When do you think humans will land on Mars?

[Northstar1989]

Not before WW-III.

I think pessimists such as yourself need to consider this quote:

"We were born of risen apes, not fallen angels, and the apes were armed killers besides. And so what shall we wonder at? Our murders and massacres and missiles, and our irreconcilable regiments? Or our treaties whatever they may be worth; our symphonies however seldom they may be played; our peaceful acres, however frequently they may be converted to battlefields; our dreams however rarely they may be accomplished. The miracle of man is not how far he has sunk but how magnificently he has risen. We are known among the stars by our poems, not our corpses."

- by Robert Ardery, American Anthropologist -

Consider for a moment the powerful truths of that statement. We, humans, have risen from brutal, ignorant apes that made a regular practice of killing one another (despite what some ignorant fools may tell you, neither murder nor warfare is a uniquely human tradition, even among Earth's primates... Animals engage in... murder, slavery, forced coitus, and warfare just like humans have...)

What is most impressive, most amazing, is not how often we kill one another- but how often we don't. What's most unique among humans is our art, our poetry and music, our desire to understand the universe, and our ambition. An ape may be content to sit eating bananas and masturbating (yes, animals do this too) all day in the jungle amidst its own filth when it's not killing other members of its species, but humans aspire to, and reach for, the stars...

Regards,

Northstar

Edited December 10, 2014 by Northstar1989

[kerbiloid]

And yet it's much cheaper to send two entirely separate robots

Yet  of course. And will stay so until the voyage will take several weeks, not fifteen months.

But real Mars investigation will begin after people will solve all problems right at place, not awaiting Earth KSC for any hand motion.

Robots are just to prepare ski-track for them.

What's the use of being "faster" ? Those rocks aren't going anywhere and isn't any particular emergency to get the data.

Door of your room is also not going anywhere.

But what is faster for you: move yourself there and just open it, or to write a script for a door controller to open, then test it on a door emulator, then get a confirmation from administration, and at last wait twenty minutes while the signal flies through space?

[Northstar1989]

Yet  of course. And will stay so until the voyage will take several weeks, not fifteen months.

Two words: Cycler Ships.

The cost of reaching Mars goes DRASTICALLY down when you can re-use the same ship to get there over and over.

And, when you have the massive fuel-savings of only needing to accelerate your habitat for the duration of the transfer to a Mars intercept once (a Cycler Ship takes the same Delta-V as a 5 month Mars transfer, and can be reached over the course of *years* with ion engines before you ever place a crew aboard the ship).

And when that allows you to make repeated use of heavy equipment that saves on mass in the long run with enough use- like bioregenerative life support (aka. Greenhouses/Aeroponics), heavily-insulated actively-cooled Hydrogen tanks for the Cycler Ship (you still have to transfer the fuel back over to a more lightly insulated orbiter vehicle that will separate from the Cycler when you reach Mars, though), and an onboard comms-relay on the Cycler Ship so you don't have to orbit as heavy communication equipment around Mars... (as the outbound Cycler Ship won't get too far from Mars before the return Cycler starts closing in, this can reduce the maximum distance to the nearest comms relay...)

I even started a thread specifically on Cycler Ships if you're interested:

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/102410-Cycler-Ships

Regards,

Northstar