Mission to Mars: Why Space Travel is Needed.

self | 7/25/02 | self

[Age of Reason]

The correct answer is: an opportunity to vote with your feet. Freedom is the wealth in space.

That's ironic--in outer space, room equals freedom. What about here on Earth?

LOL.

Whenever I suggest America stop immigration because the crowding is taking away our freedom, there's always some poster out there that quotes Limbaugh's howler about how the entire population of planet earth can fit in Texas with room to spare.

Freedom is vast green areas, clean bodies of water and fresh air from blue skies--not blackness and an oxygen mask and the slavery needed to maintain a glass bubble over your neighborhood (it's bad enough when your neighbors make you mow your lawn--I sure don't like the idea of doing windows in some monstrous geodesic domed space greenhouse).

Instead of colonizing Mars, it's better to simply stop immigration.

Then we'd have plenty of room here in America.

[Pagey]

Jeopardy Question
Answer: Why Space Travel is Needed.

Question:What is: "the only legal way to marginalize #42"?

[RightWhale]

A similar thread:

Space Exploration: Why it is Needed

[Atlas Sneezed]

"I'm damn glad the folks that financed Columbus weren't as narrow minded as you are."

Who paid for the glory of Isabella?

The slaves? Do you admire that?

Is it narrow minded to think that people should decide for themselves how to spend the fruits of their labors. Do you and big government know best?

[Atlas Sneezed]

"The IMAX® film format is so large that the film canisters in the IMAX® camera can only hold 3 minutes of film at a time."

OK. So we will have a "Manhattan Project" of film formats, and create someting for 1/1000th the cost of a manned mission so that the masses can have their filmed circuses of more than 3 minutes length. Satisfied?

[Atlas Sneezed]

"...look at another angle - there are millions of folks on earth with "mobility" impairments..."

What percentage of my earning do you need to keep them happy?

[Consort]

...Mars flag.

[CJ Wolf]

Mission to Mars: Why Space Travel is Needed.

well duh...If you wish to travel to Mars you have to use space travel. How else you gonna get there, teleportation?

[Don Joe]

Simple solution: use Kodachrome.

35mm Kodachrome will beat the snot out of 70mm anythingelsechrome (or anythingelsecolor).

Since it's a reversal film, it will need to have an internegative made so that large numbers of prints can be distributed, but a 70mm (or 90mm) internegative generation would probably be capable of capturing most of what the Kodachrome original had captured.

Or, the original reversal film can be scanned, and then prints (of any desired format) printed via a digital-to-film printer directly onto the release print film.

Of course, this is all moot, as none of it will ever happen.

[hedgetrimmer]

Mars exploration is a great goal. Bring the awe and mystery of space to kids at school. Help them to become scientists and astronauts. Mars exploration will be a no-brainer if we raise children with strength, wit and vision. They will go. Nothing will stop them.

[general_re]

Simple solution: use Kodachrome.

35mm Kodachrome will beat the snot out of 70mm anythingelsechrome (or anythingelsecolor).

Hmmm. 8+ months for the film to return to earth, plus three weeks for developing...how about some nice E-6? Better color saturation anyway ;)

[morjon]

From reading your posts, I'd say that me and big Govt know better than you. Yep.

[Knitebane]

I'm damn glad the folks that financed Columbus weren't as narrow minded as you are.

Seems I remember from my history lessons that Isabella sold her personal jewelry to pay for the trip. The money didn't come from public funds.

If every federal elected official, executive branch appointee and federal judge dug deep and coughed up $500,000 each, we could go back to the moon.

If you threw it open to citizens to donate money too, you could probably fund the Mars mission.

And if the private sector was given the money instead of letting NASA blow it, we could probably go to Mars for about a billion dollars.

And all without extorting money from the public.

Extort: Latin : to obtain from a person by force or threat of force. See: income tax

[camle]

as I sent you in your mail, wouldn't it be better for them to earn their own keep, like you and I? I'm not necessarily talking about a GOVERNMENT project because we all know how they turn out, but rather something private, long term, and with a positive benifit greater than the sum of it's parts.

Mars is an unworthy goal, it must be only a starting point. We need to colonize space, obtain new sources of raw marerials, food, etc., plus room for humanity to continue to expand and prosper. We need true long term thinking.

[camle]

nice flag, but where's Marvin?

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

Mmmmm. Ok.

[Scarlet Pimpernel]

"What percentage of my earning do you need to keep them happy?"
I am not without sympathy for your position, but I still think you are not seeing the bigger picture.
100% of my earnings would not have been possible without the space program. The space program, as flawed as it was and still is, created far more wealth than it consumed. I would prefer a free country where people are not discouraged by taxation and regulation from investing in space, but either way, space exploration is a bargain.

[Twodees]

You sound like a Green. I've read the book and I know how this all comes out. You're working yourself into a lather over something that will never happen.

Mars my butt.

[camle]

oh beleive me, I ain't no green! (dem's fitin' words!):-)I beleive in utilizing the resources God put at our disposal. My point is thet some of these resources exit on other planets, and we need to get to them. The "Green" argument uses the libs' lunacy against them.

[sweetliberty]

Darn! I thought you were gonna say because it would give us someplace to send liberals.