Which is more viable for space colonization? (poll)

[pat34lee]

Imagine Mars or wherever had enough atmosphere to protect us
from solar radiation and there was enough oxygen, carbon dioxide
and nitrogen so we could breathe and water to drink. What else
would we need, besides insect, plant and animal life to make a new
home? Like terraformers, we would need to begin with all the bacteria
and fungi that break down our soil and waste for reuse. Then, how
many metals, minerals and trace minerals would be either excessive,
poisoning us, or not there at all, ensuring our eventual demise due to
lack of them?

Before that though, we have to find a way to get from here to there
without being fried by random solar radiation or being torn apart by
micrometeorites.

 

[pat34lee]

Like what I have said earlier, only solution is population reduction by globally enforced one-child policy for many decades until a sustainable population has been reached.

When our waste products are killing scores of animals, even driving some of them to extinction, unnaturally high costs of living, we should realize by now we are now way past beyond sustainable and into the realm of utter stupidity.

When people start to decide on a maximum population, they
also must decide who's genes should be preserved and passed
down, and who should be sterilized. You can't just have anyone
spreading inferior stock in a limited genepool.

 

[Shemjaza]

But as I said repeatedly, we should try extra-planetary colonies as a fallback option, in case there is the real possibility that we cannot fix the Earth.

A seriously large asteroid would ruin our day here. But if we had colonies, then we could re colonise the Earth.

Even with nuclear winter, green house effect, asteroid debre, or anything short of a full sized rogue planet smashing it to bits: the Earth would still be the best planet for humans.

 

[timewerx]

When people start to decide on a maximum population, they
also must decide who's genes should be preserved and passed
down, and who should be sterilized. You can't just have anyone
spreading inferior stock in a limited genepool.

I was thinking of every race/culture being slapped the one child policy.

However, for the really overpopulated nations like China and India, I might consider 0.5 or 0.33 child policy which means a significant % of the population will be prohibited from having any children.

I'll consider your idea though. Once profiling of human DNA is completed and correlations found between a person's character and DNA (based on a person's profile/criminal records) and if the correlations prove to be strong and quite consistent, then yes, it can be good to implement on the basis of moral grounds (and hopefully, not based more on intellect).

I'd say, I'd rather be surrounded by average performing people but of negligible chance of committing any crime/mischief than brilliant people if they had a slight chance of committing mischief/crime.

We could take that opportunity to rebuild our civilization upon a foundation that is righteous and just instead of letting greed once again steer us into the path of destruction.

 

[AmericanChristian91]

Colony Ship/space station in earths orbit. Another idea is one in Mars orbit. A problem with trying to colonize the moon or mars is the smaller amounts of gravity. Which would screw with the human body over periods of time (and issues with births). Various other issues with the environment that would inhibit large colonization. A space station could be spinning simulating artificial gravity. From this space station we could send explorers and robots for mining/building outpost(s) instead of it being from earth to Mars all the time.

 

[Oafman]

Sub-terrain habitats on the moon would be the most viable initially. Apparently, there are underground chasms three times the size of Manhattan

There are?

 

[Warden_of_the_Storm]

That's the arrogance I was talking about. The universe is teaming with life.

But we won't know that unless we get up there. Also, as freezerman2000 asked, do you have a source for this claim?

 

[Warden_of_the_Storm]

A seriously large asteroid would ruin our day here. But if we had colonies, then we could re colonise the Earth.

Even with nuclear winter, green house effect, asteroid debre, or anything short of a full sized rogue planet smashing it to bits: the Earth would still be the best planet for humans.

Yes, Earth will always be Humanities home (Terra Primus), but as you said, if we have extra-planetary colonies, then future generations could come back and undo the damage we've done here.

 

[BadHabit]

There are?

I am trying to find the source I read that from, but apparently there are ancient voids from when the moon was geologically (volcanic) active and some of the lava tubes are quite substantial in size.

 

[ViaCrucis]

If we ever manage to find an earth like planet that could support things like us, then why not use generation ships (kind of like colony ships I suppose). The difficulty with this, at least immediately is two-fold:

1) Having advanced enough equipment to be able to tell with any level of certainty how habitable the prospective planet is; we're able to at present get some rough estimates (from what I understand) such as distance from the parent star, the density, mass, etc of the planet, though I don't know how good we are at figuring out the basic chemical composition. A prospective planet would have to be within the parent star's habitable zone where liquid water can exist naturally, it would need to have an active magnetosphere to protect the planet from stellar radiation and hold onto a oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere. The planet, ideally would also need to be pretty close to the earth's size and density so gravity is fairly approximate.

2) Following off the issue of gravity, we'd have to deal with those generation ships where generations in space with low or zero gravity would seriously have consequences on us, especially over generations and the centuries (if not millennia) it would take to get to the target planet. I would like to imagine that figuring out a decent way to create artificial gravity would be necessary--and if we have a pretty good idea of what the gravity on the future planet is like, perhaps even find a way to over time adjust the ship's artificial gravity so that by the time people get to the planet they would be better suited to live there. And let's not even begin to talk about the sheer logistics of long-term space flight holding hundreds of people over the course of hundreds of years, the actual getting a ship that could handle that sort of thing would be mind-boggling.

This is, of course, not anywhere close to being feasible at present, let alone in the near(ish) future; but I can imagine at least it being plausible in the next several centuries perhaps--depending largely on technological developments.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[AirPo]

Haven't read the thread yet, but just wanted to respond. I selected colony ship. Basically, given the time scale that were looking at, based on our currently technology, I don't see anything happening other than an ark kind of scernario.

 

[Landon Caeli]

Haven't read the thread yet, but just wanted to respond. I selected colony ship. Basically, given the time scale that were looking at, based on our currently technology, I don't see anything happening other than an ark kind of scernario.

I voted: "something else"... See posts 64 and 65 on page 4.

 

[pat34lee]

I'd say, I'd rather be surrounded by average performing people but of negligible chance of committing any crime/mischief than brilliant people if they had a slight chance of committing mischief/crime.

We could take that opportunity to rebuild our civilization upon a foundation that is righteous and just instead of letting greed once again steer us into the path of destruction.

You fell for the humanist idea that we can become better
through some other way than God. Genetics won't do it.
Karma won't do it. Time won't do it. Government won't do it.

 

[timewerx]

You fell for the humanist idea that we can become better
through some other way than God. Genetics won't do it.
Karma won't do it. Time won't do it. Government won't do it.

It was actually through God's Words we became better even many people aren't exactly aware of it. Hand of God at work?

It can be summed to one word: knowledge. Hosea 4:6 and the rest of Proverbs. The more knowledge, the more truth we have, the more we live. The truth doesn't just encompass theology, it also encompass science, the nature of God's creations, the nature of the Universe, the true nature of our political and economic systems, etc.

It is the key to solving the fundamental issues in our world today. The truth will set us free. Free from the things that hold us back - greed, disease, crime, poverty, evil....

 

[pat34lee]

It was actually through God's Words we became better even many people aren't exactly aware of it. Hand of God at work?

It can be summed to one word: knowledge. Hosea 4:6 and the rest of Proverbs. The more knowledge, the more truth we have, the more we live. The truth doesn't just encompass theology, it also encompass science, the nature of God's creations, the nature of the Universe, the true nature of our political and economic systems, etc.

It is the key to solving the fundamental issues in our world today. The truth will set us free. Free from the things that hold us back - greed, disease, crime, poverty, evil....

We are 2000 years out from getting the NT, and 3000+ for the OT.
What do we have? Hundreds of sects of Christians, whose main
differences involve how much of the bible to keep, and how much
to throw away as old-fashioned or useless or fairy tales.

 

[Warden_of_the_Storm]

We are 2000 years out from getting the NT, and 3000+ for the OT.
What do we have? Hundreds of sects of Christians, whose main
differences involve how much of the bible to keep, and how much
to throw away as old-fashioned or useless or fairy tales.

That's very much a societal and cultural issue.
And can we please not go down this route on this thread, please?

 

[BadHabit]

In addition to establishing a living colony on/in the moon, the dark side would make an ideal area for large-scale optical, infa-red, and radio astronomy. There are craters that allowing for the manufacture of mirrors in low-gravity from the lunar regolith, could be made absolutely enormous in size, even if they are made of interlocking hexagonal panels. Add to that the ability to link scopes together through interferometry, and the resolution of the instruments would be amazing compared to what we're doing now.

 

[Shemjaza]

In addition to establishing a living colony on/in the moon, the dark side would make an ideal area for large-scale optical, infa-red, and radio astronomy. There are craters that allowing for the manufacture of mirrors in low-gravity from the lunar regolith, could be made absolutely enormous in size, even if they are made of interlocking hexagonal panels. Add to that the ability to link scopes together through interferometry, and the resolution of the instruments would be amazing compared to what we're doing now.

Plus almost no light, radio and atmosphere run off from the Earth.

 

[Michael]

There are?

Maybe.

http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2010/12jul_rabbithole/
http://www.universetoday.com/119634...es-on-the-moon-large-enough-for-whole-cities/

I'm surprised that Terra-forming hasn't received more votes. Humans will need protection from high speed charged particles and underground facilities would work pretty well at protecting against long term radiation exposure, and provide some gravity as well.

 

[doubtingmerle]

Maybe.

http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2010/12jul_rabbithole/
http://www.universetoday.com/119634...es-on-the-moon-large-enough-for-whole-cities/

I'm surprised that Terra-forming hasn't received more votes. Humans will need protection from high speed charged particles and underground facilities would work pretty well at protecting against long term radiation exposure, and provide some gravity as well.

Yes, humans will indeed need protection from high speed charged particles.

I have an idea: I found a planet that has better protection than the tunnels you reference. That planet is earth.

In what way is living in tunnels in the moon better than living in a fallout shelter on earth? If things get so bad on earth that we are desperate for survival, wouldn't you be a lot safer in a concrete bunker on earth? Can't we build bunkers on earth for a lot less money than flying to the moon?

What sort of terra-forming do you suggest? Would you like to transform the atmosphere and landscape of a planet to the point where humans can safely breathe the air and vegetables will grow in the soil? This is a massive undertaking. How could we ever expect that to have a positive payback?

On the other hand, if we leave the atmosphere unbreathable, and confine our efforts to domed buildings and cities, we have a massive building program that needs to take place in a hostile environment with no infrastucture to help us get started. And if you are driving between completed domed cities, and have a flat tire, well you put on a space suit and try to change it in a space suit. This is enormously difficult.

What advantage does any of this have over building a dome in Antartica? What advantage does any of this have over building an underground city? What advantage does any of this have over building a network of rafts out in the ocean to support an ocean-based city?

Earth. A great place to live. Why the heck not stay here?