Incredibly, unquantifiably low risk for a Mars base. I was addressing the bizarre thought that Mars would provide some sort of insurance for Earth. You might as well pray!
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Improbable but not entirely impossible. After all the moon was probably formed when something smashed into the earth and broke off a chunk of it. (Thatâs the prevailing theory.)
You think an asteroid strike causing massive deaths is vastly unlikely? You need to read what I wrote.
Why? I know itâs vastly, unquantifiably unlikely. In all of human history and prehistory itâs never happened. Weâre about half way. It never will. Why would an asteroid leave the belt after 4 ga? What force could possibly send even a million ton rock our way? So what if it impossibly did? Its chance of hitting the Earth, even in the same plane unlike comets, is what? Please do the âmathâ. And yeah, Deep Impact is a great film. We have infinitely more real and important things to deal with.
btw, do you accept the lunar landing? Was it real, or was it fake?
From NASAâs jet propulsion Lab:
(JPL is a research and development lab federally funded by NASA and managed by Caltech.)
What are Near-Earth Objects (NEOs)?
Some asteroids and comets follow orbital paths that take them much closer to the Sun â and therefore Earth â than usual. If a comet or asteroidâs approach brings it to within 1.3 astronomical units of the Sun, we call it a near-Earth object. [One astronomical unit is close to the mean distance between the Sun and Earth â approximately 150 million kilometers (about 93 million miles).] Near-Earth objects may provide needed raw materials for future interplanetary exploration. Some should also be fairly easy to land on for future exploration.
Potentially Hazardous Objects
A relatively small number of near-Earth objects pass close enough to Earth and are large enough in size to warrant close observation. Thatâs because the gravitational tug of the planets could, over time, cause an objectâs orbital path to evolve into an Earth-crossing orbit. This allows for the possibility of a future collision.
Potentially hazardous asteroids are about 150 meters (almost 500 feet) or larger, roughly twice as big as the Statue of Liberty is tall. They approach Earthâs orbit to within 7.5 million kilometers (about 4.6 million miles). By comparison, when Mars and Earth are at their closest, they are about 53 million kilometers (about 33 million miles) apart. Potentially hazardous comets also get unusually close to Earth.
Knowing the size, shape, mass, composition and structure of these objects helps determine the best way to divert one, should it have an Earth-threatening path.
How beautifully bizarre. So colonize Mars?
Colorless green ideas sleep furiously.
Ah, the smell of broken glass and the distant sound of cheese.
Did you bother to read my post about near earth asteroids? And do you think the lunar landing was real?
@GJDS Iâm tagging you because I thought youâd like the picture of the Russian Orthodox priest blessing the Soyuz spacecraft.
I thought this 2012 article from The Atlantic was interesting:
Communion on the Moon: The Religious Experience in Space
Our secular endeavor of space exploration is flush with religious observance. Why is that?
The non sequiturs get better and better. 5 million miles is 20 times further than the Moon. What has any of this got to do with Mars? If anything this justifies an orbital nuke, dual-keyed by the US & Russia. For extremely low values of justified*
âThe soonest virtual impactor of an asteroid larger than 50 meters in diameter with a better than 1:1-million chance of impact is 2005 ED224 on 11 March 2023 with a 1:500000 chance of impact. It is estimated to be 54-meters in diameter, has a short observation arc of 3-days, and is expected to be 2.7 AU (400 million km) from Earth on 11 March 2023.[3] Since it has not been observed since 2005 and has an orbital period of 2.6±0.3 years, we do not know where on its orbit 2005 ED224 is.â
It orbits every 5 years. *A near certainty in two and a half million years⊠of a 10 MT blast. Most likely in the Pacific!!! Or central Asia!!!
Lose sleep over this if you will:
What we âneedâ is much better tracking.
The story of Noah and the promise of God in that context is just one of several promises and prophecies in the Bible supporting the interpretation that God will not destroy all humans, at least not before everything promised has happened. Yet, itâs good to note that Gods promise was that he will never again destroy every living thing, as long as earth remains - every living thing is not the same as humans.
There are also several stories, warnings and prophecies indicating that God has permitted or indirectly caused a lot of destruction after violence, worship of idols and other crimes have prevailed in a society for an extended period. My interpretation of this is that a major disaster is possible and could even kill most or all humans within a large region. This includes the possibility of a loss of technological knowledge in a way that retards the development of human societies.
Another type of âpunishmentâ are the consequences of bad stewardship on Earth. Climate change and loss of ecosystem services because of human activity are something that humans have caused by their greedy behavior. This kind of payback phenomena may have a major impact on human life on Earth.
I think itâs very, very dangerous to think that humans canât go extinct.
Sorry BioLogos, but we are going back to the moon, and then itâs hopefully off to Mars. Part of what makes us human is a thirst to explore the world and understand it.
This space program is called Artemis. A diverse crew with the âright stuffâ has been selected. By 2024, we should have the first woman and the first person of color land on the moon. Weâve going to establish a permanent presence on the moon this time, with an outpost orbiting the moon. We will study the moon extensively, and eventually go from there to Mars.
NASA is working with international partners and commercial partners (e.g. Elon Muskâs SpaceX) in this undertaking. Godspeed, astronauts!
"For those who travel on land, on water, or in the air or through outer space, let us pray to the Lord.
Lord, have mercy."
(The 1979 Book of Common Prayer)
The advances of science and technology often bring deeper insights that signify the majesty of Godâs creation.
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Maybe the real problem is thinking that whatever we do, we can continue life as we have used to live. Or that whatever bad consequences will come, they come after I have died - the suffering of the future generations is their problem.
Survival of humanity includes the possibility of losing all you love, living in cave-like conditions without modern healthcare or technology, starving, suffering from heat and cold weather. Selfmade suffering on earth.
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If fuel can be harvested on the Moon then that does make sense.
Absolutely. I think that is enough justification on its own without needing to find further justification, and we shouldnât try to go beyond these goals unless something really big happens that changes the stakes, such as finding life on Mars. Going back to my previous analogy, we arenât going to the top of Mt. Everest to establish a human colony just for the sake of creating a colony.
Lots of water on the moon. That can give us water to drink, and oxygen to breathe and hydrogen for fuel.
Iâm sure there will be a continuous human presence since itâs one hell of a commute. We already have a continuous human presence in some very inhospitable and dangerous environments, such as the Arctic and Antarctic research stations and the international space station.
Like helium-3?
What oxidizes the hydrogen? Thereâs a billion tons at the poles, 0.1% under the surface elsewhere. So what purpose does this serve that remotes canât provide?