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[Duuvian]

Do we have the technology to land some sort of equiptment on an asteroid body that would theoretically be able to give that asteroid some form of propulsion in our general direction at least?

If we have that, do we have the ability to design such a propulsion device that it would be able to maneuver the asteroid into the orbit of the earth or even the moon?

Basically, if governments wanted to invest in the future it would not be a bad idea to start getting some sort of private space industry working and hint at those 20$trillion dollar asterioids out there if someone can get them into orbit of earth (or safer the moon)

The way I'd see it is the government in question offers a company 10 or 15$ trillion for a 20$ trillion dollar asteroid if they can park it in orbit. Then they could sell it to a second different unaffiliated company for 18$ trillion minus the cost of space manufactures that would refine the ore into it's shipping form (as long as it's <2$trillion in start up capital cost or similar maths)

First you'd want to spectrograph the asteroids to determine it's component atoms, but I'm hoping that astrologer(s) somewhere are doing that. I think I saw it on television not too long ago that they were doing spectrographs on the surfaces of asteroids already with unmanned ships.

EDIT: Also, after the first giant hunk of metal there is the possibility that it would influence the supply of metals and thus they wouldn't be worth 20trillion$ anymore. Alternatively, space habitats probably could use all the metal they can get, and if you built those with the ore you wouldn't have to bring it down to earth. It would be a whole separate and unique economy.

[counting]

There is a slight delay of my internet connection, and I didn't expect such quick replies on this topic. There are several points I'd like to share.

1. People do always use "CURRENT" data to extrapolate the future. It's like you measure the European population in 1500 of 50 millions and said that the world total population can never exceeded 1 billion (Europe is just about 7% of world land area). You should not limit your imaginations when things are happening in 500 years or more.

2. Earthling like to think 2d only. Why only lived on the "Surface"? You know I already mentioned in the post that when population reach that level, it's highly unlikely people will live like now. You can dig down and lived underground, live in the floating platform, or living in space. Only sky is the limit. If we all lived like medieval villagers or in castles, I don't think our ancestors can imagine what's like living in skyscrapers in modern city.

3. It's actually easy to colonize Mars in my opinion. Since we don't need to bring water, airs, most the raw materials to Mars to build colonies. And the gravity is suitable (to live and growing plants) without too much artificial means. And traveling in space is not like driving car. Most fuels are used when take off. When you are in space, there is no extra fuel needed to go to the Moon or Mars, or even Jupiter. All you need is time. So the first step may not to colonize using giant space cylinders. But simple rockets to the Mars using local materials to build simple colonies. And all the current techs can be easily modified to suit Mars environment. It's much more work and lot of extra materials needed to start up the Moon colonies. And the distance will also force the Mars colonies to self sustain more.

[counting]

Do we have the technology to land some sort of equiptment on an asteroid body that would theoretically be able to give that asteroid some form of propulsion in our general direction at least?
...

The problem in space is often something counter intuitive with things on Earth. It's not hard to move  and redirect objects in space, since there is nearly no resistance. A slow and low yield rocket can easily accelerate a city size asteroid. It's the problem of slowing them down when it's near Earth. If not carefully, it will create a giant crater on Earth and wipe out civilizations. (Or just pick those asteroids which will burn out in atmosphere)

But it's doable. Just not that appealing to mining industries right now. They lack the equipments and know-how for such operations. If the asteroid is too small, its not worth the effort. If it's too large than it's hard to control, and we have zero experience about how to evaluate that, and it's supporting industries and infrastructures (like giant smelting factory in earth orbit) don't exist yet.

[Pnx]

In any case, I think humanity's ability to survive the future hinges on creating a space elevator (which currently we technically have the technology to do, although I think it still needs some development). If we don't make one, we're stuck with the massive costs of space travel, which probably means we'll just keep dropping satelites, and doing scientific missions. What concerns me is all the questions of making one, can we even keep it up there without the weather breaking it? Or debris smashing into it? If it's inevitable, how long will it take? What's the gamble? There's a chance we might not actually make it into space before our resources here are exhausted. They really aren't infinite, and we're going through them pretty fast.

Another thing I'm interested in is what mars would be like to live on. Considering it has ~1/3rd the gravity of earth, I don't know if it could sustain an atmosphere people are capable of breathing for extended periods of time (of course hab domes are more than possible, but that adds a whole bunch of difficulties... which can be overcome).
And then there's the question of what that gravity would do to human development. Zero-G is horrible for your health, how bad is 1/3G? Can you live in 1/3G? What's the life expectancy on an overgrown martian... I think genetic engineering could take care of those difficulties... it is of course a pretty sure bet humanity will one day no longer be humanity.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

We don't really know the effects of 0.3G on the human body, but we do already have devices that can be used to simulate Earth's gravity and keep your bones stable.

[Maggarg - Eater of chicke]

To SPEHSS!

[Il Palazzo]

I want to be smug and snarky. Can I be smug and snarky? I'll be smug and snarky.

BAD SCIENCE DETECTED IN THE THREAD!

[GlyphGryph]

Quite a bit of it too!

But yeah, I honestly think we're going to have a lot more stacking up and down before we start considering living out in space, or even under the oceans (which is in many ways more epensive and problematic than space)/

[Lord Shonus]

The technology for a constant-boost refinery ship is available now. There is no logical reason to move asteroids to Earth orbit when you can mine them in-place and either ship the finished resources back to Earth (fairly cheaply once it gets going) or use them to build facilities Out There. There's already at least three planets in this star system that could be used for colonization with only evolutionary technology (in other words, tech that grows naturally from what exists now as opposed to revolutionary development.) Luna is close enough to Earth that shipping the raw materials for a colony would only be massively expensive instead of prohibitally expensive. The massively thick venusian atmosphere, while an obstacle, also contains enough hydrogen and oxygen to make a colony viable, along with a host of other gases that have industrial uses. Mars is an obvious choice due to the presence of accessible water that can be turned into air as well as used for water. The costs would be massive, and investment in this field is not particularly attractive at this time. But the technology exists to do it.

[counting]

About the costs going to Mars, and colonizing, you can read Robert Zubrin's books

The Case for Mars: The Plan to Settle the Red Planet and Why We Must (1997)

Entering Space: Creating a Spacefaring Civilization (2000)

We already able to do that with affordable costs even back in 90's. And lift off techs are not just limited to space elevators. There are two stage lunch, flying to upper atmosphere with planes, than lunch the sub-small-shuttle with less fuel costs, or trajectory lunch. There is using ground acceleration rail guns to shoot up cargo. (electromagnetic power, or other wise sling shoot, but human can't take the G force using this method, so early lunching techs neglected its development). Rocketry is simply the most well development tech to use since WWII. Even rocketry can use nuclear power to propel. (repel compressed gas as plasma using strong electromagnetic field generated by nuclear powered generator, already been used in deep space probes), but it's development hit the rock with political issue.

[Lord Shonus]

A nuclear ion drive is pretty much essential for a constant-boost drive, which is pretty much neccessary if you want to make an interplanetary flight in a reasonable time period.

[counting]

I like to think that there is not only one way in a future of 1 trillion population world as space colonization. People can be like dwarfs, and digging into Earth and using the energy within Earth, and minerals deep inside Earth core, creating mass living space in the process as well.

But space colonization is a better development, since once you take the first step, regarding where, it's easier to expand outward and multiplied. And who doesn't dream about giant spaceship when they grow up. (At least in my generation, I can't say how younger generation is thinking about)

[Maggarg - Eater of chicke]

I like to think that there is not only one way in a future of 1 trillion population world as space colonization. People can be like dwarfs, and digging into Earth and using the energy within Earth, and minerals deep inside Earth core, creating mass living space in the process as well.

But space colonization is a better development, since once you take the first step, regarding where, it's easier to expand outward and multiplied. And who doesn't dream about giant spaceship when they grow up. (At least in my generation, I can't say how younger generation is thinking about)

Nah, it's still spaceships.

[Akura]

And who doesn't dream about giant spaceship when they grow up. (At least in my generation, I can't say how younger generation is thinking about)

Unless you and I are the same age, yeah, I always wanted to see interstellar flight. Otherwise, kids theses days, they have no imagination. It's kinda sad, but seeing that at least some of the technology for it is currently feasible is a big lift.

Colonizing Luna(I love the name Luna, it's so much better than calling it "The Moon") would be a pretty good idea, since the last I checked, its crust contains a lot of titanium oxide, the refining of which would provide both breathable oxygen and titanium for ship/habitat construction. Mars is also extremely useful, with large quantities of iron, much of which is readily available in usable nuggets on the surface. I've never really thought about Venus, although in Tachyon: The Fringe, Venus' atmosphere is terraformed as part of some the extra fluff in the storyline.

[Lord Shonus]

The value of venus is in the extremely rich atmosphere, which would be a great boon to a subterranean (subvenusian?) colony.