Elon Musk outlines plans to build an 80,000 person colony on Mars

[Guest]

I agree with what GUEST said.

 

[Guest]

You can say what you want about Elon Musk, but he's a genius. They laughed about him with his Tesla company...he proved them wrong....laughed about his SpaceX....he proved them wrong...and once his Falcon Heavy launch system is active, he'll have the strongest rocket since the Saturn V and it can be used to send manned vehicles to the moon. So you all go ahead and laugh about the guy....

 

[Pan Wah]

Really? People asking are asking 'Why'?
We are kind of running out of habitable room on earth :')

Are you sure? I see no sign of it....
And since when is Mars habitable? You may be happy breathing ridiculously thin CO2, but I'm not (it makes me cough!), bit chilly on a night, too.

 

[Pan Wah]

You can say what you want about Elon Musk, but he's a genius. They laughed about him with his Tesla company...he proved them wrong....laughed about his SpaceX....he proved them wrong...and once his Falcon Heavy launch system is active, he'll have the strongest rocket since the Saturn V and it can be used to send manned vehicles to the moon. So you all go ahead and laugh about the guy....

Well, the name's slightly amusing, he should have a sensible one like Pan Wah or suchlike....

 

[TJGeezer]

You can say what you want about Elon Musk, but he's a genius. They laughed about him with his Tesla company...he proved them wrong....laughed about his SpaceX....he proved them wrong...and once his Falcon Heavy launch system is active, he'll have the strongest rocket since the Saturn V and it can be used to send manned vehicles to the moon. So you all go ahead and laugh about the guy....

Well, the name's slightly amusing, he should have a sensible one like Pan Wah or suchlike....

Unfortunately, Pan Wah was taken. Elon Musk was his second choice.

I haven't seen much laughter at Elon Musk, not since the Tesla proved his notion that electric cars could be as fast, drivable and beautiful as any wheeled contraption on the market. Ideas that might seem outlandish from someone else are getting a "well.... maybe..." now that the Tesla and SpaceX projects proved do-able.

As for not thinking about the costs - you can't. Even a large organization like a government needs to devote heavy resources to seed such a huge project as an investment, as the ESA decided to treat space transit (having been prodded by Musk, to be sure), and not as short-term bottom-line drains, as the corporate government of the U.S. has done with NASA lately. It's a question of vision, yes, but it still needs to be supported at least in the early stages.

Personally, I think a space elevator is a natural first step, much more so than a Moon base or colony. A space elevator would be close and would provide a more effective (and cheaper) way to climb into and out of the Earth gravity well. If someone builds one, I hope they name it after Arthur C. Clarke, speaking of visionaries.

 

[danhodge]

Are you sure? I see no sign of it....
And since when is Mars habitable? You may be happy breathing ridiculously thin CO2, but I'm not (it makes me cough!), bit chilly on a night, too.

I'm not necessarily saying we have to live on Mars to fix the problem - but if we (however impractical it may be) used Mars as a dumping ground for our trash, instead of using landfill sites, and (depending on the conditions, which as you may have guessed, I know nothing of) maybe find some way of generating electricity on there too?

The only way we will be able to sustain the increase in population soon will be by decreasing all the woodland areas, which (if scientists are right) will screw over the world because of all the Co2 (lets pretend the 2 is smaller and above the O).

A lot of our current problems on earth could be fixed by having some more space, so a new planet is pretty good. And unless I am mistaken, it is the most habitable in our solar system - which is our only option since I doubt we will be able to build something that can leave the solar system anytime soon.
I'm not saying it is a good earth substitute; but we could technically live on it with minimal terraforming (stick a heater on, and get some oxygen tanks ).

 

[Pan Wah]

The only way we will be able to sustain the increase in population soon will be by decreasing all the woodland areas, which (if scientists are right) will screw over the world because of all the Co2 (lets pretend the 2 is smaller and above the O).

Definitely not! MORE woodlands would reduce CO2 levels, plants use it up in photosynthesis.
Also, I hate to think how much energy would be required, and how much pollution caused, by boosting rubbish out of Earth's gravity (on the way to Mars landfill!) - bring on the Saturn V garbage trucks!

Personally, I think a space elevator is a natural first step, much more so than a Moon base or colony. A space elevator would be close and would provide a more effective (and cheaper) way to climb into and out of the Earth gravity well. If someone builds one, I hope they name it after Arthur C. Clarke, speaking of visionaries.

Totally agree. Solar powered one would be nice?

 

[danhodge]

Yes, the first bit is exactly what I meant. Not sure how you are disagreeing with me there, you just repeated the same point :')

Who knows - maybe part of his plan is a new fuel source? To make this realistic, we will need to get there pretty damn quick, which will be hard with current fuels/technology. Then of course we will need to please the hippies...

 

[Pan Wah]

Yes, the first bit is exactly what I meant. Not sure how you are disagreeing with me there, you just repeated the same point :')

No.

 

[Guest]

Well, I would go out of this planet as soon they colonized another planet. I'm just a parasite here, there is no commensalism in this world. Haha.