Andy Hawkins
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#letstalkaboutmars
So who wants to talk about mars? I have so many questions about this whole idea of sending people to Mars like it's the answer to all our problems.
Why not save the planet we already have?
Who decides who gets to go?
Who pays for getting people there?
Join the conversation!
07:51 AM - Mar 05, 2023
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BrilliantFuture
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In response to Andy Hawkins.
3.

Far as who pays, the private sector will be doing most of this, yes Elon is obnoxious and I want to see him ousted from Spacex but fact is they are WAY ahead of everyone in terms of getting there.

Starship is making great progress, also Blue Origin & Virgin Galactic.
08:38 AM - Mar 05, 2023
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BrilliantFuture
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In response to BrilliantFuture.
As the technology evolves prices will drop dramatically. Reusable rockets alone have dropped cost immensely, that was a huge milestone. We'll see a day it's all very affordable. Another big step to that is better propulsion systems.
08:41 AM - Mar 05, 2023
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Andy Hawkins
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In response to BrilliantFuture.
Can't see the private sector footing the bill for anyone other than the people they need to be there. That puts them in a very powerful position, what about employees that end up not working out when they're 7 months away from home? Space tourism for a round trip that takes over a year? Doubtful
08:53 PM - Mar 05, 2023
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BrilliantFuture
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In response to Andy Hawkins.
2.

That is a good question, I mean initially of course it'll be astronauts, engineers and a wide variety of scientists. Before citizens can go it will be an immense amount of work to build safe habitats.

Far as who get's to go after all that, it'll be a process for a while. Continuting
08:32 AM - Mar 05, 2023
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BrilliantFuture
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In response to BrilliantFuture.
That is one thing it's tough for me to gauge, it'll need all from entertainment to people to help with transport, food etc so we'll just have to see how it starts off. Once it is big enough honestly I think it'll be pretty open to the general public, tourism will be big.
08:35 AM - Mar 05, 2023
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BrilliantFuture
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In response to Andy Hawkins.
Happy to chime in here! For let's tackle the first question since I see it often.

1. We do both! In fact many of the incredible technologies we have are in part due to Nasa.

The space program does an immense amount of R&D on creating tech that can help any planet, ours included of course.
08:19 AM - Mar 05, 2023 (Edited)
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BrilliantFuture
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In response to BrilliantFuture.
Continuing, doing both is simple and Nasa actually doesn't take much money, though of course the private sector is doing amazing now too.

Inevitably, we will be terraforming planets so that will require advanced tech that can solve problems, like climate change.
08:23 AM - Mar 05, 2023
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BrilliantFuture
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In response to BrilliantFuture.
one more comment on the 1st question, also we need a plan b, if something happens to this planet our species ends, that's it. We need to become multi-planetary.

We will do it to ourselves, look how we act or a celestial event of some sort from an asteroid to a gamma ray burst etc. It's a long list
08:26 AM - Mar 05, 2023 (Edited)
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STEM TheBleeding
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In response to Andy Hawkins.
Before we get to the ethical challenges, we have to deal with the physical ones, primarily mass, thrust, time, and fuel.

Humans are - finicky creatures. We need things that burn fuel like water, food, CO2 scrubbers, space to live,, etc.

That means more fuel burnt.
07:58 AM - Mar 05, 2023
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STEM TheBleeding
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In response to STEM TheBleeding.
Sending unmanned probes and rovers is easy, they're unmanned.

This isn't just a 300k mile jaunt. It's 33,000 times longer than that, at a time of 7 months.

Unfortunately, Newtons laws still apply.
08:01 AM - Mar 05, 2023
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Andy Hawkins
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In response to STEM TheBleeding.
Is it a realistic possibility, are wasting precious time and resources, and are we doing it for the right reasons? I'm not against it in theory, but we appear closer to catastrophic changes in our climate than we do to sending people to Mars. Mars feels like an escape plan that's come too late.
09:11 PM - Mar 05, 2023
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