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Instead of colonizing Mars, we might want to establish a colony and industrial infrastructure on the Moon, using it to mine/manufacture aluminum, glass, steel,
by stcredzero 5y ago
Instead of colonizing Mars, we might want to establish a colony and industrial infrastructure on the Moon, using it to mine/manufacture aluminum, glass, steel, oxygen, and water. (For use in space, not Earth, of course.) If we can get the Moon's population up to a half million, with industrial infrastructure to match, the colony might be able to maintain the emergency capability of gathering enough resources from Mars and the asteroids to become materially independent in the event some disaster befall the Earth.
Just the fact that the Moon is only 3 days away would make achieving the above situation a lot easier than achieving the equivalent on Mars. Whichever Earth power controls the industrial infrastructure on the Moon would also be in a position to militarily dominate Earth-Moon space and the inner solar system and asteroids.
- wil421 5y agoPlot twist. We do what you said and eventually destabilize the Moons orbit from mining. It becomes a heated debate on wether it’s going to happen like climate change. Or we do a reverse Armageddon[1] and mining causes an asteroid to split and hit earth. [1] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120591/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120591/
- belter 5y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space:_1999 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space:_1999 My most favorite of all time...:-) https://youtu.be/Y6BXaGEuqxo https://youtu.be/Y6BXaGEuqxo
- stcredzero 5y agoWe do what you said and eventually destabilize the Moons orbit from mining Look up the Moon's gravitational binding energy. https://www.sciencefocus.com/space/what-would-happen-if-we-blew-up-the-moon/ https://www.sciencefocus.com/space/what-would-happen-if-we-b... "120 million, trillion gigajoules"
- wil421 5y agoIt is a joke my friend. If you started taking materials off the moon maybe you would only need 300 billion atomic bombs.