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Why Give a Fuck about Colonizing Mars?
- cutler 10y agoOne small problem with all this inhabiting other planets nonesense - oxygen.
- vvpreetham 10y agoHence they are called closed-loop biosphere :) and there are consideration and techniques to actually instill atmosphere at a planetary scale.
- dalke 10y agoIt seems like it would be more important to fund self-sufficient cities here on Earth first. Otherwise it's all too likely that Marsport, to re-use a classic name, will be a repeat of the Biosphere 2 experiments, but without the chance of opening the doors for fresh oxygen should there be a collapse. Just think of all the spinoffs from being able to make an arcology that can support 1M people with almost no environmental impact. I suspect it would be more than the spinoffs of a rocket that could take 100 people to Mars. Argentina and Chile have colonies on Antarctica, which are heavily subsidized. Wouldn't they like a city of 100K which doesn't require additional support and which doesn't contaminate that continent?
- internaut 10y agoThis is what we should be talking about. That role is up for grabs! Is there a corporation that is willing to put their energies behind a closed loop system? Because solving or scaling some kinds of closed loop system problems would, as you say, have enormous impacts on the everyday economy. Not to mention the attention of the world would be focused on you like a laser beam.
- vvpreetham 10y agoAgree. I believe these need not be necessarily be in a series though (like first we do this and then next another). There is and should be a large portion of investment that should go to Earth for Earthly problems. The point I was teasing out is that, compared to such substantially large budgets that are already being invested into Earth on a continual basis, it is OK to consider % of budgets for space exploration and colonization as well.