Ask Bas Lansdorp About Going to Mars, One Way 540
NASA's been solicited ideas for exploring Mars, but Dutch entrepreneur Bas Lansdorp is already planning a different kind of trip than is likely to come from the U.S. government. Lansdorp's Mars One project has the goal of putting humans on Mars in 2022, with a twist that might dampen many people's hopes to be a Mars-exploring astronaut: the trip Lansdorp plans is one-way only. That means dramatically less fuel on board, because unlike typical Mars voyage plans, there would be no need (or ability) to carry the mechanism or the energy storage to return to Earth. If you (and three close companions) are willing to go be the first people to die on Mars, you'll also need to give up more than a pinch of privacy, because the Mars One plan to obtain the necessary funding is straightforward: create a media spectacle, and monetize it through advertising. (Note: If Elon Musk's optimistic sounding predictions are right, maybe one-way Marstronauts can get a return ticket, after all.) Many questions about the proposed journey are answered in the project's FAQ; check there before formulating questions. Ask Lansdorp about the practicalities and impracticalities of reaching Mars with as many questions as you'd like, but (lest ye be modded down) please only one question per post.
National vs. Commercial Interests (Score:2, Insightful)
Mars One plan to obtain the necessary funding is straightforward: create a media spectacle, and monetize it through advertising.
Why is it in humanity's best interest to let this initiative be led and run by business interests rather than by a government space program?
Re:Participant Psychosis? (Score:5, Insightful)
You give them a way to quickly kill themselves. The whole plan is somewhat brutal, I don't see why the final step wouldn't be included.
Just one question. (Score:4, Insightful)
Just one question: Wait, what?!
Understatement of the year (Score:5, Insightful)
"Living on Mars cannot be considered entirely risk-free, in particular during the first few years."
Ya think?
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Participant Psychosis? (Score:4, Insightful)
You give them a way to quickly kill themselves.
No need for that -- if they're on Mars, simply stepping outside will suffice.
All (Score:4, Insightful)
We all gotta die somewhere.
Re:Participant Psychosis? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, well, maybe you shouldn't apply for this. I'm sure there's some suitable people among the 7,000,000,000 others who live here.
Re:Life Insurance (Score:5, Insightful)
Huh? What? Insurance is about mitigating risk. Risk is the uncertainty of outcome. There is no risk at all in this instance... a 100% chance of death. In this case, you are offering payment for someone to essentially commit suicide. Insurance has no role here.
Re:National vs. Commercial Interests (Score:4, Insightful)
Because for the foreseeable future, no government space program is going to do anything remotely like this. If we're going to go to Mars, business interests are pretty much all we've got.
Put your lives where your mouths are (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:National vs. Commercial Interests (Score:1, Insightful)
What do you mean "let"? Why on Earth can't some people go to Mars if other people pay them to go?
Because by international treaties, the planets belongs to humanity, and are not subject to exploitation.
Also, any hope of finding traces of life on Mars might be shot if we ship life there.
This is a plan that needs to be shot down. With Reagan's ray guns if needed.
Radiation (Score:2, Insightful)
On the surface of Mars, which lacks a magnetic field (such as that of Earth) and a thick atmosphere, the inhabitants would have to endure much higher levels of ionizing radiation [wikipedia.org] in comparison to the background radiation on Earth. How are you going to shield the people on the surface? Or will this kind of danger be just another part of the risks that the "astronauts" take, like burning up on entry in the atmosphere? How much fun will it be to watch cancer patients die on Mars?
False analogies (Score:5, Insightful)
Every time manned space exploration is discussed on Slashdot, we usually see false analogies to the Age of Exploration on Earth. These analogies are false because they fail to account for the vast, vast difference between traveling to a foreign (but inhabitable and, in fact, already inhabited) continent on Earth, and traveling to a hostile desert in outer space.
Christopher Columbus made not one trip to the New World, but four. It wasn't a one-way journey and he didn't die there; he died back in Spain, a successful and wealthy man. People who went to the New World didn't do it for shits and giggles; they did it because they calculated they could be more successful there, because they thought they would be freer in America than in Europe, or in some cases because they were expelled there as convicted criminals (this latter instance was even more common with Australia). And for the most part these were rational beliefs; America had a lot of good land available, while in Europe it was mostly in the hands of a few wealthy aristocrats. (And in an agrarian society where most of the population consisted of farmers, this was a big deal.) There were plenty of natural resources in America, and once the first communities got settled, people could have a decent life there for themselves and their children. It was far enough from Europe that the European countries couldn't meddle too deeply into local affairs, but near enough that there could be an import/export trade, communication, and a return to the homeland if need be.
The same was true of America's Western frontier expansion - yes, there was an ideological element (Manifest Destiny) but the average pioneer did so because they thought they could better make their fortune out West, either by homesteading land or by prospecting for valuable minerals. And again, the land was livable and the native people had in fact been living there for thousands of years already.
None of this applies to a mission to Mars. There is literally nothing for us out there. It's a vast desert worse than any on Earth - at least in the Sahara you can breathe. How could anyone plausibly think that going to Mars would mean greater material prosperity, or more actual freedom? (Yes, there are no governments on Mars, but remember you'll be relying on supply ships from Earth, and if they don't like what you're doing up there, you can easily be cut off.)
This absurd proposal has more in common with Jonestown than with Jamestown.
Re:Power Draw? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm thinking it might be more like this.
1. We're on Mars, Hooray!
2. Set up equipment.
3. Transmit episodes of "Life On Mars".
4, Get call from producer, "You had some great content, really, but the show's been canceled by the network execs for a new user-submitted video show called Cute Puppy Antics."
5. All communication between Mars and Earth cut (show's canceled = no more budget).
6. Weeks pass.
7. Crew goes insane, kills each other.
8. Last crew member alive, as he is dying from lack of food and water, notices that the cameras have been filming the whole time.
9. Producer call comes through "Thanks. That 'going insane and killing everyone' stuff will make a great series finale."
10. Video cuts out and last crew member dies.
Re:National vs. Commercial Interests (Score:5, Insightful)
Why is it in humanity's best interest to let this initiative be led and run by business interests rather than by a government space program?
Why is it in humanity's best interest to have a government space program rather than to let this initiative be led and run by business interests?
Mars One plan to obtain the necessary funding (Score:4, Insightful)
No media spectacle in the history of the Earth has garnered 6 billion dollars.
Why should we believe that your mars landing would?
Question (Score:5, Insightful)