New Mars Forums

Yes interesting article, but how valid will it be when china's economy has doubled a few times? The fact that they can do what they have with their 1.5B annual budget astounds me.

The dangerous thing about China's space rogram is that unlike in the US it is a great source of nationalistic pride. When China spends money on their space program it directly aids the country by quieting opposition. It unites China in short.

When the US trys to increase spending on its space program there is strong opposition.

Ask yourself this, if we woke up tommorrow and China had landed a few people on the Moon, what would our reaction be? I don't think even this would start a new space race, because most people would be like 'so what'.

This is why I fear that China will take the lead in space before we can or will do anything about it. If they can land people on the Moon and we don't even jerk, then by the time they want to go to Mars we will be too far behind to dream of catching up.

You would have had to see Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. It was Khans last word before his ship blew up. Very dramatic

Sorry Martian Republic, but your analogy isn't appropriate. A hotel is a place you visit, enjoy the sites, then go back home. Perhaps I shouldn't have used the word tourism since that comes with many preconcieved notions in most peoples minds.

Specifically, what I am talking about is real estate. Mars is a world, not an asteroid or moon. It has the same land surface area as the Earth (till it has bodies of water). It has air, wind, and many features that make it beautiful and interesting. The hotel you speak of will be the stepping stone for people to 'try-out' Mars and see if they like it. Most will go back home, but some will stay.

As I stated in an earlier thread, these things will play out on the Moon first. The Moon has several advantages over Mars in this respect. Travel time to the Moon in an economical vehicle is about a week. It is closer to 'home' and therefore safer in the minds of potential visitor/resident investors.

But once people are making money transporting and servicing people on the Moon, Mars won't be far behind. Mars offers something the Moon likely never will, a world where plants can grow in the open, where streams and lakes can exist.

Now before you get excited and say 'that's not possible' let me explain. Most people think of terraforming as making a planet like Mars Earth-like (and they are correct). But most people take the process a step farth in their minds and equate terraforming with breathing oxygen (not true). The work needed to make Mars into a world where people can walk around and breathe the air without aid is currently beyond our abilities.

However, the more we learn about Mars, they less hostile it seems. Long before, perhaps hundreds of years before humans could breath the air of Mars, plants will be growing on the surface. We already have a list of simple organisms that can survive and perhaps thrive on Mars today. With a modest effort, we could make Mars suitable to much more complex plants like trees and grasses in 50 years. Now how much more appealing is a green Mars than the Moon?

All these dreams of Moon/Mars colonies pumping out starships is great, but rather unrealistic. As Bill White has said many times here, these thing can't happen unless there is a profit motive. No one is going to invest billions of dollars for these things unless they can turn a profit.

Obviously we need a lot of people to work and maintain these colonies with or without robotic labor, so what is the answer? Tourism. The private sector will soon make a stab at building a lunar resort of sorts. Should that prove even moderatly successful, then a Martian community isn't far behind. The japanesse have been looking into the feasibilty of this on the Moon for decades and I believe it's only a matter of time.

Nope, turning this country into a welfare state is bad, can't say I was ever for that. However, there are serious needs that aren't being addressed.

Nuclear fission is not the solution to our power needs. Until a means can be devised for dealing with the radioactive waste we have already, I cannot fathom a reasonable person being for even more plants.

No one sees Kerry as a saint (Bush either for that matter). These are the choices one gets when people cast votes due to a single issue (military, space, etc.). It becomes very easy to please enough the population to get elected by calling yourself 'the education president, the compassionate conservative, the environmental president and so on.

I honestly groan deep inside when a politicain says he/she will improve something while cutting funding (coarse they don't say how, but no one asks for details just soundbites).

It appears that the GOP's plan to label Kerry as a flip-flopper has been at least somewhat successful. I admit, I honestly hoped people wouldn't be fooled, but it appears to have stuck. Perhaps people have come to trust anything that comes out of their TVs as truth, without questioning where the accussers get their information from.

Has Kerry changed his position on issues over his 30 years in the Senate? Yes, of coarse. Every human being changes over time and with change goes insight and new opinions. A representitive should change the way they vote if the people that elected them expect them to vote as they would on a bill.

Bush's policies have hurt a LOT of people. Perhaps this is why they hate him so much. I don't hate Bush, but the people around him are rather arrogant, secretive, and deceptive. I don't like our nation being compared to Nazi, and I don't like the path this administration is leading this country. This is why I am voting for Kerry. He is a good man, a caring and hardworking man. I feel he has what it takes to be a good President. That's why I and so many others are going to vote for him.

Clinton may have made the world chuckle at us (and they mainly laughed because of how over-blown the issue became), but I fear Bush is making the world disgusted and angry with us.

I remember that when we first started to go to war in Iraq, oil prices shot up in anticipation of more oil fires (even though Kuwaitt only provides a tiny fraction of our oil).

OPEC is pro-Bush due to his being an oil man and his energy policies, so they wouldn't be trying to oust him by raising oil prices.

Let's not forget that oil companies sell oil to make money, not determine elections. Remember all those polls a few months back about weither Americans would buy less gas for summer holidays and traveling if gas went over $2 a gallon? Remember the results of those polls? Americans said they would continue to buy as much gas as always mainly cause they have no choice.

There is a false belief in this country that oil producers can offer cheaper gasoline at the pumps if production is raised in the Middle East. This is simply not true. OPEC sets the prices and regulates the production of oil to avoid flooding the market with oil and therefore make less per barrel.

Notice how they make just enough barrels to satisfy demand, yet not enough to actually allow countries to build up reserves?

Kerry may or may not live up to his promise of ending the Middle East's strangle-hold on us by switching to alternative energy sources, but we have little choice. Bush's policies won't have any effect on our energy consumption until around 2020 and that is only if the next four presidents continue with his policies. And seeing how partisan politics has become, I don't think that is possible.

Here's a thought, split NASA up!

Our military doesn't fall under one office and their tasks are relatively simple by comparison. Our Armed forces are made up of the Navy, Air Force, Army, Marines, National Guard and Coat Guard with each having their own specific goals.
Perhaps NASA would be better off if we had a Moon, Mars, Beyond, and Earth Science branch. This way each department could focus on their specific goals instead of fighting amongst each other for much needed funding.
NASA worked great when THE goal was entering space, then orbiting the planet, then going to the Moon. However, these days NASA does so much more. Like solar missions like SoHo, telescopes like Hubble, deep space missions like Voyager and JIMO, rovers like Spirit, not to mention all the PR work they do with schools across the nation and other tidbits.
Perhaps this is what is really wrong with NASA, we are asking them to do too much at one time....

Personally, I say leave the Moon for private industry. It is a goal that they can realistically reach in a few years. Anyways, it's so 60's......

'Deag, you twit, the media itself went back and recounted the ballots. Bush won anyways. Stop beating the dead donkey.

That butterfly ballot was made by a Democrat, btw, and the confusion of votes was between Gore and Pat Buchanan, not Gore and Bush as you insinuate, though that's an irrelevant issue anyways.'

See, this is the major difference between people like me and people that support Bush. I respect your rights to have an opinion based on facts, but you don't respect my same rights. Theres no need to name call.
The 'media' (whoever that is) may well have recounted the available votes and Bush may have won, but that doesn't change the fact that thousands of votes from key districts historically known to vote for Democrats have missing votes in a disproportionate amount to the usual amount of 'lost votes'.
As I said, I don't swallow the excuse put forth that butterfly ballots are at fault, it makes no sense.
Fact: since exit polls have been taken they have never been wrong with only one notable exception, Florida 2000. In 50 years of taking polls from people who have just cast their votes, this is the only exception.
All this is beside the point anyway. Give Bush Florida by 500 votes and he still loses the majority vote national. Bush W, could have made the arguement about electoral colleges mute by setting a president and refusing the office on the basis that he didn't win the majority vote. This is supposed to be a democracy isn't it?
What boggles my mind is that many supporters of Bush don't see this as realistic. The ends justify the means, no matter what the cost. If the roles had been reversed and Gore had taken the position Bush took, I'd be ashamed of my vote for Gore. Winning at the cost of your morales and integrity is not worth it. We are Americans and we should expect better from our leaders.

Well, yea Euler, Ive heard something similar too about the top 40 militaries (but lets be honest #40 is like 1 million dollars)

I never did buy the 'information' coming from GOP camps at the time about butterfly ballots being the cause of the difference between exit polls and actual voters ballots (wouldn't it be just as easy for a Bush supporter to vote for Gore?).

I don't think its a coincidence that the company that recounted the votes has strong GOP ties (owner is cousin to Jeb I believe) or that the districts missing the most votes are dominantly black districts (in other words: Democrats).

I wish the media would have published some of the information available about the demographic breakdown of missing votes. But oh well.....

It will also be interesting to watch as China becomes more democratic, will population increases force China to look to Mars as an expansion possibility?

You and I both know that no matter how ambitious a space program China has, it won't be enough to transport population growth to Mars even if Mars could be made to sustain thousands of immigrants a year.

I don't feel as if my point is getting across.

Looking at the numbers, it doesn't seem logical to save Hubble. It is expensive, yes. It is dangerous, all missions are, but yes. Is it worth it? Definately.

As I have said, NASA has nothing better to do in the next four years. We probably won't get much past Core Complete let alone finish the damn thing so why let Hubble die for a space station no one wants?

Has O'Keef even asked another country if they don't mind waiting for their personal module? Has any attempt been made to contact our so-called partners and stike a deal? Nope.

Why can't Japan wait for their module a year longer so we can service Hubble and then we can share the viewing time with their scientists on a regular basis?

When O'Keefe made his January announcement that Hubble would not be serviced again there was an incredible outcry from teachers, politicians, and supporters like us. When has any NASA program generated that kind of support? Even Apollo was old and unwanted after the first landing.

Killing Hubble only reinforces the public's perception (perhaps correctly) that NASA lacks the determination to follow through will grand schemes.

It isn't about the costs or risks. This is about inspiration. You can't tell the taxpayers 'well we know you want us to keep this here, but we'd rather go ahead and build an obsolete space station'.

Of the two, don't you think that the ISS will cost more lives than one or two more servicing missions? Frankyl I'm suprised no one has died yet.

I was going to say....damnit Euler, you took the words out of my mouth. 

But seriously, it is important to note that a China depression or recession would be on par with steady US growth (think Clinton years not Bush).

As more and more industry bends over backwards for China you have more Chinesse making pretty nice salaries (which in 20 years translates into a large generation of inheritence powered people). At that point China will control much more of the high tech market as its people can afford all the niceties that we enjoy (luxury cars, cell phones, computers). When more than half of China has a pc conected to the internet, then China's economic boom will start in earnest, as well as real social change.

What we are feeling now isn't really even the beginning of China's boom. All we are experiencing now are the tossings and turnings of the sleeping giant. When China's population can afford (10-15 years) all the junk we buy, only then will people understand its power. By then, unfortunately, it will be too late.