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Since the goal is a self sustaining outpost, the only expense is the start up investment. We send them up with with what they need to extract/recycle air and water, and grow there own food.
Other than maintanance and crew swapping flights, there shouldn't be any additional cost. And ideally, they would be able to produce there own repair parts.
Of course those technologies will probably find plenty of profitable applications right on Earth, long before it ever turns a profit from the moon. Possibly enough to finance lunar operations.
"Yes, I was going to give this astronaut selection my best shot, I was determined when the NASA proctologist looked up my ass, he would see pipes so dazzling he would ask the nurse to get his sunglasses."
---Shuttle Astronaut Mike Mullane
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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.
I hate to be the barror of bad new, but Tourism will also fail too.
Like how many hotel do you know that build city air port so they can bring customers to there hotel?
Or how many hotel build the freeway or major roads that go along the side of there hotel and bring guest to there door for the night stay?
Or Hotels that grow there own food, or have there own water or sewer plants or power station, etc.?
Hotels that will service those Tourism generally follow and not do the leading. They generally build there hotel where other have already been and plug into the infrastructure that already there and it won't be the other way around in space either.
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Comstar03 and Grypd, just about everyone here thinks this will one day happen, but not anytime soon.
Here's why:
The first back to the Moon or on to Mars isn't going to control either body. It is very expensive to just get there let alone bring along a personal military to protect said resource. Also, what would happen to the controling country here on Earth. Picture China saying that it was going to the Moon to exploit its resources and no one else better get in their way. Perhaps most importantly, there isn't oil on the Moon or Mars (as far as we know) or any other resource worth investing billions of dollars to reach, extract, and transport back. This is why I argue that tourism will open the door, because the only thing you can't get back here on Earth much cheaper is the view.
Don't get me wrong, the resources produced by any colony is going to be it's lifeblood for that colony. However, the Earth doesn't need ore or solar energy bad enough to get it elsewhere.
Comstar03, the rewards are there, but they aren't as tangible as a lump of steel or watt of solar energy. The true benefit of settling either place in an effort large enough that the colony will eventually be independent and grow under it's own power, is that whoever does it first will directly reap the new technology invented on a challenging frontier. Problem is, since it is new and alien, we can only guess what that might be (and people don't usually invest on guesses).
Everything has to be done in baby-steps. Put people on the Moon or Mars and you then have a greater need for faster/safer transport to and from. Large amounts of people had to travel to California before the governement thought it important to lay railroad tracks from coast to coast.
John F. Kennedy invested in guess with his Moon Mission. But, then John F. Kennedy was President of the United States and not just President of some corporation that had to make a profit either. But, if we are talking about a private corporation, then your right. But, if we are talking about a President of the United States who has a vision of the future for space, then your wrong.
Let take your rail road to California as an example:
In 1829 the first steam engine was invented in London England. In 1832 Abraham Lincoln hear about the steam and what it did and proposes that we should build a transcontinental rail road. In 1848 the Illinois Rail Road was the biggest rail road in the world with more track laid. During the civil war in 1862 just thirty years after Abraham Lincoln hear about rail roads, he signs the transcontinental rail road act to build that rail road and proposed building one. Seven year later in 1869 we complete that rail road. Of course not too much was done on that project until 1865 or the end of the civil war, but you would expect that.
People who have vision and become President of the United States, some times can do interesting things.
Larry,
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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?
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Martian Republic you state we need advanced AI systems to operate on the moon this is wrong. It will be many many years before we have functioning AI systems that have the complexity and power to operate in the enviroment. You probably have not really read my earlier posts but im dealing with tele robotics.
Robotics as a science as we term it is in an interesting position we can build the bodies the legs and arms that are light and functional. Powerplants are also in a good position and the sensors are good too and advancing. The problem is we just cant make them think, we do not have this knowledge but as this science is still in its infancy it will one day be sorted.
Telerobotics is where we have human operators in near constant control of the Robot from a distance. We have a lot of skill in this regard and can easily fly planes and control submarines with this skill. Most space probes are examples of tele robotics in action. The two probes on mars are small versions of what we plan. Telerobotics will allow Human operators if used on the moon to have almost no difficulty due to time lag and this allows a lot more effective operation.
Why use Telerobotics to build infrastructure on the Moon, well robots will be able to operate without life support and for the full 14 day lunar day. The actual weak element in the function is the Human operator and if we use a shift system with about 3 centers set around the world it means we can use the robots almost constantly. This allows a building and mining rate almost worthy of any Earthside mine.
There are of course problems with using robots, Maintenance being the main problem but these problems can be solved using reasonable methods. In the case of maintenance the robots can go to a "repair shed" where operators on earth can involve itself in seeing what is the robots problem. If we can use Tele robotics to allow doctors to operate on humans using a robot do you think we are worried about working on a much easier anatomically robot? As for the maintenance of the heavy machinery, the solar ovens etc we use smaller more flexible robots, think R2D2 with arms.
The one reason that telerobotic infrastructure creation on the Moon is one of the most efficient methods of a foothold being gained is that it has been well researched. We could use the Shuttle C style to send the base machinery to the Moon in only a few launches. Additional robots can be added as required. This plan was one of the spinoffs from when people found the 90 day report to be too expensive.
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Clearly a robotic work for on the moon will use tellerobotics. However, the need for tellerobotics increases the cost because there must be an operator here on earth. Because of the long delay time (is it seconds or minutes) there are too options. The robots can move very slow thus negating the delay time or they could use some kind of virtual feedback coupled with a state estimator. By virtual feedback I mean that the a computer will simulate what in thinks the robotic arm is doing and simulate the feedback for such motions as gripping and colliding with surfaces. Constants measurements will be taken to correct the simulation results. This idea is similar to using a Kalman filter.
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The first one is hoping the machines won't break down. Electronic component have standard of what a failure rate should be per thousand units and a how long it suppose to last before the unit fails or ware out. In the physical world where you have moving parts that rub against each other. You will have ware and tear on the machine and will ware out and break down. These are physical laws that govern this universe and we can not change those laws of physic. So not having machine breaking down is not an option. But, we can design machines that break down less often with new techniques.
Okay, won’t break down is an exaduration or an approximation. So lets consider how long the robot must last. I would start from an economic perspective and say that if the robot lasts longer enough that the interest paid on it is much greater then the cost to make it and ship and ship the robot to the moon then the robot is nearly as economical as a robot that lasts for ever. Thus form a finical perspective we could make the approximation that the robot lasts forever. Or we could look at it from the productivity prospective. That is if the net contribution of the robot to the automated economy is greater then the cost of make the robot then I guess it doesn’t last forever but it lasts long enough. Looking at the moon, since nothing on the moon really has much value, then from the productivity perspective the robot would have to do enough work to sustain the infrastructure that supports the automated economy. Some of this could include the assembly of new robots.
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Your second answer is have robots that can fix things. I am assuming that we are talking about AI or artificial intelligence in robots. Your assuming that a program in machine language can solve problems like a human can. Although AI can emulate thinking process, it can duplicate the thinking process.
You mean to day it can’t duplicate the thinking process right? Well, these are philosophical and linguistic questions and I won’t want to waste much time arguing over semantics. My first response is so what? Emulate but not duplicate what is the difference? Well, lets see one is in silicon and one is in chemistry. So what? The real question is what is the essence of thinking. If we define thinking as what a human does well then we clearly conclude that there is no artificial intelligence, alien intelligence or animal intelligence. Whoopee!
The question is not really easy though. Often people thinking they know what thinking is and then they write a program to do it and find something is still missing. Well, at least in the sense that it can’t do what people can do. Well it can do it yet. Anyway, I don’t think thinking even sums up all of what is intelligence. What is thinking? There is problem solving, decision making, objective weighting and reassessment, reflection, processing external inputs etc. But if we react in a game of ping pong are we thinking? When our brain identifies an object moving towards are we thinking? When we walk are we thinking? Well, clearly a person is always thinking but not necessarily about the task at hand. In fact it is amazing how many things we can do without thinking about them. Anyway, what is my point? Reconsider what it means to think.
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Clearly a robotic work for on the moon will use tellerobotics. However, the need for tellerobotics increases the cost because there must be an operator here on earth. Because of the long delay time (is it seconds or minutes) there are too options. The robots can move very slow thus negating the delay time or they could use some kind of virtual feedback coupled with a state estimator. By virtual feedback I mean that the a computer will simulate what in thinks the robotic arm is doing and simulate the feedback for such motions as gripping and colliding with surfaces. Constants measurements will be taken to correct the simulation results. This idea is similar to using a Kalman filter.
There would only be about one second delay or so. Light travel about 183,000 miles a second and the moon is about 245,000 to 250,000 miles away. So the time delay is not that bad or too much out of sink with what you actually see.
But, the rest of your argument is sound though. For each tellerobotics or NASA Robertron you have on the moon will require at least one operator on the earth and you will probably have to have hundreds or even thousands to get the job done you want done. But, the maintiance would still be a nightmare with that many tellerobotics and thing else there servicing.
Larry,
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An AI emulating the thinking process is basically a series of "If then or else" commands along with other types of commands to run our robot that can fix things. Now that robot can only operate with the perimeter of that AI emulator to fix something and anything that out side that AI emulator it can't fix. Just to drill a simple hole on an NC/Machine it might take ten to twenty commands to drill that hole or lines of code and this is on a fix location too.
But, back to our NC/Machine when they proof a tape to do a new job which may have hundreds of thousand of lines of code, which I admit is one of the bigger programs that they write to do a job and it on a fix perimeters too or boundaries. It will generally take several months to program it and take it out to the machine and run and modify the program and run it again until they get right. Your probably talking about a tenfold increase in lines of code for a mobile unit to do the same thing and that just one project too. Your going to have thousands or tens programs to do different things. So you will have to add that to the list of programs that you have to keep on line.
In AI terminology a program that solves a problem by a large amount of human input is said to have a low A to I ratio. Read http://www.genetic-programming.com/book/]“Genetic Programming IV: Routine Human-Competitivve Machine Intelligence” John R. Koza, Martin A. Keane, Mathew J. Streeter, William Mydlowec, Jessen Yu & Guido Lanza"
Your suggestion of program composed of hundreds of thousands of if then statments is such a program. Another example of such a program is the Chess program big Blue. Although the program learned how to play chess very well it was the result of many man years of human input. If we can solve our AI problems this way that is fine. It works and won’t be two difficult to program if there is a limited number of cases.
“Now that robot can only operate with the perimeter of that AI emulator to fix something and anything that out side that AI emulator it can't fix.” Well if this were true it wouldn’t really mater to much. The robot would just have to waits for the upgraded to be downloaded from earth. However, this style of programming is not the objective of artificial intelligence.
The goal of artificial intelligence is to obtain a high A to I ratio. That is the program can solve the problem with as little human input as possible. Genetic Algorithms are one example of algorithms that have a very high A to I ratio. They can solve a large class of problems with very little human input. All the user has to specify are the objectives. The algorithm then figures out how to solve the problem. So for instance if the objective is to screw in a bolt all the user tells the program is it is bad to bump into things, It is bad to cross thread, it is good to be fast. The program would then simulate several algorithms (thinking) until it found a good enough algorithm (stopping condition) to screw in the bolt.
Thus in a primitive AI the user could write many IF then statements. However in more advanced AI the human first designs the architecture and then decides the objectives and lets the computer program take care of the rest. BTW the computer thinking can take place both on the mars and on the moon. Genetic algorithm have the advantage of being highly parallel. If each robot had enough free processing power they could work together to solve common problems. Anyway, I think I am going to start a new thread.
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BTW, Martian Republic there are a lot of knoledgebele people in engineering, computer science and philosophy that think we are along way from artificial intelligence. But I wonder if this is more of philosophical stance because many human competitive results have been generated. Anyway, you are not alone. I kind of wish AI was my area of study because I don’t think it is really that hard.
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The first one is hoping the machines won't break down. Electronic component have standard of what a failure rate should be per thousand units and a how long it suppose to last before the unit fails or ware out. In the physical world where you have moving parts that rub against each other. You will have ware and tear on the machine and will ware out and break down. These are physical laws that govern this universe and we can not change those laws of physic. So not having machine breaking down is not an option. But, we can design machines that break down less often with new techniques.
Okay, won’t break down is an exaduration or an approximation. So lets consider how long the robot must last. I would start from an economic perspective and say that if the robot lasts longer enough that the interest paid on it is much greater then the cost to make it and ship and ship the robot to the moon then the robot is nearly as economical as a robot that lasts for ever. Thus form a finical perspective we could make the approximation that the robot lasts forever. Or we could look at it from the productivity prospective. That is if the net contribution of the robot to the automated economy is greater then the cost of make the robot then I guess it doesn’t last forever but it lasts long enough. Looking at the moon, since nothing on the moon really has much value, then from the productivity perspective the robot would have to do enough work to sustain the infrastructure that supports the automated economy. Some of this could include the assembly of new robots.
I was trying to show him the fallacy of his argument that things aren’t going to break down.
But, as to your question:
No!
It not going to be economical to send either humans or robots to the moon.
No!
It does make a difference how long something last or how dependable it is. You want to build something that will work and will serve the ultimate good of humanity or otherwise there no point in doing it.
No!
It not a done deal, that you can do everything remotely from the Earth. Now these robots can assist in it, but can't guarantee it by themselves alone to accomplish that mission.
And
No!
Without people on the moon you don't have an economy, you just have a collection of machines that have human operators on Earth. And basically serve no purpose other than say we did it. One of the purposes for going to the moon is to create Lunar economy and you do that by going to the moon with people.
Larry,
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To design a system of telerobotics and operate it on the Moon it will roughly be one operator on one shift per robot and this makes them like the Heavy construction machines used by Industry with one driver on one machine. The other thing to do is to ensure the robots are tough and simple. Simple means less things that can break down and for ease of maintenance. If a commonality between the various robots can be achieved this will lead to us being able to make parts for the robots on the Moon.
The time delay between the Earth and Moon and then back is 4 seconds this is easy to operate machines on the Moon. Robots that operate on the Moon will not be high speed machines we will give them simple object avoidance and various sensors to increase safety. If we have Humans in one of these Robot operating zones we will equip with them devices to ensure no robot can get within a certain perimeter of the Human astronaut.
Things will get complicated when we reach the stage of large numbers of Robots operating but we can take certain actions to ensure less problems. One is to have deliveries to the factory sector be done by lunar railroad, a simple railroad true but railways lend themselves to telerobotic automation what are toy railway sets. One operator can control the whole system in an area.
But it must be remembered Robots are not as flexible as people so when we have people on the Moon it will make things a lot easier. We use robots to make the conditions for the people to reurn not replace them entirely.
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Martian Republic NOTHING we do in space will be of economic value at the beginning it WILL only become of value when there is something to do. And we must build the infrastructure first before we can do anything that can make a profit.
So what if sending Robots to the moon will not make profits (at first) It will allow those who can make profits to operate, then and only then will space be open to all.
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BTW, Martian Republic there are a lot of knoledgebele people in engineering, computer science and philosophy that think we are along way from artificial intelligence. But I wonder if this is more of philosophical stance because many human competitive results have been generated. Anyway, you are not alone. I kind of wish AI was my area of study because I don’t think it is really that hard.
I agree with those engineers. Computer can only emulate the thought process, because they are actually making calculation and not actually thinking. The computer is very stupid, but does very fast calculations, which is it advantage. That why I use the term emulate and as opposed to duplicating the thought process. Duplicate as an exact copy of the original thought processes.
Now there are several forms of intelligence also, Like:
1. Intelligence or I.Q.
2. Intuition and it seam to come out of nowhere that some wrong.
3. Cognition, like a scientist studying a problem that he trying to answer and all of the sudden the light comes on and he knows the answer. How he does that, is called cognition intelligence.
You can also activate a certain kind of intelligence by the way you choose to think too or deactivate it. I’m sure there are other kinds of intelligence too, but we will cut it off there.
I have also read that some AI also uses biology from the animal kingdom in addition to silicone or kind of a dual configuration. If that the case, there could be minimal thought process going on with a computer interface. I don’t know how much of this is true, but that would open up another can worms if it is true.
Larry,
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I was trying to show him the fallacy of his argument that things aren’t going to break down.
Clearly I new it was a fallacy but you made a good case of why it is a fallacy or should I say you argued the obvious well. BTW pay attention to who you are replying to.
But, as to your question:
I don’t think I asked these question but anyway.
No!
It not going to be economical to send either humans or robots to the moon.
That it quite a strong statement. At least put some time limit on it like within the next 50 years. Also we must ask economical for what purpose? We already send robots to mars and I believe it is an economical way to accomplish science but this is a question of values. How about the question of is it an economical way to produce goods for space. Clearly there should be a point where it is cheaper to produce things locally then ship them from earth.
No!
It does make a difference how long something last or how dependable it is. You want to build something that will work and will serve the ultimate good of humanity or otherwise there no point in doing it.
I didn’t say no difference I said negligible difference from an economic perspective. That is the economic cost of replacing them is negligible relative to the cost to build them. Clearly there is a time for which this occurs.
No!
It not a done deal, that you can do everything remotely from the Earth. Now these robots can assist in it, but can't guarantee it by themselves alone to accomplish that mission.
Who are you referring to when you say you. Me personally. Well thanks for the suggestion that I might be able to although this would be quite an undertaken for anyone person. Or do you mean humanity in general anytime in the future. Well, I suppose there could be some political reason that we will stop progression or set back centuries in our technological endeavors. Anyway, I am assuming the current rate of progress.
And
No!
Without people on the moon you don't have an economy, you just have a collection of machines that have human operators on Earth. And basically serve no purpose other than say we did it. One of the purposes for going to the moon is to create Lunar economy and you do that by going to the moon with people.Larry,
Hmmm…I once read a book called nature’s economy. What is an economy? An describes the nature of the production and trade of goods. The rules for production and trade are usually based upon some notion of values. For people the value could be measured in dollars or utility. For an ant colony the value would be the survival advantage given to a colony by the number of ants, the amount of food and the size of the ant hill. For a robotic colony the value could be measured in terms of diversity and reproduction rate. Anyway this is another logistic question. But consider the internet. A web site is not a physical good yet it may be given value in the economy.
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Martian Republic NOTHING we do in space will be of economic value at the beginning it WILL only become of value when there is something to do. And we must build the infrastructure first before we can do anything that can make a profit.
So what if sending Robots to the moon will not make profits (at first) It will allow those who can make profits to operate, then and only then will space be open to all.
In the same post you flip one way in the first part and then you flip the other way in the second part of your post.
Well!
Which way is it?
Can we make a profit on the moon or can't we?
Stake a flag on the ground you want to defend and stand fast. But, you move around like some one on a pogo stick.
Larry,
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In the end it will be the ability to reduce the cost of building infrastructure in space that will allow Humans to finally become a space faring nation.
That is why we will use robots, people cost too much and if we dont have to launch all the items that are needed from earth it saves money. If we can process Lunar soils to make Oxygen and materials that are needed in the Leo cheaper than are sent from the Earth then we have an export that will sell.
Many people say that tourism will open up space I doubt it, It will cost too much until the time that someone makes the supply of orbital hotels cheaper.
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Martian Republic profit depends on your definition, I will put down the possible definitions and answer if I can.
1) Money
The Moon like all space operations will not make a profit at first. There are ways for the Earth to be supplied with electrical power from the Moon but this is the stuff for the future. What can be done is to use the resources of the Moon to supply the LEO and higher stations. But in the end you must have first built on the Moon before you get anything. In the end No money for nothing.
2) Science
This the Moon will be off immense benefit to mankind their are so many science applications that can only be done on the moon that is off immense benefit to man. Starting with astronomony, Lunar telescopes will be impressive and as they will be sited on the so called "darkside" they will be removed from the light and radio interference from the Earth. If we have multiple telescopes all looking at the same spot and without an atmosphere and with the long times that can be focused on a point it may be possible to actually see Earth type planets around other stars. With there being no atmosphere and the ability to use Super conductors in the constant tempatures we could have partickle accelerators as big as we want even as big as the whole circumfrence of the moon. Not to mention earth sciences our study of how the Earth got formed will be greatly helped with the study of the moon.
3) Morale
Imagine looking up and seeing lights on the Moon people will think it is there right to go to space. That alone is worth the whole trip.
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But, as to your question:
I don’t think I asked these question but anyway.
Hmmm…I once read a book called nature’s economy. What is an economy? An describes the nature of the production and trade of goods. The rules for production and trade are usually based upon some notion of values. For people the value could be measured in dollars or utility. For an ant colony the value would be the survival advantage given to a colony by the number of ants, the amount of food and the size of the ant hill. For a robotic colony the value could be measured in terms of diversity and reproduction rate. Anyway this is another logistic question. But consider the internet. A web site is not a physical good yet it may be given value in the economy.
It been fun doing web debate with you. The way you wrote it, I kind of took it as an implied question. Well that the way I responded to your post.
But, as to what economics is, there are two basic views of that issue.
There the shareholder value of economic of buy low sell high or other forms of trades. The economy is based on good and services we have right now to the value of money and gold which is wealth. The Adam Smith Wealth of Nation concept of wealth. The market forces will dictate the price of goods and services and the secret hand that operates the markets have to be free of government intervention to operate. This system generally revolves around a private central banking system which creates money for it members banks out of thin are and loans it to them so they can loan it to the public.
This is basically the economic system that we all operate in and most people hear pattern there thinking after that and most of there opinion show it.
But, I have a slightly different idea of what economics, or money should be as did John F. Kennedy, FDR, Lincoln, Ben Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, etc. This concept of wealth revolve around increasing the productive of the masses and the ability to generate future goods and service that don't exist, but will by choices we make. Money is not real wealth, it just a medium of exchange for goods and services so you can run the economy by trading chicken or cows in the market place. This economic/banking system is public banking system under the federal government as authorized by the U.S. Constitution. We have to give someone the power to generate credit to get the economy running and keep it running. That why the U.S. Government was given that responsibility instead of giving that authority to private bankers by the U.S. Constitution. If you generate too much credit, you get run away inflation and become worthless. But if you don't generate any credit or not enough credit, you will have a collapsing economy, because it will implode on itself and disintegrate. The amount of credit that just right is somewhere between 500 billion dollars and one trillion dollars of credit being generated a year. Since it was the government that generated the credit, they get first use of it and can dictate where that credit going to be used. So we are going to pick some infrastructural projects for the government to invest in. The bulk of that generated credit will be spent down here to rebuild America, but we intend to use some of that generated credit to build city on the moon, Mars, L1 point. The two main purposes of that generated credit was to keep the U.S. Economy going and to build infrastructure and once it serve that purpose, it has no useful purpose.
You would look at that people less collection of building, machines and robots and say what a waste that is. But, you would spend more money to build a city on the moon with people in it, because it served your concept of what wealth is better. As long as I have an ample supply of credit that I can generate and dispose of when I'm through with it, I can afford to do that.
Now these people that don't control there own credit, can't afford to do much of anything on the moon and that includes this robot to build the infrastructure on the moon.
Larry,
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The use of telerobotics , is to build the main infrastructure for the moon, the detailed work would be done by humans, after the site is operational for habitation.
The phases for base construction are as follows
Phase 1 - Site preparation including landing zones
Phase 2 - Habitation and control buildings
Phase 3 - Human Installation Services
Phase 4 - Scientific and other services buildings
Phase 5 - Mineral Processing Plant construction
Phase 6 - Spacedock Construction ( small vessel development)
That is the first phases for development for the moon in general terms. The start competing for LEO and other related space contracts against earth based firms. Generating income for more supplies for the lunar expansion. ( example use the a mass driver as a vehicle launcher for satellites from moon to earth.
Look at the value of the satellite market >>> then the new scientific platform market >>> then the space station market >>> and you can see alot of profit in the development.
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alot of profit in the development
Reminds me of advertisement to sell apartments.
One could buy an apartment, or business site,
inside a Moon based shopping center type development.
Then sell occupancy time, similar to Timeshare.
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Lets discuss the repair process. The first stage is fault detection. This can be done by simply checking to see if the dynamics of the plant agree with the dynamics of the model. Once a fault occurs, the machine must go through a controlled shut down procedure. Then test must be done to see what caused the fault. In the case of a milling machine image processing can be done to see if the tool is damaged. In many machines the tool can be automatically replaced. Perhaps some kind of vibration test can be done to see if the part is still secure. If the part is not secure the robot can try a tightening procedure. Image processing can be used to see if the part is damaged. For instance if a hole is drilled in the wrong sport or into far. In this case the part being built will be replaced by the robot and a new part brought in. Various failure scenarios can be explored. AI can be developed to solve each of these problems. Human operators on earth can be notified of various failures and if desire remove the repair task from an AI task to a tellerobotic task.
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One of the first things that any Lunar base must be able to make is the solar cells which will be its lifeblood. Constant production and emplacement of these are the singly the most essential Industrial process that we will do. With electrical power we can increase the Industry and infrastructure.
It is the creation of solar cells in which the Moon has an advantage over Mars. Solar cells especially the easier to make ones we plan are not too efficient so a lot of sunlight makes up for this and they need a vacuum to be created and again the Moon has this.
The production of these solar cells actually lends itself to complete automation and again as long as we supply the resources the solar cell factory will keep turning them out.
Chan eil mi aig a bheil ùidh ann an gleidheadh an status quo; Tha mi airson cur às e.
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Lets discuss the repair process. The first stage is fault detection. This can be done by simply checking to see if the dynamics of the plant agree with the dynamics of the model. Once a fault occurs, the machine must go through a controlled shut down procedure. Then test must be done to see what caused the fault. In the case of a milling machine image processing can be done to see if the tool is damaged. In many machines the tool can be automatically replaced. Perhaps some kind of vibration test can be done to see if the part is still secure. If the part is not secure the robot can try a tightening procedure. Image processing can be used to see if the part is damaged. For instance if a hole is drilled in the wrong sport or into far. In this case the part being built will be replaced by the robot and a new part brought in. Various failure scenarios can be explored. AI can be developed to solve each of these problems. Human operators on earth can be notified of various failures and if desire remove the repair task from an AI task to a tellerobotic task.
For discovering most of the faults, you plan is OK, but, if your communication goes down and/or you have mutable faults at or near the same time. You could have another problem to deal with that you wouldn’t even know about. Because, your going to have hundred or even thousand of either machines or robots at one time operation twenty four hours a day, seven day a week for 52 week year and for several years. Beside have to replace carbide inserts and tool holder, ect, you can also expect several machines or robots to break in one week period at a rate of around few percentages to maybe 5% or so. So you may as well start figuring that into the system right now and not hope for the best that that won’t happen. So your going to have to have a maintaince station to deal with that problem. To deal with the communication possible break down, you would want to setup two or three independent communication system so we don't suddenly lose communication for either a few minutes or possibly several hours. You would also want to put a panic button on it too. Just encase everything start going haywire and start crashing into each other, you can push the panic button and stop every thing until you have a chance to trouble shoot the problem and can correct it, before tear everything up.
Some time those machines will do some really crazy things for no apparent reason and so you will have to assume the worst case scenario and plan that way to deal with the problem.
Larry,
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