Buzz Aldrin: Get to Mars within 20 years | Hacker News Reader

Buzz Aldrin: Get to Mars within 20 years

lightyears.blogs.cnn.com

59 pointsevo_943 comments

What really bugs me about Mars how much of a political opportunity it is for a president to reverse the economic and scientific atrophy that plauges the US. One of the big factors in economic recovery is morale - if people don't have faith in their country, government, or monetary system; how can you expect them to be productive members of society?

If you were to ask any person what they thought US's most notable achievement was - it's not unlikely they'll mention the moon landing. The moon landing was such a milestone, such a landmark achievement - it sent nationalism through the roof. That kind of pride and fervor would be extremely over the next few years, not only in economic recovery, but in growth and expansion of tech related fields.

All it would take is one very good speech I think, to inspire the nation and light the fire under US's latent tech reserves. Something kinda like Reagan's speeches - which felt like pep talks more than presidential speeches, linking the economic, political, and cultural muscle of America's yesterday to the moon landing. There's a lot of people out there who feel like America's golden days have passed, so I don't think it would be horribly difficult to link those prosperous times with the moon landing. At the end they could sign off with something like what Aldrin mentioned in his article; “I believe this nation should commit itself, within two decades, to commencing American permanence on the planet Mars.”

The only difference between Kennedy's speech and the Mars speech would be that Kennedy's was used to win the cold war, and the mars speech would be used to fix internal economic strife.

What really bugs me about Mars how much of a political opportunity it is for a president to reverse the economic and scientific atrophy that plauges the US.

The president that will get credit for landing a man on Mars is the president 20 years later, not the president that initiates the program in the first place.

Other than at the height of the lunar landing program, most Americans think it's a waste.

The only difference between Kennedy's speech and the Mars speech would be that Kennedy's was used to win the cold war, and the mars speech would be used to fix internal economic strife.

I don't think the space program alone is going to fix our underlying maladies, but it will help.

Are you sure on the first part? My read of the historical narrative is that folks attribute the success of Apollo to JFK, not Nixon, and not Johnson. However wrong or right.

(It should be pointed out that I was born in the mid-80s, and am frequently distracted by cat memes. But I have briefly worked for NASA.)

I'm not saying you're right or wrong, but I am saying if you're wrong, it's because history tends to treat assassinated persons overly well (provided they were in good standing in the first place).

He's absolutely right and while the assassination certainly "helped" cement his legacy, the reason we give Kennedy most of the political credit is because he got the ball rolling on the national political stage and he was a great speaker.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwFvJog2dMw

Watching this video makes me extremely sad because that's 1962. Here we are 51 (fifty fucking one!) years later and I can't begin to imagine a modern US president making a speech like this.

"Not because they are easy, but because they are hard!"

I don't know, man. I'm 24. For all I know, Harry Truman was a great speaker and we in modern times just aren't as familiar with his material. Nixon v Kennedy was the first GE with televised debates, was it not? And are not modern, TV-viewing American unwilling to listen to someone's speech if they can't watch it too? FDR had those "fireside chats" on radio, what was it, weekly? I've never once heard more than a ten second clip from one.

Furthermore, Kennedy was president during the narrow "American togetherness" window after WWII and before Vietnam, giving him the room to say, "Hey, let's we do this thing." Nowadays "we" can't do anything except "step up on education" and "not negotiate with terrorists." Anything more asks too much from a public that relishes picking sides for the sake of picking sides.

Only because JFK died and it was a memorial project. If he hadn't died, Johnson (or whoever succeeded JFK in 1968 (or '64, who knows?)) would have gotten the credit, if we'd made it by '69 in the first place - doubtful.

Besides, if the president who proposes Mars will get the credit, that'll be Bush. The president who actually pays for it will lose.

>Other than at the height of the lunar landing program, most Americans think it's a waste.

I think this has to do with the lack of notable "stuff" nasa has been doing over the past few dozen years because of budget constraints. People think nasa takes up a huge amount of the budget, and then when they hear that all they've been doing over the last few decades is LEO/probe work, it's not hard to imagine that a layman would be unsatisified with them.

>I don't think the space program alone is going to fix our underlying maladies, but it will help.

You're absolutely right on this. It certainly wont fix the problem, but finding a reason to dump a few hundred billion dollars into an agency that brings up to 14x economic returns in addition to a boost in national pride is a pretty good investment.[1]

[1] http://www.nationaljournal.com/njonline/no_20100827_1798.php

> I think this has to do with the lack of notable "stuff" nasa has been doing over the past few dozen years because of budget constraints.

No, it has to do with 90% of NASA's current work having no benefit to the day-to-day life of 90% of Americans.

> It certainly wont fix the problem, but finding a reason to dump a few hundred billion dollars into an agency that brings up to 14x economic returns in addition to a boost in national pride is a pretty good investment

Your citation:

> Some early academic and other studies “made very ‘generous’ assumptions about the spinoffs, goods and services produced as a result of NASA’s investments,” G. Scott Hubbard, a consulting professor at Stanford University, said in an e-mail. A study commissioned by Hubbard in the mid-2000s when he was director of NASA’s Ames Research Center in California on the center’s local economic impact found a “more conservative” 2- to 3-to-1 ratio.

So 14x isn't realistic, more like 2-3x. And there's no comparison with other public investments. Obama said the Human Genome Project returned 140x. One study said highway investment returned 52x in the 1950-1991 period [1]. Public preschooling allegedly returns 7x [2]. What about reducing crime, subsidizing college tuition, medical research? All of these things, by the way, are exactly what people mean when they say NASA is a waste and that problems "at home" should be addressed instead. I think these concerns are legitimate and should not be waved off as "not caring about science" (doing so definitely alienates those whose support you're trying get though). We all live on Earth.

Announcing a Mars mission won't bring national pride. Completing it will. The only way that will happen, and I'm certain it will, is a space race against China, once they solidify their currently vague space ambitions [3]. I hate to say it, but it was jingoism which spurred Apollo, and it will be the same with a mission to Mars.

[1] 32% per annum simple interest over 40 years, http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/policy/nadiri2.htm

[2] http://www.ed.gov/blog/2013/04/obama-administration-budget-m...

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_space_program#Mission_...

90% of NASA's current work having no benefit to the day-to-day life of 90% of Americans.

Not that Americans have ever understood the ROI of space research. Most of them don't know NASA makes their satellite weather a possibility - most of them don't even know that without satellites we wouldn't have even the forecast accuracy we do. Most of them don't know NASA makes their TV possible. All they know is the moon landings, and that was eons ago.

Add that to the fact that Americans have absolutely no idea how their tax dollars are spent, and bam - asking Americans about spending policy is just time wasted.

  | it will be the same with a mission to Mars.

At a national level, maybe, but Elon Musk/SpaceX have ambitions of Mars. We may see the private sector make it to Mars first.

The president that will get credit for landing a man on Mars is the president 20 years later, not the president that initiates the program in the first place.

Are you sure? I don't think many people give Nixon credit for the moon landings.

>The only difference between Kennedy's speech and the Mars speech would be that Kennedy's was used to win the cold war, and the mars speech would be used to fix internal economic strife.

With all due respect, I am continually surprised by STEM folk who make this Mars argument. Kennedy-Moon Landing was one data point. That's not to say "we need more data" or something stupid like that, rather realize that in predicting data point #2 will be just as successful in every way, shape, and form as was data point #1, you are extrapolating a general trend from the single most unique event in human history.

It's impossible to get just as excited about Mars as everyone was about the Moon. (Yes, yes, a second green planet would be cool; the concept of terraforming is news to no one.) By the time anyone sets foot on Mars, it will have been longer between the Moon and Mars than it was between the Wright Brothers and the Moon. That's your context for how impressed the public is capable of being.

It's not going to be the least bit inspiring to send people to Mars and plant a flag, or ride around in a rover. Find a reason to go there and stay. If we could at least colonize it that would be some motivation.

If you want to drive the cost to get to Mars down, game it in some way. The X-Prizes seem to be an effective way to get lots of people working on various problems.

http://www.googlelunarxprize.org/

This technique has worked for centuries:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Longitude_prize

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orteig_Prize

> It's not going to be the least bit inspiring to send people to Mars and plant a flag, or ride around in a rover.

Uhh... it would definitely be at least a bit inspiring.

Nope. In fact, it would probably be demoralizing because the public's appetite for spending money on the space program would probably be exhausted.

We've already ventured off the planent. Now we need to figure out a way to permanently leave the planet. What's the most effective way? Expensive manned missions to Mars is not the place to start.

I fully agree. But only because an American colony on Mars would be aesthetically preferable to a SpaceX corporate colony on Mars, where colonists'd predictably work fifteen year sentences as indentured servant miners to pay off their voyage.

Also, an extension of our country on another planet would probably be the first move toward humans getting past statism entirely. But that's just a guess/hope.

I prefer that we look at those colonies as societies of their own, not an extension of some country into outer space. Otherwise, the inevitable will happen, and we will have an ugly civil war 200 years into the future. It's better that we look at this as an altruistic enterprise that will eventually yield a shitload of benefit to mankind 200 years down the road.

Right but if a society cannot possibly survive on its own, then what? If the settlement is tied by umbilical to a company or country or treaty org here, it's hard to act like it's an independent entity, because it's not one.

I think we're certainly capable by now to create a charter that hands the colony over to itself at some point, 10, 20, 50 years in the future.

According to Elon Musk, the cost of the ticket to Mars will be $500k, and the cost of the return ticket will be free (after all he's bringing the spaceship back, doesn't cost much to add a body to it).

If he holds to something like this (inflation adjusted), then the availability of a free return will keep your nightmare from happening. Furthermore the free return makes sense from a PR point of view. It is easier to get people to take a risk like that if they believe that they can get back from it. (Though I'm sure at some point there will be interesting litigation around someone who sold their house, didn't bother to pay out the mortgage, then took the money to buy a ticket to Mars, then disappeared to another world...)

Who in their right mind would pay incredible amounts of money (or labour) to go to Mars? The only reason to go to Mars is for the sense of adventure (mining could get boring fast, unless you count the potential danger of it) and getting a place in the history books as one of the pioneers. Earth is a paradise compared to Mars.

I don't think it'd be the folks living in a paradise. It'd be the folks fleeing persecution or economic horror. Why'd folks leave Europe for the New World, or any other migration? (And I mean the early ones-- not the gold rush-thinkin' ones.)

Walter Miller's "Crucifixus Etiam" is a rather good story about this; essentially terraforming Mars as the new frontier for migrant labor, with all the harshness that comes from those types of frontiers (including the fact that it is, largely, a one-way trip for the laborers, since their lungs atrophy due to the special breathing equipment they're attached to).

>Also, an extension of our country on another planet would probably be the first move toward humans getting past statism entirely. But that's just a guess/hope.

So... have a state settle on Mars instead of a company of people mutually coming together will help us get past statism as a species? Brilliant. Truly brilliant.

Only because it'd spectacularly fail.

Is nationalism a good thing though? By thinking your own country/people is great, aren't you creating a dichotomy where you think less of another country/people. (i.e. racism...)

Maybe I'm over thinking it.

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Joe schmoe doesn't really care. What this speech would target is people who were borderline between a STEM field and something like law or finance. There's a lot of brain muscle that's on the fence on whether they should choose STEM or choose a field that will make a lot more dosh. If STEM could be evangelized through a Mars program, I'm certain that there would be a lot more minds heading off into STEM.

Not to mention, national pride has plenty of interesting side effects; people are more willing to invest in guv bonds, less unrest, everyone doesn't jump down the president's throat when he makes a mispronunciation, etc.

I want to hear about the economic viability of Mars colonization. I support colonization, but without some kind of economic interest it is going to be no more viable than our colonization of Antarctica-

The thing people forget about Antarctica is that it's not a wild frontier. It's dangerous, it's cold, but it's also governed by a lot of very important international treaties about what you can and can't do there - and it's a major part of the global ocean ecosystem.

Basically: it's a terrible idea for us to go mining, drilling or terraforming in the Antarctic, and if we did, it would probably rapidly turn into a warzone.

Space on the other hand - other planets, or asteroids or whatever - are not like this at all. They are literally owned by no one, and barring some event where you crash something into the Earth, nothing you do on them will ever effect the livability of our planet. You really can go there and do whatever you want, on whatever scale you want.

Economically asteroid mining makes more sense, but if we acknowledge that scientific research is important then the old truism of our off-world rovers is still - afaik - full in force: impressive as they are, they take weeks to accomplish what a geologist with a shovel could do in an hour.

All true and valid, but I still want to know the economic value of building a colony on Mars- is there anything worth mining there, and not only worth mining for Mars use but worth commerce with Earth over?

This is a well-studied topic, of course. The primary economic value is tourism/novelty. There are not large amounts of helium-3, like on the Moon, but there is ice. If you can get there (SpaceX in particular is working on that, for $500,000 a ticket), you could potentially live in a spacious, bomb shelter-like structure with relative comfort, and even venture outside (with a spacesuit) if you felt up for it. Mars could become a retirement locale for the sufficiently-successfully, not unlike of Florida but without the gators.

It is not particularly likely, even with reusable rockets, that ore would be worth the price of shipping back to Earth in bulk. More efficient to use it for cheaper spacecraft (launch from Mars is less demanding on fuel) or Mars building structures directly, to house more residents.

Economics is really what will drive space travel. Consider that launch costs are going down steadily, and worldwide GDP is going up considerably. Knowledge of the solar system is going up at the same rate. Eventually a line will get crossed where transportation costs are lower than expected ROI. This is already the case for satellites. Eventually it will be the case for asteroid mining.

Mining asteroids will further reduce the cost of getting raw materials into LEO, and yet more break even points will be crossed etc...

I don't know if it will take 20 years or 200 years, but once there is serious money to be made you'll see humanity become a spacefaring species overnight.

The common criticism is: Why buy space exploration when we have problems here on earth?

People who make this claim, may not realize that space exploration could be a net win on some of these problems quite easily.

Education for instance. Take $200/year for 10 years from every student in the US. In exchange they get a textbook each year detailing some aspect of the mission to mars.

82million students x $200 * 10 = $164B

Printing the textbook and shipping 82million copies costs what? maybe $2B per year? $144B leftover to cover the actual mission.

Ask yourself if our average academic achievement level would be higher or lower than if we left that money in the educational system?

Yeah. Because the only two options are to send the money to mars or squander it on public education. Congratulations on solving your own contrived false dichotomy.

I am not really sure why going to Mars is a good idea, and no one has been able to give me an answer outside of new age manifest destiny bullshit.

If you want to research on living in desolate waste lands there are huge swaths of fucking desert.

I think you'll find that humans are fueled by what you'd call 'bullshit'. What is the reason behind making works of art? What is the utility of music? Alcohol is a waste of resources. Climbing mountains is a needless risk.

I don't consider manned space missions inherently as a research project. More of an engineering project combined with an iconic act. I'm sure the egyptians didn't have to build the pyramids, but eventually we are all going to be dust anyway. Why not take part in something grand?

You're right my view was presented with only two options, but my point was that we may end up with a win/win. A scenario where academic achievement goes up in addition to having a manned mars mission. I understand that there may be yet better alternatives, perhaps you could present some?

Slave armies built the pyramids. "Why not take part in something grand?" indeed.

>What is the reason behind making works of art?

For fun. But no one is forcing me to fund their bullshit on Etsy.

>What is the utility of music?

For fun. But no one is forcing me to fund their EP on Kickstarter.

>Alcohol is a waste of resources.

It isn't a waste if people enjoy it. And no one is forcing me to help get them hammered.

>Climbing mountains is a needless risk.

Its fun and no one asked me to pay for their fucking climbing ropes.

>I'm sure the egyptians didn't have to build the pyramids.

You're right, they didn't. They were a fucking useless piece of shit built by self appointed gods for ego stroking. They were a huge waste of human labor and resources. They provided next to no utility and the only reason they are worth anything today is because people think they are cool. If the pyramids existed today in a first world country that had something going for it besides tourism the land would be worth more by tearing down the shitty stone structures of oppression.

>Why not take part in something grand?

Because I have limited time on this Earth and I would rather my money go to things that I derive utility from:

* Research into living forever. * Making currently uninhabitable land habitable. * Getting drunk.

I derive no utility from some dudes putting another guy on Mars. There may be some incidental research that I benefit from in the long run, but I have a feeling much more utility would be gained by not spending money on jet fuel to launch something at a fucking rock miles and miles away.

>I understand that there may be yet better alternatives, perhaps you could present some?

There are infinite possibilities. 99.9% of the population of Earth will see absolutely no benefit from someone visiting Mars. In fact, some may even be worse off for it due to the pollution created by blasting shit off into the ether to reach a place that has absolutely nothing of value on it.

Here are just a few different ways you could spend that money (164 Billion dollars):

* Give every person on Earth an ice cream cone. * Research Phage therapy further. * Invest in internet infrastructure. * Invest in transportation infrastructure. * Give out research grants. * Clean up the ocean.

All of that will get way more utility for the vast majority of people than flying to fucking mars.

Here's one - risk management. Having a second place we can call home will greatly improve our chances of surviving as a species.

That is a shitty reason. 200 billion invested in clean energy or reversing green house gasses would go way further. For Earth to get bad enough that Mars was a viable planet would be fucking insanity.

Wow, the comments on that blog make YouTube look like TED. Judging from them, you'd think the vast majority of the population were delusional conspiracy theorists and/or racists.

I love Buzz but not running tests on the moon first seems crazy. Hell you could pay for a lot of the Mars trip through space tourism to the test sites.

Actually I think not running tests on Earth first seems crazy. We've never built a fully sustainable artificial biosphere. Surely that's a fundamental requirement for colonising anything.

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