Nuclear-electric rocket propulsion could cut Mars round-trips down to a few months

[RaXelliX]

More nonsense about going to Mars. We're not sending people to Mars, period. How hard is that to understand?

Yes we will. At some point. Not to colonize but to land and then come back.

Mars is an uninhabitable planet. It has low gravity, strong winds that create dust storms, high levels of radiation that is harmful to humans, a thin atmosphere with very little oxygen, an average temperature of -55C (-67F), and no magnetic field. Almost like the planet doesn't want us there.

Right answer is underground base. Less radiation, higher temperature and no need to worry about dust storms. There are natural tunnels already preset so there's no need to even dig.

As for inhospitably - show a beach planet with fresh water and palm trees in the solar system. By our definition ALL planets in the solar system are inhospitable. That does not mean humanity should not visit them or establish outposts. By your logic on giving up on Mars we may as well give up on space travel altogether because it's too inhospitable. Then we will all die here on earth due to a asteroid or nuclear war, or a virus.

Again, we're not going to Mars. Not in the next 20 years, not in the next 50 years. So get over it.

You can accurately predict the 50 years of space travel?
Im sure people who saw the Wright brothers first plane in 1903 also said surely were not flying anywhere in the next 100 years on those things.
Less than 70 years later in 1969 humans landed on the moon.

 

[kiwigraeme]

Incorrect. The ratio between "infinite time" and "the age of the universe" is, well, infinite itself. Furthermore, our hypothetical monkeys could actually perform the feat in finite time ... if one assumes an infinite array of them.

Not saying what I believe, just a story in a science mag I skimmed. I qualified it, with I thought it was a silly out
Given that what is the time of the universe, assumption now is will go to a cold death, yet if you amass enough matter, then you could turn that to energy in your little part for along time .
Or you could create a system where you allow nanoparticles to pop into existence, yet don't allow them to pop out by containing them be super small ravine - Apparently there is seething flux all about us of particles created out of nothing eg +1 and -1 and disappearing just as quick

 

[jeffbert]

Hmm., what if some people are frightened by the idea of launching nuclear reactors into space? They might suggest that if something goes wrong, nuclear material will fall to Earth somewhere. Protests, etc., to follow!

As for myself, I expect to be long dead long before spacecraft venture outside our solar system, so make some more cool science fiction films for me to watch in my old age.

 

[Endymio]

Hmm., what if some people are frightened by the idea of launching nuclear reactors into space? They might suggest that if something goes wrong, nuclear material will fall to Earth somewhere. Protests, etc., to follow!

Fun fact: The LEM in Apollo 13's ill-fated mission carried 4 kg of plutonium in its nuclear generator. The LEM, after separating from the crew capsule, catastrophically reentered the earth's atmosphere and burned up. The containment cask holding the nuclear fuel, however, performed as designed, survived the reentry, and dropped into the deep sea without releasing any radioactivity. And that was with 1960s-era materials technology.

As for myself, I expect to be long dead long before spacecraft venture outside our solar system

You're too late. Voyager 1 left the solar system a decade ago, and Voyager 2 a few years after that.

 

[jeffbert]

Fun fact: The LEM in Apollo 13's ill-fated mission carried 4 kg of plutonium in its nuclear generator. The LEM, after separating from the crew capsule, catastrophically reentered the earth's atmosphere and burned up. The containment cask holding the nuclear fuel, however, performed as designed, survived the reentry, and dropped into the deep sea without releasing any radioactivity. And that was with 1960s-era materials technology.


You're too late. Voyager 1 left the solar system a decade ago, and Voyager 2 a few years after that.

I was thinking about manned missions. Admittedly, I should have been specific.