Summer Slum/Elon Musk needs his own thread because he's in every damn thing/positive Elon Musk

I know Pennywise is the Eater of Worlds.

 

Que....I thought it was Pound Foolish!

 

Cost and time is a couple reasons. Moon First is a lot more expensive as it starts with first developing technology to reach and stay on the moon and then building the lunar station. Then once that is complete, start the process again for the mars mission. Mars direct cuts out the cost of building the moon mission part.

There’s also the “sexy” facto. We’ve already been to the moon and there just isn’t a lot of interest in going to the moon. Mars, on the other hand, has never had humans on it and there could be life on Mars. As a result, there is just a lot more interest in going to Mars and interest means more money.

 

That's an option but I don't see why it's absolutely necessary. We have all the tools needed to go now if we treated it like the Apollo Program. Quick hop and a skip and back and a job well done. We can make oxygen, rocket fuel, water, etc on Mars already with current tech. Sending a home ahead of time prefabbed isn't impossible.

One launch is the auto factory to make fuel and a little oxygen/water. A second is the reverse. A third is the hab with a bunch of supplies. The fourth is the return vehicle and rover (or could attach to launch one). The last is the crew and a backup car and more supplies. The lag is low enough that we'd know if all is good before leaving.

It's not like we waited for all the data from the ISS before going to Luna. We just tested each part needed and once reasonably sure it'd work, went. Mars can be done the same way.

Edit: also what @Yoshou said above.

 

Screw all that, where's the Jet Pack I was promised back in the 50's?

 

The idea that technology created for the moon landing created useful tech we use is way, way overblown. The idea that going to Mars would do anything but waste money (and, in the unlikely event of actually producing something physical, lives) is hogwash.

 

Big sci-fi nerd here. Loved the KSR Mars trilogy when I read it in the 90s. Now, like Robinson, I think any manned Mars mission is a travesty given the climate change shitshow we have created here on earth. Unmanned missions at a fraction of the cost (environmental cost included) are the way to go.

 

https://innotechtoday.com/12-technologies-that-came-out-of-apollo/

There are countless examples but here's some:

I'll also add from personal experience that a lot of our understanding of the human body and how best to safe guard it came from those missions (still have my grandfather's published research on those topics while he worked on Apollo and precursor missions). This lead to things like the sneakers and shoes we all love today for one.

https://spinoff.nasa.gov/pdf/Apollo_Flyer.pdf

 

If everything went 100% well without a hitch, it would likely take 18 months round trip, which is 3months longer than any single human has spent in space in a single stint.

 

Spurred on by NASA but not for space flight but instead for airplanes.

https://web.archive.org/web/20090320071931/http://www.sti.nasa.gov/tto/Spinoff2005/ch_6.html

Some work was done by a NASA engineer, but on his own time and in the late 70's so calling it a spin-off is a real stretch. The first experimental implants were done in the 1950's, and there many independent researchers doing work all over the world on this project. There were actual international conferences on the subject before that NASA engineer even started, and the first successful multi-channel implants were done based on European work done without effect by what that NASA engineer did. This paper on the history of the development doesn't even mention that NASA engineer's name, so the idea that the concept was invented or even meaningfully advanced by him is not accurate.

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamaotolaryngology/fullarticle/1688121

Glass strengthening was a constant project by Corning since way before Apollo and done for their own interests. Their first hardened glass, Chemcor, was released in 1962. It's use in cell phones was spurred by Apple, who asked Corning to make a version of their glass thin enough for their phones as the prototype iPhones had plastic screens that scratched easily.

https://books.google.com/books?id=xdxlCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA8#v=onepage&q&f=false

First invented in the 1930's, there was lots of independent advancement throughout the world after that, and the concept was well understood when the American Atomic Energy Commission first allowed radioactive elements to be used in them for commercial use in 1963.

https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/smoke-detectors.html

I don't believe that spin-offs make a project worthwhile. The Vietnam War saw lots of advancement in emergency care of wounded, and procedures and techniques used in trauma care in our hospitals today can be directly linked to what was developed there. It has for sure saved hundreds of thousands of American lives. Does that mean the Vietnam War was worthwhile for our country? Frak no. Just as I stand against the Great Man of History theory, I stand against the Great Inventors of History theory. Almost all of this stuff would have been invented anyway at just about the same time because that's just how inventions work.

If you want to invent stuff, make a new Bell Labs or Xerox PARC. Imagine what could have been done if 400,000 of the brightest minds of their generation were given hundreds of billions to solve real problems instead toiling for years to let a couple of guys shuffle around in dust for a while. I'd trade that for space blankets anyday.

 

The gravity part of that can be overcome with artificial gravity. Having a short stint on Mars, rather than the long option, will also reduce concerns of Martian gravity.

 

I think the prototypes were shot down when they wandered over an air force base

 

And the time's already gone
I won't be a casualty of Elon
I will walk in peace along
Woo-hoo-hoo, my my
Woo-hoo-hoo

 

No one now has an artificial gravity system capable of being employed on the space craft we would now be sending to Mars.

 

What's the gravity since Val went to the dark side?

 

Thank God they still have ass cooling technology for their footy seats!

 

Doesn't mean it can't be done. You just need a tether and weight with the appropriate length/mass, respectively.

 

I'm not saying it can't be done but I thought you all were posting about the practicality of going to the moon or Mars in the short term like within the next 7-10 years. What your talking about is something that would be developed in the next 20-40 years at the soonest.

 

At the current budget and lack of will, sure. But it doesn't have to.

 

Even if it started today, it would be more of the scale of 20-40 years to have a operating artificial gravity suitable for a trip to Mars. It's not like any nation has any working experiments in this area today.

 

It's not like we need to invent something new. It's basically physics (ditto the factories to make the rocket fuel, etc). Agree that at current investment it's unlikely to happen even in my lifetime.

 

If the showbiz fascist regime we have now in the US is not an aberration, it's more likely to be the Chinese to develop something like this first anyway.

 

That's sadly true.