2 ms·

Nonsensical argument, this shielding has to exist on Earth first (we are rolling the dice otherwise), deciding to colonize Mars adds nothing except a colossal

Nonsensical argument, this shielding has to exist on Earth first (we are rolling the dice otherwise), deciding to colonize Mars adds nothing except a colossal waste of time and effort on other things.

somenameforme 3y ago
Shielding isn't some distant future technology. Many simple compounds work as great shields, including water. That's been proposed as one of the ways to deal with extreme space weather events when traveling to Mars - using the water storage as an emergency shield. But of course you can't just put some giant shield up over the entire Earth for many reasons that I think should be pretty clear? Unfortunately, Earth will literally never be safe from extinction. Nor will any planet. The first thing that should happen once we set foot on Mars is planning for the settlement of the next planet, or moon, to follow. That doesn't mean we should neglect any planet, most obviously including Earth, but the benefit of having 8 billion people is we're more than capable of doing more than one thing at a time.
- throwaway290 3y ago
  > Shielding isn't some distant future technology. Many simple compounds work as great shields, including water Wasn't it your own comment that there was a burst that killed 85% of marine species at the time. Water did not help did it? > Unfortunately, Earth will literally never be safe from extinction. Nor will any planet. The first thing that should happen once we set foot on Mars is planning for the settlement of the next planet Gamma bursts don't distinguish between planets or even entire solar systems. You'd need to go way further to be safe. So if you choose to colonize Mars, you are trading off the work that could allow that for a bunch of unrelated effort associated with colonizing Mars.
  - somenameforme 3y ago
    The gamma ray burst didn't just fry things (or at least half the planet would have been completely untouched), rather it fried the atmosphere. That set in stage a domino effect. If you strip the ozone introducing ultra high UV radiation everywhere, and then life starts dying from that including plants/animal in shallow water, creatures that depend on those creatures start dying, oxygen levels start shifting, and you get this lengthy domino effect everywhere. The 15% that survived were primarily from sea life that was deep enough to not just be shielded (which doesn't need to be that deep at all), but also to have a self sustainable cycle of life untouched by the life that was affected. And this zero sum notion of work is a bit off. Nearly all work is spent doing completely pointless to harmful tasks. Unimaginably vast sums of money and manhour are spent doing things like trying to make people watch ads they don't want to see, or far worse. Yet, somehow, this sort of 'optimization of labor' only seems to come up when talking about doing petty things like make humanity a multiplanetary species. I find it to be neither compelling nor made in particularly good faith.
    - throwaway290 3y ago
      That was 6000 ly away. If another one happens 3000 ly away, whatever water thickness you cover your entire Martian base may easily not be enough. Or 1000 ly. Or 100 ly. You can hope but you are still rolling dice wherever you are in solar system or out. If you want to protect humanity's survival from gamma rays, you can add the same protection on Earth more easily. The rational reason to colonize Mars is so that you can escape there when things go bad on Earth. Which is especially funny because the 1% who escape there are the ones responsible for most of the pollution right here.
      - somenameforme 3y ago
        Again, the rays themselves did not directly cause the death and destruction. Rather they messed up the atmosphere. On Mars, where the atmosphere is already toxic, this would be irrelevant. And there's no way to shield Earth against this at all. And nobody's going to be escaping to Mars. The wealthy and powerful already have their doomsday bunkers and hideouts; even a post-apocalyptic (such as after WW3) Earth would generally be a much more hospitable place than Mars will be.
        throwaway290 3y ago
        Okay, I see how I was wrong re GRB impact on life. Should've looked it up before!

somenameforme 3y ago

Shielding isn't some distant future technology. Many simple compounds work as great shields, including water. That's been proposed as one of the ways to deal with extreme space weather events when traveling to Mars - using the water storage as an emergency shield. But of course you can't just put some giant shield up over the entire Earth for many reasons that I think should be pretty clear? Unfortunately, Earth will literally never be safe from extinction. Nor will any planet. The first thing that should happen once we set foot on Mars is planning for the settlement of the next planet, or moon, to follow. That doesn't mean we should neglect any planet, most obviously including Earth, but the benefit of having 8 billion people is we're more than capable of doing more than one thing at a time.

throwaway290 3y ago
> Shielding isn't some distant future technology. Many simple compounds work as great shields, including water Wasn't it your own comment that there was a burst that killed 85% of marine species at the time. Water did not help did it? > Unfortunately, Earth will literally never be safe from extinction. Nor will any planet. The first thing that should happen once we set foot on Mars is planning for the settlement of the next planet Gamma bursts don't distinguish between planets or even entire solar systems. You'd need to go way further to be safe. So if you choose to colonize Mars, you are trading off the work that could allow that for a bunch of unrelated effort associated with colonizing Mars.
- somenameforme 3y ago
  The gamma ray burst didn't just fry things (or at least half the planet would have been completely untouched), rather it fried the atmosphere. That set in stage a domino effect. If you strip the ozone introducing ultra high UV radiation everywhere, and then life starts dying from that including plants/animal in shallow water, creatures that depend on those creatures start dying, oxygen levels start shifting, and you get this lengthy domino effect everywhere. The 15% that survived were primarily from sea life that was deep enough to not just be shielded (which doesn't need to be that deep at all), but also to have a self sustainable cycle of life untouched by the life that was affected. And this zero sum notion of work is a bit off. Nearly all work is spent doing completely pointless to harmful tasks. Unimaginably vast sums of money and manhour are spent doing things like trying to make people watch ads they don't want to see, or far worse. Yet, somehow, this sort of 'optimization of labor' only seems to come up when talking about doing petty things like make humanity a multiplanetary species. I find it to be neither compelling nor made in particularly good faith.
  - throwaway290 3y ago
    That was 6000 ly away. If another one happens 3000 ly away, whatever water thickness you cover your entire Martian base may easily not be enough. Or 1000 ly. Or 100 ly. You can hope but you are still rolling dice wherever you are in solar system or out. If you want to protect humanity's survival from gamma rays, you can add the same protection on Earth more easily. The rational reason to colonize Mars is so that you can escape there when things go bad on Earth. Which is especially funny because the 1% who escape there are the ones responsible for most of the pollution right here.
    - somenameforme 3y ago
      Again, the rays themselves did not directly cause the death and destruction. Rather they messed up the atmosphere. On Mars, where the atmosphere is already toxic, this would be irrelevant. And there's no way to shield Earth against this at all. And nobody's going to be escaping to Mars. The wealthy and powerful already have their doomsday bunkers and hideouts; even a post-apocalyptic (such as after WW3) Earth would generally be a much more hospitable place than Mars will be.
      - throwaway290 3y ago
        Okay, I see how I was wrong re GRB impact on life. Should've looked it up before!