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FrostedFlake -> RE: One Way Ticket to Mars (3/8/2014 3:44:08 PM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: MasterCaneman
quote:
ORIGINAL: FrostedFlake
Trying to make something out of Mars is one of those things everyone knows we are going to take whack at. But the Lemmings plan is not going to work here. I mean, there.
I think the fundamental problem is the overall lethality of the Martian environment. This would go right past the sort of person who thinks the environment is something other people keep trying to get him to give a fuck about. In fact, the environment is simply the conditions that prevail. And Mars sucks. It has almost no air. And it has just a few scattered bits of magnetosphere, so the radiation count is bad enough that air doesn't matter. You have to solve both these problems to make any progress at all. To solve either of them, you need asteroid mining equipment.
Making air is not tough. Breathable air is a trick. Probably best leave that to plants. But a magnetosphere could be as simple as a Tesla tower at each pole. Each pole pumping power into the ionosphere at opposite polarity, powering every piece of equipment on the planet from two power plants, wirelessly.
Read Robert Zubrin's book The Case for Mars, and you'll see the overall plan isn't all that far-fetched. The 'no-return' option is puzzling, because there's already hardware available to make fuel for a return trip. As for the Tesla-style magnetosphere plan, it sounds good in theory, but you're talking about engineering on a truly astronomical level on a site with zero in-situ resources, such as roads, trucks, construction equipment. Raw materials are present, but you're literally have to land an entire manufacturing technology base onto the planet. Twice, since you're electrifying both the poles.
I'm in agreement this isn't a con job as much as it's a bellwether to see if the social climate is ready for the Next Big Thing, which is off-world colonization. Apparently, it is. So much the better, even if nothing further comes of this. All they're really trying to do is plant the seeds and see if they take.
You said that so well.
Suppose instead we hire the asteroid miners to make a bunch of bar magnets about the size of railroad ties. Thousands of them. Deliver half to each pole. In big foam balls that can be easily rounded up, herded around and driven to the railhead. There they get the stuffings knocked out of them, their innerds flung on a cart on a rail leading to a hole in the ground where the magnets all disappear from sight forever. Plenty of opportunities for horseplay with this project. But it might just work and once done, it's done. Unless you want to add more. A giant but finite project to deflect charged particles to the poles. A roof of a sort. No power, though. You will have to make do with a six legged lizard. It's not so bad. Six legged lizards eat big bugs.
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