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[Madman198237]

Footprints are the first step. Sustaining momentum is the hard part, and asteroid mining will not get us there, sadly enough. The problem is that it is NOT more efficient or cheaper to collect material in space and ship it down through our atmosphere to the surface---even collecting and mining one largeish asteroid is a large-scale space mission. However, it IS a good idea to provide for extended large-scale space missions...but then you need a reason to do extended large-scale space missions, and we're back to square one.

Anyway, sorry for the derail, maybe this should go to the science thread?

[Bralbaard]

America has not been capable of manned space flight since 2011, only china and russia have active human spacecraft. That is likely to change soon-ish, but Mars before Trumps term is over seems a bit of a far fetch :-). I think Trump will have to settle for "return Americans to space" before the end of his term.

[Madman198237]

We have SpaceX and United Launch Systems IIRC who have manned capabilities now. No, they're not the US government, but their manned programs are governed by NASA rules and whatnot anyway, so, close enough.

[Bralbaard]

Not yet, Spacex will actually test their manned capsule in an actual launch next week, but they will need to do a in flight abort as well before it is considered OK to fly actual people. They expect to launch a manned version before the end of the year, but realistically that is likely to slip. ULA is on a similar but slightly slower schedule.

A lot of exiting developments to be sure, and SpaceX especially is planning grander things than that. I'm actually quite optimistic that there will be actual progress in manned spaceflight over the next decade. We might actually get back to the moon and on our way to mars, but we're not there yet, and if the last four decades of manned spaceflight are anything to go by, we should not expect miracles.

[Trekkin]

You've been making a lot of assertions without a lot of proof or sources, Madman198237 -- and several of them have been flatly wrong. Maybe take a step back?

[Madman198237]

You've been making a lot of assertions without a lot of proof or sources, Madman198237 -- and several of them have been flatly wrong. Maybe take a step back?

Aren't we all?

As for the SpaceX thing, huh. I thought they (and their competitor) had already moved to manned spaceflight. I can only assume that I had at some point confused an expected date of manned flight with the real one.

[Trekkin]

You've been making a lot of assertions without a lot of proof or sources, Madman198237 -- and several of them have been flatly wrong. Maybe take a step back?

Aren't we all?

Well, we've certainly got a surfeit of people over-willing to talk about things well outside their areas of expertise, but that's no excuse for sloppiness. Here, for example:

oh and the pesky necessity of waiting for the proper alignment of Mars and Earth AFTER all that other stuff is done.

Surely you know that launch windows are a byproduct of reliance on Hohmann transfer orbits, since they require a specific point in the synodic period, and are only a necessity in that context -- which might be petty quibbling, Brachistochrone curves being as energy-intensive as they are, were it not for the concomitant reduction in trip time and therefore radiation exposure relative to career limit making things like VASIMR more appealing options. It's not a necessity by any stretch, and in fact represents an optimum for characteristics we don't want for manned flight.

[Madman198237]

Of course I am in fact aware of that reliance, but even using electromagnetic propulsion like ion engines and VASIMR or packing extra fuel [and thus being able to make use of less-efficient but faster transfer orbits] STILL requires you to be at the right position in orbits relative to Mars, to minimize trip duration so those squishy human components don't soak up quite as much radiation as they would if you just launched whenever you were ready.

[hector13]

So... the Art of the Deal is throwing a tantrum for a month then giving up?

I guess we'll have an interesting three weeks with the CR, then. Perhaps he'll use the tried and tested stick-your-fingers-in-your-ears-while-shouting-LALALAICAN'THEARYOULALALA technique.

[Madman198237]

Clearly, Trump is the best at deals.

At least SOMEBODY grew enough neurons to form a synapse and backed down. Honestly, shutting down the government is bad enough, but crippling TSA and many other government institutions and harming so many government employees and their families? Reprehensible on the parts of everyone presently in office.

[pikachu17]

Yeah, but they can easily say it was the Democrat's fault for refusing to accept the 'reasonable' deal.

[Max™]

Footprints and a flag on mars would be a grave disservice. There's noplace else in the solar system that's more appropriate to settling (don't give me crap about floating Venusian cities, let's try building one city floating on water before we try it over an ocean of vaporized acid).

But to do that, we need to do it smart. Start with with a new generation of NASA lifters. Move into asteroid mining and space industry. That's where the real money is. Land on Ryuguor something and make something like $30 billion dollars of profit. More money by far will be made in the industrial boom that infusion of metal and cash will have on the economy.

Then you can afford a serious investment in a Mars colony that will have the potential to be self-sufficient.

Self sufficient on Mars? It's got such a wispy atmosphere the only real benefit of Mars vs orbital which you get is gravity without needing to spin something. Dropping a tube of air with a sulfuric acid resistant coating into the upper Venusian clouds really isn't harder than making something which has to sustain slightly less of a pressure differential than an actual space station. You punch a hole in your Venus cloudtube and it stinks, you punch a hole in your Mars dustcanister and you're going to experience what might be a very interesting death.

You fall to get to Venus, you climb to get to Mars, I mean, yeah, watching boots on soil would be a neat stunt while elsewhere dudes are living in a literal cloud city and discovering how long it takes to get sick of "I have altered the deal" jokes.

Also: did Trump hire a mouse to be press secretary?

Who knows?!?!

[Trekkin]

So... the Art of the Deal is throwing a tantrum for a month then giving up?

Per the actual book, yes; the idea is that you only make deals you can afford to lose, then threaten to let them fall through until you get everything you want and more concessions on top of that for good measure, because your opposite party wants a bad deal more than they want no deal at all.

It's exactly the kind of approach you might expect someone who's come to rely on other people to bail them out to take, and in that context it works -- but one of its obvious fail conditions is when you try it on a deal you need. Trump, by all accounts, didn't understand that the shutdown was such a deal.

[pikachu17]

Also: did Trump hire a mouse to be press secretary?

Who knows?!?!

Clearly, someone told Cadet Bonespurs that never before in the history of the world had a president instated a mouse as press secretary.

[Madman198237]

Self sufficient on Mars? It's got such a wispy atmosphere the only real benefit of Mars vs orbital which you get is gravity without needing to spin something. Dropping a tube of air with a sulfuric acid resistant coating into the upper Venusian clouds really isn't harder than making something which has to sustain slightly less of a pressure differential than an actual space station. You punch a hole in your Venus cloudtube and it stinks, you punch a hole in your Mars dustcanister and you're going to experience what might be a very interesting death.

You fall to get to Venus, you climb to get to Mars, I mean, yeah, watching boots on soil would be a neat stunt while elsewhere dudes are living in a literal cloud city and discovering how long it takes to get sick of "I have altered the deal" jokes.
-snip-

It's actually HARDER to "fall" in the Solar System than it is to go out. Weird consequence of orbital mechanics. In order to "fall" (highly inaccurate verbiage) to Venus, you have to slow your "sideways" motion. Perhaps it's easier to explain and think of in an energy sense:

Things in larger orbits ("higher" orbits, perhaps) have more energy. In order to switch to a lower orbit, you must lose energy. In order to get to a higher orbit, you must gain energy. It turns out that losing enough energy to reach Venus is not substantially less difficult than gaining enough energy to reach Mars, at least not using ideal Hohmann transfer orbits.

Mars, you can land, go outside, build a nice sheltered place underground with a contained atmosphere, and maybe even make use of the sunlight. On Venus, if you use glass it'll be eaten away by acid, you can never go outside, and you can afford exactly zero failures in your habitable space, because it there's a failure you fall out of the sky and burn, or you burn and then fall out of the sky, or you sink a little bit before being crushed and burned, or....you get the point.