I’m a big space nerd, and I absolutely want to see people on Mars.
But I feel like people like this guy are grossly underestimating what it’ll take to achieve that. Mars is an arid, freezing, toxic, irradiated hell. The total round trip mission will take two years, during that time each astronaut will exceed their lifetime allowance for radiation exposure.
There WILL be deaths. That is just the nature of it. Both single persons and entire missions. People died crossing the oceans to the new world and that was a paradise compared to Mars and interplanetary space. So if we’re going, we need a better reason than just to find microbes or fossils. It needs to be worth human blood.
Wow. That was an incredible speech. Strong persuasive skills, colourful language, and passion. A very forward thinking perspective which ultimately begs the question, why not spend the money on present day concerns?
But I want to know more. I want humankind to continue pushing and reaching for knowledge. To find life on Mars, or not, is within our technological capability sooner than later and probably a worthwhile goal for the survival of our species.
Another thing to consider – no one remembers the other followers from Spain, they remember the first one (he wasn’t but history is funny like that). That idea of eternal fame likely would power a _lot_ of imagination and determination.
I agree with Armisen 100%, but I always cringe whenever people hold up Columbus as a role model for space exploration. Columbus wasn’t an explorer. He didn’t “discover” anything. He was a conqueror with unusually good luck.
You know what makes a way, way better historical example? The Polynesian expansion. Just 300 years before Columbus bumbled into a giant continent where people had been living for about ten thousand years, the Polynesians reached Rapa Nui (Easter Island), completing the expansion across the surface of the planet that our species began *two million years ago*. Moreover, the Polynesian explorers weren’t just bumbling around the Pacific at random — they used sophisticated methods to detect and locate islands they had never seen. They even used [*the same actual stars that spacecraft use today*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polynesian_navigation?useskin=vector) for navigation references to find their way around the Pacific.
If you want historical role a model for space exploration, maybe don’t go with the con man who bumbled his way across the Atlantic in the wallowing, unseaworthy tubs? Go with the steely-eyed *ho’okele wa’a* steering his fast little outrigger into the true unknown, guided by his science and his training, the vanguard of not only his own people, but of our species entire.
Sending humans to mars is a fool’s errand though. Do it with robots, it’s cheaper and easier.
You are not going to set up a colony on mars within two hundred years. It’s probably not even possible to set up a self sustaining colony. you just don’t have the minerals necessary to set up manufacturing of the items you need every day.
If pursuing Mars takes away from the effort to stop climate change, then the people in 500 years won’t think of us fondly if they even have records at all. I’m not saying that space exploration can’t be done in parallel with the transformation to a sustainable economy. But you can’t say that there is a lack of challenges even without Mars. Mars is *just optional,* other things are *critical*.
Another way civilization might fail in the next 500 years is because of political issues. We need a ways to reign in corruption/lobbyism and a way to handle globalization and information technology that changes the job-landscape and journalism.
Very glad to see this. I’ve noticed a disturbing turn where people are basically opposing everything Elon Musk proposes because he’s a jack ass.
That means that any good ideas that Elon Musk has (like going to Mars, or replacing ICEs with EVs) is getting criticised by people who don’t realise that you can criticise someone and still share some opinions with them.
Thankfully Musk isn’t the only advocate for going to Mars and Robert Zubrin has always been better at making the case than Musk ever was anyway.
1. Yes, this is interesting science.
2. The challenge: there are lots of challenges we could take on. An investment in something more rational would yield way more benefits than a boondoggle to mars.
3. The future. He’s tripping. We’re never going to expand to mars for the same reason we didn’t establish colonies in Anarctica nor is there any city on earth above 6,000 meters. We go to these places for research and exploration and resource extraction and recreation, but we do not live there even though it would be INFINITELY easier to do so than establishing colonies on Mars. And the people who do would be condemned to a miserable existence fraught with constant danger and require incredible ongoing resources just to keep them alive.
He’s high as a kite if he believes Mars is the next “New World” where “branches of civilization” will flourish. Never. Absolutely never going to happen. Not in 100 years, not in 1000 years, not in 10,000 years, not in 100,000 years. Never.
breathe, dude
How a person can walk around with that haircut baffles me.
[Nah this is why we need to visit Mars](https://youtu.be/bDIXvpjnRws?si=p2KZAHyjvWq5a2dr)
I’m a big space nerd, and I absolutely want to see people on Mars.
But I feel like people like this guy are grossly underestimating what it’ll take to achieve that. Mars is an arid, freezing, toxic, irradiated hell. The total round trip mission will take two years, during that time each astronaut will exceed their lifetime allowance for radiation exposure.
There WILL be deaths. That is just the nature of it. Both single persons and entire missions. People died crossing the oceans to the new world and that was a paradise compared to Mars and interplanetary space. So if we’re going, we need a better reason than just to find microbes or fossils. It needs to be worth human blood.
Sounds like the guy from grizzly man
Fred Armisen is right!
This guy reminds me of the joker from the dark knight
Wow. That was an incredible speech. Strong persuasive skills, colourful language, and passion. A very forward thinking perspective which ultimately begs the question, why not spend the money on present day concerns?
But I want to know more. I want humankind to continue pushing and reaching for knowledge. To find life on Mars, or not, is within our technological capability sooner than later and probably a worthwhile goal for the survival of our species.
“If you have it in your power to do something great and important and wonderful, then you should.” One of my favorite quotes.
*TerraForm Earth* ^tm.
It has a much better atmosphere, *for the time being*.
Another thing to consider – no one remembers the other followers from Spain, they remember the first one (he wasn’t but history is funny like that). That idea of eternal fame likely would power a _lot_ of imagination and determination.
Hell yeah
We haven’t been to the moon. Sheer fact that it has been 52 years since we went back. No other nation has even made the moon
I agree with Armisen 100%, but I always cringe whenever people hold up Columbus as a role model for space exploration. Columbus wasn’t an explorer. He didn’t “discover” anything. He was a conqueror with unusually good luck.
You know what makes a way, way better historical example? The Polynesian expansion. Just 300 years before Columbus bumbled into a giant continent where people had been living for about ten thousand years, the Polynesians reached Rapa Nui (Easter Island), completing the expansion across the surface of the planet that our species began *two million years ago*. Moreover, the Polynesian explorers weren’t just bumbling around the Pacific at random — they used sophisticated methods to detect and locate islands they had never seen. They even used [*the same actual stars that spacecraft use today*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polynesian_navigation?useskin=vector) for navigation references to find their way around the Pacific.
If you want historical role a model for space exploration, maybe don’t go with the con man who bumbled his way across the Atlantic in the wallowing, unseaworthy tubs? Go with the steely-eyed *ho’okele wa’a* steering his fast little outrigger into the true unknown, guided by his science and his training, the vanguard of not only his own people, but of our species entire.
Sending humans to mars is a fool’s errand though. Do it with robots, it’s cheaper and easier.
You are not going to set up a colony on mars within two hundred years. It’s probably not even possible to set up a self sustaining colony. you just don’t have the minerals necessary to set up manufacturing of the items you need every day.
Rovers and drones can do all this.
I’m on it, let’s do it.
This is more relevant today than ever…
https://www.spacedaily.com/news/oped-05zzb.html
If pursuing Mars takes away from the effort to stop climate change, then the people in 500 years won’t think of us fondly if they even have records at all. I’m not saying that space exploration can’t be done in parallel with the transformation to a sustainable economy. But you can’t say that there is a lack of challenges even without Mars. Mars is *just optional,* other things are *critical*.
Another way civilization might fail in the next 500 years is because of political issues. We need a ways to reign in corruption/lobbyism and a way to handle globalization and information technology that changes the job-landscape and journalism.
Very glad to see this. I’ve noticed a disturbing turn where people are basically opposing everything Elon Musk proposes because he’s a jack ass.
That means that any good ideas that Elon Musk has (like going to Mars, or replacing ICEs with EVs) is getting criticised by people who don’t realise that you can criticise someone and still share some opinions with them.
Thankfully Musk isn’t the only advocate for going to Mars and Robert Zubrin has always been better at making the case than Musk ever was anyway.
To his points:
1. Yes, this is interesting science.
2. The challenge: there are lots of challenges we could take on. An investment in something more rational would yield way more benefits than a boondoggle to mars.
3. The future. He’s tripping. We’re never going to expand to mars for the same reason we didn’t establish colonies in Anarctica nor is there any city on earth above 6,000 meters. We go to these places for research and exploration and resource extraction and recreation, but we do not live there even though it would be INFINITELY easier to do so than establishing colonies on Mars. And the people who do would be condemned to a miserable existence fraught with constant danger and require incredible ongoing resources just to keep them alive.
He’s high as a kite if he believes Mars is the next “New World” where “branches of civilization” will flourish. Never. Absolutely never going to happen. Not in 100 years, not in 1000 years, not in 10,000 years, not in 100,000 years. Never.