What do you think the medium term future of space exploration will be like?

[DAL59]

1 minute ago, tater said:

why must people be there, exactly?

 

[tater]

So no reason at all.

Sending people to Mars for that reason is actually fine, I think that human striving is a valuable thing all by itself. Venus? Nope. It offers nothing that will capture the imagination at all. A can in a fog bank. No boots on the ground, no data collected that could not be collected by robots, and no hope of anything better going forward. Just risk for people with no payoff.

Literally any body in the solar system other than Venus is a more interesting as a place to send people.

Venus is a place for probes, and nothing else. 

Edited November 3, 2017 by tater

[Diche Bach]

Why climb Mt Everest when you can send a robot drone there? For a fraction of the cost and virtually zero risk of human harm.

And BTW, personal journeys like climbing a mountain because they find the experience enriching should not be portrayed as analogs of national or at least collective social projects to advance the human condition.

There is no reason to go to space except to advance the human condition. Climbing Mt. Everest does not appreciably advance the human condition, and neither does sending people into space on shoe-string budgets using iffy designs whose ethicality will almost certainly be brought into question in due course.

[DAL59]

7 minutes ago, Diche Bach said:

whose ethicality will almost certainly be brought into question in due course.

Nobody is forcing anybody onto a ship.  Many people would be willing to take the risk.

The boat transport industry didn't disappear after the Titanic.  

[tater]

12 minutes ago, Diche Bach said:

Why climb Mt Everest when you can send a robot drone there? For a fraction of the cost and virtually zero risk of human harm.

And BTW, personal journeys like climbing a mountain because they find the experience enriching should not be portrayed as analogs of national or at least collective social projects to advance the human condition.

There is no reason to go to space except to advance the human condition. Climbing Mt. Everest does not appreciably advance the human condition, and neither does sending people into space on shoe-string budgets using iffy designs whose ethicality will almost certainly be brought into question in due course.

There is value in human exploration for its own sake. Not just for the people doing the exploring, but for the rest of humanity. It raises the bar for everyone on what is possible.

National projects obviously bow to political realities about where budgets are best spent. 

Private exploration OTOH, has no such limits. The more Musk and Bezos spend, the better, IMHO. 

Advancing the human condition is a tough call, I suppose. At some point I suppose you think about the "cosmic endowment" of humanity.

[Kerbal7]

2 hours ago, DAL59 said:

I'm sure there are plenty of rich people who would go to Mars just for the adventure.    

I'm not sure about that. I think DDE was right when he said...

Quote

Whenever millionaires run away from civilization, they always do so to low-tax countries, and to within less than a half-day trip from major metropoli of a First World country. They never move to Antarctica, or even Spitsbergen.

Rich people are very risk averse and like their privilaged lifestyles. What rich person wants to be isolated, living in a tin can on extremely dangerous Mars, when they could be in the French Riviera, or some other exotic place, enjoying beaches, sunshine, and beautiful people?

   

[DAL59]

15 minutes ago, Kerbal7 said:

some other exotic place

Mars is pretty exotic.  Also, its supposedly only going to be 500,000 dollars, so lots of people can go if they sell all their stuff and save up money for years.  

[PakledHostage]

2 hours ago, tater said:

There is value in human exploration for its own sake. Not just for the people doing the exploring, but for the rest of humanity. It raises the bar for everyone on what is possible.

I think Diche Bach was being facetious in his first line. He and I have corresponded about our respective outdoor pursuits. He's not in the "Adventures make you late for dinner" crowd.

But the point remains: While pushing the frontiers of exploration has long been a noble pursuit, it doesn't necessarily go hand in hand with colonization and settlement. As DDE said, nobody is clamoring to live in Antarctica or Spitsbergen, even though they are both incredibly beautiful and would be high on many people's lists of places that they'd like to travel to.

[DAL59]

Even if it is "irrational" using that metric, people might still do it.  

[Nibb31]

10 hours ago, Kerbal7 said:

Rich people are very risk averse and like their privilaged lifestyles. What rich person wants to be isolated, living in a tin can on extremely dangerous Mars, when they could be in the French Riviera, or some other exotic place, enjoying beaches, sunshine, and beautiful people?

Also rich people usually can't afford to take a 2 year vacation. That's not how you get rich. They can probably afford a week-long trip to the Moon, but Mars is too much of an expedition, too dangerous and too boring.

 

[wumpus]

5 hours ago, Nibb31 said:

Also rich people usually can't afford to take a 2 year vacation. That's not how you get rich. They can probably afford a week-long trip to the Moon, but Mars is too much of an expedition, too dangerous and too boring.

The most common way of getting rich is via inheritance.  So that  really isn't a problem (although it obviously reduces who can go even more).  Musk does point out that increasing the number of people given the choice to go to Mars is key to large Mars expeditions.

[DAL59]

Mars would probably be moneyless for a very long time.  Plus, if someone's already a multimillionaire, they don't need to work.  

[Diche Bach]

3 hours ago, wumpus said:

The most common way of getting rich is via inheritance.  So that  really isn't a problem (although it obviously reduces who can go even more).  Musk does point out that increasing the number of people given the choice to go to Mars is key to large Mars expeditions.

Hmmm. In certain societies, at certain points in their histories, absolutely yes.

In the "West," at any period other than say 900 AD to 1300 AD? Hmmm . . . I'd tend toward skeptical that your generalization applies. Certainly, in the last 25 years, the majority of the wealthiest people did not inherit the majority of their value, and many inherited almost none.

An exhaustive analysis is probably undoable, but I wouldn't be surprised if a representative analysis was doable and I'd be surprised if it would support your generalization.

19 hours ago, DAL59 said:

Mars is pretty exotic.  Also, its supposedly only going to be 500,000 dollars, so lots of people can go if they sell all their stuff and save up money for years.  

You did notice those two sexy, youthful bipedal apes in the pic that Kerbal7 attached right?

"Exotic" is a very vague word 

[Nibb31]

3 hours ago, DAL59 said:

Mars would probably be moneyless for a very long time.  Plus, if someone's already a multimillionaire, they don't need to work.  

Why would it be moneyless ? It's going to cost a lot of money just to stay alive. Even if you believe in the half million dollar ticket price annouced by Musk (which everybody agrees is even more unrealistic than his timeline), the basic ECLSS, ISRU and habitation infrastructure is going to cost much much more than that.

[softweir]

8 minutes ago, Nibb31 said:

Why would it be moneyless ?

It wouldn't make money. (Not that I can see it ever making money, unless there is some natural resource there that is actually harder to find elsewhere in the solar system.)

[NSEP]

23 hours ago, DAL59 said:

I'm sure there are plenty of rich people who would go to Mars just for the adventure.    

Why send life-support and other supplies for a useless and selfish tourist when you can send a usefull experiments, an extra habitat or new tech to Mars for the same payload mass?

[DAL59]

2 hours ago, NSEP said:

useless and selfish tourist

I didn't mean random millionaires.  People who are tech innovators(i.e. Bill Gates) would love to go to Mars.   

[NSEP]

1 minute ago, DAL59 said:

I didn't mean random millionaires.  People who are tech innovators(i.e. Bill Gates) would love to go to Mars.   

What would people like Bill Gates do on Mars? People like Bill Gates are good with tech, but just too of an overpowered and important to send on a dangerous mission to the deep unkown. I'd rather pay for a brave and experienced scientist to go to Mars than go myself if i was a Billionaire.

[DAL59]

Exactly.  If either is the case(smart millionaires go there or billionaires pay others to go there), there is money for a colony.  

[NSEP]

2 minutes ago, DAL59 said:

Exactly.  If either is the case(smart millionaires go there or billionaires pay others to go there), there is money for a colony.  

Yes, okay. 

[DAL59]

However, I admit that unless there's some major political or economic upheaval, there won't be mass emigration from Earth.  Several thousand, maybe even half a million(there are 11 million millionaires in the US, believe it or not) people in a colony isn't unbelievable though.  

[Guest]

If the Outer Space Treaty is still there, development will keep the same pace as today's, and most efforts put into space exploration or space travel will end up coming from private companies.

If big countries withdraw from the Outer Space Treaty, they're likely to increase their space exploration agencies' budgets for research in new technologies for military spacecraft that could be also then be used for civilian spacecraft (propulsion, materials, fuels, etc), territories would be claimed outside Earth (sure way to make us a interplanetary species as a byproduct), mining celestial bodies other than Earth could become an actual big thing, etc

I really wish space exploration could be conducted in a peaceful manner, but it simply does not work. The Space Race only happened because of the Cold War, and compare the pace at which NASA and the Russian Space Agency explored space back then with today. We (live human beings) haven't left low Earth orbit in 45 years now, simply because the Cold War is over, and so is the Space Race.

Basically, there's no reason for countries to invest in space if you can't claim territory, put weapons there or if your mining rig has to be open to other countries. Europe didn't invest in colonizing the Americas "for science", they wanted to establish territory and make money from it. Space will be no different.

 

[Nibb31]

7 hours ago, Aperture Science said:

If the Outer Space Treaty is still there, development will keep the same pace as today's, and most efforts put into space exploration or space travel will end up coming from private companies.

If big countries withdraw from the Outer Space Treaty, they're likely to increase their space exploration agencies' budgets for research in new technologies for military spacecraft that could be also then be used for civilian spacecraft (propulsion, materials, fuels, etc), territories would be claimed outside Earth (sure way to make us a interplanetary species as a byproduct), mining celestial bodies other than Earth could become an actual big thing, etc

I really wish space exploration could be conducted in a peaceful manner, but it simply does not work. The Space Race only happened because of the Cold War, and compare the pace at which NASA and the Russian Space Agency explored space back then with today. We (live human beings) haven't left low Earth orbit in 45 years now, simply because the Cold War is over, and so is the Space Race.

Basically, there's no reason for countries to invest in space if you can't claim territory, put weapons there or if your mining rig has to be open to other countries. Europe didn't invest in colonizing the Americas "for science", they wanted to establish territory and make money from it. Space will be no different

If militarization of space is the only way to boost exploration, then the price is probably too high to pay. I don't particularly want to live in a world where orbital weapons are flying over our heads at all times.

But your premise is wrong. The USAF already has a Space Wing. The US DoD has plenty of military satellites, including offensive ones. SpaceX is probably launching one in the next couple of weeks. None of that has any relationship with exploration.

You seem to be confusing exploration with exploitation. Exploration is going strong for no other motivation than science. Exploitation can only really be done by the private sector because governments aren't there to make a profit.

[Guest]

3 hours ago, Nibb31 said:

If militarization of space is the only way to boost exploration, then the price is probably too high to pay. I don't particularly want to live in a world where orbital weapons are flying over our heads at all times.

But your premise is wrong. The USAF already has a Space Wing. The US DoD has plenty of military satellites, including offensive ones. SpaceX is probably launching one in the next couple of weeks. None of that has any relationship with exploration.

You seem to be confusing exploration with exploitation. Exploration is going strong for no other motivation than science. Exploitation can only really be done by the private sector because governments aren't there to make a profit.

While there's the risk that comes with orbital weaponry, mutually assured destruction is something that would likely prevent them from being used. It prevented nukes from being used in the Cold War, after all.

And yes, there are spy satellites and other military spacecraft in space, but all of those are only in Earth orbit.

By allowing countries to claim territory and put weapons in space, it would boost efforts into exploring it (for claiming territory), new technologies, etc. 

Also, countries do have to make money. They can't live on taxes alone, they sell resources to other countries, for example, and try to have more money than they did before at the end of the day.

Exploration and exploitation go hand in hand. Just like it did back in 1500.

Edited November 5, 2017 by Guest

[Nibb31]

24 minutes ago, Aperture Science said:

By allowing countries to claim territory and put weapons in space, it would boost efforts into exploring it (for claiming territory), new technologies, etc. 

It would also introduce conflict, war, death... You probably think that it would make a nice setting for Sci-fi movie, but there is absolutely no need for militarization as long as there is no threat.

You also don't need to claim territory to exploit it. Fishermen have been exploiting the oceans for centuries without claiming territory. The Outer Space Treaty doesn't prevent exploitation.

Quote

Also, countries do have to make money. They can't live on taxes alone, they sell resources to other countries, for example, and try to have more money than they did before at the end of the day.

You need to make a distinction between a country, its economy, and its government. Those are different things with different actors.

Quote

Exploration and exploitation go hand in hand. Just like it did back in 1500.

Anything that you have retained from 16th century history no longer applies. The world is a different place, with different actors and different rules.

Exploration doesn't always go with exploitation. Exploration goes hand in hand with science, extending our understanding of the universe. Whether that science can be applied to economical gain or not is moot.

 

Edited November 5, 2017 by Nibb31