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"The old world hadn't run out of resources when the American Industrial Revolution hit full stride." I don't understand what point you're trying to make. Ameri

by TriinT 17y ago

"The old world hadn't run out of resources when the American Industrial Revolution hit full stride." I don't understand what point you're trying to make. American Industrial Revolution?!? Let us look at Europe. In the early 15th Century, while England was fighting France and Spain was fighting the Moors, the Portuguese started exploring the western coast of Africa. The goal was to seize access to commodities such as gold, silver, silk, spices, etc. Spain then started its own explorations, but while the Portuguese went east, Spain went west. Then the Dutch, the French and the English joined the party. The old continent had no resources, so yes, it was a hunt for resources that triggered the European expansion. Of course technology is constantly changing. If space exploration becomes really cheap, then going to Mars for resources would make economic sense. However, I keep saying there are more urgent problems to be addressed. One of them is energy. If we could come up with relatively clean and safe nuclear energy, then the hunt for oil and coal would cease to make sense. The world would be a safer place. It took the Portuguese 100 years to reap the benefits of their expansion overseas. I don't know if the U.S. can afford to wait that long to start reaping the benefits of going to Mars.

stcredzero 17y ago
I don't understand what point you're trying to make. American Industrial Revolution?!? Let us look at Europe. In the early 15th Century... Okay, I see. You're taking a shorter term view. In the 15th century, they didn't know the potential advantage of the conveniently situated coal and iron resources of North America. "Gold, silver, silk, spices, etc," weren't strategic resources for the American Industrial Revolution, not so important if you want to understand the ultimate potential of North America as home to a future superpower. If space exploration becomes really cheap, then going to Mars for resources would make economic sense. Please get this already: using North American history as a model, we should figure out that going there to bring resources back is not the point. That's obviously stupid. The point is from what set of values the next superpower draws its lineage. I think human history will be far better if it's the US that gives rise to Mars civilization. If we could come up with relatively clean and safe nuclear energy, then the hunt for oil and coal would cease to make sense. The world would be a safer place. I agree. But there's no reason why we can't go to Mars while we are doing this. It took the Portuguese 100 years to reap the benefits of their expansion overseas. I don't know if the U.S. can afford to wait that long to start reaping the benefits of going to Mars. In the longer term view, it is imperative that we start as soon as we can.
- TriinT 17y ago
  I agree with everyting you wrote. And I keep thinking the U.S. should first rebuild itself before going to Mars. It depends on what kind of time horizon we're talking here. Each shuttle launch cost over 1 billion USD. Hence, killing the shuttle program would release enormous amounts of capital to be used to "conquer" Mars. Say, 10 billion a year. That's enough money to fund the space exploration effort if the time horizon is a few decades, instead of 1 decade (as it happened in the 1960s). Carl Sagan was against the shuttle program because he said that one can't keep going to the very same place and call it "exploration". In a way, he had a good point. So, it perhaps would make sense for the U.S. to allow the Europeans and Russians to manage the ISS, and while the Chinese spend trillions becoming the world's super power, the U.S. could spend trillions becoming the Solar System's one and only colonizer. It would take decades for the other nations to catch up. Last but not least, I am a bit concerned about the impact on Mars. It's a very long shot, but suppose there's life on Mars. Colonizing Mars would contaminate, if not destroy, the original habitat and prevent us from learning more about it, which would be unfortunate.

by TriinT 17y ago

stcredzero 17y ago

I don't understand what point you're trying to make. American Industrial Revolution?!? Let us look at Europe. In the early 15th Century... Okay, I see. You're taking a shorter term view. In the 15th century, they didn't know the potential advantage of the conveniently situated coal and iron resources of North America. "Gold, silver, silk, spices, etc," weren't strategic resources for the American Industrial Revolution, not so important if you want to understand the ultimate potential of North America as home to a future superpower. If space exploration becomes really cheap, then going to Mars for resources would make economic sense. Please get this already: using North American history as a model, we should figure out that going there to bring resources back is not the point. That's obviously stupid. The point is from what set of values the next superpower draws its lineage. I think human history will be far better if it's the US that gives rise to Mars civilization. If we could come up with relatively clean and safe nuclear energy, then the hunt for oil and coal would cease to make sense. The world would be a safer place. I agree. But there's no reason why we can't go to Mars while we are doing this. It took the Portuguese 100 years to reap the benefits of their expansion overseas. I don't know if the U.S. can afford to wait that long to start reaping the benefits of going to Mars. In the longer term view, it is imperative that we start as soon as we can.

TriinT 17y ago
I agree with everyting you wrote. And I keep thinking the U.S. should first rebuild itself before going to Mars. It depends on what kind of time horizon we're talking here. Each shuttle launch cost over 1 billion USD. Hence, killing the shuttle program would release enormous amounts of capital to be used to "conquer" Mars. Say, 10 billion a year. That's enough money to fund the space exploration effort if the time horizon is a few decades, instead of 1 decade (as it happened in the 1960s). Carl Sagan was against the shuttle program because he said that one can't keep going to the very same place and call it "exploration". In a way, he had a good point. So, it perhaps would make sense for the U.S. to allow the Europeans and Russians to manage the ISS, and while the Chinese spend trillions becoming the world's super power, the U.S. could spend trillions becoming the Solar System's one and only colonizer. It would take decades for the other nations to catch up. Last but not least, I am a bit concerned about the impact on Mars. It's a very long shot, but suppose there's life on Mars. Colonizing Mars would contaminate, if not destroy, the original habitat and prevent us from learning more about it, which would be unfortunate.