What is Digg?Sponsored by newegg
Ready. Set. Shop view!
newegg.com - Newegg.com Black Friday Sale starting 11/25 3PM PST. No Lines, No Crowds, Click and Save.
148 Comments
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+31The moon is rich in the isotope Helium-3, which does not occur naturally on Earth. This isotope can be used for fission, and unlike those fuels we use currently, does not waste 80% of its power in the form of radioactive byproduct or excess radiation.
It has been estimated that enough Helium-3 exists on the Moon to power the Earth for thousands of years. One shuttle bay full could power the United States for over a year.
I think this is compelling reason to set up a permanent base on the Moon. - noripcord7, on 10/12/2007, -5/+23A base on the moon is a necessary jumping point for any manned mission to Mars.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/25/AR2006032500999.html
Don't you two watch Diggnation? - TheBarge, on 10/12/2007, -1/+15@Azur2
"No, it isn't necessary for a mission to Mars."
Launching the mission from the moon means no need for the fuel to break Earths gravity.
"The Moon doesn't have any resources of interest either"
Other than the possible water at the poles. - andydumi, on 10/12/2007, -0/+13Hey Crilen, no one knew what was in the Americas when they sailed. They wanted to go to India for spices and they landed here.
On the moon we think there is nothing right now, as far as surface goes, but you never know whats below. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -6/+19The same arguments against sailing to the Americas were being made in 1492 as well.
- SmokedL, on 10/12/2007, -0/+12Author ignores the lower, but existent, gravity on the moon that
1. Helps to keep the muscles of space explorers from atrophying, which brings:
1.1 Ability for longer stays.
1.1.1 Immense savings on the ridiculous costs of getting things to and from earth.
1.2 Less rehabilitation needed on earth before return for another period.
2. Makes take off immensely easier.
2.1. Makes construction some pieces of equipment within the gravity well possible.
2.1.1 Make certain types of construction far cheaper and easier.
2.1.2 See 1!
2. Makes landing far far easier combined with the nonexistent gravity.
2.1 Makes some rehabilitation possible on the moon in prepatation for returning to earch.
2.2 See 1!
3. There are actually raw materials on the moon. Duh
3.1. Immense savings on the ridiculous costs of getting things to and from earth.
This is just a short list of things that popped into my mind from memory. The list goes on and on and on and on. If you don't even know about the benefits of using the Moon as stepping stone for further space exploration you really should not go shooting your mouth off about space exploration.
Edit: Note to self, digg will kill your layout dead by removing spaces on new lines. - noodlez, on 10/12/2007, -0/+12the moon is a much better launch pad for a mars mission. everything is much more favorable.
imho, that would be the #1 reason to put a base there. - argoff, on 10/12/2007, -0/+11No No No No No, you don't get it. This moon base has nothing to do with space, research, exploration, or coolness. Well to us it does, but to the US government it has to do with the arms race with China who is also getting into the space race. A base somewhere else like Mars would be of no military or strategic value.
- vhold, on 10/12/2007, -0/+11The most compelling reason to build a base on the moon is that it impresses the hell out of the world.
How are we (Americans) going to feel when China beats us to it? - awm4, on 10/12/2007, -2/+12The moon is so 1970s
The moon is like that one kid in 8th grade that already has his drivers license. You know that he has no bright future but you hang with him because he can help you get around. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+9I'd ebay the moon rocks
- edzieba, on 10/12/2007, -1/+10Look, the Moon is a lot easier to get to than Mars. The Moon has resources. the Moon is easier to launch FROM than the Earth OR Mars. It's got no atmosphere, so it's a goddamn perfect telescope site (never mind that the low gravity makes ultra-large telescope construction possible).
The only way to one-up the Moon would be to grab one of the psuedo-earth-orbiting asteroids and pull it into a stable orbit, preferably at the Earth-Moon Lagrange point, and even then you're unlikely to have as large a supply of ice as you'd find on the moon.
All in all, I'd say a base on the Moon is a far more important endeavour than a trip to Mars. - ThinkBox, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8And you steal change out of his ash tray when he isn't looking.
- digitalrift, on 10/12/2007, -7/+15well what if we went to the moon and we found the mooninites?
- pheen, on 10/12/2007, -2/+10Someone alert NASA, some dude on Digg can't understand a reason for having a base on the moon. Maybe they'll cancel the project once they hear Azur2 isn't on board with this whole plan.
- acff, on 10/12/2007, -1/+9if you build it, they will come.
- hifiDesign, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7@Azur2 et al: Why you gots ta be moon hatin'???
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7Azur2 was wrong. The Moon has rich mineral resources.
- defectDS, on 10/12/2007, -2/+8I am fascinated by the moon and am drawn to stare at it whenever I can, just to try and conceive it as the moon, and not just a white dot in the sky. It's hard to see it as a giant mass of... moon. It's like the same feeling you get when you get on an airplane and you realize that your are really that high and you're not just looking a computer screen.
In other words, I'm sure there are more people like we who would live on the moon just as a novelty. They'd be unimaginably rich of course, but it would be a great accomplishment of human kind. I'd always tell my mom "I'll be the first to live up there." - Renork, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7@FearlessFreep
You can make mulitple trips to the moon base to restock, resupply, and refuel for the trip to Mars.
If you launch from Earth you will use 60% of your fuel. If you launch from earth, go to the moon base. Wait there for 2 - 3 shuttles to bring you more fuel then look your at 100% fuel again and maybe you only use 20% to get off the moon. Significant improvement. - Shivetya, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5Actually a moon base would be easier to support and maintain than an orbital base. You can bury parts of it for radiation protection, it has minimal gravity which is very useful, and since the moon is a large fixed object you can't fall off of it :)
- marinist, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5I'm also not convinced that we need manned missions to Mars, except perhaps for furthering manned space travel. However, for the cost of sending people to Mars, we could perhaps fund a dozen robotic missions that could sample Mars and return to Earth.
- kigabit, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5Well, one reason I haven't seen mentioned yet is that the moon would make an excellent place to build some powerful telescopes. At the moment astronomers have to go to really high or remote locations to get decent pictures and readings from Earth's surface. And the Hubble is but one, very expensive and old telescope. The moon's almost nonexistent atmosphere would make for clearer, more accurate pictures, and maintenance and upgrades would be much cheaper, safer, and easier than those on the Hubble.
- crysys, on 10/12/2007, -4/+9@digitalrift
See, that's a good reason not to build a moon base. Those guys are dicks and will only reduce our property values. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6It's not a practice area. It is a launching/viewing platform. Having 1/6th the gravity of earth and almost no atmosphere the moon is an excellent launching platform. You could send a ship to mars with a large rubber band if you wanted. As mentioned earlier the lack of atmosphere makes the moon extremely attractive to anyone who wants to look at space. On the moon stars don't "twinkle." The only thing between you and other worlds is the vacuum of space. We are VERY lucky to have a gigantic foundation for a space station right in our backyard.
- Valleye, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6Why would you want to travel to Mars with a fuel cell that is already 60% empty? Seems to me that if you can leave the moon you would have less wasted space on the ship than if you left earth.
I think this can be similar to the way a fighter plane will refuel after taking off from a aircraft carrier. So it can go into battle better prepared. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4... and Titanium, which I forgot.
http://www.digg.com/space/Why_putting_a_base_on_the_Moon_IS_a_good_idea_Helium_3_isotope_for_fusion
;) - SmokedL, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4@koko775
True. I stopped where I did intentionally, because I have neither the time, nor the competence to try to condense half a century of research, and educated speculation, on space exploration into a digg post that remains readable. As I said, the list really does go on and on and on.
Suffice to say: If you think the moon should be bypassed in our exploration of space, you are well advise to possess new and revolutionary information, and be very very knowledgeable about space exploration. If you don't fit those criteria, you should probably just keep quiet in so you don't embarrass yourself. Advice that comes a bit late to the author of this opinion piece. - jhub908, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Damn Azur2, quit rainin on my moon parade.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5"The Moon doesn't have any resources of interest either..."
See my post above. The Moon has rich deposits of Helium-3, an isotope that can be used for unprecedented amounts of fusion power without radiation byproduct.
It is also rich in Hafnium and tungsten. - Tangaroa, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Speaking of space research in Arizona, whatever happened to the Biosphere 2 project? The goal was to try to create a self-sustaining environment to support human life, as would be needed by space stations and manned long-range spaceships. Theories are all good and well, but some real-world testing is necessary before lives are risked. The initial attempt failed and I haven't heard of anything being done towards this issue since.
Google is my friend. It looks like it didn't turn out well:
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/305/1 - dacracot, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Build an array on the dark side as a radio telescope... enough small dishes and Arecibo will seem like a thimble.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4The Moon is rich in tungsten, heavy metallic element, which is valuable for electrical uses and when alloyed with steel, creates an extremely hard & durable metal.
As I note above, the Moon also rich in Helium-3, an isotope which can be used in fission power without any radioactive waste byproduct or radiation. The amounts of this element predicted to exist on the Moon could solve the Earth's power problems for thousands of years. - martyr, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4@ Konrad9: mars is a vacuum?
- cosined, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Unfortunately there's no such this as a Dark Side of the moon. There's just a part that never faces Earth.
However, placing radio telescopes in large arrays would have a number of benefits over earth based systems: the lack of atmosphere and van Allen belts allows for minimal distortion of received signals. Though I suspect that an array would suffer from sun-born interference that said atmosphere and van Allen belts would reduce. But the trade off might be worth it given the slow revolution/rotation of the moon. Thirty day rotation provides for longer windows to study a point in the sky. - koko775, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4@SmokedL:
also, research into mitigating the problem of Lunar dust should be helpful for Mars, and figuring out how to get the oxygen out of the regolith in the process of mining could be helpful. 1/6 gravity also means that it could be practical to have different earth and moon launch vehicle due to massively decreased escape velocity requirements. - dosle, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4the technology involved in being able to create livable habitation on a planet that isn't earth would in itself be justification. Critics are missing the point that we didn't just FIND a space shuttle, we had all sorts of research and industries created originally just to create the first one.
I'll be damned if nothing we learned from the shuttle program thus far has been implemented elsewhere outside the space program. - PDelahanty, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3#1 reason to make a moon base: Practice for Mars.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Yeah, that's mostly correct, but it does have pockets of magnetic protection, much like bubbles of EM field popping thru the surface over certain areas. I believe there are maps of these, I saw them somewhere.
In any case, I'm sure that we could build some kind of dome system, or something along these lines: http://www.physorg.com/news4752.html
- This outlines a quirky electrostatic radiation shield.
The value of having a potential second habitable planet would outweigh the problems. I'm sure we could come up with some system, perhaps an orbital satellite array using the electrostatic shield system, to cope with this issue. I mean, we are talking about hugely grandiose projects like space elevators here on Earth, so something could be done on Mars, I'm sure. Even if it only meant small areas of terraformed earthy goodness. - IzeasGT, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Not to mention that the far side of the moon is the only place permanently shielded from all of Earth's radio noise and such, PLUS the moon rotates only once a month. Much more time to look than in LEO.
- totorototoro, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4The U.S. just doesn't want to get there and find the Russians/Chinese/Japanese etc. already there, charging admission fees for landing rights.
- s6t9eve, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3You have got to be kidding me? No reason to go to the moon?
ITS SIMPLY ***** COOL! We dont need any other reason than that. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Mars can be terraformed, creating an Earth-like colony. It might well take 300 years to convert the Martian atmosphere (Mars does in fact have an atmosphere with oxygen, but it is not the same ratio as on Earth), & futher time to build localised eco-systems with transplanted Earth flora, but once this is achieved, we could have a second habitable planet in our solar system, a pretty good goal for the future, I think.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3"Seriously, I don't know a single reason for even going to the moon, much less building a permanent base there."
Perhaps you should do more research, then. The Moon is rich in Helium-3:
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/helium3_000630.html
It also has potentially large amounts of Hafnium & Tungsten. - Valleye, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4I am sure that the Yanks will be pissed when they see a red flag on the roof of a chinese base on the moon. Can anyone say Sputnik?
- marinist, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4@warty___
Mars does not have a magnetosphere, which means far less protection from the solar wind and the radiation that would harm life. Even if we could simulate an atmosphere, we will never be able to live on Mars like we do on Earth. - eddie72, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3What I want to know is why this will take them 13 years to complete? I can see the benefits of a established base on the moon though.
- Necoras, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4The moon is useful for a number of reasons.
First, it's big enough to have a small gravity field. This means we can modify earthbased manufacturing processes to work there. For example, in a microgravity environment (LEO) slag won't separate from molten metal. Thus, metal can't be purified in that method. You'd likely have to spend extra energy in the form of a centerfuge. There are hundreds of cases like this.
However, the low gravity field also means that once you've made something on the moon, it's easy to launch it. Mars' gravity field is weaker than Earth's but not by so much that it really matters when launching spacecraft. Besides, Mars is a dustbowl, and probably useless if it cannot be teraformed. Granted, there may be mineral assets, but they may end up being more expensive to get off of Mars than they are from Earth.
So we know the moon is good for processing, and a launchpoint, but it is sorely lacking in minerals. The costs to get stuff from Earth to the moon is prohibitive. So where do we get water and metal from? Easy enough answer. Asteroids and comets. Asteroids are basically hunks of iron and nickel floating around in space for the taking. Launch a robot out to grab one, use an EM mass driver powered by all of the solar energy it's been gathering as it got there, and fling the hunk of iron back at the moon. No need to catch it, there's no environment to destroy when it throws up a dust cloud. Better yet, throw them into orbit to be pulled down and used as needed. Comets provide huge amounts of ice if we can figure out how to get at it.
So yes, a moon base would be very valuable, if used correctly. - curios, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3With you there completely. If we could gently nudge comets into orbital paths around asteroids, moon, mars or earth, we would have a valuable resource water and organics for terraformation and mining.
- hifiDesign, on 10/12/2007, -2/+5@FearlessFreep: No one said it was about cost or manufacturing. It's about practicality. What's easier to do:
A) Launch a bigass ship that can travel to Mars from Earth, requiring more fuel and a complex design/configuration, due to the stresses of terrestrial flight (not exactly flight, I know)...
OR
B) Launch smaller payloads, assemble said bigass ship on the moon or in orbit of the moon, in a configuration that is better suited for space.
A manned Mars mission means artificial gravity, solar arrays, etc. To pack that all up in a box for a one shot deal just isn't as logical. -
Show 51 - 100 of 148 discussions
© Digg Inc. 2009
— Content created and posted by Digg users is