POLL: The Future of Space Exploration

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Based upon this recent statement, what are your thoughts on continued exploration of our Solar System and beyond?

Poll Information
This poll contains 1 question(s). 27 user(s) have voted.
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Poll Results: The Future of Space Exploration (27 votes.)

The Future of Space Exploration (Choose 1)
* Yes - 74% (20)
* No - 7% (2)
* Maybe - 19% (5)

 

Presently robots would probably be a better idea. Hell, a complex robot could do everything better than a human anyway. But getting to Mars is definitely a good idea, and in the long run it could easilly be useful.

 

I think it will happen, but slower than people might want or think. Look at 2001: A Space Odyssey - released in 1968, but we are nowhere close to the world envisioned by Clarke and Kubrick (fictional, granted, but still...) I just think there there are bigger priorities for government spending than an extensive space exploration program.

 

I personally think that a space-program is 1/2 social welfare, 1/2 state investment in scientific progress. "Real things" like "colonies" and so on aren't possible I think. Social welfare because its money spend on employes and orders to companies, which earn money and people get a job. "Average" people and high skilled people, who get a change to work with and further their skills. It's scientifiv progress, because those people actually explore something not only in space, but also in all involved technics, therefore there's a high chance that some random benefit will come out of it, new knowledge, mabye not having a direct connection to space at all.

 

I think that continued space exploration is important. Although I shudder to think of the complications involved with property rights on an extraterristial basis.

 

We have no business on Mars, and those minerals are not ours to mine.

I do not think the new technologies help much either, more laziness, more commercialism, we are not ready to harbour such technology without it being abused, for that is just the way we are right now I fear.

People are curious, by all means I say go and learn, but perhaps if we handled our own planet better we would not be so disinterested in it.

We need to learn restraint.

I am sorry if this seems directed at dmc, it is not by any means, just bad timing.

I am sure it can be seen in a good light, I just do not think now is the time. I do not know if there ever will be.

 

But to me, the ideal is to work towards what is best for us and for everyone. I don't know, not many people may agree, but I think we will do more damage to ourselves by pursuing this than we would if we did not, let alone the damage we do to mars.

Well, that is open for interpretation. I am one of those who say that in the end, sure, only good may come, but here and now a man who does wrong injures himself, by debasing himself he hampers his progress. This is perhaps only in the belief that there is a progress to speak of, so as I said, not all may agree.

My point was, what need to we have to go there? If there is no reason for us to do so, and there is reason for us not to, that is, by focusing on such we loose sight of our own world, and our own situation, or become lazy and complacent, careless, or even the fact that we think we have the right to do as we please simply because we can. To me, this is a harmful notion. I do not think that we do. Thus, I see it in our best interests not to try for such a thing.

Don't worry, I've been called worse

 

For reasons to go to space the one I keep coming back to is natural resources.

I would much rather use lasers to melt down an asteroid made of iron than to strip mine somewhere on earth for the same resources.

My understanding is that the asteroid field is supposed to be composed of rock, ice, and heavy metals.

 

Would not it be better to simply use less iron, or to re-use the iron we allready have?

Better yet, melt down all the cars. I don't like cars. I think I said this somewhere else.

To use the iron from asteroids is almost a worse thing to do; As we use the excesses of iron, and the things that are made from it, which is a negative effect in itself, and we do not have any consequences to observe. Out of sight out of mind? Well, the earth is not being damaged, and the trees and animals are better off, so it has that going for it, which is why I said almost.

I still don't like the idea, the lesser of two evils is still an evil, and to my mind should be avoided. But perhaps we are less ready for this than we are for space...

 

I personally think it is a disgrace what we haven't landed on Mars yet.

Its been over 30 years since we landed on the Moon - Mars should be a part of history at this point too.

 

@ Manus

Space exploration isn't only about mining for resources. It's about expanding life on our planet to other planets. In the case of our solar system, it's only one other planet, and one which life certainly doesn't exist at the moment. We wouldn't be imposing on anyone's territory. It's also about learning more about the way the universe works. Human space colonization is inevitable. Sooner or later, we as a race will take a flashlight into the big dark forest, so to speak. It's in our nature.

I'm all for conservation, efficiency, and not stepping on anyone's toes, intergalactic or otherwise. But this is just a silly way to view things. It's a rock in space, not the rainforest. If we can somehow use Mars to do some good and advance the human race, I'm all for it.

 

Unfortunately Mars does not have an active magnetic field. As a result, solar radiation constant bombards the planet. Even if we were able to make the temperature and pressure compatible with humans, the radiation would kill us.

Mars may only be good for natural resources.

Personally, I would like for the U.S. to disregard the celestrial body U.N. charter, and claim Mars as U.S. soil.

 

I'll ignore the remark about you-know-where.

Yeah, I know, because it's there, natural curiosity and all that, I'm all for expanding our knowledge, but I have to ask, is it worth it?

Go to everest now, not much life there really, but the mountain-side has been destroyed, and the path there is littered with human waste (the garbage, not the 'climbers' and tourists )

The thing is, these breakthroughs in technology only bring us further problems, what has really been solved by all this? It makes peoples lives a bit easier, meaning they don't care about those things anymore, think they are unimportant, spend their time earning money in a job that is likely corrupt, bercause let's face it, most businesses are. Path to materialism, hollow lives, devoid of purpose.

OK, that may be just me as well, but we cannot say we should be colonising other panets, we can't even handle one- and we have more than enough space, more than enough resources, people just waste them. Even with all that waste we still have an excess.

Yeah, ok it's a rock. But I value rocks as well, in my understanding of things, we screw up human fate, and we doom the animals, trees, rocks to the same, because one day our fate is theirs too. I know I'm going out on a limb here, but we have our own planet for a reason, those other panets are none of our concern, not yet, they have their own fates, with lives, at some point in time, tied to them, just as our lives are now inexorably tied to the Earth.

Just because it seems vacant now, doesn't make it right.

But it's not just that, and I wouldn't expect any of you to accept my argument on such beliefs, it's the fact that we are doing something solely because we think we can, because we want to, serving only our own pride. Curiosity it may be, but again I say if we worked at improving our lot here, we wouldn't have time to be curious, nor would we find the need to sway our attention away from where it currently rests.

Look, I won't lie to you, I like the idea of spaceships and human colonies across many worlds as much as everyone else here, I just don't think it's the right thing to do. If we were striving for some greater cause, maybe, but we're not.

And in the end, anything which I think to myself would be 'cool' and then I think that for some reason isn't right, is going to end up in my disfavour.

"The cause of all human suffering is desire. Even to desire not to desire is still to be caught on the wheel."

I had written a lot here, but I took it out. All I was trying to do was explain how I came across these views, but it doesn't matter.

I know how stupid some of them sound, a few years ago, I would have laughed at me too.

Perhaps the only way our curiosity, our pride, can be sated, is to do so, to push forward until we break. It's the only way we'll learn.

I am sorry for convoluting this argument. Perhaps I just need sleep.

 

@DR

I'm not so sure about Mars being devoid of life. I'm not saying there are Martians or any complex life up there, but it wouldn't surprise me in the least if there was microbial life on Mars. They have an atmosphere almost completely made of nitrogen. There are several type of nitrogen-fixing bacteria on earth that exist in anaerobic (meaning devoid of oxygen) conditions, and if there is a "blueprint" so to speak of the development of life, then it's not so far of a stretch to say there can't be some form of life on Mars.

@everyone

Actually, my take on life elsewhere is pretty clear. I feel that simple life is quite common in other solar systems, and probably even within our solar system. Complex life, on the other hand, such as multi-cellular plants and animals, is extremely rare, and actual intelligent life is even more rare than that.

All told, I like the idea. I imagine the space station on the moon as being essential to get to Mars. I fully believe that a rocket/shuttle/whatever-gets-developed would have to take off from the moon instead of earth to get to Mars, because of the reduced gravity. It's pretty simple physics actually. It took astronauts 3 days to get to the moon. Mars is about 1,000 times further away than the moon. That doesn't mean it takes 1,000 times as long to get there, you just need more fuel. In theory, if you take 1,000 times the amount of fuel, you can get to Mars in 3 days as well. The only problem is, with that much fuel, the weight of the fuel itself becomes an impediment in terms of getting the rocket off the ground. So you would need even more fuel to lift the added weight from the fuel you added. It isn't an infinite extrapolation however - there is an finite amount of fuel you would be required to take. Of course, it would be a huge number, because we still haven't accounted for the amount of fuel we would need to get back home. So, I view a takeoff point from the moon - or at the very least a refueling point in orbit around the moon, as an essential part of the trip to Mars.

 

@ Aldeth
Apart from the weight of the fuel your forgetting another factor. No matter how much fuel your transporting, you still have only limited thrust for the spacecraft, which means you have limited acceleration, which in turn means you won't get their in 3 days. But you're right when you say it won't take 1000 times the time to fly to the moon.
But this is only if you accelerate during a part of the way to Mars that is longer than half the way to the moon, assuming that the 3 days are calculated with full thrust. (only during half of the way since you'll need the other half to decelerate again) But this isn't realistic. The amount of fuel would be almost impossible to transport from a practical point of view. The most logical way would be to accelerate to a certain speed and then just stay there, which means no acceleration, which in turns means no use of fuel except for course corrections and deceleration.