Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Criptfeind]

If I know my stupid politics it seems that something like that could gain bipartisan support.

[alway]

Then we can finally have our fascist space marines! Yay!

[NRDL]

Really cool discussion.  My personal views:

As a space exploration/Star Wars nerd, I'd love to see a moon base.  It would be expensive as hell, sure, and I'm still trying to figure out the actual gains from this, other than social, cultural and technological advancement.  If there are actually usable minerals up there, it would probably be a good investment. 

I'm hoping that no single country or mega-corporation ( ipads on the moon...) actually does this.  What I'd actually like is for some multi-national organization
( the United Nations? ) do this for the sake of all mankind, not just a specific country or group.  If this doesn't happen, we might actually have war over who controls the big floating ball in the sky. 

[Valid_Dark]

Scientists think that the lunar core is made of metallic iron, with small amounts of sulfur and nickel. Astronomers know that the core of the Moon is probably at least partly molten.

Outside the core is the largest region of the Moon, called the mantle. The lunar mantle extends up to a distance of only 50 km below the surface of the Moon. Scientists believe that the mantle of the Moon is largely composed of the minerals olivine, orthopyroxene and clinopyroxene. It’s also believed to be more iron-rich than the Earth’s mantle.

The outermost layer of the Moon is called the crust, which extends down to a depth of 50 km. This is the layer of the Moon that scientists have gathered the most information about. The crust of the Moon is composed mostly of oxygen, silicon, magnesium, iron, calcium, and aluminum. There are also trace elements like titanium, uranium, thorium, potassium and hydrogen.

A mining/manufacturing colony could be built and the moon could be mined for materials for building other stuff in space, since it's not very practical to rocket materials into space to build stuff.

[zchris13]

Problem? About 4 inches of Lunar dust covers the moon, and that is easily diggable, but beneath that, the lunar surface is stupidly hard. It's been compacted by millions of years of meteroid impacts. Mining anything would take a while.

[Montague]

The moon's crust is 99% feldspar, olivine and other volcanic rock. Everyone here should know that olivine isn't worth anything and there is literally no shortage of it here on earth. There is nothing worth mining there. Also, if you know anything about mining you know the profit margins are razor-thin. A moonfoundry's accounting moonoffice would quickly run out of red ink to printing their quarterly reports.

 If there is some demand for zero-gravity manufacturing it could be done on a space station for significantly less. A moonbase could never turn a profit, it would just be a needless drain on resources and further accelerate the problems on earth.

Also, a permanantly settled moonbase would not be likely, even if nominally self-sufficient, it's not easy to live there. It would be incredibly dangerous all the time there and the safety requirements and low gravity would make things miserable for the people there. Once the intial novelty of living there wears off, people would need to be rotated out at great expense or otherwise everyone would develop space madness, or moonmadness in this case. Not to mention the acculmative effect of radiation exposure.

Look, we are not running out of space to house people or running out of volcanic rock or poor-quality titianium ores. We are just running out of money. We can't even get normal factories and towns on earth to prosper right now, how would a moonbase do any better?

[zchris13]

The moon's crust is 99% feldspar, olivine and other volcanic rock. Everyone here should know that olivine isn't worth anything and there is literally no shortage of it here on earth. There is nothing worth mining there. Also, if you know anything about mining you know the profit margins are razor-thin. A moonfoundry's accounting moonoffice would quickly run out of red ink to printing their quarterly reports.

 If there is some demand for zero-gravity manufacturing it could be done on a space station for significantly less. A moonbase could never turn a profit, it would just be a needless drain on resources and further accelerate the problems on earth.

Also, a permanantly settled moonbase would not be likely, even if nominally self-sufficient, it's not easy to live there. It would be incredibly dangerous all the time there and the safety requirements and low gravity would make things miserable for the people there. Once the intial novelty of living there wears off, people would need to be rotated out at great expense or otherwise everyone would develop space madness, or moonmadness in this case. Not to mention the acculmative effect of radiation exposure.

Look, we are not running out of space to house people or running out of volcanic rock or poor-quality titianium ores. We are just running out of money. We can't even get normal factories and towns on earth to prosper right now, how would a moonbase do any better?

It would be AWESOME.

[Valid_Dark]

And in SPACE !!

[sneakey pete]

If there is some demand for zero-gravity manufacturing it could be done on a space station for significantly less.

Exactly. The gravity well of the moon might be small... but its still there. You have to get anything you want to use down into it, and then get it back up and into orbit once you've made it. Asteroids are more promising, but even those are out a long way.

[Tellemurius]

The moon's crust is 99% feldspar, olivine and other volcanic rock. Everyone here should know that olivine isn't worth anything and there is literally no shortage of it here on earth. There is nothing worth mining there. Also, if you know anything about mining you know the profit margins are razor-thin. A moonfoundry's accounting moonoffice would quickly run out of red ink to printing their quarterly reports.

 If there is some demand for zero-gravity manufacturing it could be done on a space station for significantly less. A moonbase could never turn a profit, it would just be a needless drain on resources and further accelerate the problems on earth.

Also, a permanantly settled moonbase would not be likely, even if nominally self-sufficient, it's not easy to live there. It would be incredibly dangerous all the time there and the safety requirements and low gravity would make things miserable for the people there. Once the intial novelty of living there wears off, people would need to be rotated out at great expense or otherwise everyone would develop space madness, or moonmadness in this case. Not to mention the acculmative effect of radiation exposure.

Look, we are not running out of space to house people or running out of volcanic rock or poor-quality titianium ores. We are just running out of money. We can't even get normal factories and towns on earth to prosper right now, how would a moonbase do any better?

You think a space station is any cheaper? You know floating in low orbit, dodging any space trash, constantly correcting your flightpath so you don't turn into a flaming ball of metal when reentering the atmosphere isn't any cheaper. Anchoring yourself to a rock is cheaper than floating in space. Burying yourself into the rock is cheaper protection than armor. Also meteors, basic composition of those? Iron. The basic composition of moon dirt? Iron. Where are you getting your facts? Not to mention there is water that can be extracted to produce oxygen. Seriously you guys aren't thinking this through well.

If there is some demand for zero-gravity manufacturing it could be done on a space station for significantly less.

Exactly. The gravity well of the moon might be small... but its still there. You have to get anything you want to use down into it, and then get it back up and into orbit once you've made it. Asteroids are more promising, but even those are out a long way.

Considering the nonpresence of a atmosphere on the moon a energy thruster is viable for use. A asteroid has one of the most erratic gravity fields known. True they are a floating iron ball but that damn thing is more of a hazard than a damn moon in orbit close to home.

[Montague]

You think a space station is any cheaper? You know floating in low orbit, dodging any space trash, constantly correcting your flightpath so you don't turn into a flaming ball of metal when reentering the atmosphere isn't any cheaper. Anchoring yourself to a rock is cheaper than floating in space. Burying yourself into the rock is cheaper protection than armor. Also meteors, basic composition of those? Iron. The basic composition of moon dirt? Iron. Where are you getting your facts? Not to mention there is water that can be extracted to produce oxygen. Seriously you guys aren't thinking this through well.

We have water on earth, ffs. While the core of the moon is made of iron-nickle (just like the Earth) the crust of the moon is volcanic rock. As in silicon dioxide. We got lots of that here. Also, burrowing on earth is already challenging and expensive, I can't imagine the challenges of burrowing on the surface of the moon and what it'd cost to accomplish it.

A space station or orbital factory could be put into high geostationary orbit and it could be run autonomously and/or remotely and not worry about any of the dangers to human life or expense of habitation and life-support if all it needed to do is manufacture something that can't be made on earth. Space exploration/exploitation is best done with machines. The surface of the moon isn't any safer, it's more difficult and dangerous, if anything. It's hit with micrometeors constantly, bathed in radiation and the surface is covered with abrasive dust that sticks to everything, it'd be extremely difficult just to keep machines functional in that sort of enviroment, let alone people.

[Valid_Dark]

Have you seen the movie ”moon”?

[Andrew425]

I really wish Newt was serious when he said that.

Because if he was, and I was American I would think very hard about voting for him.


But in all seriousness we are looking at the wrong planets.

Venus is where we want to go. We can terraform that puppy in 20 years. Use the science from that to combat any sort of climate change on earth. Also have a near earth planet in weight.

[Tellemurius]

You think a space station is any cheaper? You know floating in low orbit, dodging any space trash, constantly correcting your flightpath so you don't turn into a flaming ball of metal when reentering the atmosphere isn't any cheaper. Anchoring yourself to a rock is cheaper than floating in space. Burying yourself into the rock is cheaper protection than armor. Also meteors, basic composition of those? Iron. The basic composition of moon dirt? Iron. Where are you getting your facts? Not to mention there is water that can be extracted to produce oxygen. Seriously you guys aren't thinking this through well.

We have water on earth, ffs. While the core of the moon is made of iron-nickle (just like the Earth) the crust of the moon is volcanic rock. As in silicon dioxide. We got lots of that here. Also, burrowing on earth is already challenging and expensive, I can't imagine the challenges of burrowing on the surface of the moon and what it'd cost to accomplish it.

A space station or orbital factory could be put into high geostationary orbit and it could be run autonomously and/or remotely and not worry about any of the dangers to human life or expense of habitation and life-support if all it needed to do is manufacture something that can't be made on earth. Space exploration/exploitation is best done with machines. The surface of the moon isn't any safer, it's more difficult and dangerous, if anything. It's hit with micrometeors constantly, bathed in radiation and the surface is covered with abrasive dust that sticks to everything, it'd be extremely difficult just to keep machines functional in that sort of enviroment, let alone people.

True but plating for a space station is alot more expensive than drilling a cavern up. Space stations also get hit with micrometeorites too. Geostationary orbit is worse as then not only we are placing ourselves into the van allen belt, the platform would then be under constant orbital correction.   Im also going for long term, without the existence of gravity the human body will degrade. Even with the crappy gravity on the moon its still better.

[10ebbor10]

I really wish Newt was serious when he said that.

Because if he was, and I was American I would think very hard about voting for him.


But in all seriousness we are looking at the wrong planets.

Venus is where we want to go. We can terraform that puppy in 20 years. Use the science from that to combat any sort of climate change on earth. Also have a near earth planet in weight.

Venus terraforming would take at least 100 years, and that wouldn't solve all the problems. The atmosphere is way to dense, full of sulphides and the planet suffers from a runaway greenhouse effect. The best thing we can do is drop some genemanipulated algae in there, wait a 100 years while they clean up a bit of the atmosphere and then we still have to build our base floating in the air because the pressure on the surface would turn us into pancakes. Also, while there would be enough oxygen in the atmosphere to breathe, the sulphides make the air extremely poisonous and corosive. Doesn't sound like a good place to live to me.

As for using the science to combat global warming on earth, forget it, the best we can get are some Co2 eating, higly acidic resistant algae.