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Discussion (32 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews
I would agree that any notion of a large martian settlement (much less a comfortable one that people actually want to live in) on any shorter timeframe is not realistic and that Mars cannot be treated as a "plan B" in the case of climate change making Earth uninhabitable, but total dismissal of the idea (as well as the idea that humans will forever [and potentially should] be permanently Earth-bound) rubs me the wrong way.
Yes, it's an unfathomably difficult and complex project that should not be in any way underestimated. Realistically, it will take many decades at minimum and probably in excess of a century. That doesn't mean it shouldn't be attempted however, and it's not as if any of it will magically get easier in all the time spent not trying. This could wind up being a self-fulfilling prophecy sort of situation if it's allowed to be.
The alternative I seem to see suggested most often is that we should be dedicating more of our resources to maintain the status quo as long as possible, which honestly sounds more insane to me.
Maybe the timeline is much longer out, but we don't have an infinite amount of resources on this rock and if we don't figure out how to get off it before we run out of those resources we may be stuck forever. Accepting that as inevitable feels wrong.
I think you've vastly underestimated the difficulty and the timeline, ironically. It's unrealistic to use the words "decades" or "a century". On the contrary, that's the delusion.
Consider: more than 50 years after putting a few people on the Moon very briefly, we're no closer to a colony on the Moon. And rocket technology won't help at all. Among the problems: the Moon has very little gravity, and we can't handwave like Q, "just change the gravitational constant of the universe."
Sometimes it make lot of sense not to even try. I mean technically we could save a few lives in northern countries during winter by heating all roads in such a way that there is no ice or snow... Doable maybe... But not worth trying...
By the same token "we don't want to be defeated" isn't a good reason to create a planetary exploration timeline driven by false urgency. Mars isn't going anywhere.
We have limited resources, and every investment is a tradeoff. We can play with rockets, but how does SpaceX solve the problem of humans living with much less gravity than Earth, for example? It seems to me that this is a vastly greater problem than traveling to another celestial body.
Has anyone ever conceived a child off the Earth, much less given birth or raised one? Don’t talk to me about space colonies until we’ve done that.
https://idlewords.com/2023/1/why_not_mars.htm
https://idlewords.com/2025/02/the_shape_of_a_mars_mission.ht...
““”Twenty years of tinkering with the much simpler systems on the space station have brought them no closer to reliability. And yet to get a crew to Mars, we’d need to get this stuff working like a Swiss watch. Humanity does not need a billion dollar shit dehydrator that can work for three years in zero gravity, but a Mars mission can’t leave Earth without it.“””
and his article l’affair siloxane:
https://mceglowski.substack.com/p/laffaire-siloxane
And Charles Stross’ “The High Frontier Redux” (2007)
http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2007/06/the-high...
“”” Mars is ... well, the phrase "tourist resort" springs to mind, and is promptly filed in the same corner as "Gobi desert". As Bruce Sterling has puts it: "I'll believe in people settling Mars at about the same time I see people settling the Gobi Desert. The Gobi Desert is about a thousand times as hospitable as Mars and five hundred times cheaper and easier to reach. Nobody ever writes "Gobi Desert Opera" because, well, it's just kind of plonkingly obvious that there's no good reason to go there and live.””””
Kennedy was describing one of the most fundamental ambitions; to try to achieve the impossible. Think pieces like this must betray their fundamental lack of any ambition whatsoever
"Packing for Mars" by Mary Roach
I remember reading a while ago if water you drink distilled water and only distilled water long term, it will do you harm. I wonder if the same could apply to water on other planets ? IIRC, it has to do with minerals or something in water here.
This might also be one problem as whole. Whatever food you eat must cover all needs or be supplemented. So there is need to ensure that either sufficiently varied items to fill needs are shipped in or whatever is produced locally covers absolutely all needs.
it's physically impossible with current technology for humans to survive a trip to Mars and live on the surface
space really, really wants to kill life
cosmic rays will kill humans before they even make it to Mars
there is no current technology that shields from cosmic rays
we should appreciate the earth greatly for its atmosphere and magnetosphere that shields us from them
best emulation idea so far is to surround astronauts with several feet of water
but we don't have the lift capacity for that much water weight
the total time on the moon outside the capsule per person maximum was 22 hours
the astronauts kept seeing bursts of light even with their eyes closed
when NASA inspected the helmets there were microscopic groove where some had made it all the way through
cosmic rays are physical particles traveling near the speed of light
the bursts of light were their nerves and other cells being destroyed by the cosmic rays
it was happening to their brains and CNS too
mice exposed to simulated cosmic rays became slow and stupid
Hydrogels.
https://www.esa.int/Enabling_Support/Space_Engineering_Techn...
You seem to say this as if it’s some sort of enlightened reason to “not”
Instead, I suspect for many, enumerating, quantifying and solving the impossible is precisely the reason we venture into the unknown.
https://phys.org/news/2026-07-permanent-magnets-astronauts-s...
Space exploration nay-sayers really are the lamest people imaginable.
I think it’s important to hold Mars enthusiasts to specific timelines. What will humanity do in a hundred thousand years, or a million years, if it survives that long? Who knows. Humanity hasn’t even had agriculture for that long. The relevant question is, what will humanity do with regards to Mars within the coming decades? Let's be honest: nothing much. Elon Musk had made predictions about the future that have already passed and proven false. How many times will you allow him to kick the can down the road before you stop believing lies? Let’s also stop pretending that launching some rockets now will somehow prepare for the hundred-thousand-year future. The best way to get to that future is to preserve the only currently habitable ecosystem in the solar system, by immediately stopping pollution and global warming on Earth. Sadly, Musk is financially backing politicians who are doing the opposite.