One way to Mars NO return trip

BigNick said:
Obvious scam is obvious, as the young people on the Internet say. I'm going to assume that the US is the most expensive country and maybe China is $10. So they've already pulled in well over $1 million. Not bad for a bunch of jokers, none of whom even has a PhD, who built a website and got some free publicity by being outlandish. They say themselves, they're on target for half a million applicants. Ker-chingggg!
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I'm in the US, and my fee was only $39. I'm not sure how it breaks down. Maybe Saudi Arabia or Dubai has to pay more. I didn't pay, since I'd be 67 by the time the first opportunity came, even assuming it all worked out on time. And I doubt I'd be in the first wave, or even the 100th. No credential, just enthusiasm. Plus, I'm a known cheapskate.

veremchuka said:
Come on! There's is no comparison. Those people did not leave the planet they left their homeland but they were still on a planet where there is food and other people. Times were much more difficult yet simpler then, can you really imagine leaving everything that you have available here for nothing? Dying on another planet. Food you like. Oh the list is endless I could type for an hour but I have other stuff to do. Seriously there is no comparison to what the colonists did and going to Mars.
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I disagree. It's all going into the unknown. Your reasons not to go sound exactly like what my great to the eighth grandfather would have told his son. I suspect the premature death rate of interplanetary colonists will be a little higher at than that of earlier century ones, but not by much. Remember Roanoke Island? The technology is a bit better today than it was back in the wooden ships and muzzle loader days. And the adventure! Dying on another planet isn't a problem to be avoided, it's an opportunity to be embraced. I wish I was younger, or this tech was farther along.

I also suspect the ratio of those that want to go vs those that think they (we) are crazy is probably pretty close to what it was back in the 16th century. Humanity doesn't change that much in such a short time.
 
Even he wouldn't have been worried about there not being AIR where his kids were thinking of going, would he? :facepalm:

harley said:
I disagree. It's all going into the unknown. Your reasons not to go sound exactly like what my great to the eighth grandfather would have told his son. ch was farther along.

.
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Amethyst said:
Even he wouldn't have been worried about there not being AIR where his kids were thinking of going, would he? :facepalm:
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There's going to be air. You just can't go outside and play without dressing appropriately. At least on Mars there *probably* won't be hostile natives, at least at the macroscopic level. And if there are, even cooler!
 
harley said:
There's going to be air.
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Where from? Check out how much air a scuba diver can carry. There is no vegetation. It costs about $1 million per kilogram to put a payload into space, and they're going to ship the equipment to produce indefinite air to Mars? Better get that set up before you start erecting the tents. Oh, and make sure you never, ever, ever scratch your pressure suit on the ground.

Seriously: this project is just an exercise in gullibility. Absolutely none of the numbers can possibly add up, except that half a million applicants at up to $75 a pop is a lot of money. Maybe the five or six chosen candidates will have their $75 refunded when the mission is tragically cancelled due to being ridiculous.
 
I'm not saying this trip is going to be the one that will lead to colonizing another planet, just that the opportunity is exciting and that it will hopefully happen in or shortly after my lifetime. When the time comes for a properly planned (not government managed) colonization effort there will be plenty of people who want to go, and orders of magnitudes more telling them they're crazy. In most things I'm pretty conservative, but in this one I'm definitely among the crazy.
 
For an ER bunch, seems all are missing the ER aspect of this deal.

For a young couple it is an all expenses paid trip, with full accomodations, ie. food, shelter, fuel provided at US taxpayer's expense for life. To an exotic place. However short it may be.:LOL:

Are divorce court fees included? Dunno. Full medical care included, with remote robotic surgery tossed in if necessary.

What will any offspring's citizenship be?
 
I'm saving my Discovercard points for one of those neat cryo-beds like in Alien.
 
I disagree. It's all going into the unknown. Your reasons not to go sound exactly like what my great to the eighth grandfather would have told his son. I suspect the premature death rate of interplanetary colonists will be a little higher at than that of earlier century ones, but not by much. Remember Roanoke Island? The technology is a bit better today than it was back in the wooden ships and muzzle loader days. And the adventure! Dying on another planet isn't a problem to be avoided, it's an opportunity to be embraced. I wish I was younger, or this tech was farther along.
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Harley you can have my seat!
 
harley said:
I'm not saying this trip is going to be the one that will lead to colonizing another planet, just that the opportunity is exciting and that it will hopefully happen in or shortly after my lifetime. When the time comes for a properly planned (not government managed) colonization effort there will be plenty of people who want to go, and orders of magnitudes more telling them they're crazy. In most things I'm pretty conservative, but in this one I'm definitely among the crazy.
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The only people crazy enough to actually want to go, would become so psychotic on the voyage that they'd kill themselves and everyone else on the ship.

But if you want to get a feel for it, by all means go and spend a year in the Antarctic (in a cabin, not at a research station; they have running water and electric heating). Mars is probably only about 10 times harder to survive than that.
 
ls99 said:
For a young couple it is an all expenses paid trip, with full accomodations, ie. food, shelter, fuel provided at US taxpayer's expense for life. To an exotic place. However short it may be.:LOL:
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It's neither government-funded, nor a US company. The company going for the project is a private Dutch group. They wanted to fund it media-frenzy style, basically turning it into a lifelong run of Big Brother--- in Space!

BigNick said:
But if you want to get a feel for it, by all means go and spend a year in the Antarctic (in a cabin, not at a research station; they have running water and electric heating). Mars is probably only about 10 times harder to survive than that.
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Anyone chosen has to spend 6 years in a recreation of the colony here on Earth. During that time, the cargo missions and atmospheric preparations would be made on Mars, according to the plan outlined on the group's website, with water, atmosphere, and oxygen production systems being fully in place by 2022, and the first group landing in 2023, and more groups of colonists arriving every two years after that. I'd watch this show :p
 
Arifriekinel said:
Anyone chosen has to spend 6 years in a recreation of the colony here on Earth. During that time, the cargo missions and atmospheric preparations would be made on Mars, according to the plan outlined on the group's website, with water, atmosphere, and oxygen production systems being fully in place by 2022, and the first group landing in 2023, and more groups of colonists arriving every two years after that. I'd watch this show :p
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Oh so that isn't so bad then I mean you can call out for pizza, Chinese maybe still get ice cream. :rolleyes: Maybe I'll go to Mars after all. :LOL:
 
I think it is a little bit early. If they can develop some magic carbon nanotube dome AND they find a spot with frozen water, perhaps some sort of biosystem could be set up. They would probably need to go nuclear for power.

I would say we are about 40 to 50 years out...which is sad...I might not get to see it.
 
MichaelB said:
Can we sign up others? I'll pay the way for a couple of siblings and even offer up a few of my own darling offspring (in the best interest of advancing science and humanity, of course)
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And me for my sister....
 
Arifriekinel said:
It's neither government-funded, nor a US company. The company going for the project is a private Dutch group. They wanted to fund it media-frenzy style, basically turning it into a lifelong run of Big Brother--- in Space!


:p
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OK. Stand corrected on the funding and company. The ER aspects remain.
 
veremchuka said:
Come on! There's is no comparison. Those people did not leave the planet they left their homeland but they were still on a planet where there is food and other people. Times were much more difficult yet simpler then, can you really imagine leaving everything that you have available here for nothing? Dying on another planet. Food you like. Oh the list is endless I could type for an hour but I have other stuff to do. Seriously there is no comparison to what the colonists did and going to Mars.
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Not really disagreeing with you, but I recently read a story about the first missionaries to Hawaii. They packed all of their belongings for the trip - in their own coffins. No, it wasn't Mars, but there was NO return planned. Talk about commitment. YMMV
 
Yes that was and so was crossing the Atlantic ocean coming to the new world. But my point, and I'm not arguing with you either, is going to Mars knowing you will never return to Earth I think is different. IMO it is crazy, there are just millions of reasons why going from here to there is just not a reasonable thing to do. Go and return, that's different, but to stay there I just don't get it.
 
Exactly. Some (most) people stay, and some people go. It's sort of like mortgage vs pay off the house. Everybody has their opinion, and nobody ever convinces the other side. Plus, say you were 25 or 30 when this concept (assuming it's legit, and would work, and everything) started, and you went to Mars. There's nothing saying that in 20 years or so if you are still alive that space travel wouldn't have been improved enough that you could come back. I understand the concept of gravity/atrophy and all that, but still, it would be entirely possible in a younger person's lifetime. Not mine, I'd be packing my stuff in my cremation urn like the missionaries. But tech doesn't stand still. I'm sure there's a Moore's law equivalent in space travel.

It won't happen in time for me, but if it did and I could qualify and get there, I'd go. Even knowing I wouldn't come back. Just like you can't imagine going, I can't imagine not going.

Edit: I'm curious? Am I the only one here that feels this way? Again, not tying the question to this particular mission, just the concept of a (potentially) workable Mars colony, although with little to no chance of returning.
 
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Humans need breathable air, potable water, and of course food to live. None of that is on Mars. Cross the Atlantic, the Pacific, whatever humans know they will be able to get those 3 requirements of life. I don't see a trip to Mars as comparable to what the first European settlers attempted on America, or the missionaries to Hawaii.
I'd love to experience what it would be like to set foot on another planet....but only if it took at most a month to get there, stay a few days, and then head on home. And, of course, with assurances of no danger from radiation. Failing that, I'll stay on terra firma.
 
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