Mars Curiosity Rover.

[eLuSiVeMiTe]

I agree entirely.

I fail to understand why deluded individuals like Elon Musk spend millions/billions sending spaceships to planets which cannot support human life instead of focusing on planet Earth which does and has done for thousands of years.

Because this planet it's resources and even our sun is finite.

Rather he spent it trying to push our knowledge of the unknown that hording it in bank accounts

 

[ronan]

Because this planet it's resources and even our sun is finite.

Rather he spent it trying to push our knowledge of the unknown that hording it in bank accounts

The sun has billions of years to go, we'll be long extinct before the light goes out. Disease, or wars or something else will be the finish of us.

 

[cheb]

Even if he he just kept it in a bank account or two the banks would still be lending that money to others to use for their own reasons.

 

[Maker]

Elon's doing pretty well for someone so deluded. As Bigegg says, the money isn't lost, it stays here on earth and is very good for the economy. The ROI for the Apollo program was supposedly as high as 7 to 8 dollars for every dollar invested over the ten years it ran for and some estimates put the ROI as high as 40:1 for space exploration/research today!

 

[ronan]

That's a very defeatist attitude Ronan.

It's not just habitiation there's huge amounts of resources just floating around.

If you don't look you won't find

If panspermia is a valid theory then we have plenty of bacteria here we can shoot off. If nice vacuum protected pods

Or build.

Perhaps, but how could we ever move millions or billions of people over unbelieveabley large distances ? Even sending a few people to Mars, which is right on our doorstep relatively, is a massive and expensive task.

 

[eLuSiVeMiTe]

The sun has billions of years to go, we'll be long extinct before the light goes out. Disease, or wars or something else will be the finish of us.

Yes I'm aware
It was last in my list for that reason.

Have a look I to how many close approach asteroids a year they detect. Note how many remain undetected until after they've missed us.

Not like there a precident or anything.....

 

[eLuSiVeMiTe]

Perhaps, but how could we ever move millions or billions of people over unbelieveabley large distances ? Even sending a few people to Mars, which is right on our doorstep relatively, is a massive and expensive task.

Never if we don't try.


Who said you need to move everyone.

Keeping eggs in several baskets it a sensible approach

 

[The_Yellow_Ardvark]

People also over look the fliter down effects of the invention of the space age.

They way they have to designe items, do filter down.

Fuel cells.
Lit Ion Batteries.
Light weight metals.
New methods of growing plants.
Medications

 

[ronan]

Yes I'm aware
It was last in my list for that reason.

Have a look I to how many close approach asteroids a year they detect. Note how many remain undetected until after they've missed us.

Not like there a precident or anything.....

Yes i was watching this the other night. Stephen Hawking reckoned that a meteor is the most likely thing to finish us.

 

[bigegg]

Yes i was watching this the other night. Stephen Hawking reckoned that a meteor is the most likely thing to finish us.

Good job we're spending all that money looking up at the skies, then.
Better chance of spotting them early enough, and then getting Bruce Willis up there to save us.

 

[Maker]

Perhaps, but how could we ever move millions or billions of people over unbelieveabley large distances ? Even sending a few people to Mars, which is right on our doorstep relatively, is a massive and expensive task.

So because it sounds too difficult to you there's no point?

200 years ago if you wanted to send a message to America you had to get on a boat for two weeks, the idea of sending terabytes of information across the ocean in seconds was absolutely inconceivable (Information theory wouldn't exist for another 130 years so there was no concept of a bit, let alone terabytes ). In 1856, the first transatlantic cable was laid, it was expensive, slow and quickly broke. Was it a waste of money or did it pave the way for the next transatlantic cable, and the next one? Hundreds of years of development got us to where we are today. Just because space travel today is slow and expensive, how can you say in 2221 it won't cost £150 and take a few hours to get to mars, and we'll all be moaning about having to go through space customs.

It cost about $55,000 dollars to get 1kg of material into low earth orbit with the space shuttle, a Falcon Heavy can supposedly do it for $2,350 now. Clearly the money that's gone into space research hasn't been wasted if it's now so much cheaper to get satellites into space, and no one can argue that's not a good thing (Though I'm sure someone will try ).

 

[roofman]

i think the people with the money and power have concluded that man has ruined the earth and we must move on before its ruined to the point it just wont sustain life anymore..the oceans are now chocked with plastic and its in the food chain,we now have no choice but to find another home

 

[brightspark]

Yes i was watching this the other night. Stephen Hawking reckoned that a meteor is the most likely thing to finish us.

wouldnt worry about it many a time the jehovas witnesses said the end is nie and it hasnt who gives a monkeys anyhow you wont know about it be quicker than swatting a fly

 

[ronan]

So because it sounds too difficult to you there's no point?

200 years ago if you wanted to send a message to America you had to get on a boat for two weeks, the idea of sending terabytes of information across the ocean in seconds was absolutely inconceivable (Information theory wouldn't exist for another 130 years so there was no concept of a bit, let alone terabytes ). In 1856, the first transatlantic cable was laid, it was expensive, slow and quickly broke. Was it a waste of money or did it pave the way for the next transatlantic cable, and the next one? Hundreds of years of development got us to where we are today. Just because space travel today is slow and expensive, how can you say in 2221 it won't cost £150 and take a few hours to get to mars, and we'll all be moaning about having to go through space customs.

It cost about $55,000 dollars to get 1kg of material into low earth orbit with the space shuttle, a Falcon Heavy can supposedly do it for $2,350 now. Clearly the money that's gone into space research hasn't been wasted if it's now so much cheaper to get satellites into space, and no one can argue that's not a good thing (Though I'm sure someone will try ).

No, but we're not talking about satellites though, we're talking millions or billions of miles. To send someone to mars and have them stay there for any length of time is a logistical nightmare.

 

[eLuSiVeMiTe]

wouldnt worry about it many a time the jehovas witnesses said the end is nie and it hasnt who gives a monkeys anyhow you wont know about it be quicker than swatting a fly

Only if your at or close to ground zero.

More likely to freeze and starve

Crocs faired well as they feasted on rotting dinosaur corpses

 

[brightspark]

No, but we're not talking about satellites though, we're talking millions or billions of miles. To send someone to mars and have them stay there for any length of time is a logistical nightmare.

not a nightmare verry feasable just you aint got a 2 way ticket a few people want to go aparently

 

[tom2207]

People also over look the fliter down effects of the invention of the space age.

They way they have to designe items, do filter down.

Fuel cells.
Lit Ion Batteries.
Light weight metals.
New methods of growing plants.
Medications

And Velcro ,,,, even though its a bit of a rip off.

 

[bigegg]

i think the people with the money and power have concluded that man has ruined the earth and we must move on before its ruined to the point it just wont sustain life anymore..the oceans are now chocked with plastic and its in the food chain,we now have no choice but to find another home

More likely that life will evolve to deal with it: it will just become another part of the food chain - same as all that oxygen that the first microbes polluted the planet with, 600M years ago.

Or it'll eventually sink, and be buried, to re-emerge in another 60M years as oil.

 

[cheb]

And it'll give a name to a new geological age: The Plasticene.

 

[bigegg]

And it'll give a name to a new geological age: The Plasticene.

D'ough.