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Could We Terraform Mars???


Kerbinchaser

Terraforming  

55 members have voted

  1. 1. Will we terraform Mars?

    • Yes
      14
    • No
      15
    • Maybe
      26


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Well, for so many years, science fiction writers and scientists have dreamed of terraforming a planet. I think it just might be possible, but not for a VERY long time. (At least 50 years) 

How would we do it?

For a start, we would have to increase the pressure of Mars's atmosphere. After that, we would have to increase the temperature of Mars by quite a bit. Of course, we would have to get water. 

For that, we would melt the ice caps, which would give us water and Co2. Soon, we would have to slowly begin growing algae and other oxygen releasing plants in greenhouses, which in turn would put the Oxygen into the atmosphere. However, bad news for Terraforming: http://www.space.com/31044-mars-terraforming-nasa-maven-mission.html

After tens of thousands of years, we might have a breathable atmosphere to live in. 

 

What are your thoughts? Do you agree?

Edited by Lo Var Lachland
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@Lo Var Lachland

You need three more options on the poll, 'International effort', 'Colonist effort' and 'Interplanetary effort (Colonist and International parties)'

But I think that it may be awhile, we haven't so much as sent cargo to the surface, so I think around the 2080 or later, but if we somehow speed things up, I could see it happening sooner.

EDIT: However for us to really terraform it, we'd have to wait at least hundreds of years.

Also, mandatory vids :)

Spoiler

 

 

Edited by Spaceception
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Your questions are leading. Question 2 and 3 imply that "no" is not an answer.

How far along are we with self-sustaining bases in the Antarctic? How well are we getting along with reversing the expansion of the Sahara desert? We've been really succesful in combating that drought that's been terrorizing California over the last 10 years, right?

Each of those projects is about 10,000,000× easier than terraforming Mars. And we've come not even close in succeeding, despite trying (except for the Antarctic, because it's "impossible." Still millions of times easier than Mars).

So, no. Not going to happen. Ever.

 

 

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Processing the perchlorates and the other problematic compounds would be a herculean task all on its own, let alone terraforming.

Terraforming is a very slow process, and one that requires a lot more than a single organization's efforts. SpaceX won't do it. Neither will NASA, ESA, or Sierra Nevada. It's too long. Those companies might go bankrupt or die off hundreds, or thousands, of years before Mars gets a breathable atmosphere.

There are faster options than terraforming, of course.

Besides, Mars isn't that good of a candidate. It's only advantage is that heating things up is easier than cooling things down. Otherwise, Venus would be far more ideal.

5 minutes ago, Kerbart said:

How far along are we with self-sustaining bases in the Antarctic? How well are we getting along with reversing the expansion of the Sahara desert? We've been really succesful in combating that drought that's been terrorizing California over the last 10 years, right?

The drought in California is heavily improving, actually. The worst any area is getting is severe drought, and that's just a tiny sliver of California now. Most of it is in the clear. Of course, that doesn't mean that we did that.

Edited by Bill Phil
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Your survey is messed up. If my answer to the first question is NO, then I should not be required to submit answers for the next two.

It would take anywhere from 500 to 1,000 years to completely terraform Mars. Most people will not sit through a performance of Beethoven's 9th Symphony in one night! Terra-forming is going to remain in the realms of science-fiction.

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make a bus stop near pluto much better ^^ mars terraforming what for ^^ harlock reboot , sunless sea ? let's "dig" that out a little eventually for science and moaar booster but large scale, what does it bring ^^

Edited by WinkAllKerb''
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At least 1000 years. The energy expenditure needed alone is colossal, way out of reach for any current or near future entity. I might believe it could be within the capability of the Second Empire of Man circa 3000 AD, but the costs are so far in excess of the benefits that it's essentially irrational to do it unless you're a Galactic Pharoah trying to show off how powerful you are.

As others have pointed out, question #2 of the poll should not be required. I said No, and then I had to pick which organization would do it to have my No counted, so you're collecting bad data for either question #1 (bias towards Yes if people decline to answer because they don't want to choose randomly for question #2), or for question #2 (if people pick an organization randomly so their No can count) or both.

Also the "How would we do it" section needs to address how we would engineer a magnetosphere for Mars.

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cost what's that's ? something used per alien on a silly planet ? that's really a concept i hardly get, what's this cost thing your talking about ? ^^ that's something that's happened at some point in your evolution or history or wut ? something you can't evolve without ? a must have , wut ? alien on earth are just weird ... with their cost concern

Edited by WinkAllKerb''
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1 minute ago, WinkAllKerb'' said:

cost what's that's ? something used per alien on a silly planet ? that's really a concept i hardly get, what's this cost thing your talking about ? ^^

Think of it as the number of megajoules we would need to expend to complete the project.

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@HebaruSan:

Absolutely correct. If anything, the best bet for Mars would be humans to develop some sort of technology that would take the oxygen directly out of the thin atmosphere, much the way newer medical equipment pull oxygen out of Earth's atmosphere for those using oxygen therapy and mobile devices. But the thin Martian atmosphere would take at least twice the effort. Large domed cities, as seen in the 1950s sci-fi serials? Even those could be risky in the Martian environment.

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it's fun it may disappear at some point in history like a time stamp when it appeared ^^ a must have lulz ; ) weird aliens weirds with there ego disorder unable to balance, stuff, task and all without cost for trading amongst each others may be leaving the "moan hey" on earth is the next step ^^ who know  :wink:

you need to add 5 ton of lincoln time stamped paper per sateliite we send in the sky, if some alien find them, they gonna be happy and thks us for the laugh ...

Edited by WinkAllKerb''
i m allergic to money, and ther is no pharma pills to resolve this allergy, imagine if alien are like me ...
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Can we terraform Mars?  Yes.

We can also strip mine the entire Earth and use it to construct generational ships to travel to TRAPPIST-1 to colonize it.

 

As long as it's physically possible, we can do it.  It's merely a question of funding, time, and getting enough people interested in it.  (And keeping them interested over the thousands of years involved.)

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obligatory NASA spaceflight forum link : https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=42438.0

TLDR version: getting atmosphere and temerature could be quicker than anyone thought.

 

35 minutes ago, Nibb31 said:

We can't even fix climate change on our own planet. What makes you think we could terraform Mars ?

 

Less humans throwing in their own agena?

Edited by hms_warrior
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No. Si-Fi isn't reality. It's not like someone goes there with a barrel of water and a bottle of oxygen. Study geoscience (i recommend this to everyone :-)), you'll be fascinated by the complexity and interactions of the earth's dynamics.

We have only a slight idea of how complex the biosphere on earth is and how it built up and how it maintains the stability and flexibility (though we are eagerly destroying the latter). I cannot imagine any artificial processes that where able to copy this, let alone install new ones elsewhere. The processes are incredibly complex and interdependent, from short-lived and local weathering to global plate tectonics, necessary for the long term exchange of climate relevant elements on earth. It's not only the skin ....

I claim that no artificial process, if left unattended, can do this faster and more flexible as on earth. But if you start now and have 2 billion years the sun will help you and mars will move in the habitable zone(tm). Maybe a visitor is one day able to build a little garden in or around a pressure yurt for space potatoes and void tomatoes :-)

 

 

1 hour ago, hms_warrior said:

obligatory NASA spaceflight forum link : https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=42438.0

TLDR version: getting atmosphere and temerature could be quicker than anyone thought.

 

Hehe, that's the star trek generation :-))

It is not a scientific opinion and they can model anything with the right parameters ... A biosphere is not a cooking recipe :-))

Edited by Green Baron
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I voted 'maybe' since it can't be completely ruled out. However, I think the cost, complexity and timescales involved make it exceptionally unlikely. We could probably develop the necessary technology but I doubt we'll evolve the necessary social, financial and poltical maturity any time soon.

If we're going to be doing any terraforming in the next few hundred years it's going to be right here on Earth, fixing the mess that we've already made and seem set to continue making.

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Could we? Most likely, yes. Would we? No. Nothing in it for us. By us, I mean Earthers. Future inhabitants of Mars however would have a huge incentive to Terraform their planet. I don't think we'll see any sort of Terraforming project, beyond a Sun-Mars L1 magnetic shield station started by us here on Earth.

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  • 2 weeks later...

It's possible, but not worthwile. First of all, Mars's internal core has long since hardened, which means it has almost no magnetic field to protect life from solar radiation and from solar winds blasting away its atmosphere. The atmosphere Mars now retains is a mere wisp that's too weak to sustain. In order to terraform mars, the first thing that we had to do is to make the atmosphere at least survivable for life, problem is, mars is too weak to retain it before it dissipates too quickly. Secondly, mars gravity is weaker than earth. While this might not matter much, it has an impact towards colonist's life (muscle and bone problem). Venus is more preferrable for colonization since it's gravity is similar to earth, has atmosphere, has magnetic field to protect from solar radiation, and the upper atmosphere is theoretically suitable for floating colonies (venus gases is heavier than earth air, allowing flying colonies supported by balloons filled with normal atmosphere to float on upper atmosphere) the only problem is finding water, since venus has no source of water at all (that's for making settlement, but I'm doubtful about transforming venus since it's too hostile on the surface)

Edited by ARS
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56 minutes ago, ARS said:

It's possible, but not worthwile. First of all, Mars's internal core has long since hardened, which means it has almost no magnetic field to protect life from solar radiation and from solar winds blasting away its atmosphere. The atmosphere Mars now retains is a mere wisp that's too weak to sustain. In order to terraform mars, the first thing that we had to do is to make the atmosphere at least survivable for life, problem is, mars is too weak to retain it before it dissipates too quickly. Secondly, mars gravity is weaker than earth. While this might not matter much, it has an impact towards colonist's life (muscle and bone problem). Venus is more preferrable for colonization since it's gravity is similar to earth, has atmosphere, has magnetic field to protect from solar radiation, and the upper atmosphere is theoretically suitable for floating colonies (venus gases is heavier than earth air, allowing flying colonies supported by balloons filled with normal atmosphere to float on upper atmosphere) the only problem is finding water, since venus has no source of water at all (that's for making settlement, but I'm doubtful about transforming venus since it's too hostile on the surface)

Obligatory post in every Mars terraforming thread.

-The magnetic field has very little effect on radiation dose rates at the surface of earth (or a terraformed Mars). The vast majority of the shielding comes from the mass of the atmosphere itself.

-While the magnetic field does protect the atmosphere from being stripped by the solar wind, atmospheric loss happens over the timescale of millions of years, so if we have the capability to give Mars an atmosphere, we have the capability to top it up or retain it.

If magnetic field was a deal breaker, then Venus would be out as well, because not only does it also not have a magnetic field, it experiences far higher solar radiation than Mars.

Edited by peadar1987
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1 hour ago, peadar1987 said:

Obligatory post in every Mars terraforming thread.

-The magnetic field has very little effect on radiation dose rates at the surface of earth (or a terraformed Mars). The vast majority of the shielding comes from the mass of the atmosphere itself.

-While the magnetic field does protect the atmosphere from being stripped by the solar wind, atmospheric loss happens over the timescale of millions of years, so if we have the capability to give Mars an atmosphere, we have the capability to top it up or retain it.

If magnetic field was a deal breaker, then Venus would be out as well, because not only does it also not have a magnetic field, it experiences far higher solar radiation than Mars.

You have a point there

Though for what I know, building a floating colony on Venus is still easier than terraforming Mars :)

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