Going to Mars - Am I the only one?

Planet@lien · 2005-04-09 12:31:39

Just wondering who else would someday want to go to the red planet. We all know it is going to happen someday, but who will be chosen to go?

Dook · 2005-04-09 12:41:05

A relative few number of astronauts and scientists will be the obvious choice. Don't expect a mass abandonment of the earth.

RobS · 2005-04-09 14:42:11

Who goes is a function of who organizes and pays. If it is NASA--90% likely for starters--we know who will go. If it is a private company, the range of choices is wider. Eventually transportation to Mars will get cheaper. Then you can expect the Catholic Church to send a priest (most likely there will be more Catholics there than anything else, except maybe agnostics), Mormons to send missionaries, nations/ethnic groups to sponsor colonists, etc.

-- RobS

Dook · 2005-04-09 14:52:42

Great, that's all we need. Catholics there telling us what to do also.

RobS · 2005-04-10 02:02:12

Well, there will no doubt be a few Fundamentalists there as well, to disagree with the Catholics! There will be the same range of religious views one sees among scientists and engineers, if that's the largest population on Mars. They aren't much different from the average population, where religious views are concerned. The number one graduate from my college class, who went to Berkeley to get a PhD in physics, became an evangelical Protestant; my masters degree advisor in Planetary Geology,who worked with Carl Sagan on the Viking Mission, was a liberal Protestant and very active in his church; his colleague in the department, though, was not particulary religious at all. If you Google "astronaut" and "church" you will find references to current astronauts running Bible study classes in their churches. It's no big deal.

-- RobS

srmeaney · 2005-04-10 02:16:48

Open an air lock and space the lot of them. Most of the real Mars colonists will be people with years of mining experience. Not a bunch of zealot parasites.

The first preist to crack open a bible and preach tyranny, despotism and the evils of independent thought will fall down a very deep hole.

Rakial · 2005-04-10 08:46:12

Catholic priest?????? I guess Catholics are the only ones who can actually afford that. But remember there are over billion Chinese and most of them are atheists there are couple hundreds of millions of Russians and most of them are atheists as well. And as someone in this forum suggested that, while Americans watching reality shows Chinese graduate 10 engineers for every lawyer in USA (or something to that effect).

Martian Republic · 2005-04-10 08:55:46

Open an air lock and space the lot of them. Most of the real Mars colonists will be people with years of . Not a bunch of zealot parasites.
The first preist to crack open a bible and preach tyranny, despotism and the evils of independent thought will fall down a very deep hole.

Most Martian colonist will not have years of mining experience. Only a small portion will have years of mining experience. You will have a division of labor on Mars like we have a division of labor here on Earth. Matter of fact, we would setup private mining company that would specializes in doing nothing but mining the Martian land scape to retrieve resources. Matter of fact, we may eventually have several private mining companies on Mars. But, that would only be a small portion of the Martian population though. The rest of the Martian population will be doing other things like farming and/or hydroponics Gardens, manufacturing, maintaining the complex, teaching, doctors, etc. Being able to mine those metal and other natural resources are no good to us if we can't use them as a finished product. It defeats the whole purpose in mining those things in the first place. I have word in the manufacturing business most of my adult life and I know what I'm talking about by first hand experience. We are going to need a fairly good size complex or city on Mars, before they will be able to significantly be able to reach anything close to be self-sufficiency at all and most of them are not going to be in the mining business at all either.

Larry,

Mad Grad Student · 2005-04-10 13:42:30

Open an air lock and space the lot of them. Most of the real Mars colonists will be people with years of mining experience. Not a bunch of zealot parasites.
The first preist to crack open a bible and preach tyranny, despotism and the evils of independent thought will fall down a very deep hole.

Thank you, Hitler.

Okay, sorry, I suppose that was a little too rough. But still, that kind of mentality gets us absolutely nowhere. The fact of the matter is that religion is not spread by genetics but mental attitude, something you can not wipe out with genocide. As long as there is any communication between Mars and Earth you can expect Earth ideaologies to spread to Mars and vice versa. Like it or not, even if you could stop this from happening (and why would you want to?) someone's going to start preaching about salvation and living a good life and life everlasting. It's as much a part of who we are as the will to explore.

Personally I really don't know how religious types are able to convince themselves of their beliefs but I understand that they feel exactly the same way back towards me. As much as I'd love for the two sides to come to an understanding, that's about as likely as Cobra Commander becoming a die-hard liberal (no offense). It's a case of irreconcilable differences, which is why I'm a fan of the live-and-let-live policy. As long as no one gets hurt, I'm fine with people practicing whatever the heck they want.

GCNRevenger · 2005-04-10 14:19:04

"Not a bunch of zealot parasites."

I'm with MGS on this one, and I find your position to be patently offensive smreany.

srmeaney · 2005-04-11 04:44:19

Just wondering who else would someday want to go to the red planet. We all know it is going to happen someday, but who will be chosen to go?

Sane, normal people who do not pose a danger to the team. Predominantly, multiskilled individuals who can hold their own end up and not be a burden on the rest.

The weak shall perish!

GCNRevenger · 2005-04-11 05:57:08

The weak shal what?

Maybe MGS's analogy isn't that far off after all

Dook · 2005-04-11 08:01:00

I don't know where this "We have to send millions of people to mars now!" stuff comes from. Science fiction movies I guess. And the idea that living on mars would be "better than the earth" is just insane.

Having more than a few people on the moon, mars, or in orbiting space stations would be nothing more than a burden.

BWhite · 2005-04-11 08:06:30

Open an air lock and space the lot of them. Most of the real Mars colonists will be people with years of mining experience. Not a bunch of zealot parasites.
The first preist to crack open a bible and preach tyranny, despotism and the evils of independent thought will fall down a very deep hole.

= = =

Guess you won't like one of my novel ideas based on the premise that two Jesuits monks are the first people to get to Mars, going one way to stay.

The Mars Direct mass budget starts looking a whole lot better if we skip the Earth return leg altogether. :;):

And who better to go one way to stay as the first humans on Mars than two Jesuit priests with a strong interest in science?

Edited By BWhite on 1113228420

SpaceNut · 2005-04-11 08:41:23

Well the question is why do we go? At what cost can we afford? What can we learn?

The article The top three reasons for humans in space does a very good job to highlight some of these with responses.

Lists of reasons for human spaceflight are readily available. The National Space Society has a detailed list, and SPACE.com has its Top 3 and Top 10. Nonetheless, there is a need for a concise list that can be easily recalled—perhaps something like this:
Humans are in space:
3. To work
2. To live
1. To survive

MIght be a very simplistic view but give the starting point none the less.

srmeaney · 2005-04-11 08:44:56

1. We will not be sending Priests to Mars. It is a waste of resources that are reserved soley for the expansion of the human race beyond earth. Considering the human race has outgrown the need to be told what to think by others, They are in a soon to be extinct industry.

2. 10 million is the total population sustainable by the resources of Mars on Mars. The idea is to Colonize other places that we not all die when the Big rock hits the little Blue Green world called Earth.

3. They will be people mostly from the mining industry with long experience in working together with others in what will be the biggest mining project in the Solar system. They will be Geologists, Electrical Engineers, Electricians, Materials Engineers, Miners, Biologists, Nurses, Doctors, Plant Operators (Machine specialists), Agriculturalists, and Technicians. They will be poets, and artists, and philosophers, and parents because that is what sane, useful people are when they are not at work. They think for themselves and they uphold a fundamental respect for the sanctity of life and act to preserve the right of the individual and the all to that equality.

4. There will be no armies, no instruments of despotism and tyranny no flag wrapped politicians. The right and the responsibility of the Individual to self government is inherent in both Civilization and Ethics

5. Nations and Religions mean nothing. They are not Civilization. People are. Only life has value. And those who cannot uphold that right, people who disrespect that right have no place in a civilization. And have no place sharing in that civilization.
The people who go and build a civilization have the right to inherit that civilization.

6. Yes they will be workers. There is zero room for those who contribute nothing and even less for those who wreck good works and care nothing for the right to an equal share of the responsibilities and benifits of Civilization.

You say we should send a few people and then end it there. You are wrong. We should send Millions.

Fledi · 2005-04-11 10:08:25

Anyone will be able to go as soon as it is cheap enough.
I don't think that ANYONE should by exluded from this great project for whatever reasons.
It will not be possible to do so by the way, even if you wanted to, simply because there will be not only one way, one organization through which you can get into space but many.
The only thing that could stop or even just substantially delay the colonization of the solar system would be some kind of global disaster on earth like atomic war, a comet striking or some scientist creating a black hole in a particle accelerator.

srmeaney · 2005-04-11 10:16:13

I don't think that ANYONE should by exluded from this great project for whatever reasons.

We will exclude those who are a threat to the sanctity of life, we will exclude those who are not interested in an equal share of the responsibility.

clark · 2005-04-11 10:44:06

1. We will not be sending Priests to Mars. It is a waste of resources that are reserved soley for the expansion of the human race beyond earth. Considering the human race has outgrown the need to be told what to think by others, They are in a soon to be extinct industry.

That's been said for thousands of years though, and yet we still have religion. It looks like everyday brings new religions into the world. I don't think religion is going anywhere, regardless of your claims.

2. 10 million is the total population sustainable by the resources of Mars on Mars. The idea is to Colonize other places that we not all die when the Big rock hits the little Blue Green world called Earth.

And you derive this precise calculation by what means?

3. They will be people mostly from the mining industry with long experience in working together with others in what will be the biggest mining project in the Solar system. They will be Geologists, Electrical Engineers, Electricians, Materials Engineers, Miners, Biologists, Nurses, Doctors, Plant Operators (Machine specialists), Agriculturalists, and Technicians.

Just to pint out, you are naming a whole slew of people who are not in the mining industry.

4. There will be no armies, no instruments of despotism and tyranny no flag wrapped politicians. The right and the responsibility of the Individual to self government is inherent in both Civilization and Ethics

Obviously there will be no armies, afterall, there are only miners on Mars... and biologists, nurses, doctors... any lawyers?

5. Nations and Religions mean nothing. They are not Civilization. People are. Only life has value. And those who cannot uphold that right, people who disrespect that right have no place in a civilization. And have no place sharing in that civilization.

Name me one civilization older than any of the oldest religions. Just one.

You say we should send a few people and then end it there. You are wrong. We should send Millions.

I vote to send you to your orbiting lunar pit.

Grypd · 2005-04-11 10:48:49

I don't think that ANYONE should by exluded from this great project for whatever reasons.
We will exclude those who are a threat to the sanctity of life, we will exclude those who are not interested in an equal share of the responsibility.

But you will still find that there will be more than one group going to access space and it will simply become a race between these groups. Note I said groups as this allows the possibility of commercial interests as well as religous or even groups of people from various nationalities going to Mars as they share a same idea that would not be allowed on Earth.

Your group may exclude who it likes others may only take the sort that you have excluded in the end we need all sorts to make a civilisation.

Still its a long way before we are capable of this.

Fledi · 2005-04-11 11:10:37

We will exclude those who are a threat to the sanctity of life, we will exclude those who are not interested in an equal share of the responsibility.

And how are you going to tell who these people are?
Sorry but persecutions always began with one more influential group of people pointing at another group telling they are less worthy than others.
Tragically the truth can be bent a long way if one has enough instruments of propaganda at hands.

GCNRevenger · 2005-04-11 11:22:18

You know Smreany, you know who you are starting to sound like? A hard-core Marxsist Communist. The one modern idealogy that has killed more people then Nazi genocidal antisemetism.

BWhite · 2005-04-11 11:33:35

I don't think that ANYONE should by exluded from this great project for whatever reasons.
We will exclude those who are a threat to the sanctity of life, we will exclude those who are not interested in an equal share of the responsibility.

All money is green, at least US currency. If the Vatican chooses to write the necessary checks, they will be going.

Commodore · 2005-04-11 14:07:13

You know Smreany, you know who you are starting to sound like? A hard-core Marxsist Communist. The one modern idealogy that has killed more people then Nazi genocidal antisemetism.

Thats not entirely fair to the Nazis. They only had 12 years. :;):

Fledi · 2005-04-11 14:40:21

It basically boils down to the same principle of persecuting minorities because they do not "fit in" in both systems.

But maybe we should just let the politics be, before this becomes another endless debate...

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Re: Going to Mars - Am I the only one?

#2 2005-04-09 12:41:05

Re: Going to Mars - Am I the only one?

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Re: Going to Mars - Am I the only one?

#4 2005-04-09 14:52:42

Re: Going to Mars - Am I the only one?

#5 2005-04-10 02:02:12

Re: Going to Mars - Am I the only one?

#6 2005-04-10 02:16:48

Re: Going to Mars - Am I the only one?

#7 2005-04-10 08:46:12

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