tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17232051.post2635031123454446510..comments2024-03-28T03:16:14.104-04:00Comments on Noahpinion: Is space exploration over?Noah Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09093917601641588575noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17232051.post-46865058023079281362011-07-13T07:20:57.259-04:002011-07-13T07:20:57.259-04:00Space is where we should be getting the renewables...Space is where we should be getting the renewables to keep us from sliding back into the iron age as you put it. Once we have even a token colony on the moon, it's very easy to start creating photo-voltaic cells in space from the abundant lunar surface deposits of silicon. They would be about 5-6 times more efficient then earthbound ones due to consistency, lack of cover and no day-night cycle. Then microwave energy transmission beams that energy back down to any city where there is demand on the half of earth that the satellite is above.<br /><br />With a profitable export industry on the moon, it makes sense then to expand the lunar colony until either energy becomes so cheap that our problems are over or we have committed the resources for serious space colonization like O'Neil cylinders using lunar materials.theamazingjexhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08062080723075521288noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17232051.post-55866287437594890062011-07-03T12:42:30.644-04:002011-07-03T12:42:30.644-04:00Michael Turner --
And your point is?
I lived un...Michael Turner -- <br /><br />And your point is?<br /><br />I lived until recently in Los Angeles. Consider that LA is pretty well a known commodity by now. There are maps of the place, detailed maps, whole books of maps. There are pictures of the place in magazines. There are geologists wandering over the area, there are people checking out the weather and people looking at water quality and even some hopeful folks on the outskirts panning local streams for gold.<br /><br />Wierdly enough, despite the depth and totality of our knowledge of Los Angeles, people actually choose to live there. More than a few dozen people, in fact. Rumor has it that somewhere in the last couple of centuries, in defiance of all sane economic reality, LA ceased to be an empty, howling wilderness. But that's probably just science fiction!mike shupphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08383379836883992742noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17232051.post-14857989077036053012011-07-03T08:55:54.106-04:002011-07-03T08:55:54.106-04:00Some people question whether "exploration&quo...Some people question whether "exploration" is even the right term - and I'm one of them. If and when the first human beings set foot on Mars, we'll know far more about it than the first explorers of North America knew about that continent.<br /><br />Space *recreation* - sadly, only for the rich - has a bright future however.Michael Turnerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00713921931911369458noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17232051.post-46002122234081393222011-07-02T22:06:12.405-04:002011-07-02T22:06:12.405-04:00What's actually galling here is The Economist&...What's actually galling here is The Economist's no-big-deal attitude. Think a moment: we're in a universe at least 30 billion light years across, holding several hundred billion galaxies with on average several hundred billion stars for each, which will last for septillions of years to come. Our knowledge and our wealth have been expanding exponentially for centuries now, and curiosity and wanderlust seem baked into our genes by millions of years of natural selection.<br /><br />And the Economist blandly consigns us all, for all time to come, to one small planet about one rather ordinary star, where presumably we will spend the next few million years squabbling with one another for natural resources, social position, and other goods until the swelling sun brings our extinction. Shouldn't the Economist at least say "too bad"? I've seen the magazine spend more ink and more emotion on the closing of Victorian-era train stations.mike shupphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08383379836883992742noreply@blogger.com