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Never having been a smoker, what I resent most about "criminalization" is the lack of products made from hemp fabrics for sale just anywhere...they're comfortable, wear well, look good, don't shrink, etc. How sad....
Am I being "devilish" to suggest that God's thoughts would have to propagate faster than light-speed to enable Him to have any control over the Universe...?
Damage Mars? That planet is already damaged! We should go there to "fix it" asap!
Wheels for horizontal-landing commercial spaceplanes--certainly not skids. Solid tires of some sort, but not gas-filled, would make conventional configurations of tandem, dual wheeled landing gears viable.
I'm kind of surprised that hovercraft and/or low altitude air-jet "surface" levitated transporters aren't being suggested, using the Martian air via multi-stage compressors, however powered. Lightweight structures and broad-bodied fuselages, I would think, could make this a good engineering approach....
If anyone alive now wants to wait around to see a space elevator in operation, they should forget it, and pay more attention to what's do-able in their lifetime. In other words, funds and know-how to get into space that way won't even exist before today's new-borns will be too old to ride the thing. I, myself, being quite old, would rather that single-stage-to-orbit catapults erected in the Himalayas be used...which could land horizontally, this decade--if only the political problems in that part of the world can be resolved. Alternatively, the Andes, catapult-launched from the Peruvian desert...How's that for optimism?
The power of advertising is alot stronger than I thought it would be.
A guy my dad knows owns this shop, he ordered these stupid spinning-top toys called "Bane-Blades" and no-body bought them for months. Then he saw a couple of adverts on T.V. which were part of the toys Ad campaign and now he has queues outside and he can sell 100 of the things in less than 10 minutes.
People are really quite shallow, especially young people like me. So if you can get into their minds, you can tell them anything and they'll believe you.
I think/suggest we reserve the word "propaganda" for negative connotations, and perhaps use "public relations" for everything else.
The Mars Society, I suggest, could use as much public relations as it can get. Everyone I know, had never heard of the M.S. before I brought it up...and I just happened to stumble upon it myself, while searching the internet under "Mars". They'd heard of NASA, of course, but these days they just ho-hum at the obviously slanted "propaganda"--get my meaning?
I just watched the movie "Minority Report" on video, and saw the small daddy-longlegs robots that supposedly would be used in 2034.
While I don't agree with the animators' concept (as being mistaken and/or too in advance of the time-period) I would like to suggest something that Mars Society members who are animators might do "in their spare time," ie:
Obtain ground scenes from the various Mars Landers, create realistic millipede-type robots and make them crawl around and over that rock-strewn terrain to reach the horizon as an objective--at least to start with. Vary the designs of the "bots" to show how different arrangements of segments, legs, feelers, sensors, etc., and semi-autonomous programs would have to function in order for them to reach their goal. Don't omit unsuccessful designs and failed goal attempts, and demonstrate the results of improvements. Show follow-on types of robots exploiting what the originals view, such as bulldozing, drilling, sample-and-return, etc.
The results of such a pre-working hardware animation effort, I believe, could create a lot of publicity...even perhaps an Academy Award...and lead eventually to the construction of successfully-working crawler models, for testing at the Mars habitat simulation site. Just a thought....
Soph: Thanks. Right back atcha--
(1) Sat-view rebroadcast on local TV channel
(2) On internet, after downloading.
(3) City lights, dawns and dusks, auroras, volcanos, fires...
(4) Tastfully, how?
(5) How so, in the case of (hypothtical) Earth view?
CalTech 2010: Thanks for the nicely thought-out reply. In answer, since no one appears to have seen such an Earth view on TV...and I would like to see something like this to catch on...I would comment further--
No, not by NASA satellite TV, because access is so geographically limited. This should be a World View for the people of the world.
Live Earth view would be forever changing, weather-wise and lighting-wise...certainly not "paint-wise" for gosh sakes.
In fact, I'd love to have it connected to my computer as a live screen-saver.
Downloaded from the internet, it would be zoom-able in any number of ways.
Commercials, if necessary, would be acceptable to get it started.
I wonder which geostationary satillite(s) might be capable of providing the Earth views service?
There was a suggestion a while back, by Gore I think, to launch a satellite out far enough from earth to catch the entire globe rotating. The idea was to beam back the image 24/7 for everyoen to watch on a single channel.
Yes, I remember, but that was then and this is now: What more can be added to make the view (1) useful to anyone, anywhere on the planet (2) zoom-able if accessible also on the internet (3) nighttime lights view (4) commercial if necessary (5) as a screen-saver (6) your court, anyone?
Has anyone else here read about NASA's research into building small spider bots that would be released onto the surface of Mars and could do double duty as both scientific research instruments and also act a planet wide communications network for crewed Mars missions? Here's the link.
Much obliged. I never should have stopped searching NASA/Jet Propulsion Lab, because...you never know....
Soph: Thank you for writing the letter I would have, had I the skill and intelligence you display.
I feel deprived whenever I think of full-time views of Earth seen from space being unavailble to the people of the world on their local TV (including me).
Someone--Buzz Aldrin perhaps--mentioned something like this in the past, but as far as I know it hasn't happened yet. Do any of you know of such a dedicated TV channel?
If not, how can we bring it about? And, with today's improvments, what enhancements might be included such as: centre of interest selection (hemisphere, country, city), zoom capability, weather and air pollution emphasis, ISS current location-in-orbit superposition, and I don't know what else....
AltToWar: I really appreciate the photon discussion. Now, for my next hang-up regarding "the photon": If sunlight imparts thrust to a perfectly reflecting light-sail, normal to the radiation, so that total reflection back sunward occurs, where does the energy to produce thrust come from? I know I'm overlooking something, but it beats me how to explain this. (I'll repeat this to you privately, as well.) ???
i dont think thats true. you could brace the vehicle as much as you want. you could also strengthen the legs with high tension cables, which can hold up huge amounts of weight. legs provide an advantage, in that they could extend and contract, so a robot with legs could go as high or low as it wants, and in many directions.
i would think that construction would require a variety of autonomous robots, but overall, it would be better than using people, because it would be safer, cheaper, and it would free people up for other jobs.
AND do it long before people can arrive!
The crawler (pedapodal?) robot configuration appealed to me upon seeing that funny little multi-wheeled rover in operation in that field of rocks on Mars. I experienced an alternative mential picture: that of a multi-segmented, "centipede on steroids" crawling around and over those rocks on its own, to reach the hill-horizon (perhaps a kilometre distant) in order to view what was on the other side of the hill.
Due to its low c.g. and jointed configuration, utilizing whisker-like feelers, and inertial-platform base programmed guidance, it should enable it to reach the objective autonomously, then signal the remote presence operator to use the video camera to look around...etc.
Segments could be synchronized via wireless links rather than wires or fibreoptical cables; universal-joint-coupled to each other, and disconnectable and reconnectable for add-ons or damaged segmant replacement. Leg "muscles" might use replentishable compressed CO2 from solar-powered pumps; video camera units and manipulators to make each segment an atomaton. Navigation and optical sensing would comprise additional functions, of specialized head and tail segments.
A whole population of such robots could be landed and commanded for selected survey chores, and from more than one lander. The crawlers' mode of locomotion would resemble that of the equivalent insect, scaled up (say) 100X in the survey configuration, with their mobility, climbing and descending abilities enhanced by the reduced gravity. The survey robots need not return, but simply continue until they become damaged or simply worn out.
Power chores, such as drilling, digging, and bulldozing would be carried out by tracked vehicles in follow-on operations. Attachable/detachable bulldozer blades would enable narrow roads through the rock fields to be dozed to eg. drilling sites, for returning samples to lander/relaunch vehicles.
I would love to see something along these lines to be tested in conjunction with the simulation habitat programmes, by unpaid, retired engineering types withing the Mars Society.
Let's not put the cart in front of the horse... have you seen the "latest" crawler on a scale of that size at MIT(?)? It had six legs, and it takes about 90 seconds to move one leg out in front of the others and stabilize it. I would much rather use a rover for the non-rocky areas of Mars
Not so: the latest centipede-like robots just seem to "flow" over objects, including verticals, with the advancing part supported by the trailing parts still on the horizontal. Progressive leg action is automatically (not cognitively) coordinated, forward or backward, and they can be made to just creep along or go like hell. This is the way to go! (See University of California at Berkeley, Robot Labs.)
Re. Martin Rees's article--I wish to thank the Mars Society for presenting his thoughts, which I found profoundly logical and consistant with my own. He puts into perspective past accomplishments in space, and romanticizes about the not too distant future...which I gather is all that he (and I) have to look forward to due to our advanced age.
As to his views of the far distant future, I couldn't agree with his prognoses more. But I am not satisfied with his view of the immediate future.
I want to see Mars taken possession of by us asap. I want the adventure to take place, and I need it at least to begin in my lifetime. And my need (I suggest) is identical with a great majority of people living in the technologically still-under-developed nations such as the United States & the Commonwealth & Russia & China & the European Union.
While we live out our ridiculously short lives compared with time to reach intellectual maturity, sorting ourselves out on Earth with regard to population, politics, religion, terrorism, justice, energy, ecology, conservation, transportation, communications...I/we need the stimulus--to give it meaning-- of experiencing the simultaneous expansion into human-occupied interplanetary space. Need I go on?
dickbill: On the contrary: Dead comets--easier to reach, energywise, than the Moon--populate space between the orbits of Venus and Earth, above and below the ecliptic plane, which are not easily observable from Earth due to the Sun's glare. "Earth-crossing" was not what I meant, but the name of the above-mention comet (and asteroid) population escapes me (Amour?). Anyway, how about discussing this further?
Eventually I would like my company to be the one that produces the first colonist ship to Mars; not the spacecraft for the first manned mission, but a commercial interplanetary spacecraft to carry colonists for permanent emigration to Mars. That may be a long way off, but within my life time. So call me a dreamer.
Would that I were young as that...my dream is: live to see the first person(s) reach mars and (dare I dream further?) find water-ice no more than a metre down!
Hi all,
Since hydrogen is so light and requires big tanks, very inconvenient, is it possible to send water or water ice in orbit, hydrolyze it with solar energy and fill an inflatable tank which could then wait in orbit, like in the ISS and serve for a trip to Mars ?
I realize that sending 20 tons of ice in the ISS is very expensive, maybe more than just sending the hydrogen tank already filled with liquid H2/O2.
Gee, I like the idea of an ice-ship of sorts, which could (1) shield you from solar flares (2) supply hydrogen and oxygen by electrolysis from low-voltage thermoelectric generation (3) onboard water. No, seriously, the mind boggles at your idea. And, where to obtain the water: Why, from dead comets in Earth-crossing orbits, of course--and a good thing too, since we'd better locate and go get them...before they get us!
Regarding tethers, they have the potential to make a big impact on the total mass needed for a flight between planets. But who knows when one will be built. We don't even know yet whether the technology will actually work when placed in orbit.
-- RobS
Oh, it'll work alright. Robert Forward started a business based upon it, and I believe since his death (which I still can't feel the loss of, on account of not having read all his stuff yet) the firm goes on. Should be available under: Space tethers.
I got tired of the ASU Themis "Image of the Day" handouts together with descriptive blurbs, and how "great" the results were that Odyssy was getting...and just stumbled on the Mars Society webpage. I'm hooked, so long as I get responses to my offerings. Like a thirsty man in the desert!
Robs: How about boosting your ion rocket to Earth escape velocity by means of a tether attached to (a) space station (b) conglomeration of LEO space junk. Or, in the case of Mars, either or both of the moonlets? Over to you.