The Space Review: Review: Spacefarers Comments

Doug Lassiter

Thu, 30 Apr 2020 20:48:28 +0000

On the contrary, it is well understood by astronomers that astronomical telescopes belong in space, and not on the Moon. Gravity, dust, vibration, and thermal issues make the Moon a poor choice. There is some interest in low frequency radio telescopes going on the lunar far side, to be shielded from Earth, but you could also send such a radio telescope far from the Earth and have the same advantage.

E.P. Grondine

Sun, 19 Apr 2020 22:33:07 +0000

Hi g - Since Zubrin's presentation on in Martian situ resource utilization ,there has bee a focus by many on manned flight to Mars. Our Moon has other uses. Sine we lack a compelling reason for flying to Mars, it will be Moon first.

E.P. Grondine

Sun, 19 Apr 2020 22:26:51 +0000

Hi g - A rock from space far less then 1 km in diameter does devestating damage, and they hit far oftener than you guess.

E.P. Grondine

Sun, 19 Apr 2020 22:21:30 +0000

Hi Explorero8 - You' re right about the telescopes, and it will be no problem to get the US Taxpayer to fund them, as you are about to find out. Sine Musk thinks he can get the price of manned Mars low enough so he can fund it himself, we'll see who is going to clear back contamination. Whoever that is will likely need AI systems to do it, so watch this space. It is interesting to note that about next week corona will equal Vietnam in fatalities.Bil saw this, of course.

Explorer08

Thu, 16 Apr 2020 18:38:27 +0000

Both optical and radio telescopes on the Far Side are a pretty good reason to establish manned research facilities. Kind of like Antarctica. Of course, getting Americans interested in funding that is like pulling teeth from a lion without anesthetic. Most Americans just aren't interested in space....enough to fund it.

gbaikie

Thu, 16 Apr 2020 01:45:01 +0000

A space rock which is larger than 50 km in diameter, could do a lot damage to all life on Earth, and smaller than 50 km in diameter could worse than anything humans imagine and worse than anything that has happened to humans. And there is no shortage of space rock 50 km in diameter or larger, which could hit Earth at "any time". Though in terms of time is about 1 chance in about 100 million years. Or in next 100 years, it seems the chance of having an "encounter" with space aliens is much higher. Or in terms odds of 50 km diameter or larger rock hitting Earth compared to space alien invasion, it seems more likely for the Space Aliens having some effect upon Earth compared to the effect of 50 km or more diameter space rock in next 100 years. But since have endless amounts of space rocks and possibility of space Alien, the Space Aliens could cause a space rock to hit Earth, by accident or intention. Now if we become a spacefaring civilization, humans rather than space aliens could by accident or intention to cause a space rock hitting Earth. But difference is, if we are spacefaring we can stop any space rock- for whatever reason- from hitting Earth. And space rocks which are problem because they are more likely and more powerful than mere nuclear weapons, are space rock about 1/2 km in diameter or larger. But anyhow, chance are we going hit space rock which about 100 meter in diameter, and that will cause everyone to realize that we need to be spacefaring- millions could die and lots of possible property damages. And it's possible such an impactor, does not kill many or cause much damage, or don't need lots of death and destruction to occur, all that "needed" is for people to get a "a good idea" of what space rocks could actually do. So one question is, do have to be so stupid, before we decide to become spacefaring? Do you want future generations to assume that we are so stupid. No doubt, they will do this to some degree, anyhow, but how right do want them to be? There of course other reasons they will know we are stupid- which is even better or more significant reasons then allowing space rocks to impact Earth. But impactors will without any doubt, will cause them to be spacefaring, eventually. Ten years maybe, 40 years, more likely, and 100 years pretty certain before then. Which not about what number is killed, because all have do is see something, which makes it clear to "everyone", that it's quite dangerous. So we could possible detect long enough ahead of time, we could take steps to mitigate it's effect, but it still will cause people to decide to do something about it. The good reasons, is space has unlimited amounts energy, humans can use, which much more important than being hit by 1 km diameter space rock. So doing something which will establish electrical market in space- which could mining lunar water to make rocket fuel. Would be example of starting to go in that direction, which eventually leads to a state of more 1/2 of all energy production of Earth comes from Space. Which again, is still the beginning of the beginning of something you call a spacefaring civilization. And it's possible that is less than 60 year in the future, or less than 100 years. Though there no evidence, yet, for me being so optimist {there has not been the space rock, or anything, yet, which is such evidence}.

E.P. Grondine

Thu, 16 Apr 2020 00:56:27 +0000

No one wants to hear this, but it is funny. Most space enthusiasts are still living int the world of the 1950s, when Mars was considered an Earth like planet. Or the world of the 160s, with ONeil's Berkeley's in space. Well, all of us are already living in space, passengers on spaceship Earth. IMO, there is one reason to return to the Moon, and that is to build impactor detection systems even better then NEOWISE. If you think Conona virus is bad, consider the consequences of any mid size impact. Incidentally, the Moon is also a great place to mine asteroids, or rather the debris fields from their impacts there. As semiconductor trade competition with China continues, this may come to play a role. We do not know if Mars harbors any life form which may threaten the Earth's biosphere if brought here.

DougSpace

Wed, 15 Apr 2020 17:39:38 +0000

A common problem with space skepticism is the assumption that the future must be a repeat of past history including past solutions. Choose your analogy. Certain settlements in the past were funded because of mining. So apparently, space settlements will only work if the mining can be profitable. Since that is a stretch the skeptic concludes that space settlements are not possible (at least not by humans). But what if the economic driver for settlement? What is Elon's proposed means of funding settlement? It's not mining. In addition to Starlink, his main approach is to receive from the savings of the intersection of people who want to go and those who can afford to go. And he's doing a right fine job in making making it affordable for a larger group of people. And it's a very large group. There are $86 million millionaires worldwide. If we're leaning on analogues, how about the analogy of the many active retirement communities. They neither mine nor invent nor broadcast reality TV shows yet they nonetheless prosper. How is that possible? The economic driver for space settlements will primarily simply be the savings of those who want to go. Since skeptics are inclined to disbelieve, they won't come to recognize this until they watch other, more adventuresome people doing it.

derekl1963

Wed, 15 Apr 2020 16:13:43 +0000

"Why you go to Moon is if there is mineable water." And...? I mean, you state that as an absolute - as if mining water were a worthy goal in and of itself.

Peter Davey

Tue, 14 Apr 2020 19:35:20 +0000

Machines can do almost everything they can to assist humanity, except replace it. My own support for space exploration is based, at least in part, on two quotations. One, from the early 20th century Russian philosopher, Konstantin Tsiolkovsky: “Earth is the cradle of Mankind, but no-one stays in the cradle forever.” The other, from the later 20th century American science-fiction writer, Robert A Heinlein: “The Earth is now too small and frail a basket for the human race to keep all of its eggs in.” There is a rather nasty scientific concept called “entropy” which suggests that, if a society stops going forward, it will end up going backward, stability - “stasis” - is not an option. "One of the great dreams of humanity has been to visit other worlds. It’s starting to look as though this might be a very good idea – not just for fun and profit, but for survival.” ― Terry Pratchett, The Science of Discworld With regard to the idea of Mankind leaving a dying Earth, we have no idea of the time scale involved in the “dying”; this time, next week, we might detect a meteor a month away from impact, giving almost no chance of escape. As the writer, Larry Niven, once said: “sometimes the only defence against something is to somewhere else when it happens”. There are cataclysms that could affect the entire Solar System, we can only hope that none of them occur in this area before the human race has passed beyond the point of being mortally injured by such a thing. It is striking that, should the Earth be rendered uninhabitable tomorrow, evidence of our existence would still exist – in orbit, on the Moon,, Mars, and so on. However, as someone once said, sometimes the best symbol for something is the thing itself; the best symbol for the human race is the human race itself.

gbaikie

Tue, 14 Apr 2020 04:07:34 +0000

Why you go to Moon is if there is mineable water. You explore the Moon to determine if there is mineable water. The moon has yet been explored enough to determine if there is mineable lunar water. Or at this point in time there is no reason to go to Moon- other exploration to determine if and where there is lunar water which perhaps could be extracted and be profitable to do this. Let's say we land somewhere in the lunar region by 2024. A purpose of NASA landing on the Moon could seen as step to take before exploring Mars. And this could quite different than a program to determine if and where there is mineable lunar water. But one could do robotic exploration {including what already been done} to pick what looks like the best place to mine lunar water on the Moon. And the purpose of manned landing is to confirm other robotic lunar exploration results AND to calibrate what was predicted to be the conditions of possible water on the Moon, and crew taking samples {and core samples} and returning them to Earth. Also the crew landing could other aspects related to mineablity of lunar water. And this is not how I think one should explore the Moon to find mineable water, but it's a stab in the dark, and any exploration tends to discover something. And one might let others do additional lunar exploration- Private efforts or other space agencies. But one wants to Explore Mars, and going to the Moon, and then going to Mars could be a way doing it. One aspect of landing once on the Moon, you "want" to prove there isn't mineable water on the Moon. Or robotic mission has suggested there could be mineable lunar water, and robotic exploration is telling there is water somewhere, and there isn't- maybe the robotic exploration is simply wrong. And if plan is to go to Mars, it's quite low cost to eliminate, such speculation. Because you using the Moon as kind of dry run for Mars exploration. And same/similar method for finding water on Moon is used on Mars- so, likewise there might also problems with the Mars results regarding how much water is on Mars- which could alter plans regarding Mars exploration. Also possibility is one moon crew landing could lead to other moon landings. And with lunar lander developed, private sector might also do that. So, the saying, "Go to Moon to stay" could hopeful rather a deliberate plan of intention regardless of what discovered in lunar polar region- otherwise such a deliberate sounding plan seems, quite stupid to me.

Brett

Tue, 14 Apr 2020 03:48:41 +0000

There really isn't a "Why" other than "this group of people want to go, and maybe at some point it will be cheap enough for them to pay for it." The commercial rationales fall apart unless you discover something incredibly lucrative that can only be done in space, or unless LEO satellite broadband turns out to be some heavily profitable industry in competition with ground-based broadband and cellular internet service. Ever wonder what human spaceflight would be like if Kennedy had lived and gotten cold feet on Apollo (as he seemed to be doing when he was shot)? I don't think we would have shut it down as long as the Soviets were doing human spaceflight, but maybe it wouldn't have survived the end of the Cold War if the end of the human spaceflight program didn't have the whole "No President wants to be the one who tells kids there are no more astronauts, something something Kennedy".

Daniel Lantz

Tue, 14 Apr 2020 00:33:24 +0000

Perhaps knowledge of Gerard K. O'Neill's plans will help!

Bob Mahoney

Mon, 13 Apr 2020 23:59:29 +0000

Below is the post I made to a review in TSR from two weeks ago (For All Humanity) that touches on not the only reason but perhaps the most important reason to explore & develop the solar system. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Sounds like a great read. What the diversity and commonality [of the reactions to the Moon landing] together point to is that quite intangible but difficult-to-articulate justification for exploring space. The Christmas Eve reading of Genesis (beyond its religious connotations, it is beautiful metaphorical poetry about the reality of the Universe) and the Apollo 11 landing are probably the two most iconic moments in the history of space exploration...and they rank among even the biggest other non-space moments through the millennia. Nearly everyone (or perhaps everyone, even those who were opposed to the spending, etc) who 'participated' in those moments felt something deep, profound, noble, and uplifting. It became for each and every one of them THEIR experience, THEIR drama, THEIR accomplishment. The stories in this book (and so many others out there) demonstrate this. And it's something that you can't tabulate on a financial balance sheet. We argue all the time here and elsewhere about how best to do this or that in space, but there is something in all of us—something that IS 'us'—that lights up when we see & hear fellow humans (individually or in small or large teams) achieve certain kinds of goals. While it may not have a dollar value attached to it, every person knows it when they partake of this—for want of a better word—spiritual experience. Call it what you want, but it can't be denied that their mind/consciousness/soul like(s) 'it'...a lot. It feels good. It is good to know. It IS good. Somehow, it is playing a tune on some kind of instrument inside each of us, and we each all resonate to the melody in a special way, since it is true to (perhaps) the best of what we all have in common. Why explore space? Because pursuing the good, especially a higher good, is the right thing to do.