New Mars Forums

I'm not particularly worried about the "big crunch". With a 10% base unemployment rate widely regarded as "normal", today's advanced industrial economies appear to be suffering from an endemic labour surplus rather than the other way around. Given ever increased mechanization and rising productivity, I see no reason for this gap not to widen either, especially without a corresponding increase in demand.

As I see it, the big picture is that less and less people are needed to run the real economy, but instead of my opinion, let's by all means throw out a few facts.

During the 1990's the population in Sweden rose from 8.6 million to 8.9 million, mostly through practically unrestricted immigration. Despite this increase, absolute employment numbers actually dropped during the period, from 4,500,000 to 4,150,000, that is by 350,000 individuals. This should be viewed against the increase of people of employment age, that is the workforce, which rose from 5,400,000 to 5,650,000, in other words, a net increase of 250,000 individuals.

See, we don't have a demographic deficit, what we have are several hundred thousand people the economy either have no need of or who are basically unemployable. More of the same, that is importing even more people to live on welfare transactions, meaning increased taxation, the solution to some looming "big crunch"? I shouldn't think so. At least, we should try getting the people who simply hang out here to work first and we have a lot of those!

I'm pretty sure you can see variations of this theme repeated in country after country in western Europe, albeit perhaps not always as extreme as around here.

Thanks for detailing the issue, Grypd. Yes, this has mainly been my impression also. Ban the fox hunt has appeared to me largelly an irrational reaction of typical urban lefties, in this case combining two irresistable notions: glorification of furry animals (especially predators) and hatred for the aristocracy.
Of course, I'm a city dweller as well, yet half my family comes from Småland, traditionally an area of deep forests, cold winters, a hard land. There's also an alleged trait they are said to share with Scotsmen, namely a deep-seated frugality.

I'm not sure I understand it. Do you think fox hunting is good or bad, Graeme? What's this with the British and fox hunting anyway? Why are they so hung up on it?

Must say that first photo, "Hunting in Oxfordshire" is very pictoresque. Like a Gainsborough painting almost.

Personally, I don't look at it exactly in that way. To me, almost anything would be better than what's in power in for example this country or that has any resonable chance of coming to power. Looked at in the long perspective, it would probably be better for the Swedes to be occupied by the Russians than to carry on as now, since at least Putin wouldn't continue to pursue a policy of auto-extermination.

Speaking about the EU, my thinking starts with making a sharp distinction between state and nation. As long as the state is benefitting and protecting the nation, the composition or origin of the political body is of less importance. The great advantage of the EU is that the common market is big enough to counteract economic globalization provided protectionist policies were pursued. On the other hand, I fear for the new constitution and its take on freedom of speech matters. The way it seems to be aimed in regards to "hate laws" and similar is tantamount to laying the foundations of a "Ministry of Truth".

Turkey would probably be okay if the country was restricted to Istanbul and Thrace. I have nothing against the historical Young Turks and their program of modernization. Nevertheless, as far as I know, the countryside in Anatolia is still just another part of the Muslim world to a major extent, with everything it entails in regards to confusing politics with religion, oppression of women, unassimilatory Islam etc. I don't want a Muslim bridgehead in Europe, an officially recognized one even less. Besides, they need as an absolute basic to sort out their differences with the Kurds. A conflict that can only really be solved by ceasing part of the country and erecting a Kurdish nation state. Otherwise, it would be a conflict the European Union would only stand to inherit.

The only demographical problem in Europe worth mentioning is related to the unchecked and historically unique immigration of African and Mid-East nationals. This is a first rate disaster in the making on nearly every level. Thankfully, at least, it's the delusional Rousseauist generation that created this folly that is going into retirement.

Funnily, "bubbles", spiralling "deficits" and "debts" are the sort of thing I generally hear about the US economy these days. Who'll be right in the final analysis? I'm not sure. Please note though that most European countries have been through that situation more or less already, while it seems like a rather new experience in the US. When I listen to American optimists, I can't help but recalling the carelessness of own country in the 80's. Don't ever trust a GDP growth built on outsourcing and newly installed money printing presses.

I'm impressed with your degree of self-confidence. Good luck!

Good, dump the pork barrel! A visionary who stakes out the goals and who'll thug the space agency out of obscurity and into public consiousness is precisely what I believe NASA needs at the top. Leave the managing to the middle-men. An efficient leader says, "I want this. You have full freedom to whatever means you feel necessary. Just achieve the results!" Whatever is meant by managing, Zubrin has got his priorities straight, and that's what counts in that position.

Precisely. I have all my faith in Zubrin, though if the Americans don't want him, maybe we Europeans can have him. Hehe, kind of like Portugal lost Columbus to Spain.
:;):

We will beat you.

Armour protection is really not the issue, especially not in guerilla warfare. A tank can always be knocked out from the sides by a single guy manning a HEAT shell launcher of some sorts. The non-verbalized dream of the Cold War era was to find an armour resistant and thick enough to inabilitate the one front hit, one kill scenario, which by that time had reached a critical stage of development due to vastly improved accuracy and penetration power. Basically, whoever shot the first APFS (put in whatever following abbreviation you want) round won. This is what the thick armour of the Leopard II Improved and the M1 Abrams A2 was all about, all conceived within the conceptual restraints of tank versus tank warfare on a western European battlefield. It has absolutely nothing to do with the situation facing occupational forces in Iraq.

As for APC's and IFV's, their armor is primarily designed to deflect artillery shrapnel. There is no way you could improve that armour to withstand antitank sniping from freedom fighter ambushes, provided the latter are at least armed with RPG's.

Iraq, the wrong war at the wrong moment for the wrong reasons. Result: quagmire.

Carried over from the previous thread, Cobra, I'm a little disappointed in you. Are you seriously implying that vehicle fuel conversion is best handled by public preferences and capitalism?

Yeah I know, that wasn't fair. There was more to your statement than that. Let me present you all with the car of the future the public will want to crave, whether fuelled by gasoline or hydrogen fuel cells or what not (provided of course it makes a magnificent V-Eight cylinder roar). Oh yeah, and it's *not* a SUV.

http://www.blackhawkauto.org/autocollec … ucker.JPEG

Yes, 6 rather than 4, anyday. But how to cram them into the Transhab and Earth Return Vehicle? Boils down to the launch vehicle. Mars Direct is really pushing the limits, but with a NTR stage it probably would be viable.

Which means more development and more money, even if it's 'just' about dusting off 60's technology.

Cindy is right, you can't rule out fatal casualties. If you Americans weren't so godamm anxious about safety all the time you could achieve great things. Scott and explorers like him were willing to put their lives on the line, what's a hero worth if he's not prepared to take risks and live with it (or lives in a nation who won't allow him to)?
The real sign of greatness would have been if in case no one came back, you just learnt from the experience and launched another mission.
Often, being prepared to take risks, acting forcefully but in a simple way, is the very element that is risk minimizing. Like this thing with "cyclers". According to my understanding, the transit of such vehicles last considerably longer and they are hard to dock with. Worse in every respect, in my opinion.

The Cosmos is a cruel place and we are just people. The stay advisaged in Mars Direct is long enough and dangerous enough. I see little reason in prolonging a mission which will be highly demanding on those taking part, any way you put it.

Will they be greater heroes becasue they stay longer? No. Not with a mission that will already last for years.

Oops, just recalled I had to reply to another thread by John Creighton, if I recall correctly. Too bad I've got an exam coming up and I haven't got the time. Sorry.

I think the Mars Direct plan is sound, basically because its long series of missions and cycling of (specialized) participants would allow you to try out all the techniques needed for an actual settlement, for a minimum of capital and resources spent.

You'd learn as you go along without risking to waste very much on mistaken preconceptions in the process.

Although, I must say that my impression has been that much of this has to be tried out and tested on Mars. Hydroponics for example, the small greenhouse carried by an early mission could do little more than testing the suitability and methods of growing plants using Mars soil, yes? To get into full fledged self sustaining production you'd need a larger acreage and consequently the involvement of building materials created on Mars, methods to accomplish which the early missions should also put into practice.

The very techniques of creating a settlement are things that I have imagined should go into the Mars Direct missions in themselves, but until self-sustainability can be achieved in various areas, the missions would be entirely dependant on Earth.

A warm female?