Should Mars be terraformed?

[Crisp]

NASA was planning on heading back to the moon first before going to mars, until obama killed the project off.

People who belive in religion don't like Space.

[DrakeN2k]

the fact is you almost can never get rid of those things, no mater how much you spend there will always be a region that is poorer and less able to cope with climate, conditions, and just other factors... we could throw all our money at places like africa and never see a change, due to how the region just works

and helping support a growing population that cant feed themselves now.

[Eddo89]

If we have the technology to terraform Mars, I don't think we really need to be able to "fix" earth. By the time we ruin Mars, we probably be able to travel to other star systems.

Not saying it is the right thing to do being parasites. Sort of remind me of the antagonist race in Mass Effect.

[redfish]

What if Mars is lifeless? Even if no life otherwise exists there, that pristine and unique alien environment, so far barely scratched by humans, needs to be preserved as is as much as possible. We?ve already done too much damage here on our own planet.

This is a stupid attitude. Mars is rock and sand. Romanticizing about rock and sand is stupid. Though obviously if there are beautiful areas on Mars people will want to preserve them.

[neoadorable]

focusing on somehow "colonizing" more of our own planet instead of other worlds is foolhardy. first, it won't grow our economy as much. second, it will continue to further destabalize this world, and since we won't have any other worlds to escape to, that's dangerous. we need more baskets, to quote the cliche. and the least of the problems we have on Mars is gravity, 0.4g is quite enough for Earth life forms to be comfortable. the biggest problem is the toxic air. i don't think solar radiation is that big a deal on Mars given proper clothing and minimal shielding on structures (i assume initial settlers will live in underground bunkers anyway). reactivating Mars' dynamo to have magnetism is too risky and expensive, thickening the atmosphere will work much better for reducing levels of radiation. we can easily terraform Mars with current tech, but it will be crude and take at least a century before we see any results. i say terraforming can wait, focus on utlization first.

and Obama didn't kill any mission to the moon. NASA have dozens of plans, they are always slow to act on them. if anything, it's during Obama's watch that the 2010 NASA authorization act passed.

[Gone]

People who belive in religion don't like Space.

Always leave it to some troll to throw in a religion argument in something completely unrelated. Good job! :rolleyes:

re?li?gion

a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, especially when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.

I wish we had more Stephen Hawkings but thoughts geared towards FTL travel and long term space flights, but also the funding. It is not economically feasible though to try multi billion dollar space experements when the economy all over the world is pretty much bad. But of course, if we started mining asteroids, etc, it god be a great source of income [and tax] for space related expeditions!

[THolman Veteran]

I don't know about the technological feasibility of this, but I don't see a problem with terraforming Mars, if we could benefit from it. There's a good chance that Mars is just a barren rock, but even if it is not, the life that could exist there is probably on the microbial level. A microbe shouldn't stand in the way of (potential) advancement.

[qdave]

Let's fix this planet first before we destroy another one.

The money that would be spent on achieving this could get rid of poverty, famine, homeless, etc.

One does not influence the other. With one centralised world government, and proper resource management everything is achievable ;)

[Hell-In-A-Handbasket]

to move past the issue of if terraforming should be done, more along lines of who will go. will it be a select few that have money,would it be it be a planet of the rich , a planet of the geniusor a prison like USA Georgia / Australia used to be during colonization.

its just about garenteed that governments will try and claim as much of it as their own, leading to Martian Wars that will somewhat mirror what humans already do on earth, with exception fo being on their own ( est 5 year travel time ). also because of the distance, will Martian population break off and consider earth population of dregsdregs, or earth consider martian a population of dregs.

humanity needs to get over problems and learn to live in peace with each other before go about colonizing and bringing our problems to other parts of our solar system. untill then humanity should leave other plants the hell alone. as in a planetary scale, Humans are nothing more then a virus / disease, destroying all we touch

[neoadorable]

hey Hell, whatever you're smoking, i want it NOW!!! it doesn't take five years to get to Mars dude, unless you're flying a 747. the big colony ships will likely use something like a 500MW VASIMR, so expect travel times in the couple of weeks a side - we will have our beloved torch ships by the time Mars terraforming is something to actually vote on!

Tholman said it, Mars is not a life-bearing planet, so the moral issue is not as significant. of course there's something to consider, like what gives us the right? i think that's where faith and religion do come in. someone has picked humanity to have the gift of intelligence, and wants us to do this. i really believe that. i also believe the only way to fix our supposedly ailing global economy is by going to space - endless growth potential!

[Hum]

How will you get Mars to generate a protective magnetic field .... ?

[medium_pimpin]

Since it seems Mars once had water and an atmosphere, but lost these due to it's weak magnetic field, why would a 'teraformed' Mars not simply return to a rocky wasteland?

[Memphis]

Terraform Antartica first? We have a whole continent virtually unlivable here we could start with.

[DocM]

How will you get Mars to generate a protective magnetic field .... ?

Most papers say once an atmosphere is established it would deteriorate very slowly - it's taken billions of years to get to where it is so constant low-level replenishment should suffice.

As for protective artificial magnetospheres, they can be built into transport vehicles. UK and US labs have been working on those for years.

[neoadorable]

we don't need a magnetosphere. we don't need an atmosphere, for that matter. like i said, focus on making the most of Mars as-is. by the time terraforming is desirable we'll have access to several other worlds, the technology to modify humans to live better on Mars un-assisted, and vastly improved life support systems that will be very good at staying out of the way.

[perochan]

how about terraforming idiots earthings 1st before moving on to another one

[Hell-In-A-Handbasket]

hey Hell, whatever you're smoking, i want it NOW!!! it doesn't take five years to get to Mars dude, unless you're flying a 747. the big colony ships will likely use something like a 500MW VASIMR, so expect travel times in the couple of weeks a side - we will have our beloved torch ships by the time Mars terraforming is something to actually vote on!

Ah cool, I thought it was 5 years.

[DeadEndAccount]

I think the biggest obstacle will always be a public who is happy with the status quo and commercial interests having to be the backbone of any sort of colonisation/terraforming. It is a situation where by one could achieve it today if there was the political will and humanity put aside pursuit of wealth in favour of reaching a common interest but I doubt it'll happen in my life time.

[Hum]

we don't need a magnetosphere. we don't need an atmosphere, for that matter.

You wouldn't live long on Earth, without those.

[neoadorable]

i meant on Mars dude! on Mars! clearly on the ideal level we need all those, and to live unassisted obviously we need them...but we're not going to live on Mars unassisted, it's going to be 100% technology and science. just like the pressurized cabin we will be sharing on the trip out there.

Nom Nom, you should read The Man Who Conquered Mars if you're interested in the commercial aspects of Mars exploration. It's more digestible than the Mars Trilogy by Kim Stanley...you don't have to commit to three books. lots of info dumping but quite a realistic scenario where governments basically don't want to pay for Mars settlements so it's the transnational corps that do it.

[Joseph B]

Mars is smaller, and arguably whats the point of terraforming a planet that has a dead core? With no magnetic field any substantial amosphere would just be blown off by solar winds... Further more terraforming a planet would take at least 50+ years, by all current realistic methods laid out anyways.

We would be better off trying to terraform one of gas giant moons, even then we'd have to constantly worry about the giant gravitational pull of the giant itself pulling constant barrages of meteors and asterioids.

[DocM]

Remember that the solar wind is much weaker at Mars than Earth. It took billions of years for Marts atmosphere to be deteriorated to this poiunt, and most studies indicate a terraformed atmospherte wouldn't seriously degrade for a very, very long time - long enouygh that a minimal amount of supplementation would do nicely.

Terraforming a moon like Titan would be tougher due to the minimal amount of solar energy getting there (remember the inverse square law) and the intense radiation environments around Jupiter and Saturn.

[Joseph B]

Remember that the solar wind is much weaker at Mars than Earth. It took billions of years for Marts atmosphere to be deteriorated to this poiunt, and most studies indicate a terraformed atmospherte wouldn't seriously degrade for a very, very long time - long enouygh that a minimal amount of supplementation would do nicely.

Terraforming a moon like Titan would be tougher due to the minimal amount of solar energy getting there (remember the inverse square law) and the intense radiation environments around Jupiter and Saturn.

Thats true, I didn't even consider the amount of radiation coming off Jupiter.

Could you imagine waking up to the sky filled with Jupiter though? I wish.

Still, I think we could be better off placing our eggs in another basket. Mars is by no means a long term solution, theres even no assurance after it is "terraformed" we still wouldn't have to walk around with some sort of protection, like light space suites.

Also, " Even if some internal heat source warmed the planet up enough for ice to melt, it wouldn't yield liquid water. The Martian atmosphere is so thin that even if the temperature rose above freezing the ice would change directly to water vapor. "

Who is to say the water vapor wouldn't just bleed out of the thin atmosphere and out into space?

http://science.nasa....001/ast05jan_1/

[DocM]

Depends on how you warm Mars. The atmosphere is mostly CO2, and with trillions of tons of frozen CO2 at both poles & it being a greenhouse gas....

Once you have a denser CO2 atmosphere spike it with methane and other supergreenhouse gases then plants can do most of the rest.

[Hum]

^ Wonder what sort of plants might do well on Mars .... Evergreen trees ?