New Mars Forums

Yeah, but Tuvalu is still part of the British commonwealth.  I'm sure they could do it if they wanted.  I wonder what they would take for Scotland?  I'd offer Louisiana, but it's sinking just like Tuvalu... Texas maybe?

According to the Gale Group's register of associations, the Mars Society's membership is now declining after growing roughly linearly between 1998 and 2003.   Does this mean we only had support when people were afraid we weren't going to Mars?  Or does it mean that I need to start paying my dues again so I'll actually show up on the next count?

Hmm...

Sounds like a church.   :?  No, "Commonwealth" has worked before, it would work again.  Canada aside, confederacies have a bad name here in the States, anyway. 

There's technically a US Commonwealth already, consisting of the USA proper, Puerto Rico, Guam, and a host of other little islands.  I could see us with a few additions, but I'm not sure Tuvalu's worth open warfare at this juncture.  Perhaps the British could swap us something?

I don't believe this rises to the level of heresy.

Most of Zubrin's statement is just discussing the requirements to send a crew return vehicle (remember the ERV?) directly to the moon if it will be using a direct return to get back.  Applying those limits to the CEV won't necessarily hamper a moon mission if 70% of its hardware arrives on another rocket.  There's no renunciation of "Moon Direct" here, and, IMHO, nobody's flying to Mars with nothing but a CEV, anyway.

The blurb about finishing the ISS is chilling (typed by Bob's own hand *shudder*), but this course has to be considered.  The International Space Station will not be safely at the bottom of the Pacific by the time work begins on a heavy lift vehicle.  NASA will probably try to wed any new HLV to the ISS just out of general principles.  We shouldn't just sit back and enjoy the ceremony, but we must be prepared for this eventuality.

Considering that the usual sources of coke here on Earth are coal and petrochemicals, I think that research could be very useful to the manufacture of steel on Mars. 

It ties in with http://www.newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=3485]this thread and http://www.newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=280]this one in ways I'd never thought of.  Put them together, and you've got steel!

A little australian genius could be just what Marsian metallurgy needs.  8)

I agree with 8.5 of the Green Party's "Ten Key Values", so I could get on board with the whole decentralization thing.  Save me a haunch.

I'd need to have someone to blame, though...

Clark,

The comparisons between the Simplicity movement and a religious movement are abundant, but so are the comparisons between religion and the Mars Society.  I am not convinced that this represents a new cult springing up around process flow management.  (I'll consider myself warned, though.   The Mars Society is starting to look really suspicious lately.  )

From what I can tell about the Simplicity movement, it is indeed primarily a "western" (or "northern" or "first world", depending on which pop culture shorthand you prefer for affluent european/american industrially influenced) cultural phenomenon.  Most of the earliest proponents lived in North America.  I don't consider that much of an indictment - space travel started out under similar circumstances.  At this point, any discussion of the Simplicity movement can't cover anything so magnanimous as "Humanity as a Whole."  From what I can tell about the earliest groups (those represented by Elaine St. James, et. al), no founding member started with an income less than $50000/yr, so these groups were generally not started by poor people.

They claim to borrow heavily from the lifestyles of the poor, though after some review of their various philosophies I think "the thrifty" or even "the miserly" would be a better description than "the poor".  That's not necessarily undesirable.  They're advocating a methodology, not a vow of poverty.

Many of the recommendations of these groups center around reducing immediate expenditures.  They suggest giving up cable TV, restaurant meals and various other luxuries to reduce expenditures.  The really hard core members do things like sell their homes and either buy lower cost housing or move somewhere they can rent for the same cost as their prior mortgage payment (thus saving maintenance costs).  Or they join group living arrangements to save money.  Far from advocating hedonism, there is a distinct thread of asceticism in their teachings.

They don't typically advocate moving to log cabins in the woods, though.  They claim there's far less effort required to live in a city.  Average city jobs pay more per hour, more options are available, and commutes are less taxing when you live near your job.  Most of the group living arrangements identifying themselves with the Simplicity movement are found in cities, not rural areas.

As for their whole take on reducing work at work:

I never said they fundamentally disagreed with that.  In addition to recommending that you try to do the same work in less time, they also recommend that once you find a way to do this, you should negotiate with your boss to reduce your hours to a more appropriate figure.  This reduces the potential for conflict over "stealing time", and keeps you out of destructive behaviors like milking jobs and soldiering.  Failing that, you should go looking for a more suitable part-time job.

Near as I can tell, they don't care.  Their focus is on the individual benefit, and let the employer worry about his end.

No, actually. 

I'm sure they would recommend using the library, and be sure to ask for an extended due date, so you won't have to rush.   8)

Perhaps a purely religious track isn't the most productive course for a discussion of materialism.

Has anyone looked into the simplicity movement?  It's inspired by the ideas of Elaine St. James and other authors promoting the virtues of material simplicity over modern mass market culture.  Many of these groups are religious in character, but their common philosophies are primarily taken from economics and business management theory, not their differing religious backgrounds.

Heres]http://www.simpleliving.net/seedsofsimplicity/]Here's just one example - a group centered at Cornell.

I take issue with everything except the last two paragraphs, Bill.

According to the US Census Bureau, around 70% of new Amercan businesses survive at least five years.  Starting a business is hard, but the claim that 70% (or 80%, or 95%, or whatever - it varies) fail in five years is an urban myth.  Of those that do go out of business, sample polls suggest that only half "fail" according to the traditional economic definition - running out of money.  The rest are bought out, retire, etc.

Having already been a card carrying member of that failed 30%, I'll never tell anyone that starting a new business is easy.  However, the odds of success are better than even. 

If both your "experience as a lawyer" and your own business records agree that 70% of your clients go out of business, you should consider getting out of bankruptcy law. 

While I'll concede that going without health insurance for one's family is foolhardy, you imply that this is what it takes to start your own business.  That is not correct.  Business owners can get insurance (both group and private) just like business employees.  My own wife gets a great insurance policy offered by our parish government, but that's not why she's working in the first place.   The savings of a group plan compared to private insurance are nothing compared to the added income of a second job.  Forget insurance: My girl's workin' for the money!    (That and the fact that she seems to love public service.  We'd miss that money if she joined the peace corps and got on CHAMPUS, though.    )

Then, there's the last two paragraphs.  Spot on, I'm afraid.   :cry:  And it's so sad, because it does not have to be that way!  Insurance is a great idea, it really is, but our present insurance system is making us dependent on our employers' good graces.  And this popular fib about how the world is flat and ends just outside your boss's gate isn't helping much.

Dont]http://space.com/adastra/adastra_mars_050802.html]Don't ask "Why bother?"  Ask "What can I do?"

Every communications satellite in the sky had stopped talking to the Marvin.  The global positioning system had provided a wildly erratic fix that had ended with a rejected result, then ended abruptly in the loss of every GPS signal nearly simultaneously.  It’s tracking system, once a node in a vast integrated traffic control network that spanned the entire planet, had been completely cut off from its central server.  The blimp’s computers vigilantly continued trying to monitor it’s surroundings using only its own meager resources, scanning with radar and searching the communications bands for uplinks and other useable radio signals.  But the only broadcasts it intercepted were telemetry from satellites in inclined orbits overhead, mostly encrypted, and none equipped to respond to Marvin’s automated hails. 

Ominously, even the few satellites Marvin had managed to locate were now disappearing, one by one as their orbits crossed the zenith.  Vanishing, some with a final mysterious rustle of static, some fading inexplicably, others with the final desperate shriek of a distorted carrier.  Then, silence.

Something very wrong was happening in the heavens.

“Where are the broadcasts?” Terry asked. 

“I’ll keep monitoring the Polestat,” Brian told Terry.  “Maybe they’ll follow the emergency tone with a broadcast.”  He didn’t sound hopeful.  Thus far none had been forthcoming, and it seemed the polar statite would soon be all there was left.  Little more than a glorified weather satellite, it also performed one other critical function for the people of Mars.  On a world with globe girdling sandstorms and a dozen other hazards, it was part of the planetary emergency broadcast system.  Practically the only thing left in the sky, it was now broadcasting an attention tone once per minute.  An automated message, stating the danger and giving instructions to those affected, should have sounded in the Marvin’s cabin, but there was only silence between alarms.

“Yeah, do that, Brian,” Terry told him.  And hope it does, he thought.   Otherwise, this could get hairy.

“Can we access the weather feed?”  Bob asked, hanging at an angle from the plastic door frame to see over Will. 

“What’s wrong with your tracking?” Will asked, pointing. 

Ms. Reece, arms crossed, had claimed the other side of the doorway as her own, and stood in it as if to dare all comers.  There was a line forming behind her.

“No, we are not getting the weather channel,” Terry growled angrily, getting him a glance from Brian and little else.  He was losing his patience with these people.  Every single one of them wanted to fly the ship himself, and not one of them seemed mentally capable of remaining in a seat belt.  “We appear to be having a minor control problem.  It can’t hurt us if we just stay put.  We will inform you of any developments.   Please, return to your seats.”

Just then, a gust of wind caught the Marvin and jerked it sideways.  People shouted as they were thrown about the cabin.  Will fell backward, taking Bob with him, and Ms Reece ended up with her back against the starboard window.

“Thank you,” Terry said absently as his passengers were briefly distracted.  “Where the hell did that come from?”  he asked Brian as he turned around to take the controls.  The rogue gust had tossed the ship back and forth through a wide arc, dragging its landing gear through the soil in a long curved trench. Marvin’s propellers whirled to life as it sat on the ground, wresting the ship back from the wind. 

“Oh my,” Stacie gasped.  “Look at the dust move!  That wind has be going at least a hundred fifty miles per hour out there.”  Muttered comments of awe issued from a few other passengers. 

Dumb Earther.  “I’m sure it’s not going that fast,” Terry assured the passengers.  “Sandstorms rarely reach sustained winds over –“

Brian pulled the bridge door half closed and leaned over.  “We just hit two hundred knots, Terry,” he said softly.  “We can’t fly in this; it’s coming in too fast, and it’s only getting faster.  We’re going to have to drive back.”

Terry swore, and not under his breath.  “Damn it, Brian!  If we pull the rip cord out here and drive off, the envelope won’t be waiting for us when we come back.  It’ll blow off and shred on the rocks.  That’ll cost us hundreds of thousands!”

“Marvin won’t fly against this, Terry, and it sure won’t land at two hundred knots even if we could get to Olympus.  We’ve got to cut loose and drive in.”

“Damn it, Brian!”

“There’s something else,”  Brian told him.  “I ran the tracking back over the last hour.  You’re gonna want to see what happened while we were outside.”  He started the replay.  “A little over an hour ago, everything was completely normal.  Then we started losing satellites, like this one,” he said, pointing to the screen.  In the fast forwarded view of simulated airspace being played back by the Marvin’s computers, a little pixel that had been passing over their position slowly, inexorably veered from its orbit, ultimately turning onto a downward trajectory that took it plummeting into the atmosphere.  “That’s where tracking lost its signal.  It had to have burned up.  Then there’s the ships.”  Brian skipped ahead to the track of what was clearly a lander, hopping from Hellas to it’s listed destination at Olympus Station.  But it never made it.  The suborbital craft was dragged downward, falling onto the craggy plains north of the Marvin, a hundred kilometers short of Olympus.  “Tracking says this one made it down, and these two.  That’s the transport we saw go down in the ravine,” he said, pointing with a pained expression to a new dot on a long downward pitch.  “They didn’t make it.  That’s going to be a major crash site.”  The display paused, and the screen filled with little grey boxes.  “That’s where we lost the satellites.  All we’ve got after that is our own radar.” 

Brian paused a moment, then added, “Olympus isn’t receiving, and even if they were, they can’t fly in this.  Everything that’s tried has been forced out of the sky.  There isn’t going to be an air rescue.  If any help is coming, it’s coming overland, which could take days this far out..”

“What the hell is it?” Terry asked.  He was the sort who usually got angry rather than frightened, but shock was threatening to get the better of him. 

“I don’t know,” Brian said, shaking his head.  “But it’s got to be the worst disaster that’s ever happened on Mars, and as far as we know, we’re the only working vehicle on this end of it.”

“Well, then we’ve got to go help!” Will said valiantly, shoving the door back open after eavesdropping on the other side of it.  “We may be their only chance of rescue!”

“Yes!”  Ms. Reece agreed.  “We must see what we can do.  It is our duty to come to their aid.”

“Bull!”  Terry roared.  “It’s the duty of the marines and the emergency service to come to their aid.  We are going to pull up stakes and head straight back to Olympus as fast as we can go!  Standard operating procedure for saving our asses!  I’m not taking this crazy bunch into the middle of a killer sandstorm to put my butt on the line for people who are probably already dead anyway.  Now, for the last time, shut up and sit down, all of you!”

“No, I will not,” Ms. Reece informed him, refusing to move.  “You heard him,” she said, pointing at Brian.  “It will take days for rescue teams to get here if they can’t fly in.  Anyone still alive at that crash site could be dead by then, and we are only ten kilometers away.  If it was you out there in nothing but a crushed lander and a suit, would you want the only people close enough to help to turn and run home to mama?”

“That’s it,” Terry said angrily, unbuckling himself.  “Get up and help me with this, Brian.” 

Brian stayed put, looking at him.  The only thing his copilot moved was an eyebrow.  “We’re legally obligated to assist here, Terry,” he said.

Terry stared back for a moment, exasperated.  Then he turned and grabbed Ms. Reece by the forearm.  “I said stop this and sit down!”  he shouted, pushing the little old lady down the aisle. 

“I will not!” she shouted.  Lacking the physical strength to resist, she was carried backward and shoved into a seat, but gamely tried to get up again as soon as her back hit the cover.  Her fellow passengers scurried out of the way, trying to avoid the scuffle.  An anguished look was on every face in the cabin, and Stacie was starting to weep.

Terry shoved the old woman back, focusing on the ringleader to show the rest who was boss.  “We are not running off to some crash site!” he shouted.  “You aren’t in charge here, and you aren’t big enough to make me!  So shut up!”

“I will not!” she shouted, still struggling to free herself.

“Hah! What are you people going to do about it, lady?” he shouted at her.

…