It's a lot easier to lock a few people in a room for a year and a half than it is to do meaningful research. Leave the lockups to the prisons and the submarine corps...
A waste of time and money.Participants will not be in zero-g.Participants know that they're still on Earth and can be "saved" in a moment's notice, so psychological testing is useless.I would think that the long-term stays that we've already done in MIR and ISS provide a much more accurate study.I guess if you're not really going to do the real thing, then playing dress-up is the only alternative.
Quote from: Nascent Ascent on 03/24/2010 12:49 pmA waste of time and money.Participants will not be in zero-g.Participants know that they're still on Earth and can be "saved" in a moment's notice, so psychological testing is useless.I would think that the long-term stays that we've already done in MIR and ISS provide a much more accurate study.I guess if you're not really going to do the real thing, then playing dress-up is the only alternative. I disagree.1. There has never been a real mission or a simulation where the same 6 persons where stuck together for 520 days.2. It´s not said that a 500+ days mission will be carried out in zero-g. Perhaps they do a Zubrin-like rotating habitat.3. IMHO it´s important to see what psychological and social problems can arise an how got get over them.4. AFAIK an "unlocking" is only done, when a life-threatening situation arises.
Quote from: gomorrha on 03/24/2010 01:01 pmQuote from: Nascent Ascent on 03/24/2010 12:49 pmA waste of time and money.Participants will not be in zero-g.Participants know that they're still on Earth and can be "saved" in a moment's notice, so psychological testing is useless.I would think that the long-term stays that we've already done in MIR and ISS provide a much more accurate study.I guess if you're not really going to do the real thing, then playing dress-up is the only alternative. I disagree.1. There has never been a real mission or a simulation where the same 6 persons where stuck together for 520 days.2. It´s not said that a 500+ days mission will be carried out in zero-g. Perhaps they do a Zubrin-like rotating habitat.3. IMHO it´s important to see what psychological and social problems can arise an how got get over them.4. AFAIK an "unlocking" is only done, when a life-threatening situation arises.2. Then they should have done a rotating hab. That would have at least provided some new and useful data. It would be useful to know for example what minimum radius could be used without deleterious Coriolis effects.3. On psych effects, It's just not the same thing. Unless you can somehow trick the crew in believing they're actually on a Mars flight, it's not useful. Being locked up in a trailer vs being trapped in a Mars rocket are vastly different and trust me, knowing you REALLY can't get back home if needed, is a HUGE difference.
- A rotating hab on earth in 1 G??? That would mean more than 1 G.
- I´d say if you know, and you signed that, that you won´t get out unless you´re seriously about to die comes quite close to a mission scenario. On a Mars mission you´re doomed because of a mission failure, here you have to bring yourself into a situation that could result into your death (e.g. attempted suicide) to get out.
I think the psychological differences would be significant.
Quote- A rotating hab on earth in 1 G??? That would mean more than 1 G.Well, yes. Just like other centrifuge testing here on Earth. It wouldn't be perfect but there's lot of unknowns regarding the size requirements for a rotating hab, and such a R&D effort would be useful. Yes, ideally it should have been done on the ISS, but that got cancelled.
Quote from: Nascent Ascent on 03/24/2010 02:15 pmQuote- A rotating hab on earth in 1 G??? That would mean more than 1 G.Well, yes. Just like other centrifuge testing here on Earth. It wouldn't be perfect but there's lot of unknowns regarding the size requirements for a rotating hab, and such a R&D effort would be useful. Yes, ideally it should have been done on the ISS, but that got cancelled.Never was a human-sized rotating habitat planned for ISS. And I'm not sure how feasible it is to try to build a trailer sized habitat hanging from a centrifuge at several Gs for around a year in continuous operation. In any case it would blow any budget this project is working on.
Well to be fair, much of the research done during the Gemini flights would be considered 'basic' by today's standards.