10 ms·

Why Elon Musk Wants To Bring People to Mars—and Go There Himself

95 points by edw519 15y ago

nathanbarry 15y ago
I love the last line: “I would definitely like to go to Mars. I think it would be cool to be born on Earth and die on Mars,” he said as the night wrapped. “Hopefully, not at the point of impact.”
- Shivetya 15y ago
  I will take his grandest adventure line coupled with the part about, there will always be problems on Earth and waiting for a time there isn't will never come. Far too many people criticize lavish dreams such as what Musk has but that is what separates the watchers from the doers.
  - jpdoctor 15y ago
    > lavish dreams such as what Musk has but that is what separates the watchers from the doers. ?? Not sure of your meaning: Dreams are usually the domain of the watchers, expertise and hard work are usually the domain of the doers. Musk has demonstrated expertise and hard work, but in a different area; here he is a dreamer. Is that what you meant?
    - gammarator 15y ago
      Musk is demonstrating hard work in this area, too: they're building rockets and launching them. Far more affordably than their competitors, too.
paparoger 15y ago
Mars, sounds great! I am still amazed that the Rovers are still operational.
- jpdoctor 15y ago
  > I am still amazed that the Rovers are still operational. A lot of people are. I had the pleasure of chatting with the NASA program manager in charge of one of the rovers. She was a bit hilarious: When it came time to set the height of one of the mission cameras, someone whipped out a ruler and measured the distance from the floor to her eyes -- and then wrote it in the spec. Her comment on the first manned mission: Inevitably it leads to a discussion about one-way missions to mars. The next discussion is "who would volunteer", next followed by "who would you volunteer?" [btw, she said NASA will not officially consider one-way missions as a matter of principle.]
  - paparoger 15y ago
    Ha, now that's comical!
lolilives 15y ago
I am convinced that Mars colonization should be seriously considered as a part of space exploration policy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_to_Stay https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_to_Stay
rbanffy 15y ago
Mars is a very harsh environment - and it's very far from Earth (6 months best case with current propulsion technology). I'd suggest a permanent base on the Moon as a useful first step - it has some water, abundant energy, plenty of Aluminum, Magnesium, Titanium and a lack of atmosphere that makes metallurgy easy. Radiation is worse than Mars, but, in both cases, buried housing structures make sense and the Moon's low gravity would make construction easier and cheaper. With some infrastructure development, it would even be a nice launching point for Mars-bound spacecraft - think of a maglev train that reaches escape speed. It's also close, so, even if someone screws up very badly, a rescue mission would be less than a week away. If someone on Mars manages to, say, contaminate the colony's water supply, all we can do is record farewell messages for loved ones and deal with the bad publicity for decades. I wouldn't like that. A second step could be an Aldrin cycler space station - this way you could ride a small spacecraft to the cycler, live there for a couple months and depart to Mars when it passes by. Plus, you'd get some prime moving real-estate - one that goes between Earth and Mars without spending fuel.
- ceejayoz 15y ago
  > If someone on Mars manages to, say, contaminate the colony's water supply, all we can do is record farewell messages for loved ones and deal with the bad publicity for decades. I wouldn't like that. The same is true for a major disaster at the South Pole in winter, though. There's a several month period in which vehicles cannot reach the pole due to the temperatures and weather involved. We still go there.
  - JoeAltmaier 15y ago
    Or in an African village. It doesn't take distance to maroon someone with no means.
- schwabacher 15y ago
  I hadn't heard of an Aldrin cycler. Very very cool! Here is an animation of how one could work: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCVfUlFZQ4U http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCVfUlFZQ4U
- 15y ago
Cushman 15y ago
I'm with Carl Sagan. Visit? Yes. Settle? Not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand. Not that there's anything wrong with wanting to go to Mars as a hobby, as a tourist-- if that's how you want to spend your billions, fine. But I worry that too many impatient sci-fi lovers see space travel as some way to escape from the problems of Earth, which it will never be. If we can't figure out how to live sustainably on Earth, humanity will perish long before we have any realistic possibility of emigrating.
- JoeAltmaier 15y ago
  You say that with authority. Care to share your reasoning? Folks went as far (in terms of travel time) to desolate places to make a future before. You are likely descended from some of them.
  - rbanffy 15y ago
    None of them had to take their own air.
    - ceejayoz 15y ago
      Mars colonists won't need to, either.
      - ars 15y ago
        They might not take it, but they would have to make it. Almost no free oxygen on mars. But making oxygen (from rocks presumably) uses lots of energy (electricity - it's basically the same process used to make aluminium from ore).
        JoeAltmaier 15y ago
        Which is abundant on Mars as solar energy, with its thin atmosphere.
stevear 15y ago
A good leader sets a goal that is outside of our comfort zone and little by little works towards achieving those goals. Along the way, as steady progress is made, that once lofty goal starts to become more reasonable and others start to buy in. This seems to be the approach Elon has taken with Tesla and SpaceX. From personal experience I can tell you that simply making these lofty goals has attracted a lot of young, idealistic folk that are willing to put in a lot of sweat to show that this kind of stuff is within our reach.
maeon3 15y ago
The future of space travel is mining the asteroid belt and war preparation, anything else is just farting around, without the unobtanium or the fear of death to drive us, there is no reason to leave earth for more than a quick trip. If Elon Musk wants a base on mars, have him start putting missile silos up there, there will be a McDonalds up there in 30 years instead of some decrepit shack with a few science projects going on.
- InclinedPlane 15y ago
  Space is just a place. All that it takes is people who want to go there and the technology to do so being within their grasp. As technology advances and people grow wealthier colonization of space will become possible, and then it will happen. And once there are people living in space then the entire equation changes again, because once there is an economy in space there will be more reasons to go than just adventure. Edit: In terms of technology/wealth, imagine a future in, say, 2100 when we have mastered things like automation, 3D printing, etc. When we can fill out a form on a web app, upload a few files and not just have, say, a fully reusable rocket ship pop out the end of a factory but actually a rocket ship producing factory pop out. Such things are technologically possible, and within our grasp. What happens when we have such power? Do we sit at home?
  - joering2 15y ago
    2100?? having those things in 2100 would mean we humans all are incredibly lazy. You already have 3D printers. Automation too. Why you need to wait 88 more years? Given what happened in last 30 years, I would rather say in 2100 you will be able to scan yourself into a readable file and shoot it across the solar system all the way to the Mars, and print yourself out anew (printing algorithm would catch and get a rid of all cancers you caught and aging too).
    - InclinedPlane 15y ago
      Indeed, I was trying to be conservative with my assumptions.
zerostar07 15y ago
This is remarkable, but is going to Mars really our most challenging goal, our raison d'etre as humanity? Given the choice between being either the First human on mars or the First machine-augmented-human what would you choose?
- ars 15y ago
  Is there some reason these are mutually exclusive?
  - zerostar07 15y ago
    I find it interesting that people find these equally challenging. For the record, we know way too much about Mars and too little about the machine that makes us want to go (and go) to mars, the brain. If we can master our intelligence we could do so much more than going to a desolate planet. TBH i believe the first mission to mars will leave us disappointed (we won't have learned anything - and we don't really need mars for our future).
- JoeAltmaier 15y ago
  Let's not choose between artificial dilemmas. Do them all.
ggwicz 15y ago
Why don't we focus on the shit here first? I'm sorry, but I just get frustrate with all these wondrous predictions that always seem to be about 30-50 years in the future. Short enough away to be enticing, but long enough away where no one making these predictions will really he held accountable for their ridiculousness. It just seems that every single generation a) has some "new threat" for "how the world will end" and b) has some technological vision that ends up being way overestimated.
- pjscott 15y ago
  We can do both. Hell, even Elon Musk can do both; he also runs Tesla Motors, which makes electric cars on Earth. Also, I notice that people are much more likely to condemn space development as frivolous than they are to criticize, say, football or whittling. Does that seem like a double standard to you, too?
  - philwelch 15y ago
    Football and whittling are sustainably self-funding.
    - ericd 15y ago
      Football isn't a productive enterprise, regardless of how much money it can extract from the wider economy. Going to mars will most likely result in a large array of new tech which will find unrelated uses on Earth. Think of it like a way to buy a big burst of creativity.
      - philwelch 15y ago
        OK, I'll bite. Define "productive enterprise".
        ericd 15y ago
        You're not left with anything new at the end of a football game.
philwelch 15y ago
> In January, Newt Gingrich’s space ambitions were mocked by many experts as well as the public, particularly his vow that a moon colony would be established by the conclusion of his “second term.” Musk isn’t committing to a timeline nearly so ambitious; when pushed by Wright, he suggested that this could be a reality within the next 30 years. Gingrich's moon base by 2020 is probably less ambitious than Musk's Martian colony by 2042. The moon is orders of magnitude closer, doesn't involve leaving Earth orbit, doesn't involve the radiation hazards, and we've actually been to the moon before. I don't want to get into a political argument, but going back to the moon and staying there is not an especially difficult or onerous goal for the next eight years.
- meric 15y ago
  You're forgetting the economy and number of technological achievements grows exponentially. At 4% per annum growth the world economy will be triple the current size in 30 years. (assuming no technological singularity event). An economy triple the current size doesn't seem like it can easily afford a colony on Mars either but I think Elon Musk thinks my assumption is wrong.
  - philwelch 15y ago
    The economy is irrelevant. Technology just takes time to develop sometimes; nine women can't have a baby in one month.
    - meric 15y ago
      It's not irrelevant. If our economy one thousandth the current size, even a trip to the moon would be difficult. It just wouldn't be producing enough fuel, metal, ceramics and quality human capital necessary for a trip to the moon. It is a lot easier to takes these things from a much larger economy than a small one. Larger economy can speed up technological advancements too, but I guess that is irrelevant here.
      - philwelch 15y ago
zobzu 15y ago
What makes things go right? What makes wake up and work your best every day? Well, such inspiring, exciting stuff, as colonizing other planets. Doing that also improves all other areas. Transportation of course. Electronics. Software. Radio. Medicine. You name it. That is why such projects not a "childish idea" but actually a great plan. There's only 2 reasons for humans to work hard, and work good: - fear of death (war) - f* exciting stuff (and no, software idea 923839 is not nearly exciting enough, and money isn't either)
petegrif 15y ago
How is he going to get there and back without his bones disintegrating? I don't believe the science is there yet.
justncase80 15y ago
In the book "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" by Robert A. Heinlein, which is a fantastic science fiction book about colonizing Luna and the politics of an anarchistic government, he mentions the creation of a Rocket Sled (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocket_sled_launch http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocket_sled_launch) which seems to never get mentioned when people talk about earth side technology for improving our ability to leave earth. Does anyone know if there is some reason why this technology seems to get ignored? According to wikipedia it seems like a big win. Why aren't we doing this right now?

95 points by edw519 15y ago

I love the last line: “I would definitely like to go to Mars. I think it would be cool to be born on Earth and die on Mars,” he said as the night wrapped. “Hopefully, not at the point of impact.”

Shivetya 15y ago
I will take his grandest adventure line coupled with the part about, there will always be problems on Earth and waiting for a time there isn't will never come. Far too many people criticize lavish dreams such as what Musk has but that is what separates the watchers from the doers.
- jpdoctor 15y ago
  > lavish dreams such as what Musk has but that is what separates the watchers from the doers. ?? Not sure of your meaning: Dreams are usually the domain of the watchers, expertise and hard work are usually the domain of the doers. Musk has demonstrated expertise and hard work, but in a different area; here he is a dreamer. Is that what you meant?
  - gammarator 15y ago
    Musk is demonstrating hard work in this area, too: they're building rockets and launching them. Far more affordably than their competitors, too.

paparoger 15y ago

Mars, sounds great! I am still amazed that the Rovers are still operational.

jpdoctor 15y ago
> I am still amazed that the Rovers are still operational. A lot of people are. I had the pleasure of chatting with the NASA program manager in charge of one of the rovers. She was a bit hilarious: When it came time to set the height of one of the mission cameras, someone whipped out a ruler and measured the distance from the floor to her eyes -- and then wrote it in the spec. Her comment on the first manned mission: Inevitably it leads to a discussion about one-way missions to mars. The next discussion is "who would volunteer", next followed by "who would you volunteer?" [btw, she said NASA will not officially consider one-way missions as a matter of principle.]
- paparoger 15y ago
  Ha, now that's comical!

lolilives 15y ago

I am convinced that Mars colonization should be seriously considered as a part of space exploration policy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_to_Stay https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_to_Stay

rbanffy 15y ago

Mars is a very harsh environment - and it's very far from Earth (6 months best case with current propulsion technology). I'd suggest a permanent base on the Moon as a useful first step - it has some water, abundant energy, plenty of Aluminum, Magnesium, Titanium and a lack of atmosphere that makes metallurgy easy. Radiation is worse than Mars, but, in both cases, buried housing structures make sense and the Moon's low gravity would make construction easier and cheaper. With some infrastructure development, it would even be a nice launching point for Mars-bound spacecraft - think of a maglev train that reaches escape speed. It's also close, so, even if someone screws up very badly, a rescue mission would be less than a week away. If someone on Mars manages to, say, contaminate the colony's water supply, all we can do is record farewell messages for loved ones and deal with the bad publicity for decades. I wouldn't like that. A second step could be an Aldrin cycler space station - this way you could ride a small spacecraft to the cycler, live there for a couple months and depart to Mars when it passes by. Plus, you'd get some prime moving real-estate - one that goes between Earth and Mars without spending fuel.

ceejayoz 15y ago
> If someone on Mars manages to, say, contaminate the colony's water supply, all we can do is record farewell messages for loved ones and deal with the bad publicity for decades. I wouldn't like that. The same is true for a major disaster at the South Pole in winter, though. There's a several month period in which vehicles cannot reach the pole due to the temperatures and weather involved. We still go there.
- JoeAltmaier 15y ago
  Or in an African village. It doesn't take distance to maroon someone with no means.
schwabacher 15y ago
I hadn't heard of an Aldrin cycler. Very very cool! Here is an animation of how one could work: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCVfUlFZQ4U http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCVfUlFZQ4U
15y ago

Cushman 15y ago

I'm with Carl Sagan. Visit? Yes. Settle? Not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand. Not that there's anything wrong with wanting to go to Mars as a hobby, as a tourist-- if that's how you want to spend your billions, fine. But I worry that too many impatient sci-fi lovers see space travel as some way to escape from the problems of Earth, which it will never be. If we can't figure out how to live sustainably on Earth, humanity will perish long before we have any realistic possibility of emigrating.

JoeAltmaier 15y ago
You say that with authority. Care to share your reasoning? Folks went as far (in terms of travel time) to desolate places to make a future before. You are likely descended from some of them.
- rbanffy 15y ago
  None of them had to take their own air.
  - ceejayoz 15y ago
    Mars colonists won't need to, either.
    - ars 15y ago
      They might not take it, but they would have to make it. Almost no free oxygen on mars. But making oxygen (from rocks presumably) uses lots of energy (electricity - it's basically the same process used to make aluminium from ore).
      - JoeAltmaier 15y ago
        Which is abundant on Mars as solar energy, with its thin atmosphere.

stevear 15y ago

A good leader sets a goal that is outside of our comfort zone and little by little works towards achieving those goals. Along the way, as steady progress is made, that once lofty goal starts to become more reasonable and others start to buy in. This seems to be the approach Elon has taken with Tesla and SpaceX. From personal experience I can tell you that simply making these lofty goals has attracted a lot of young, idealistic folk that are willing to put in a lot of sweat to show that this kind of stuff is within our reach.

maeon3 15y ago

The future of space travel is mining the asteroid belt and war preparation, anything else is just farting around, without the unobtanium or the fear of death to drive us, there is no reason to leave earth for more than a quick trip. If Elon Musk wants a base on mars, have him start putting missile silos up there, there will be a McDonalds up there in 30 years instead of some decrepit shack with a few science projects going on.

InclinedPlane 15y ago
Space is just a place. All that it takes is people who want to go there and the technology to do so being within their grasp. As technology advances and people grow wealthier colonization of space will become possible, and then it will happen. And once there are people living in space then the entire equation changes again, because once there is an economy in space there will be more reasons to go than just adventure. Edit: In terms of technology/wealth, imagine a future in, say, 2100 when we have mastered things like automation, 3D printing, etc. When we can fill out a form on a web app, upload a few files and not just have, say, a fully reusable rocket ship pop out the end of a factory but actually a rocket ship producing factory pop out. Such things are technologically possible, and within our grasp. What happens when we have such power? Do we sit at home?
- joering2 15y ago
  2100?? having those things in 2100 would mean we humans all are incredibly lazy. You already have 3D printers. Automation too. Why you need to wait 88 more years? Given what happened in last 30 years, I would rather say in 2100 you will be able to scan yourself into a readable file and shoot it across the solar system all the way to the Mars, and print yourself out anew (printing algorithm would catch and get a rid of all cancers you caught and aging too).
  - InclinedPlane 15y ago
    Indeed, I was trying to be conservative with my assumptions.

zerostar07 15y ago

This is remarkable, but is going to Mars really our most challenging goal, our raison d'etre as humanity? Given the choice between being either the First human on mars or the First machine-augmented-human what would you choose?

ars 15y ago
Is there some reason these are mutually exclusive?
- zerostar07 15y ago
  I find it interesting that people find these equally challenging. For the record, we know way too much about Mars and too little about the machine that makes us want to go (and go) to mars, the brain. If we can master our intelligence we could do so much more than going to a desolate planet. TBH i believe the first mission to mars will leave us disappointed (we won't have learned anything - and we don't really need mars for our future).
JoeAltmaier 15y ago
Let's not choose between artificial dilemmas. Do them all.

ggwicz 15y ago

Why don't we focus on the shit here first? I'm sorry, but I just get frustrate with all these wondrous predictions that always seem to be about 30-50 years in the future. Short enough away to be enticing, but long enough away where no one making these predictions will really he held accountable for their ridiculousness. It just seems that every single generation a) has some "new threat" for "how the world will end" and b) has some technological vision that ends up being way overestimated.

pjscott 15y ago
We can do both. Hell, even Elon Musk can do both; he also runs Tesla Motors, which makes electric cars on Earth. Also, I notice that people are much more likely to condemn space development as frivolous than they are to criticize, say, football or whittling. Does that seem like a double standard to you, too?
- philwelch 15y ago
  Football and whittling are sustainably self-funding.
  - ericd 15y ago
    Football isn't a productive enterprise, regardless of how much money it can extract from the wider economy. Going to mars will most likely result in a large array of new tech which will find unrelated uses on Earth. Think of it like a way to buy a big burst of creativity.
    - philwelch 15y ago
      OK, I'll bite. Define "productive enterprise".
      - ericd 15y ago
        You're not left with anything new at the end of a football game.

philwelch 15y ago

> In January, Newt Gingrich’s space ambitions were mocked by many experts as well as the public, particularly his vow that a moon colony would be established by the conclusion of his “second term.” Musk isn’t committing to a timeline nearly so ambitious; when pushed by Wright, he suggested that this could be a reality within the next 30 years. Gingrich's moon base by 2020 is probably less ambitious than Musk's Martian colony by 2042. The moon is orders of magnitude closer, doesn't involve leaving Earth orbit, doesn't involve the radiation hazards, and we've actually been to the moon before. I don't want to get into a political argument, but going back to the moon and staying there is not an especially difficult or onerous goal for the next eight years.

meric 15y ago
You're forgetting the economy and number of technological achievements grows exponentially. At 4% per annum growth the world economy will be triple the current size in 30 years. (assuming no technological singularity event). An economy triple the current size doesn't seem like it can easily afford a colony on Mars either but I think Elon Musk thinks my assumption is wrong.
- philwelch 15y ago
  The economy is irrelevant. Technology just takes time to develop sometimes; nine women can't have a baby in one month.
  - meric 15y ago
    It's not irrelevant. If our economy one thousandth the current size, even a trip to the moon would be difficult. It just wouldn't be producing enough fuel, metal, ceramics and quality human capital necessary for a trip to the moon. It is a lot easier to takes these things from a much larger economy than a small one. Larger economy can speed up technological advancements too, but I guess that is irrelevant here.
    - philwelch 15y ago

zobzu 15y ago

What makes things go right? What makes wake up and work your best every day? Well, such inspiring, exciting stuff, as colonizing other planets. Doing that also improves all other areas. Transportation of course. Electronics. Software. Radio. Medicine. You name it. That is why such projects not a "childish idea" but actually a great plan. There's only 2 reasons for humans to work hard, and work good: - fear of death (war) - f* exciting stuff (and no, software idea 923839 is not nearly exciting enough, and money isn't either)

petegrif 15y ago

How is he going to get there and back without his bones disintegrating? I don't believe the science is there yet.

justncase80 15y ago

In the book "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" by Robert A. Heinlein, which is a fantastic science fiction book about colonizing Luna and the politics of an anarchistic government, he mentions the creation of a Rocket Sled (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocket_sled_launch http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocket_sled_launch) which seems to never get mentioned when people talk about earth side technology for improving our ability to leave earth. Does anyone know if there is some reason why this technology seems to get ignored? According to wikipedia it seems like a big win. Why aren't we doing this right now?