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#1 2004-12-18 18:15:45

Dayton3
Member
Registered: 2002-06-03
Posts: 137

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

I think trying to plan  for a "permanent presence" on Mars would be a fatal error in getting congressional funding for a manned Mars program.

A fair chunk on Congress would get rid of the manned space program altogether.

Many in Congress, seeing people talk about a "permanent presence" on Mars will see any approval of an initial manned landing as the "camels nose under the tent". 

They will want a program they at least "think" they can cancel after a couple of manned missions.

That is one thing I like about Mars Direct.   It holds out the possibility of a permanent base on Mars without making it an obvious goal for the initial program.

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#2 2004-12-20 06:19:38

SpaceNut
Administrator
From: New Hampshire
Registered: 2004-07-22
Posts: 28,911

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

Actually the plan would be to demonstrate the ability on the moon with a mars pre-planning process being put in place.
Meaning make the goals to design hardware to last as long as a mars mission would, design ships capacities to those that are required for a mars mission.
Doing all the ground work as it were in order to justify funding for Mars, for we can say we can do it then. There would be no nay sayers for We will have worked out the radiation potential for damage to crew, to have worked out the power requirement and types needed, the consumables of food, water and air regeneration as well as resupply capabilities and lastly the ship will have been designed for the journey.
Until Nasa can get the shuttle flying to finish the ISS we will not be able to do any of this without some contractors just say no to profits and doing the work needed.

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#3 2004-12-20 11:09:48

John Creighton
Member
From: Nova Scotia, Canada
Registered: 2001-09-04
Posts: 2,401
Website

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

I think trying to plan  for a "permanent presence" on Mars would be a fatal error in getting congressional funding for a manned Mars program.

A fair chunk on Congress would get rid of the manned space program altogether.

Many in Congress, seeing people talk about a "permanent presence" on Mars will see any approval of an initial manned landing as the "camels nose under the tent". 

They will want a program they at least "think" they can cancel after a couple of manned missions.

So I am having trouble trying to see the logic here. I fail to see why congress would want to go to mars if they just wanted to cancel it. Would they really want to spend that much money just for bragging rights or just to keep engineers employed? Why couldn’t they cancel it if they wanted to? Leave the astronauts there and let them starve just like so many people are left to starve it the world. Or make sure there is a ride home for everyone there.  It is congress that has the final say. Either they support it or they don’t. It makes no sense for them to think that if the program gets started then too many people would support it and it couldn’t be cancelled. Congress has the votes. Any plan lives or dies by them be it a long term plan or a short sited flag and foot prints plan.  Either more congressmen will support it after it gets started or less. Just like more or less people in the general population will support the plan after it gets started.

What congress wants is to see costs kept under control. They want to see value for there dollar in terms of science and engineering. A permanent presence on mars improves the value for the dollar because people will stay longer, less money will be sent shipping them back and forth and they will be able to reuse more hardware. Congress like everyone else wants an affordable program. What we need to show them is a realistic long term plan that keeps costs as low as possible while maximizing the science and engineering return.


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#4 2004-12-20 11:25:25

Cobra Commander
Member
From: The outskirts of Detroit.
Registered: 2002-04-09
Posts: 3,039

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

The defining drive of Congress critters is the insatiable need for re-election. It's not about what Congress wants per se, but what their constituents want. Trying to sell Mars to Congress is the wrong approach, we need to sell it to the general population.

Permanent presence, people living there has more potential and more angles to exploit. If we push a strictly Mars-Direct approach few will really care. Land a few people, pick up some rocks, "yippee, we're on Mars" go home. Done. Bored now.

But if we can cultivate interest in colonizing Mars, building new worlds, betterment of humanity and all that; we lay the groundwork for long-term support. Permanent presence shouldn't be downplayed, rather it is an essential element. Make people see more than red dirt with robots doing spectral analysis of rocks, make them see a glorious effort to tame a new frontier. Scientitst on Mars is a fairly narrow vision with narrow appeal. Make people think about themselves on Mars, about children on Mars and you're onto something.

Even if a few Congressmen initially think you're just on something.


Build a man a fire and he's warm for a day. Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.

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#5 2004-12-20 11:50:15

SpaceNut
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From: New Hampshire
Registered: 2004-07-22
Posts: 28,911

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

I think most of us here on this board would agree to go if given the chance whether it be by a direct, semi direct or permanent colonization settlement so long as we go in a timely manner and not centuries from now.

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#6 2004-12-20 12:16:43

Cobra Commander
Member
From: The outskirts of Detroit.
Registered: 2002-04-09
Posts: 3,039

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

Are we going to Mars to expand the domain of humanity, or are we going to Mars just to go to Mars?


Build a man a fire and he's warm for a day. Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.

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#7 2004-12-20 12:25:58

GCNRevenger
Member
From: Earth
Registered: 2003-10-14
Posts: 6,056

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

Amen Cobra, amen.

Do not let the lust for red dust blind you to the true goal... to establish humanity on Mars, not to just visit.


[i]"The power of accurate observation is often called cynicism by those that do not have it." - George Bernard Shaw[/i]

[i]The glass is at 50% of capacity[/i]

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#8 2004-12-20 15:26:23

Martian Republic
Member
From: Haltom City- Dallas/Fort Worth
Registered: 2004-06-13
Posts: 855

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

At the present time and with the present banking system along with a collapsing economy, I have little faith in either a little Mars Program or a big one either. When people don't have health care, jobs, etc. it hard to convince them that they should shell out more money for a Mars program. There no way that a Mars project could pay for itself in and of itself, so there could be not profit motive for going to Mars. If we use the currently technology for going to Mars with very few exception, there would be no technological spin offs to speak of either. All these things would doom the Mars Projects on any level that we choose to go Mars. As the United States continues it slide into becoming a third world nation that use to be a first world nation. This is what going to happen to the United States if we continue down the path that we are currently going.

If the United States instead chooses to reverse direction, then the sky is the limit as to what we can do. We will have to reorganize the U.S. financial house and generate large amounts of credit to restart the U.S. Economy. If the United States chooses to do an FDR type recovery plan, which they need to do to get the U.S. Economy going again, it going to have to be ten times bigger than FDR programs were. These programs are going to have to be massive and will make the FDR four rivers projects look like a minor ditch digging project. At that point we need to be looking for big projects both down here and in space with a twenty to forty year time scale to complete them with low interest loans to finance them. If that were to happen, then most of what everybody things is possible or hope's is possible will have to be scaled upward by many magnitudes. You would also start aiming at projects that we can't currently do with present technologies, because it pushing new technologies to be developed and putting them into the market as technological spin off’s. We would have our stated goal of what we want to do and our un-stated goal of what we wanted to do. Our un-stated goal would make our stated goal a worthwhile goal. The un-stated goal would be to double the size of the U.S. Economy every ten by way of new technologies being invented and infrastructures that are being build both down here and in space as a result of this space program. If the stated goal is big enough and massive enough, it will have this desired effect and the U.S. factories that are currently closing will have to reopen and we may even have to build new factories to satisfy the new orders flowing in. We would have a man power shortage instead of having eight to ten million American unemployed, which would be a nice problem to have.

If we can show this to the American People and that it in there best interest to do it, we could sell these major project both down here and in space too.

Larry,

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#9 2004-12-20 15:36:54

GCNRevenger
Member
From: Earth
Registered: 2003-10-14
Posts: 6,056

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

Yeah yeah yeah whatever... The American economy has been growing pretty well actually, and the Fed is not a secret cabal that is lying about economics and working for Dick Cheney to take over the world, who neither he nor Alan Greenspan nor John Ashcroft is the Antichrist.

"If the United States chooses to do an FDR type recovery plan, which they need to do to get the U.S. Economy going again, it going to have to be ten times bigger than FDR programs were."

Oh, you mean that one that monkey-wrenched our economy for years and extended the great depression? FDR was a fool and a socialist, a living breathing economic disaster.

"If the stated goal is big enough and massive enough..."

Then it would bankrupt the economy trying to pay for it... Again, this rationale can only work if the fallacy of taxes being a magic money multiplier were true.


[i]"The power of accurate observation is often called cynicism by those that do not have it." - George Bernard Shaw[/i]

[i]The glass is at 50% of capacity[/i]

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#10 2004-12-20 17:18:55

Martin_Tristar
Member
From: Earth, Region : Australia
Registered: 2004-12-07
Posts: 305

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

Dayton 3,

I see what you are going at, but the commitment has been given by the president to launch humanity back to the moon with a permanent moonbase and to mars and beyond, but in the statement didn't talk about permanent martian outpost.

The exploration plan must deliver a rapid deployment of humans and cargo to the surface of mars and the return of scientific and resources in the shortest timeframe for congress to feel that the cost outlay is warranted. Using a mothership-dropship approach methodology we could send a automated mothership with up to 10 automated drop vessels (similar design to dc-x vehicle) for surface supply from earth to mars for rapid deployment carrying all the necessary cargo for outpost deployment. Once the automated mothership drops the cargo onto the surcface the craft can be coverted into a space communication platform and scientific platform in orbit monitoring weather, and communicating with earth.

The second vessel would have all the necessaries for humans for mars surface deployment, the mothership could stay in orbit for emergency return voyage to earth. Once the crew of 6-12 has been deployed to the surface they could unpack the dropships and have ten times the supplies, equipment and infrastructure for mars outpost ready for the second crewed vessel. 

At this point, dayton 3, the martian outpost is deployed and working to the optium output for scientific value and long term settlement value. Thus congress would see an immediate benefits and the public would see the realisation of humans living and working on another planet.

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#11 2004-12-20 17:22:48

Martian Republic
Member
From: Haltom City- Dallas/Fort Worth
Registered: 2004-06-13
Posts: 855

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

Yeah yeah yeah whatever... The American economy has been growing pretty well actually, and the Fed is not a secret cabal that is lying about economics and working for Dick Cheney to take over the world, who neither he nor Alan Greenspan nor John Ashcroft is the Antichrist.

"If the United States chooses to do an FDR type recovery plan, which they need to do to get the U.S. Economy going again, it going to have to be ten times bigger than FDR programs were."

Oh, you mean that one that monkey-wrenched our economy for years and extended the great depression? FDR was a fool and a socialist, a living breathing economic disaster.

"If the stated goal is big enough and massive enough..."

Then it would bankrupt the economy trying to pay for it... Again, this rationale can only work if the fallacy of taxes being a magic money multiplier were true.

GCNRevenger, we have clashed over this issue several times and I have no doubt that we will clash over this issue several more times too.

But, when you can loose three to four million jobs in a four year period and if George Bush can continue his policies for another four years we will lose another five to six million jobs. If you can call this a booming economy, then we defiantly have a different view of what a booming economy should look like.

When you can see the U.S. Dollars slide in relationship to the other major currencies like the Euro's. The U.S. Dollars has lost about 50% of it value to the Euro in about a six month period. The only two things that give the U.S. Dollars any on the World money Market.
1. The U.S. Dollar is the world currency that oil is traded in and Alan Greenspan can print and does print or generate money out of thin air to cover short fall's trade deficits. If the other nation choose to trade in Euro's and not dollars, the U.S. Dollar would tank and become worthless, because the United States does not produce it own wealth anymore, but steals it from the rest of the world.
2. People in other nation and/or other nation investing in Wall Street to bring hundreds of billions of dollars of foreign investments back into the United States so we re-use those dollars inside the United States. If all those foreign investors took there money out of the United States, the stock market would collapse and the U.S. Dollars would be right behind it.

That why there inflation inside the United States, the U.S. dollar is losing it value to the other major currencies and there is no major internal production of goods and services. So our problems are:
1. No internal production to set the U.S. dollar to. We have change store like Wal-Mart buying the good from slave labor shops in China and shutting down domestic manufactures.
2. Sooner or later everybody is going to Euro's as the currency of preference when it comes to trading oil and that will be the end of the Federal Reserve System inside the United States.
3. People and nations are pulling out of the U.S. Stock Market, because there losing money with both the slide of the U.S. dollar and emanate collapse of Wall Street.

You could say, the demise of the U.S. Dollars is a foregone conclusion and nothing can save it. The only question that should be asked is:

Are we going down with Wall Street and the Federal Reserve System when it goes down?

We either put the present system through a bankruptcy re-organization or Chapter 11 bankruptcy or we are not getting back up and any future desire to go to either the moon or Mars will be toasted and no longer be a valid option anymore. But, after that been done, the only way to restart the U.S. Economy will be through massive government investment in major infrastructural projects with government generated credit in the trillion dollars range or the U.S. Economy is not going to kick over and restart itself.

Larry,

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#12 2004-12-20 17:39:17

GCNRevenger
Member
From: Earth
Registered: 2003-10-14
Posts: 6,056

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

MR, you would really make better arguments if you took even a basic economics course... the anticent, backward, Marxist concept that the "means of production" are all important is... well. Its not true.

Oh and losing all those jobs? Surprise! The economy picking back up again has resulted in aproximatly a net loss of ZERO for the first Bush term, no thanks to Bill Clinton setting us up for a depression.

And the US dollar is trading 1:1.33 for Euros, and not this massive "50%" drop you speak of... anyway, this is the wrong thread to discuss the topic probobly.


[i]"The power of accurate observation is often called cynicism by those that do not have it." - George Bernard Shaw[/i]

[i]The glass is at 50% of capacity[/i]

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#13 2004-12-20 19:04:35

John Creighton
Member
From: Nova Scotia, Canada
Registered: 2001-09-04
Posts: 2,401
Website

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

Martin_Tristar, I disagree that you should drop 10 times the supplies needed before the crew arrives. It is better to send the crew first and then bring extra supplies later. That way your investment gets utilized in a more immediate time frame and is better from an economic standpoint. I hope people will see the value of a mars base. We should not underestimate how powerful the images of the first mars mission will be as a catalyst or impediment to any future program.

Your writing sounds a little more sci-fi then engineering. Not because it is not technically feasible but for instance why 10 droop vessel? It is just a number. The important question is what will we bring to mars and how much will it way. Also mother ship is definitely a sci-fi word and I would not use it in any engineering proposal. I think congress will see a tremendous value from the first mars mission but that will depend on what the first crew does and how it will be spun. If they sit in there tin can and constantly repeat I want to go home I want to go home, they will truly fail to inspire the publics imagine. Anyway I hope someone can discern a point to what I am writing and not just endless ramblings.

Anyway, welcome to new mars
I hope you enjoy the discussion groups here.
In my onion it is the best one on the net smile


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#14 2004-12-20 19:11:54

Euler
Member
From: Corvallis, OR
Registered: 2003-02-06
Posts: 922

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

NASA has tried to gain funding by not mentioning any plans for colonization; all that has resulted is a progressively shrinking portion of the federal budget and the cancellation of any programs that would make colonization easier.  If we can't convince congress to support a goal of eventually having a permanent base on Mars, then it is unlikely that any subterfuge will get us anywhere. 

The best option for us right now is to openly state that the main reason for going to Mars is to eventually colonize it, and to try and increase public support for that goal.  If we want to go to Mars we need a good reason why we should go to Mars.

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#15 2004-12-20 20:45:53

GCNRevenger
Member
From: Earth
Registered: 2003-10-14
Posts: 6,056

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

Setting arbitrary numbers of ships or crew or whatnot doesn't make alot of sense when you are trying to "sell" the program, you should focus on what you intend to "get" out of a Mars program and then figure out what you need to do it.

I agree with Euler, that lying to Congress about the goal of pure exploration (and not establishing humans on Mars) is small and simple and cheap is a sure recipie for disaster, since Congress will think you are a lying cheat who has swindled them when you suddenly inform them that you actually intended to go to stay. "Where did this come from? I thought you said you wanted to..." yaddah yaddah.

You might be more likly to get a small exploration mission sooner and for less money, but thats all you'll get.


[i]"The power of accurate observation is often called cynicism by those that do not have it." - George Bernard Shaw[/i]

[i]The glass is at 50% of capacity[/i]

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#16 2004-12-20 21:16:25

SpaceNut
Administrator
From: New Hampshire
Registered: 2004-07-22
Posts: 28,911

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

So to justify going we must have technological spin offs.

I would say that a nuclear powered rocket engine would be just that but of what good would it be since we already have nuclear reactors. Radiation shielding perhaps but that went out with bomb shelters. So again what great technology can we expect to spin off from going to mars?

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#17 2004-12-20 21:30:30

John Creighton
Member
From: Nova Scotia, Canada
Registered: 2001-09-04
Posts: 2,401
Website

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

So to justify going we must have technological spin offs.

I would say that a nuclear powered rocket engine would be just that but of what good would it be since we already have nuclear reactors. Radiation shielding perhaps but that went out with bomb shelters. So again what great technology can we expect to spin off from going to mars?

NASA is and always has been a leader in science and engineering. The spin offs include technology transfers and problem solving techniques. The Kalman filter was born out of the need reliably determine the poison of a satalight and has since been applied everywhere from seismic testing to the stock market.

Space exploration motivates valuable research because the problems are difficult and there is a lot of money one the line. There is little room for error and there is a pressing need for advanced research techniques from a wide range of fields. I once partly bought the augment that spinoffs were the lasat recourse of a scoundrel. I know know that that statement is completely misguided. I also no that the most valuable “spinoffs” are not duck tape or tang but the NASA has changed the practice of engineering in general.

Since the moon and mars are both inherently challenging tasks with a lot of money on the line the will both be a strong stimulus for the advancement of science and engineering. Space based reactors are perhaps a secondary spinoff in the since it will allow us to do more with our space resources. The ISRU of mars could have benefits including, mining practices on earth, automation though robotics, surviving on earth after a nuclear war, farming in deserts or the artic, etc, etc, etc but these are secondary benefits.


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#18 2004-12-20 21:47:18

Palomar
Member
From: USA
Registered: 2002-05-30
Posts: 9,734

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

*And if we don't make it clear upfront with Congress that we want a permanent presence on Mars they'll come back later (after the one-time Flags & Footprints) with, "Well, you didn't make it clear you wanted more.  You didn't seem to care it wasn't more." 

Why give them a way out?  An opportunity to twist it around and blame the lack of a permanent human presence on Mars on us?? 

Congress needs a kick in the pants, not an excuse/cop-out/way out handed to them.

My 2 cents' worth.

--Cindy


We all know [i]those[/i] Venusians: Doing their hair in shock waves, smoking electrical coronas, wearing Van Allen belts and resting their tiny elbows on a Geiger counter...

--John Sladek (The New Apocrypha)

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#19 2004-12-20 22:39:53

Commodore
Member
From: Upstate NY, USA
Registered: 2004-07-25
Posts: 1,021

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

On one hand, I would expect Congress to balk at long term, open ended commitments.

On the other, the mass production required would really cut the price of individual units, making them feel like there getting there monies worth. Put it would be a great source of jobs.


"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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#20 2004-12-21 00:03:28

Martian Republic
Member
From: Haltom City- Dallas/Fort Worth
Registered: 2004-06-13
Posts: 855

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

So to justify going we must have technological spin offs.

I would say that a nuclear powered rocket engine would be just that but of what good would it be since we already have nuclear reactors. Radiation shielding perhaps but that went out with bomb shelters. So again what great technology can we expect to spin off from going to mars?

No SpaceNut, I'm talking about advancement across the board in just about every area of science, technology and manufacturing. You deliberately pick a target that just outside you technological and infrastructural capability. But, not too far outside your technological and infrastructural capability because you want to have some reasonable possibility of hitting your target in a twenty to forty year time frame so people don't lose there focus on the target we trying to hit.

I'm not saying that we may not start off using fission powered rocket and some current technology to carry on with the present space program, but if we stay with the present technologies and/or try to retro-fit it for future programs we both limit what we can do in space and defeat our purpose of using the space program as technology driver and promoting building a bigger U.S. Economy that double in size every ten years, because of the new technology being developed and brought on line. We decide what we want to build and what new technologies we have to invent to we can accomplish our goals. If we choose to do that, then we can choose to do bigger things in space than what we can currently do in space, because we will be inventing new things, developing the technologies to accomplish these task and building the infrastructure to get the job done. Otherwise we have to monkey around with present technologies to accomplish a greatly reduced space program than we should be doing and are capable of having. If NASA is not pushing back the boundaries of science, technologies, building infrastructures and exploring space, then as far as I'm concerned, we have a space program that not worth doing. We setup goals and targets that we are trying to hit in several area's. But, instead of having hundred of independent goal that we are aiming at, we are going to pack it into two or three major goal that we are aiming at and that we are publicizing to the public that we are trying to accomplish and a ruff time scale that we intend to accomplish that mission. We have our short term mission of build a base or even a small city of ten thousand that we intend to do in twenty years and slightly larger city for Mars of hundred thousand in forty years. Now that we know what our target is, what kind of technologies are we going to have to develop and what kind of infrastructures are we going to have to build to be able to accomplish our national goals for both our short term goals and our long term goals and we don't either have the technologies or the infrastructure to accomplish our goals either. We would have further sub-goals or goals of having reusable shuttle that cost 1/10 of the cost current shuttle with about 1/10 of the maintain of that shuttle too and rockets would be use to us in our program. We also need lunar shuttle for repeatability too. We also need some kind of manufacturing skunk works on the Moon to defray some of the cost of trying to bring everything from the Earth to the Moon. We will use the moon as a bread board for developing new technologies for our later mission to Mars. The moon has no air to speak of, so gas welder are out of the picture and electric welders don't work very well in a vacuum either. So we need to develop a laser welder for our astronaut so he won't have to jack around with an electric welder trying to make it work properly. Since we wanted to be able to be able to put hundred thousand people on Mars, these fission powered rocket are useless to us. Besides, we wanted to be able to get people to Mars in two weeks or less instead of that six month trip with fission powered. We don't want to have to deal with the medical problem that a longer fission powered rocket might cause people going to Mars. We also don't like the fact that we have 26 month launch window that we can send people to Mars and/or back to the Earth. So we look for some technology that can be develop that can be a powered vehicle and that can fill all these requirements. so we are looking for the energy density that can power such a space craft and decided to settle on fusion powered rocket and so it goes on the crash development list of technologies we need to develop. We develop a fusion powered rocket to go Mars two weeks or less, there would be an Electric fusion powered generator almost directly behind the fusion powered rocket development. We would figure on at least two hundred fusion powered rocket in forty year time frame or so and maybe capable of caring two hundred to six hundred people a piece. Most of these rockets would probably be privately owned. So all of the sudden all these asteroids, become prime real state for mining colonies, because now we have the way to get to them and for there products too. You would also have to build an Industrial Park on Mars too, so you could support the Martian population without over taxing trying to bring every thing from the Earth to support the Martian colony.

The technological spin offs on something like that would make the technological spin offs of the Kennedy Moon Mission look dinky. Like it would be a John F. Kennedy Moon Mission in over drive and super sized version.

Larry,

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#21 2004-12-21 00:26:08

RobS
Banned
From: South Bend, IN
Registered: 2002-01-15
Posts: 1,701
Website

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

I think the trick for maintaining Congressional support is to move incrementally. GCNR is right that the exploration phase should be designed with a second phase ("permanent presence"?) in mind, so that the equipment for the first phase supports the equipment needed in phase two. But you can't start by saying you're asking for money for phase one with phases two, three, and four in mind, because those phases are very hard to define adequately and any effort to try will produce wildly varying cost estimates. One thing you don't want to do is say that phase one will cost fifty billion, but phase two might cost 200 or 300 billion. Then people will add the numbers together and say you're asking for 350 billion. It's better to define phase one clearly and include in it the prerequisites for future phases. The DRM does this where they say they are planning for three missions to Mars and propose that all three land in the same place, because the DRM values the scientific value of learning how humans can live on Mars higher than the scientific return from three different sites. That's really another way of saying that DRM is planning for a next phase where people stay on Mars more permanently and may get to the other sites of scientific value as well, maybe from the "proto-McMurdo" the DRM set up.

          -- RobS

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#22 2004-12-21 01:13:18

Euler
Member
From: Corvallis, OR
Registered: 2003-02-06
Posts: 922

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

Spin-offs can't be the primary reason for a Mars mission.  They can be an important secondary reason since we can leverage the spin-offs to reduce the "cost" of the mission, but they have to compete with so many other programs that produce spin-offs that spin-offs are not viable as the only justification.  The NSF, Department of Energy, HHS, other NASA programs, etc. can produce spin-offs more efficiently than a manned Mars mission.

Just going for “science” is also hard to justify because you are competing with robotic missions, and people will wonder why we should spend so much to learn about Mars if we never want to live there.

Going out of pride and nationalism seems a bit petty, and while it can generate a lot of funding, this funding would also be very unstable and would probably not include money for working towards building a colony.

Colonization is really the only good justification for Mars, and it is also the reason why most Mars advocates want to go to Mars in the first place.  We don’t need NASA to actually come up with a plan for starting a colony right now and we don’t need to ask congress for money to build a colony right now.  What we do need to do is admit that this is the real reason why we want to go to Mars since using the other reasons to try and trick people into supporting a Mars mission using the other reasons just isn’t very effective.

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#23 2004-12-21 06:12:50

SpaceNut
Administrator
From: New Hampshire
Registered: 2004-07-22
Posts: 28,911

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

I think the idea of technological spin offs is not the same as doing research to develop what is needed for the mission but what is derived from that to which makes it to the public is. Modern computers are a spin off, handheld calculators, granted nuclear fusion is in that realm from any propulsion system using it but it is not a spin off until it is used by common people such as in a fusion power generation plant and not just by scientist or engineers in the field of endevour.

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#24 2004-12-21 06:46:35

MarsDog
Member
From: vancouver canada
Registered: 2004-03-24
Posts: 852

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

Modern computers are a spin off

War accelerated development, a spinoff War (WW2 secret code cracking etc, and Cold War). After the war/Moon race, the cut back generated large numbers of unemployed specialists who transferred technology to business.

US fights numerous wars, hence the development of spy satellites and GPS.

What technological spinoffs will the Mars Race produce ?

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#25 2024-01-04 12:06:54

Mars_B4_Moon
Member
Registered: 2006-03-23
Posts: 9,267

Re: We Should Not Plan For Permanent Presence on Mars - It Will hurt congressional approval

an old thread perhaps worth bumping

However I do not agree with its idea of non Permanent Presence


'Colonizing Mars could be dangerous and ridiculously expensive. Elon Musk wants to do it anyway'
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/colonizing-ma … 42361.html

To the moon, Mars and beyond - the eight space-faring nations' plans for 2024
https://aussiedlerbote.de/en/to-the-moo … -for-2024/

Artemis 2 astronauts meet President Biden to talk America's next trip to the moon
https://www.yahoo.com/news/artemis-2-as … 38019.html

Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2024-01-04 12:15:40)

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