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Space Colonization (think tank)

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breadloaf Since: Oct, 2010
#201: Jan 26th 2012 at 8:17:26 PM

I think you mean natural selection doesn't work like the word evolution :)

FastEddie Since: Apr, 2004
#202: Jan 26th 2012 at 8:25:22 PM

re Venzuela: Yup. Googling it up, I see that they threatened to embargo the US at one point, but backed down. Point stands that a big customer will have plenty of suppliers lining up. Earth will be a big customer in the Solar System for a good while, assuming no global catastrophic failure on the planet.

I don't think anybody has made a case that off-planet colonies will be harmful.

edited 26th Jan '12 8:25:35 PM by FastEddie

Goal: Clear, Concise and Witty
Ailedhoo Heroic Comedic Sociopath from an unknown location Since: Aug, 2011
#203: Jan 26th 2012 at 10:26:09 PM

It depends on the scenario. The following is in presumption that some colonies have developed a stable structure and a stable interaction with Earth.

The chance for colony to claim independence would rely on its population reaching a challenging number to that of the home world. If it was not challenging enough then Earth could send in the “red coats” to reinstall control from the home world. Especially since only small numbers would be sent to the possible colonies.

All in all it would require luck for a colony to declare independence from Earth’s control... presuming of course the colonies were single entities. There may be a case that each colony would be a joint project or under ownership of a national space agency. The former may have the chance to launch a claim, the latter will depend on the national attitude to the colony, whether it is willing to keep it or it would not mind it no longer being under its control.

Of course this has to be balanced by the difficulty of transporting military personnel across the stars. So if military intervention be not the tactic, there be possibilities of economic sanctions but again this depends on how self- efficiency the base is... which could lead to other interring thoughts. Of course for all we know the space colonies may take the path of Australia in its independence... if they can take the path to independence..

On other issues such as the possibility of Mars serving as a colony: the self-efficiency of the colony bases would of course rely the infrastructure reaching the yellows to permit enough agriculture to feed the population. Before we reached a suitable environmental level needed for farming on Marshan soil (here be a article on terraforming by the Guardian), we would have to rely on green t houses a to serve as the force of agriculture. Similar greenhouses may be used in asteroid bases. A colony will need to be agriculturally efficiency to be able to grow and prosper.

I’m a lumberjack and I’m ok. I sleep all night and work all day.
GameGuruGG Vampire Hunter from Castlevania (Before Recorded History)
Vampire Hunter
#204: Jan 27th 2012 at 12:17:43 AM

Here's a question... Assuming we do make a permanent outpost on Mars, why couldn't the "couple of techs servicing robots" be a terraforming operation beyond the current lack of technology?

edited 27th Jan '12 12:20:12 AM by GameGuruGG

Wizard Needs Food Badly
Mandemo Since: Apr, 2010
#205: Jan 27th 2012 at 12:42:58 AM

Well, if we talk about terraforming, the current tech we have now requires millenias to produce natural clouds and rains. 100 000 years to produce fully functioning ecosystem, assuming we transplant the wildlife and plants.

Tough if I do not remember incorrectly, we can, with our current tech, produce enough green house gasses to push Mars over the critical point, where it wil itself start producing greenhouse gasses(melting of ice produces them) faster than it loses its athmosphere. After that, the terraforming could proceed without human intervention. If I remember correctly, we can achieve this in around 200 years, assuming we devote our entire space agency funding to it. Which isn't likely.

But, like I said, these are something that we, our children, their theirs child and so forht for couple of hundreds of times won't we around to see. We can, with our current technology, make habitable Mars, but it is so long term goal that nobody wants to take it up themselves. Can't really blame them, I think we could accept goals that don't produce profit in our lifetime, but goals that don't produce results untill millenias later? Okay, that's asking too much.

As for colony independence from Earth, this asumes that

  • Colony does not wish be under Earth/Earth based organisation control
  • Colony feels oppressed
  • Colony has strong independece movement
  • Colony can maintain its independence
  • Earth does not have way to bring military to play
  • Earth mistreats colonies

If Earth(I refer Earth here as somesort of Earth based organisation that governs the colony) doesn't mistreat its colonies and gives them no reason to rebel, lets say colonies have strong autonomy, have representives back on Earth, are paid full-price, have strong ties to Earth etc. etc.

Colonies don't rebel just because they are colonies, there are always some reason why they rebel. Futhermore, space colonies are extremely vulnearable unless they manage to gain themselves a fleet to fight with. Imagine, Earth sends a ship that has an asteroid in it's gargo hold. "Surrender or we drop this thing and it hits group with force enough to remind us of Hiroshima". Okay, that is bit extreme, but still, as long as Earth can maintain space superiority, colony is hosed. Earth can destroy any target they want, cripple their infastructure etc. etc.

TamH70 Since: Nov, 2011 Relationship Status: Faithful to 2D
#206: Jan 27th 2012 at 4:19:52 AM

Like it or not, and contrary to the established laws of physics, which have so many holes in them that they more resemble a fine Gruyere cheese than a coherent view of what the universe is, we, mankind, are going to colonise planets outside of our solar system and we are going to get there using faster than light travel. Yeah, I said faster than light travel. I know Einstein is said to have proven that that concept is impossible. Infinite speed equals infinite mass or some such. Well, the speed of light in a vacuum is one hundred and eighty six kilometres per second. Not infinite speed. It has a value. It therefore can be striven for.

We cannot do it now, I accept that. What I will not accept is the proposition that our descendants cannot do what our ancestors have done for countless millenia and say "ballocks" to any obstacle that they have faced in the long march of progress. If we accepted prior wisdom as being eternal we would never have started walking upright and away from the plains of Africa. Teleportation may never happen. Moral issues aside, the computational power necessary is mind boggling, but speed? We have always been good at going faster. It is in our nature.

Octo Prince of Dorne from Germany Since: Mar, 2011
Prince of Dorne
#207: Jan 27th 2012 at 4:32:38 AM

We have always been good at going faster. It is in our nature.
And that shows how you do not understand the Theories of Relativity at all. Besides, "laws of the universe" > "our nature". Causality, relativity, FTL - pick two. And so far relativity has withstood thousands of tests thrown at it. You cannot do FTL travel without time travelling, and hence violating causality.

Unbent, Unbowed, Unbroken. Unrelated ME1 Fanfic
TamH70 Since: Nov, 2011 Relationship Status: Faithful to 2D
#208: Jan 27th 2012 at 4:46:27 AM

Hah. And you do not understand human nature at all. If we listened to folks like you we would still be living in mud huts or caves. And there were folks like you throughout our history. You know what we call them? Speedbumps. We eventually learned to ignore them.

Octo Prince of Dorne from Germany Since: Mar, 2011
Prince of Dorne
#209: Jan 27th 2012 at 4:50:18 AM

Whatever. You'll learn that "human nature" is not the primary constant of the universe.

Unbent, Unbowed, Unbroken. Unrelated ME1 Fanfic
Deboss I see the Awesomeness. from Awesomeville Texas Since: Aug, 2009
I see the Awesomeness.
#210: Jan 27th 2012 at 5:31:22 AM

Dunno, I'd think human stupidity is pretty constant.

Fight smart, not fair.
SpookyMask Since: Jan, 2011
#211: Jan 27th 2012 at 5:41:12 AM

I don't think you need to be human to be stupid.

Madrugada Since: Jan, 2001
#212: Jan 27th 2012 at 5:46:07 AM

I think this is veering off-topic...

SpookyMask Since: Jan, 2011
#213: Jan 27th 2012 at 5:53:27 AM

So what it would require to colonize other planets/moons than mars and the moon? Asking for curiosity.

Qeise Professional Smartass from sqrt(-inf)/0 Since: Jan, 2011 Relationship Status: Waiting for you *wink*
Professional Smartass
#214: Jan 27th 2012 at 5:57:01 AM

True, we can't change the constants of the universe and human nature is not one of them. But we don't know FTL is impossible. According to the current theories it is, but we can't say for sure that won't change.

For us to be able to colonize anything outside Earth would require a cultural shift towards long term thinking. Terraforming without some kind of major technological breakthrough will take, depending on the planet, thousands of years for the easier ones hundreds of thousands for the harder ones. Of course more advancements will be made while we're at it, but whatever happens the people starting it cannot expect to see the end of it.

Another one is getting to the suitable planets outside our solar system. It'll be a long trip where communication will get increasingly harder. And when you send a manned ship so far it'll have to be so well self sustainable that it'll be a colony in itself.

edited 27th Jan '12 6:11:12 AM by Qeise

Laws are made to be broken. You're next, thermodynamics.
Octo Prince of Dorne from Germany Since: Mar, 2011
Prince of Dorne
#215: Jan 27th 2012 at 6:05:44 AM

That's "god of the gaps" like thinking. I mean the current paradigm is the current paradigm for a reason. According to all we know, which is not so little, it holds true. And heh, even if the paradigm changes, why should the new paradigm allow FTL? The universe does not exist to grant humans every wish...

Unbent, Unbowed, Unbroken. Unrelated ME1 Fanfic
Qeise Professional Smartass from sqrt(-inf)/0 Since: Jan, 2011 Relationship Status: Waiting for you *wink*
Professional Smartass
#216: Jan 27th 2012 at 6:18:34 AM

I'm not saying FTL will become possible, just that "this time we are right, and this theory will never be proven wrong" has been said a lot.

Laws are made to be broken. You're next, thermodynamics.
DeMarquis (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#217: Jan 27th 2012 at 8:08:17 AM

Way off topic, guys.

"...Let's say Mars starts as mid point between Asteroid miners and Earth. Initialy, it's jsut refueling place. Then someone gets bright idea and sets up a bar there, another sets up hotel for visitors."

Your "outpost" consists of a couple of techs manning a dedicated workstation. If that. How do you get to a hotel?

It's far too expensive to send larger numbers of people out there, unless there is a reasonable expectation of an economic payoff. I'm willing to concede, for the sake of argument, that it might be cost-effective to send automated machines to mine things on the moon or mars or the asteroids (although, frankly, even that's questionable, why cant they mine the same things here on earth?) but to send the numbers of people you need to sustain a local economy is right out of the question. We're not talking about building a wooden boat and sailing across the sea, we're talking about space- whole orders of magnitude more expensive and challenging. We could meet that challenge technologically, but why would we do so? It's cheaper to send machines.

Frankly, I'm struggling to come up with a reason to pay for all the machines that would require a manned support system. What are they mining out there that would justify the expense? Here on earth we don't need any more food, or more fuel, or more raw materials. The terran global economy is fucked up primarily for political and cultural reasons, not because we lack sufficient resources. Spaceships cant ship enough people fast enough to relieve population pressure, and no one is going to invest the hundreds of billions of dollars that would be necessary to guard against the extremely small chance that Earth is going to be hit by an asteriod or something in the next couple of thousand years.

Unless we can come up with a way to make it profitable within, say, decades, it just isn't going to happen. Again, unless they start militarizing up there. Then the situation changes.

I'm done trying to sound smart. "Clear" is the new smart.
breadloaf Since: Oct, 2010
#218: Jan 27th 2012 at 8:27:38 AM

Technically speaking, the whole "pick two" stuff floating on the internet is based on what physicists would LIKE to be true. That is, there's nothing to prove causality at all, but we'd like to think it true otherwise the universe is quite strange. However, given what happened with quantum physics, no one can say anything for sure. Certainly nobody expected a particle to be able to instantaneously and at FTL speed affect another particle.

Anyway, generally speaking, the outpost conditions of Mars would remain for a long time. Self-sufficiency is the key here. So the first people will be scientists and engineers going over to maintain an outpost for scientific endeavours; mostly geology but also off-world ecology (some things that are general, such as hydroponics, others that are less general like, how to make Mars specifically a habitable planet?).

We'd eventually would like to put down a lot of automated systems. First would be fuel, energy, air and water production. Next would be food. Then we'd start making limited manufacturing, mining and refining capabilities so that we don't have to ship as much tech over there. Then we expand that industrial base to support the terraforming outposts, eventually to achieve technological independence.

Then we're likely to build outposts across the surface of the planet with transportation between them, and one main landing area (the spaceport) and you might get limited businesses there to keep people happy. Morale is likely to be a problem early on and by this time I should expect a lot of local luxuries (hydroponics and other items built just to provide interesting fare for the inhabitants). It'll likely stay "colonial", in terms of an economy, for some time.

For a few centuries we can turn the atmosphere breathable, then we can start going outside, now we think about turning the ground into soil and we'll likely have limited water bodies at this point. Making the atmosphere breathable will require some fairly large continuously running CO 2 or other GHG production machines. They're likely to take in some locked CO 2 compound on the Mars surface, release it and perhaps double as a power source for the outposts.

At the same time, we'll have to develop some method to protect the atmosphere from solar winds to prevent burn off, and this might some kind of satellite based system to produce an artificial magnetosphere. I'll have to look into this to see if any current proposals exist.

Once the atmosphere is breathable, or even likely far before it is breathable, we can start using bacteria and chemicals to build a top soil layer on Mars. We'll likely have to protect the first few batches against sandstorms and the like, and we may need to perform some weather moderation. The other option is heavy genetic engineering to create hardier versions of the usual Earth bacterial life. This would be a slow process to create soil but is an exponentially cheaper process as time goes on.

FastEddie Since: Apr, 2004
#219: Jan 27th 2012 at 9:12:39 AM

I not seeing these off-planet communities arising from the colonial dynamic at all. I think they will start out independent. International business consortia will be formed to do the job of building them. The consortia would be based in places like The Hague or Switzerland and have as much beholden to the country where they were formed as a tanker carrying a Liberian flag has to Liberia. That is, not very beholden.

People like Gingrich are thinking about dragging planet-side nationalism along with them into space. I think there are more agile organizations that can be formed, orgs which may even have avoidance of planet-side nationalism as a big part of their motivation.

edited 27th Jan '12 9:13:34 AM by FastEddie

Goal: Clear, Concise and Witty
Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#220: Jan 27th 2012 at 9:17:23 AM

I agree with Eddie here. Colonialism only works because you can maintain political control over the colonies and hope to profit from them in the form of taxation and goods. I don't think anyone expects planetary colonization to recoup its costs for decades at least, if not centuries. Going into it with a short-term profit motive is absurd on its face.

That said, if a space colony "rebels", the solution to the problem is simple — cut off its supplies. Poof, no more colony.

I'd also expect national identity to be a much weaker force when you're millions of miles away from Earth. Even modern astronauts are already an elite group by virtue of their profession alone: in a cramped space station with the best specimens humanity has to offer, you are not American or Russian.

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
DeMarquis (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#221: Jan 27th 2012 at 9:19:28 AM

"...Going into it with a short-term profit motive is absurd on its face..."

That's precisely the problem.

I'm done trying to sound smart. "Clear" is the new smart.
FastEddie Since: Apr, 2004
#222: Jan 27th 2012 at 9:32:36 AM

Well, how short is 'short term?' Let's say there is a product that either can only be made in low gravity or is much easier to be made there. Arbitrarily, I'll say something nano-scale for therapeutic drug delivery.

Drug companies are quite accustomed to dealing in terms of waiting a decade to make a profit. They are very well adapted to the time frames needed to put these communities on viable footing.

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Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#223: Jan 27th 2012 at 9:35:15 AM

Low-g manufacturing can be done in orbit; you don't need Moon or Mars bases for that. I agree with the doubters to the extent that I see no inherent economic rationale for planetary colonization other than "get humanity off Earth and eventually we'll get something worthwhile out of it for the folks back home, possibly."

This is why it needs to be a government effort, because what corporation is going to invest in a Mars base (other than those actively involved in making it happen, but the money still has to come from somewhere)?

edited 27th Jan '12 9:37:15 AM by Fighteer

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
FastEddie Since: Apr, 2004
#224: Jan 27th 2012 at 9:36:54 AM

Yeah, which is why I don't want Moon or Mars bases. Off planet(s), for me.

Goal: Clear, Concise and Witty
whaleofyournightmare Decemberist from contemplation Since: Jul, 2011
Decemberist
#225: Jan 27th 2012 at 9:39:50 AM

I think the Moon colonies would operate like how the 13 colonies operated, which a form of what is known as Benign Neglect and it would be semi autonomous while relying on what ever nation for Defence.

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