillation methods etc?
I assume on earth the limitations for power input into a chemical purification process is in the low medium megawattswatts based on what we have available. If you gave a mineral purifications company a multi terawatt reactor could they do some weird process for mining or purification?
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Also realistically how does nuclear charge mining work out on the moon in regards to pollution? Like project plowshare.
Unlike the earth, is it actually feasible to clean up all the debris from a nuclear blast unlike on earth since there are no water tables or winds. It almost seems like you can vacuum it up.
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#122 Reply
Posted by
rdl
on 21 Jan, 2019 17:33
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uBeam for space, that's brilliant! :-D
http://ubeam.comIn space the efficiency of uBeam only drops by about 0.3%.
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#124 Reply
Posted by
cdev
on 21 Jan, 2019 17:57
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Just because its 'possible' to do something doesn't mean its always or even often a smart thing to do.
Nuclear fission power system for space exploration:
https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/spacetech/kilopower
We may never know the full story of the small Russian fission reactors they at one time used for unattended scientific outposts of various kinds.
But what we do know is pretty scary.
That is not to say that some uses of nuclear fission in space might make sense - when there weren't any other solutions. The farther from the Sun that a space probe goes the less solar energy is available.
Some planets have atmospheres that block out most of the sunlight. Also, what if a dust storm on Mars covers up the solar panels on a rover or base.