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Comment by Shivetya | Hacker News Reader

Not a snark, but how long before the is some sort of preservationist, nationalist, or other, declaration that the moon isn't they to be exploited.

I do not know how much is in place already with regards to regulation but you can be damn sure nations and people will be tripping over themselves once someone does find a means to make money using the moon for resources.

the fantasies of space elevators appeal the geek/nerd in many of us but as a world we are far from the need of one if not too far from being united to having one. throw in there are just enough parties with the means to damage or destroy the ground side of one if ever built

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I just finished reading the "Mars Trilogy" by Kim Stanley Robson where there is a tension between the "red" and "green" parties (first group want to keep Mars pristine, the other want to terraform it). The reds even sabotaged Mars space elevator in order to slow down emigration.

I guess it will be like Antarctica, where several countries made territorial claims[1] over it, many of them overlapping.

The UN's 1984 Moon Treaty[2] is dead letter - it has never been defied but is defunct in practice as none of the most prominent space-faring nations have ratified it.

If someone settles in the Moon you can refute their claims over territory there but what else can you do? Set an embargo? Send a military force and try to kick them out? Nuke them? Someone with knowledge and resources to colonize that desolated rock in space is not an adversary to be underestimated...

[1] http://www.antarctica.gov.au/about-antarctica/people-in-anta... [2] http://disarmament.un.org/treaties/t/moon

If they can get up there to chain themselves to the bulldozers, they can protest all they want.

I don't think there are that many parties on the moon with the means to "destroy the ground side". In fact, as of right now there are actually zero. (Though that would probably change should a lunar space elevator be developed.)

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