Here is the original paper that prompted the news article in space.com.http://journalofcosmology.com/Mars108.html It's been thought-out in some detail, except they are planning to send old people. It will be difficult to establish a self sustaining colony by sending only people beyond reproductive age.
Quote from: aero on 11/16/2010 12:57 amHere is the original paper that prompted the news article in space.com.http://journalofcosmology.com/Mars108.html It's been thought-out in some detail, except they are planning to send old people. It will be difficult to establish a self sustaining colony by sending only people beyond reproductive age. Why should it be the elderly? Are there not some diseases that are incurable, uniformly fatal, detectable far in advance, with a long gestation period with few symptoms, but (near the end) a rapid onset and demise? (Any medical doctors here on NSF who can advise?) Audition people in their, say, twenties, thirties, or forties, who have been dealt a lousy hand of cards by nature and genetics, and know they face a ticking clock with at least a (say) ten year window. Downselect for intelligence and psychological compatibility with the rigors on confinement and isolation. Offer them a grand bargain: devote the bulk of the your time on earth to study of a subset of needed skills, according to interest and aptitude -- say, surgery, psychology, geology, mechanical engineering, aerospace engineering, etc., plus astronaut training for all. The government pays to send them to the best graduate schools followed by internships with the best practitioners on Earth, skipping the time-wasting scutwork. The government pays for a reasonably lavish lifestyle -- in between studying and training and practicing, sure, go vacation in Tahiti, sure, go diving in Bora Bora. And eventually they go to Mars. The trade is that their financial needs and those of their families are taken care of. They agree to devote their lives to intellectual development and practicing to be the most capable astronauts possible. They know that they will eventually die far from home, physically almost alone (but not in spirit) -- but for a Great Cause, having lived a very rich and full and intense life in the time available. One could call that a lot better choice than a regular working life inevitably ending in a hospital on Earth. And at the very end, instead of a lousy end in the lander's microclinic, one might chose to take a walk outside. Put on a thin wetsuit on a hot summer Martian day at the bottom of Olympus Mons, grab a small bottle of oxygen, and go for a walk -- just for once, feel the sun on your face, the rocks between your toes, the breeze on your skin, the crisp bite of Mars's air in your lungs. I suspect that out of 300 million Americans, or 6 billion humans, we could find the necessary few both able and wiling to take that trade. Their stories would be told and their praises sung for generation upon generation. -Alex
...We can't stop obsessing over propulsion for long enough to think about what we're going to do when we get there and why.
It doen't have to be an absolute one way trip. If the plan clearly states:1) For the first 10+ years, there will only be minimal ISRU propellant and a small unmanned ascent vehicle for sample return.2) After 10+ years there will be limited return capability.3) Anyone wanting to be eligible for eventual return has to maintain Earth gravity conditioning through weight and centrifuge training over that 10+ years.4) There is an on-going committment to regular re-supply including a few luxuries and plenty of multi-media entertainment.I think you would find plenty of people willing to commit to a semi-permanent move to Mars.This would have the added benefit of weeding out the people who just want fame and fortune. What you would get is dedicated scientists, engineers, technicians, etc, who love their work and see life on Mars as a huge opportunity, not a life-sentence.
With an opposition-class or conjunction-class expedition, they know how long the mission will last and can plan accordingly. With a one-way colony and our still-limited understanding of the challenges and risks of living on Mars, they have no idea if the colonists are going to be fried by radiation in two years or if they're going to be writing home for more supplies 10 or 15 years down the line.
Quote from: kkattula on 11/17/2010 02:52 pmIt doen't have to be an absolute one way trip. If the plan clearly states:1) For the first 10+ years, there will only be minimal ISRU propellant and a small unmanned ascent vehicle for sample return.2) After 10+ years there will be limited return capability.3) Anyone wanting to be eligible for eventual return has to maintain Earth gravity conditioning through weight and centrifuge training over that 10+ years.4) There is an on-going committment to regular re-supply including a few luxuries and plenty of multi-media entertainment.I think you would find plenty of people willing to commit to a semi-permanent move to Mars.This would have the added benefit of weeding out the people who just want fame and fortune. What you would get is dedicated scientists, engineers, technicians, etc, who love their work and see life on Mars as a huge opportunity, not a life-sentence.BINGO! That is almost exactly as I see it. A long thread severals years ago on another site lead to nearly the same proposal and for nearly the exact same reasons; any differences would be quibbling. I could see this thread headed in the same direction and have been biding my time hoping for something like that to get posted.If you go to settle Mars, everyone's expectation should be that you are in it for the long haul. Otherwise, you're there on an expedition, not as a settler.Even so, morality dictates that if an individual needs to bug out, the capability should be there. But since orbital mechanics is in charge you're gonna have to wait. Also, there needs to be a minimum time period before the trip to Earth is granted, barring extreme circumstances.
...Expeditions have no intention of setting up infrastructure for future use, and is to me essentially the same as flags and footprints...
Quote from: spacester on 11/18/2010 05:15 am...Expeditions have no intention of setting up infrastructure for future use, and is to me essentially the same as flags and footprints...I disagree. Consider the ISS for example, which will host an overlapping rotation of several dozen expeditions over its lifetime. The station is continuously employed while crews are rotated in and out.I absolutely agree that any surface hardware landed on Mars should be designed to last for a substantial length of time (15 years?). I also believe that surface hardware should be delivered separately from crew rotation and that a robotic precursor missions should prepare the basic surface station before the first crew arrives. The station would be built up over a number of expeditions much like ISS.As technology progresses and the station grows more sophisticated, new crews arrive that have been extensively trained on the new hardware. Remember that the station will be largely experimental at first and will not have "set it and forget it" operations. The first several crews are going to have to be highly proficient engineers including specialists in the latest and greatest systems that have arrived.As the station matures, then we can consider extending surface stays to multiples of the conjunction-class mission rate and see how that works out physiologically.I think we can agree that 550-day surface stays with accumulated surface hardware is more than "flags and footprints"?
So we can afford to land an artificial gravity centrifuge and an ISRU plant for sample return vehicles, but we can't afford ascent vehicles for crew? And it almost seems like we're depriving the mission of this capability on principle as if permanent settlement is a higher virtue than rotating expeditions? I don't get it.I also don't understand how the funding mechanism would work, since whichever entities are financing this program are going to have no idea how long a commitment they are making to support a Mars colony that is almost entirely reliant on Earth for consumables and hardware. With an opposition-class or conjunction-class expedition, they know how long the mission will last and can plan accordingly. With a one-way colony and our still-limited understanding of the challenges and risks of living on Mars, they have no idea if the colonists are going to be fried by radiation in two years or if they're going to be writing home for more supplies 10 or 15 years down the line.It's a very open-ended commitment whose program termination poses difficult moral and political questions. Remember the health care reform debate? Now imagine a future Congress debating whether it's worth $2 billion a year to try and keep some old geysers alive on Mars.
Quote from: butters on 11/18/2010 04:36 amWith an opposition-class or conjunction-class expedition, they know how long the mission will last and can plan accordingly. With a one-way colony and our still-limited understanding of the challenges and risks of living on Mars, they have no idea if the colonists are going to be fried by radiation in two years or if they're going to be writing home for more supplies 10 or 15 years down the line.This is precisely why I advocate *Settlement* as the goal over *Colonization*No doubt many see it as a distinction without a difference, or pedantic semantics, but I beg to differ.Colonization means not just permanence but self-sourced growth. In particular, making babies. I personally think that pregnancies will not be successful on Mars. Just a "hunch", but based on my research.Settlement is the first major step past expeditions.Expeditions have no intention of setting up infrastructure for future use, and is to me essentially the same as flags and footprints.Settlement OTOH, means permanence and growth of infrastructure, utilizing resources from the outside and from within.A half-step between Expeditions and Settlement is Attempted Settlement, meaning that the initial mission is to prove long-term viability, while maintaining the capability to evacuate all personnel at the next opportunity.I advocate Settlement, because it seems the most ambitious and audacious approach, without over-reaching due to unfounded optimism. This is the basis of so-called one-way trips, while providing for bugging out for some individuals, but not evacuation and abandonment of the entire enterprise.
Words mean what we want them to mean and my objective with that post was to establish some agreed-upon terminology to facilitate discussions. [...] Perhaps I lack authority here to propose terminology, but I don't see anyone else doing it.
Quote from: spacester on 11/18/2010 03:38 pmWords mean what we want them to mean and my objective with that post was to establish some agreed-upon terminology to facilitate discussions. [...] Perhaps I lack authority here to propose terminology, but I don't see anyone else doing it.Want some unasked-for advice? Don't use the "Looking Glass" approach for defining terms unless it's absolutely essential.I do applaud your attempt to establish some sort of classification scheme for Mars visits. Allow me to use a different distinction you attempted to make as an example of the difficulty you face. In other less specialized contexts there are already widely-accepted economic and political aspects of the terms "Colony" and "Settlement" when used to describe human habitation of a place. Ancient Greece. Modern-day West Bank. Etc. The connotations of these cannot really be avoided; use them with caution!