I would agree that any notion of a large martian settlement (much less a comfortable one that people actually want to live in) on any shorter timeframe is not realistic and that Mars cannot be treated as a "plan B" in the case of climate change making Earth uninhabitable, but total dismissal of the idea (as well as the idea that humans will forever [and potentially should] be permanently Earth-bound) rubs me the wrong way.
Yes, it's an unfathomably difficult and complex project that should not be in any way underestimated. Realistically, it will take many decades at minimum and probably in excess of a century. That doesn't mean it shouldn't be attempted however, and it's not as if any of it will magically get easier in all the time spent not trying. This could wind up being a self-fulfilling prophecy sort of situation if it's allowed to be.
> Yes, it's an unfathomably difficult and complex project that should not be in any way underestimated. Realistically, it will take many decades at minimum and probably in excess of a century.
I think you've vastly underestimated the difficulty and the timeline, ironically. It's unrealistic to use the words "decades" or "a century". On the contrary, that's the delusion.
Consider: more than 50 years after putting a few people on the Moon very briefly, we're no closer to a colony on the Moon. And rocket technology won't help at all. Among the problems: the Moon has very little gravity, and we can't handwave like Q, "just change the gravitational constant of the universe."
If you throw yourself off a cliff because only defeatists accept that they can't fly by flapping their arms, you aren't brave taking chances, you're committing suicide.
By the same token "we don't want to be defeated" isn't a good reason to create a planetary exploration timeline driven by false urgency. Mars isn't going anywhere.
There's a difference between something being extremely difficult and it being actually impossible.
And yes, Mars is not going anywhere, but the same cannot so confidently be said about our ability to get there. Our species has been capable of spaceflight for a tiny fraction of our existence and there is plenty of precedent for catastrophic loss of knowledge and capability.
Mars is not a safeguard against Earth going to hell, even in the most extreme Mars fantasies you don't end up with something independent of Earth for an indefinite period of time. We're also more than capable of exploring our Solar System in immense detail without sending people or colonists. Our greatest achievements on Mars have involved rovers, and frankly suggest that as a planet it has little to recommend it.
tl;dr There is no reality in which it's easier or more reliable to "back up the species elsewhere" than it is to act in our interests here. That doesn't imply shutting ourselves off from space, but it means treating it more like the deep ocean where rovers and drones are simply a better fit for such hostile environments. I'm hopeful that will change someday, but anyone who's thinking in terms of decades doesn't understand the scope and depth of the problem.
My recommendation is to read some of the books and articles suggested in this thread before imposing your wishes on reality.
As noted in the original post, I don't really buy into the "backup" theory so much. It's more that it would be a shame to have gained the ability to put people in space and then lose it having done practically nothing with it.
> I'm hopeful that will change someday
And part of my point is that these things don't just magically change on their own, but because a lot of smart people are actively working on changing them. Absent those efforts, the status quo remains.
If you're banking on "we will lose the knowledge to put people on Mars" as the reason for going to Mars, what exactly is the purpose of putting people on Mars? In this knowledge-loss scenario, we will lose any knowledge gained from putting people on Mars, and also if there are any people still on Mars they will all die when their support systems on Earth collapse.
I'm not banking on anything and I'm not even really that focused on Mars specifically. Mars is just a good first step in establishing self-sustenance outside of Earth's gravity well, feeding into the goal of greater spacefaring capabilities.
In the case that we don't lose our ability to get into space, cool, development in that field gets a bit of an earlier start. If we knock ourselves back into the Stone Age, well, at least we can say we tried our best in that small window of time. The worst outcome is losing the ability without having even tried.
cosmic_cheese · · focus · HN ↗
I would agree that any notion of a large martian settlement (much less a comfortable one that people actually want to live in) on any shorter timeframe is not realistic and that Mars cannot be treated as a "plan B" in the case of climate change making Earth uninhabitable, but total dismissal of the idea (as well as the idea that humans will forever [and potentially should] be permanently Earth-bound) rubs me the wrong way.
Yes, it's an unfathomably difficult and complex project that should not be in any way underestimated. Realistically, it will take many decades at minimum and probably in excess of a century. That doesn't mean it shouldn't be attempted however, and it's not as if any of it will magically get easier in all the time spent not trying. This could wind up being a self-fulfilling prophecy sort of situation if it's allowed to be.
lapcat · · focus · HN ↗
I think you've vastly underestimated the difficulty and the timeline, ironically. It's unrealistic to use the words "decades" or "a century". On the contrary, that's the delusion.
Consider: more than 50 years after putting a few people on the Moon very briefly, we're no closer to a colony on the Moon. And rocket technology won't help at all. Among the problems: the Moon has very little gravity, and we can't handwave like Q, "just change the gravitational constant of the universe."
cosmic_cheese · · focus · HN ↗
EA-3167 · · focus · HN ↗
By the same token "we don't want to be defeated" isn't a good reason to create a planetary exploration timeline driven by false urgency. Mars isn't going anywhere.
cosmic_cheese · · focus · HN ↗
And yes, Mars is not going anywhere, but the same cannot so confidently be said about our ability to get there. Our species has been capable of spaceflight for a tiny fraction of our existence and there is plenty of precedent for catastrophic loss of knowledge and capability.
EA-3167 · · focus · HN ↗
tl;dr There is no reality in which it's easier or more reliable to "back up the species elsewhere" than it is to act in our interests here. That doesn't imply shutting ourselves off from space, but it means treating it more like the deep ocean where rovers and drones are simply a better fit for such hostile environments. I'm hopeful that will change someday, but anyone who's thinking in terms of decades doesn't understand the scope and depth of the problem.
My recommendation is to read some of the books and articles suggested in this thread before imposing your wishes on reality.
cosmic_cheese · · focus · HN ↗
> I'm hopeful that will change someday
And part of my point is that these things don't just magically change on their own, but because a lot of smart people are actively working on changing them. Absent those efforts, the status quo remains.
applfanboysbgon · · focus · HN ↗
cosmic_cheese · · focus · HN ↗
In the case that we don't lose our ability to get into space, cool, development in that field gets a bit of an earlier start. If we knock ourselves back into the Stone Age, well, at least we can say we tried our best in that small window of time. The worst outcome is losing the ability without having even tried.