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> The joint American-European project is expected to cost billions and take just over a decade to implement. I'm 99% sure that if SpaceX's starship takes off,

> The joint American-European project is expected to cost billions and take just over a decade to implement. I'm 99% sure that if SpaceX's starship takes off, it will fly to Mars and back within a few years. But still, competition is good.

rsynnott 6y ago
I don't think even Musk, master of the dubious marketing promise, has claimed that; the first ones would be one-way jobs AIUI.
- raverbashing 6y ago
  Correct, only the crew mission would return, the rest would be several one-way cargo missions
  - kingkawn 6y ago
    Pretty sure Musk said the crew mission would not return
    - Valgrim 6y ago
      Nope. The whole point of developing the Raptor Engine was (A) to be able to reuse it and (B) to refuel on mars (using the Sabatier reaction with atmospheric CO2) for a return mission.
    - dividedbyzero 6y ago
      I believe those people would have accumulated enormous radiation dosages over the duration of the flight, they might not have a long life left and a return voyage would shorten that even more. Might as well stay put for the remaining time on Earth, err, Mars, stay in deep lava tubes and help build that colony.
      - JumpCrisscross 6y ago
        > those people would have accumulated enormous radiation dosages over the duration of the flight What is this based on? One of the chief contributors to the mass of a Mars voyage is shielding.
        spacemark 6y ago
        You can't really shield against galactic cosmic rays (too high energy, would require far too much mass), which make up approximately 95% of the dose. https://science.sciencemag.org/content/340/6136/1080.abstract https://science.sciencemag.org/content/340/6136/1080.abstrac... *Edit - but the comment higher up isn't right either, that most Mars-bound astronauts will have decreased lives. The paper linked above estimates 3% of astronauts to die from cancer caused by the trip (assuming no exposure on the surface of Mars, meaning they're in the ground).
        jerf 6y ago
        And if the worst thing that happens to early Mars astronauts is "a 3% increase in the chance of dying from cancer someday", they will ecstatic. The list of more pressing risks is long.
      - dr-detroit 6y ago
        The European Space Agency agrees "It would be impossible to meet acceptable dose limits,” Next I would like to direct your attention now to the Mercury spacewalk footage available on Youtube that is clearly claymation....
      - valuearb 6y ago
        NASA studies indicate a two year round trip to Mars (with roughly a year of surface time) would increase cancer rates by only 4%.
    - boredpudding 6y ago
      He did not. This is a common myth with Mars missions that was started by a company called Mars One. This company was the first to announce a mission to Mars, but they never had a single piece of flight hardware, and only had fancy 3d animations. They did however have a lot of 'applications' for becoming an astronaut while the applicants had to pay money to apply. While I'm sure the founders of Mars One had good intentions, it resulted in eventually being a scam. This unfortunately resulted in people thinking Mars is a 'one way' mission. Elon Musk has repeated that to make live on Mars sustainable, you need roundtrips. You can't keep making new rockets, eventually you need them back. Otherwise it would become too expensive. Info here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_One https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_One
    - martonlanga 6y ago
      From Dr. Zubrin's Reddit AMA: > for Mars Ascent and Earth return, SpaceX should develop a mini Starship, sized to be an upper stage of an F9. This would create a fully reusable medium lift booster, and reduce Mars propellant making requirements by a factor of 5. A Starsip could lift one of these to LEO fully fueled, after which it could fly to Mars, and return. any full sized Starships that land on Mars should stay on Mars. SpaceX will make plenty of Starships, it won't need any back that go to Mars. A Starship on Mars is much more valuable than one on Earth. https://old.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/hgy64k/ask_me_anything/fw6sjx9/ https://old.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/hgy64k/ask_me_anyth...
      - boredpudding 6y ago
        Which seems to make sense, but I don't think SpaceX wants to develop another vehicle. That's extremely expensive. The goal of Starship is to do both, and it can do both. It also gets debunked by replies. This will never happen.
- throw1234651234 6y ago
  I don't think you can call him Musk "master of the dubious marketing promise" anymore now that Tesla is meeting production goals, SpaceX is landing boosters, re-supplying the ISS, and has brought astronauts to the ISS. His promises are far more reliable than most at this point.
  - snakeboy 6y ago
    As long as you don't ask him about Neuralink (-:
    - throw1234651234 6y ago
      I don't see any problems with that since he isn't using public funds or selling anything: "By July 2019, it had received $158 million in funding (of which $100 million was from Musk)" (from Wikipedia)
      - snakeboy 6y ago
        I was responding to the enormity of his claims, not the question of ethics.
  - rrss 6y ago
    Yeah, you definitely can. 1) Tesla driving fully autonomously from LA to NY by the end of 2017 [1][and many others] 2) Tesla producing 10,000 cars per week by the end of 2018 [2][3] 3) "Funding secured" [4] 4) All Teslas produced after Oct 2016 have all the hardware necessary for full self driving [5]. This was apparently before Tesla realized they needed/wanted to design a custom ASIC for full self driving. Many more. [1] https://finance.yahoo.com/news/elon-musk-two-years-car-202858960.html https://finance.yahoo.com/news/elon-musk-two-years-car-20285... [2] https://www.thestreet.com/investing/stocks/tesla-ceo-musk-this-is-the-best-i-ve-ever-felt-about-tesla-14255072 https://www.thestreet.com/investing/stocks/tesla-ceo-musk-th... [3] https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1117526382563643392 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1117526382563643392 [4] https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1026872652290379776 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1026872652290379776 [5] https://www.tesla.com/blog/all-tesla-cars-being-produced-now-have-full-self-driving-hardware https://www.tesla.com/blog/all-tesla-cars-being-produced-now...
itsoktocry 6y ago
>I'm 99% sure that if SpaceX's starship takes off, it will fly to Mars and back within a few years. Define "a few years" and I'll bet you it won't, with whatever odds you want.
- Robotbeat 6y ago
  2031 is when the Sample Return Mission is supposed to return the samples back to Earth. Keep in mind slips happen in ALL sorts of space projects, not just SpaceX. I’ll take your bet. I want 2:1 odds: SpaceX returns a vehicle from Mars by the end of 2035 (UTC), and before the NASA-ESA sample return mission has returned its samples. I’ll buy you a beer/beverage (value not to exceed $10) if you win, and you’ll buy me 2 beers/beverages (value not to exceed $20 total) if I win.
  - rsynnott 6y ago
    Is that something returning from Mars _orbit_, or returning samples from the surface?
    - Robotbeat 6y ago
      A SpaceX vehicle returning from the surface of Mars.
      - raldi 6y ago
        You're saying the vehicle will bring all the fuel needed for a return flight to Earth down to the surface of Mars and then back up again? Do you have a link with a description of how they're going to do this?
        Robotbeat 6y ago
        No. It will make the fuel from Martian resources like water ice and the CO2 atmosphere. Using solar power. First to split the water to oxygen and hydrogen using electrolysis, then use the hydrogen with CO2 to make methane (& some water which is cycled back to the electrolysis step) using the Sabatier reaction. This is done on the International space Station today, by the way. The methane on ISS is simply vented (as the point on ISS is to recover the oxygen from the CO2, which is most of CO2’s mass). It takes a lot of energy, so there will need to be very large solar arrays on Mars, but it’s possible. This page describes the process: https://medium.com/spaceinmylifetime/how-spacex-will-refuel-on-the-surface-of-mars-3438bcc2aefe https://medium.com/spaceinmylifetime/how-spacex-will-refuel-...
BurningFrog 6y ago
> is expected to cost billions I'm annoyed by this innumerical journalistic habit where imprecise large numbers are only given as "millions", "billions" or "trillions".
- esperent 6y ago
  A decade long development for a never before attempted interstellar cargo ship... I'm sure that "billions" is as precise as anyone can be about the cost right now.
- gspr 6y ago
  I agree about general journalistic innumeracy, but in this case it may well be the best estimate available. It's no different from the order of magnitude estimates highly numerate people make for good reason all the time.
antonvs 6y ago
> I'm 99% sure that if SpaceX's starship takes off, it will fly to Mars and back within a few years. I'm 99% sure that's wrong.

rsynnott 6y ago

I don't think even Musk, master of the dubious marketing promise, has claimed that; the first ones would be one-way jobs AIUI.

raverbashing 6y ago
Correct, only the crew mission would return, the rest would be several one-way cargo missions
- kingkawn 6y ago
  Pretty sure Musk said the crew mission would not return
  - Valgrim 6y ago
    Nope. The whole point of developing the Raptor Engine was (A) to be able to reuse it and (B) to refuel on mars (using the Sabatier reaction with atmospheric CO2) for a return mission.
  - dividedbyzero 6y ago
    I believe those people would have accumulated enormous radiation dosages over the duration of the flight, they might not have a long life left and a return voyage would shorten that even more. Might as well stay put for the remaining time on Earth, err, Mars, stay in deep lava tubes and help build that colony.
    - JumpCrisscross 6y ago
      > those people would have accumulated enormous radiation dosages over the duration of the flight What is this based on? One of the chief contributors to the mass of a Mars voyage is shielding.
      - spacemark 6y ago
        You can't really shield against galactic cosmic rays (too high energy, would require far too much mass), which make up approximately 95% of the dose. https://science.sciencemag.org/content/340/6136/1080.abstract https://science.sciencemag.org/content/340/6136/1080.abstrac... *Edit - but the comment higher up isn't right either, that most Mars-bound astronauts will have decreased lives. The paper linked above estimates 3% of astronauts to die from cancer caused by the trip (assuming no exposure on the surface of Mars, meaning they're in the ground).
        jerf 6y ago
        And if the worst thing that happens to early Mars astronauts is "a 3% increase in the chance of dying from cancer someday", they will ecstatic. The list of more pressing risks is long.
    - dr-detroit 6y ago
      The European Space Agency agrees "It would be impossible to meet acceptable dose limits,” Next I would like to direct your attention now to the Mercury spacewalk footage available on Youtube that is clearly claymation....
    - valuearb 6y ago
      NASA studies indicate a two year round trip to Mars (with roughly a year of surface time) would increase cancer rates by only 4%.
  - boredpudding 6y ago
    He did not. This is a common myth with Mars missions that was started by a company called Mars One. This company was the first to announce a mission to Mars, but they never had a single piece of flight hardware, and only had fancy 3d animations. They did however have a lot of 'applications' for becoming an astronaut while the applicants had to pay money to apply. While I'm sure the founders of Mars One had good intentions, it resulted in eventually being a scam. This unfortunately resulted in people thinking Mars is a 'one way' mission. Elon Musk has repeated that to make live on Mars sustainable, you need roundtrips. You can't keep making new rockets, eventually you need them back. Otherwise it would become too expensive. Info here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_One https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_One
  - martonlanga 6y ago
    From Dr. Zubrin's Reddit AMA: > for Mars Ascent and Earth return, SpaceX should develop a mini Starship, sized to be an upper stage of an F9. This would create a fully reusable medium lift booster, and reduce Mars propellant making requirements by a factor of 5. A Starsip could lift one of these to LEO fully fueled, after which it could fly to Mars, and return. any full sized Starships that land on Mars should stay on Mars. SpaceX will make plenty of Starships, it won't need any back that go to Mars. A Starship on Mars is much more valuable than one on Earth. https://old.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/hgy64k/ask_me_anything/fw6sjx9/ https://old.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/hgy64k/ask_me_anyth...
    - boredpudding 6y ago
      Which seems to make sense, but I don't think SpaceX wants to develop another vehicle. That's extremely expensive. The goal of Starship is to do both, and it can do both. It also gets debunked by replies. This will never happen.
throw1234651234 6y ago
I don't think you can call him Musk "master of the dubious marketing promise" anymore now that Tesla is meeting production goals, SpaceX is landing boosters, re-supplying the ISS, and has brought astronauts to the ISS. His promises are far more reliable than most at this point.
- snakeboy 6y ago
  As long as you don't ask him about Neuralink (-:
  - throw1234651234 6y ago
    I don't see any problems with that since he isn't using public funds or selling anything: "By July 2019, it had received $158 million in funding (of which $100 million was from Musk)" (from Wikipedia)
    - snakeboy 6y ago
      I was responding to the enormity of his claims, not the question of ethics.
- rrss 6y ago
  Yeah, you definitely can. 1) Tesla driving fully autonomously from LA to NY by the end of 2017 [1][and many others] 2) Tesla producing 10,000 cars per week by the end of 2018 [2][3] 3) "Funding secured" [4] 4) All Teslas produced after Oct 2016 have all the hardware necessary for full self driving [5]. This was apparently before Tesla realized they needed/wanted to design a custom ASIC for full self driving. Many more. [1] https://finance.yahoo.com/news/elon-musk-two-years-car-202858960.html https://finance.yahoo.com/news/elon-musk-two-years-car-20285... [2] https://www.thestreet.com/investing/stocks/tesla-ceo-musk-this-is-the-best-i-ve-ever-felt-about-tesla-14255072 https://www.thestreet.com/investing/stocks/tesla-ceo-musk-th... [3] https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1117526382563643392 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1117526382563643392 [4] https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1026872652290379776 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1026872652290379776 [5] https://www.tesla.com/blog/all-tesla-cars-being-produced-now-have-full-self-driving-hardware https://www.tesla.com/blog/all-tesla-cars-being-produced-now...

itsoktocry 6y ago

>I'm 99% sure that if SpaceX's starship takes off, it will fly to Mars and back within a few years. Define "a few years" and I'll bet you it won't, with whatever odds you want.

Robotbeat 6y ago
2031 is when the Sample Return Mission is supposed to return the samples back to Earth. Keep in mind slips happen in ALL sorts of space projects, not just SpaceX. I’ll take your bet. I want 2:1 odds: SpaceX returns a vehicle from Mars by the end of 2035 (UTC), and before the NASA-ESA sample return mission has returned its samples. I’ll buy you a beer/beverage (value not to exceed $10) if you win, and you’ll buy me 2 beers/beverages (value not to exceed $20 total) if I win.
- rsynnott 6y ago
  Is that something returning from Mars _orbit_, or returning samples from the surface?
  - Robotbeat 6y ago
    A SpaceX vehicle returning from the surface of Mars.
    - raldi 6y ago
      You're saying the vehicle will bring all the fuel needed for a return flight to Earth down to the surface of Mars and then back up again? Do you have a link with a description of how they're going to do this?
      - Robotbeat 6y ago
        No. It will make the fuel from Martian resources like water ice and the CO2 atmosphere. Using solar power. First to split the water to oxygen and hydrogen using electrolysis, then use the hydrogen with CO2 to make methane (& some water which is cycled back to the electrolysis step) using the Sabatier reaction. This is done on the International space Station today, by the way. The methane on ISS is simply vented (as the point on ISS is to recover the oxygen from the CO2, which is most of CO2’s mass). It takes a lot of energy, so there will need to be very large solar arrays on Mars, but it’s possible. This page describes the process: https://medium.com/spaceinmylifetime/how-spacex-will-refuel-on-the-surface-of-mars-3438bcc2aefe https://medium.com/spaceinmylifetime/how-spacex-will-refuel-...

BurningFrog 6y ago

> is expected to cost billions I'm annoyed by this innumerical journalistic habit where imprecise large numbers are only given as "millions", "billions" or "trillions".

esperent 6y ago
A decade long development for a never before attempted interstellar cargo ship... I'm sure that "billions" is as precise as anyone can be about the cost right now.
gspr 6y ago
I agree about general journalistic innumeracy, but in this case it may well be the best estimate available. It's no different from the order of magnitude estimates highly numerate people make for good reason all the time.

antonvs 6y ago

> I'm 99% sure that if SpaceX's starship takes off, it will fly to Mars and back within a few years. I'm 99% sure that's wrong.