Humans Will Never Colonize Mars

I think as long as civilization doesn't crash, we will keep advancing and at some point we will go there to live.... but not anytime soon

it has to be easier and cheaper and safer then it would be today..... and that takes more technological advancements

we may send robots there to build and maintain the environment someday

 

Yeah, because we use actual numbers.

It cost $150 Billion in today's dollars to go to the moon for a few hours. Mars is at least a 1000 times more difficult.

 

What gives you that idea? Distance isn't even the biggest problem. And a big chunk of the Apollo program was to build the ground infrastructure for a manned space program in Florida and Texas. Infrastructure that does not have to be built again.

 

at one time people said mankind would never fly, mankind would never go to the moon, seems as time goes on, mankind can do many things they said we could not do

 

I agree. There will be big money efforts to sell us men flying around space - regardless of there being a purpose.

 

My weekly reader told me that it takes about the same amount of fuel to go to Mars as it does the Moon. If a ship were built outside of the Earth's atmosphere with a possible ion drive who knows? We don't need light speed....or anything close to it.... to travel locally.

 

Given our deficit and debt, I'd say it's a reasonable argument.

But, the real argumnet being used is that we can do the exploration without the stupendous additional cost of humans flying around in space.

We should be asking what our objective is and whether that objective absolutely requires humans.

 

Great nations must do certain things to still be considered great.

 

The U.S. could eliminate both (or in large part both) tomorrow if Congress passed a common sense budget agreement.

As was said a few years ago, "We're just one budget agreement away from the 21st century being the American century as much as the 20th was.".

 

These "certain things" have to show some form of "greatness".

I don't believe it contributes to "greatness" that we do something in the most expensive way.

Also, there needs to be some real reason for doing it at all.

I can understand exploring Mars for raw materials, signs of alien life, and generally understanding more about the planet (and thus our solar system). But, I see no evidence that it requires humans to do that.

Plus, we don't have the technology today to get a human safely there and back.

Roasting a human in cosmic radiation for a year isn't "greatness". And, that isn't the only risk here.

 

Now, you're suggesting that there are things we are doing that cost stupendous sums while being even less valuable than sending a human to Mars!!

I'm not so sure you could sell that idea to congress - or me, for that matter.

 

We've had the technology for more than 30 years. See Dr. Robert Zubrin's Mars Direct Mission Plan.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Direct

 

I don't believe that's true.

For example, we don't have a rocket or the spacecraft for going to Mars. And, we don't have sufficient radiation protection.

SpaceX has a craft for going the short hop to the space station we have, but it hasn't taken the trips required to prove itself for human transportation even that far - and it isn't apropriate for going to Mars.

I'm not doubting that we can find solutions within some time frame, but suggesting we've had the technology for 30 years is a statement that would require some explanation. Maybe we've known what we NEED for that long, but I even doubt that as the studies on human physiological reaction to radiation and zero gravity are all quite new -- nowhere NEAR 30 years old. And, the results are more significant than was estimated that long ago.

Let's rememer that we've been buying launches of humans from Russia since we don't have the technology available for sending someone to the space station.

 

You didn't read the information at the link did you? Dr. Zubrin has addressed EVERY possible issue regarding a manned mission to Mars. From rocket design (it isn't complicated) to overcoming micro gravity and yes to shielding against radiation.

And the U.S. has had the technology available the entire time we've been paying for the Russians to launch our astronauts. The space shuttle program was not discontinued due to technology issues.

You do remember who built the International Space Station don't you? Basically the U.S.

 

I don't know what to say here - it's just a fact that we have had no way to even get a human to the existing space station.

Arguing that we COULD is not the point here.

I know it's tempting to accept as a solution the plans for a rocket to be built in the future - to suggest it's all ok on the grounds that we COULD build such a rocket (or shielding, or whatever). But, that still takes years of design and testing.

I'd also point out that we have not been able to maintain a consistent direction with NASA across presidential administrations.

And, we still don't have a clear answer on why we should send humans when it is FAR cheaper to send robots that are capable of surviving longer, aren't necessary to return, and which have rapidly increasing competencies.

 

Nonsense. The Ares booster rocket for the Mars Direct mission plan is a simple derivative of existing space shuttle technology. Same solid rocket boosters, same external tank, same space shuttle main engines (four of them in this case), and a single second stage engine of the type that has been flown for years.

Shielding is simply use the drinking water as a shield. Basic technology.

 

The Ares V was canceled. The space shuttle versions are canceled. These were/are candidates for a lunar mission. The SpaceX lifter is likely to be a cheaper but doesn't exist yet.

Estimates I've seen call for 3' of water or about 12' of Mars regolith as needed protection. Please show me where NASA has accepted drinking water as a sufficient shield.

I've seen proposals for making a magnetosphere around the spaceship for protection.

I know these ideas all exist in theory, but it will take engineering and construction.

The far simpler scientific missions that include no humans use existing technoogy (today's lifters, energy sources, etc. etc.) and still have lead times on the order of 10 years. Suggesting technology for human transport can be designed, built and verified by multiple launch unmanned testing in less time than that hits me as science fiction.

 

Mars Direct was specifically meant to go from program approval to astronauts on Mars in 10 years or less.

Personally I don't give a damn whether astronauts suffer from cancer risks due to radiation exposure in the future or not. Just as long as they get there and get back. If we have qualified astronauts willing to take the risks then that is their problem.

 

We can't send an unmanned probe to Mars that fast.

NASA works under health and safety rules, just like everyone else. They get a slight break, but not a "slow roast some humans for a year" type break.

Why would you have America roast some humans just to say they went to Mars?

That sounds like a statment of absolute failure as well as moral depravity - which I think is not worth stupendous sums to "achieve".


This just gets back to having no concrete idea as to why we would send humans to Mars at this point.

In early times, people went places to explore, because that was the only choice for exploring. Also, they went to bring stuff back, but we can bring stuff back without sending humans. And, the only stuff we would want to bring back would be small samples for further study - nothing commercial.

We just don't have an adequate answer for why.

 

Sure we can. The U.S. could get another unmanned probe to Mars within 3 years of program approval if it wanted to.

Remember, how fast the U.S. does things is almost never how fast it could do things if it wanted to. For example it takes about 7 years to build a U.S. supercarrier. But the shipyard that builds them has estimated it could build a supercarrier in only 18 months.

 

Why should we?

We can build space habitats that are better and more useful than anything at the bottom of Mar's gravity well. The moon has plenty of resources/materials and they are much easier to move to where we need them to be

Unless we find some way to restart Mars's core and restore its magnetic field Mars will never have anything close to an atmosphere that could sustain people. Are there plans to do that?

 

Radiation shielding is the second most important problem to consider. The first is a drive system that can get us there in a reasonable time.

 

Damn.

There is NOTHING NASA cannot do.

Nothing WHATSOEVER

I am proud of many things America has done, but the only one I am unalloyedly proud of is this Agency.

 

Genetic engineering can fix these once a man and a woman don't need to mate to make children and we can engineer our bodies to live in differing space and other environments (low gravity, tolerate radiation, eliminate major genetic flaws, enhance our bodies in other ways) we can conquer space.