Elon Musk believes upto 1 million people to be living on Mars within 100 years

Wibbs

ScumLord wrote: »

FEck mars, feck planets altogether. We should be solving for living in spaceships/colonies that can float around the resources they need.

+1000 Hell mix the two and colonise asteroids. Space is badly named. As far as people are concerned anyway. It should be renamed "cramped". Crampedship is a far better description than spaceship. We sent guys to the moon in a space not much larger than the inside of a large 4X4 car. The International space station is far larger, but still bloody tiny and constrained.

seenitall

Half of the Earth's population lives with hunger or destitution. I really don't think that populating Mars or the Moon is something to be prioritising at this moment in time. But then, I'm no expert.

Musketeer4

I'd say elon musk is already living on Mars. Because he is a freaking space cadet for suggesting this.

Does it seem weird to anyone else that 2060 is only a bit over 43 years away? Like 43 years doesn't seem much but "2060" seems as far into the future as you would see on cartoons years ago when it was crazily futuristic

ScumLord

Wibbs wrote: »

+1000 Hell mix the two and colonise asteroids. Space is badly named. As far as people are concerned anyway. It should be renamed "cramped". Crampedship is a far better description than spaceship. We sent guys to the moon in a space not much larger than the inside of a large 4X4 car. The International space station is far larger, but still bloody tiny and constrained.

The main reason for that is we're obsessed with going from planet to planet. Getting on and off planets is one of the hardest parts. If we made a proper effort to find the resources in space to build something large it would make a much better staging post for colonisation and further infrastructure. I wonder for example would asteroids give us the material to make some sort of space concrete that could be 3D printed in space?

seenitall wrote: »

Half of the Earth's population lives with hunger or destitution. I really don't think that populating Mars or the Moon is something to be prioritising at this moment in time. But then, I'm no expert.

I believe space colonisation is the cure to all earth's and humanity's problems. If we could live and work in space and it's the new frontier we could send all earth's excess population off earth. The opportunity for expansion would be huge and keep humanity from killing each other for another few centuries while we work on interstellar travel.

By that time we'll probably be so good at living in spaceships we wouldn't need to contaminate every living planet we find with our colonisation attempts.

rossie1977

Venus would be a better, cheaper option plus you would have a chance to live in cloud cities like in star wars

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJ5KV3rzuag

seenitall

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Does it seem weird to anyone else that 2060 is only a bit over 43 years away? Like 43 years doesn't seem much but "2060" seems as far into the future as you would see on cartoons years ago when it was crazily futuristic

'Tis true. Time flies when you're having fun. And the older you get, the faster it flies! Which is one of the less nice features of the human condition.

Musketeer4

Ah yeah great idea. As if we haven't screwed up one planet bad enough, now we want to go off and fúck up other planets too.

Butters1979

seenitall wrote: »

Half of the Earth's population lives with hunger or destitution. I really don't think that populating Mars or the Moon is something to be prioritising at this moment in time. But then, I'm no expert.

And yet we have an all time high population. And the population growth all seems to be where the food shortages are. Funny that isn't it.

RobertKK

His Space X company is working with NASA.

He made his money from being one of the founder of Paypal. So he has always been a visionary.

His plan is the right plan, in that humans have all their eggs in one basket at the moment, the basket being Earth.
He seems to believe that a base on Mars that is self sustaining will save us from going the way of the dinosaurs.
That setting up these bases mean we can explore more of the solar system, and use the bases also as fuel depots so we could lets say go to Europa, one of the moons of Jupiter that has water, and from there have further human exploration of space.

Yes it all sounds most ambitious, but we need people like Elon Musk who want change how we see things, he is putting money into what he believes whether that is reducing the pollution of the environment with his investments in SolarCity for their solar panels, his electric car company Tesla.
Space is the next big area, we probably could have people living on Mars now if so much money wasn't wasted by humans so we can kill other humans.

topmanamillion

seenitall wrote: »

Half of the Earth's population lives with hunger or destitution. I really don't think that populating Mars or the Moon is something to be prioritising at this moment in time. But then, I'm no expert.

You're obviously correct but space exploration has never been anything more than rich countries/mens playground,
Going back to the Apollo 11 mission which is motivated solely to get one over on the soviets.

The problems you've mentioned will require a global approach to both restrict the continuing human population explosiom and improve the lives of people àround the world.

eeguy

Butters1979 wrote: »

And yet we have an all time high population. And the population growth all seems to be where the food shortages are. Funny that isn't it.

Feeding the poor is an incredibly bad idea. There are generations of people in Africa who are kept alive purely by food aid charities.

There was a million starving Ethiopians during the 80s. There's 20 million starving Ethiopians now.

BrokenArrows

I dont know why anyone would want to go and live on mars unless they invent artificial gravity.

If you live there for an extended period of time your body will deteriorate to the point that you cant return to Earth.

_Puma_

rossie1977 wrote: »

Venus would be a better, cheaper option plus you would have a chance to live in cloud cities like in star wars

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJ5KV3rzuag

Was just about to link this from the rather excellent Space Time youtube channel. Venus Cloud cities the way to go!

dont bother

one flaw in this theory is that Mars and the rest of "space" doesnt exist.
the "world" is flat and there is nothing else.

eeguy

BrokenArrows wrote: »

I dont know why anyone would want to go and live on mars unless they invent artificial gravity.

If you live there for an extended period of time your body will deteriorate to the point that you cant return to Earth.

Martian Operation Transformation!

"Congratulations Gerald, in just one day you've lost 62kg!"

Wibbs

RobertKK wrote: »

He made his money from being one of the founder of Paypal. So he has always been a visionary.

He was part of a group who came up with something. Once.

His plan is the right plan, in that humans have all their eggs in one basket at the moment, the basket being Earth.
He seems to believe that a base on Mars that is self sustaining will save us from going the way of the dinosaurs.

You do realise that this isn't even close to his idea right? And that the same argument has been put forward for decades? This is why the guy ticks me off. Actually not him, he's just spouting rehashed stuff that should be easily seen as a rehash, it's the fanboys that make Apple fanboys look like amateurs that tick me off. Helps him too, with paying people so so money and working them like galley slaves and having one of the highest staff turnovers going. Major reality distortion field with this guy.

But yeah it's the general ignorance of those who are his fanbase. A fanbase that really shouldn't be nearly as ill informed as they're mostly the more nerdy types. Hell the fact he even has fans…

BrokenArrows wrote: »

I dont know why anyone would want to go and live on mars unless they invent artificial gravity.

Jesus... Mars has gravity.

BrokenArrows

dont bother wrote: »

one flaw in this theory is that Mars and the rest of "space" doesnt exist.
the "world" is flat and there is nothing else.

Ok.
If the surface of the world is flat then whats on the underneath side?

silverharp

BrokenArrows wrote: »

Ok.
If the surface of the world is flat then whats on the underneath side?

I think the way it work is that the antartic encircles the world, the UN map is close to the "real one" and I believe the airlines are in on it :pac:

dont bother

silverharp wrote: »

I think the way it work is that the antartic encircles the world, the UN map is close to the "real one" and I believe the airlines are in on it :pac:

exactly.

the Ocean and Ice IS "space" that's all there is.
sure we only know what's in 15% of the oceans. there's a reason they havent been "able" to discover the rest - cos it goes on and on and on.

have you ever looked out the window of an airplane when you're at 35000 ft? there is NO bend in the horizon whatsoever. that is for one reason - the whole thing is flat. there's nothing else. no aliens, no gods living in the sky, no planets... nothing.

Maximus Alexander

kneemos wrote: »

Robots left to their own devices always ends badly.

As history shows.

eeguy

Wibbs wrote: »

He was part of a group who came up with something. Once.

So he had Zip2 which merged with Paypal.
And he joined Tesla and turned it into a company bigger than Mitsubishi Motors
(the actual founders broke off soon after and founded a new car company which quickly failed)
And he founded SpaceX
And he was one of the main backers of SolarCity.
And he's funding most of the Hyperloop research.

That's an impressive CV for anyone to have.

Wibbs wrote: »

You do realise that this isn't even close to his idea right? And that the same argument has been put forward for decades? This is why the guy ticks me off. Actually not him, he's just spouting rehashed stuff that should be easily seen as a rehash,

People have been talking about Mars for hundreds of years. He's not first person to sit down and work out how to do it but he's the only person with the billions and space company to actually make the plan a reality.

Wibbs wrote: »

But yeah it's the general ignorance of those who are his fanbase. A fanbase that really shouldn't be nearly as ill informed as they're mostly the more nerdy types. Hell the fact he even has fans…

I am a fan. I'm happy that there are real entrepreneurs out there who are tackling these huge engineering challenges.

Most companies like innovation and small, safe steps towards a goal. Musk is more a fan of invention and taking huge leaps, and fair enough, sometimes failing hard (explosions, recalls etc).

In a world run by MBAs and accountants, it's nice to see a real engineer take the lead.

Wibbs

eeguy wrote: »

So he had Zip2 which merged with Paypal.
And he joined Tesla and turned it into a company bigger than Mitsubishi Motors

Tesla motors that is in dire need of funding and has nearly gone bang more than once and largely survives on US government monies and whose figures for their next more "average" car still don't add up. That Tesla? I do like the Tesla cars and the innovation that is coming from that ongoing research, but I strongly suspect it'll be another company who does a Henry Ford with electric autonomous cars.

And he's funding most of the Hyperloop research.

Actually he's not. Do more digging there. Oh and I'll place a bet here; Hyperloop will be another Musk vapourware "idea". There are real world major problems with the idea, problems that have been considered for over a century, hence Musky has largely farmed out the concept.

That's an impressive CV for anyone to have.

I'm not saying it isn't but by god there is serious nerd worship of this guy far beyond the CV.

People have been talking about Mars for hundreds of years. He's not first person to sit down and work out how to do it but he's the only person with the billions and space company to actually make the plan a reality.

I am a fan. I'm happy that there are real entrepreneurs out there who are tackling these huge engineering challenges.

Most companies like innovation and small, safe steps towards a goal. Musk is more a fan of invention and taking huge leaps, and fair enough, sometimes failing hard (explosions, recalls etc).

In a world run by MBAs and accountants, it's nice to see a real engineer take the lead.

You sound like a copywriter for one of his PR companies. What does impress me about the guy is the myopic loyalty he inspires in so many, who seem to want him to be Tony Stark. Something another reality distortion field purveyor Steve Jobs was never able to project to nearly the same degree.

bodhrandude

Is Elon Musk related to Elton John by any chance.

Calibos

All this 'eggs in one basket' sh1te annoys the hell out of me.

We need to move part of civilisation to Mars in case an asteroid hits earth!!

Arrgghh!! If you have the tech to colonise Mars it means you also have the tech to spot early enough and divert any sized asteroid!!

We need to Terraform mars because we have destroyed Earths climate!!

Arrgghh!! It will always be cheaper and easier to fix Earths climate no matter how much damage we've done to it, than to Terraform Mars. Until you can re-melt Mars' Iron core to generate a magnetosphere, any Terraforming is a waste of time as it'll lose its new atmosphere to the solar wind in a thousand years anyway. The reason why Mars is a dead planet despite being in the goldilocks zone like us and with the same starting conditions is that Mars is much smaller and its molten core cooled down much quicker, tectonic activity stopped and the resulting loss of magnetosphere meant the solar wind stripped away most of the atmosphere.

We need to have another home once the Sun reaches Red Giant phase and swallows up earth in 3 billion years time!!

Arrgghhh. Earth life was single celled for most of Earths 4 billion year existence. Multicellular life only evolved 600 million years ago. WE don't need to worry about where we will move to in 3 billion years. A more sensible question would actually be, "I wonder what the sentient intelligent humanoid lifeform that eventually evolved from the gut bacteria of that human astronaut that took a dump on Mars will do now that Mars is much warmer after the expansion of the Sun"

PowerToWait

Wibbs wrote: »

Wibbs' anti Musk rant

I'm almost sure I'm not a nerd but I am seriously impressed with this guy.

Living under a rock as I do, I'd not heard of him before 2 weeks back when I happened to hear a bio of him on BBC radio.

I'm an unabashed fan. His sense of pioneeringness is pretty humbling to say the least.

ScumLord

Wibbs wrote: »

I'm not saying it isn't but by god there is serious nerd worship of this guy far beyond the CV.

He does seem to inspire faith in people, like you pointed out Tesla has been on the verge of falling off a cliff a number of times. I remember watching a documentary on the original electric cars based off the Lotus elise and how it was delay after setback. But people really wanted the cars and had faith he would deliver. He was on site a lot pushing the process forward.

I think people like him because he's an entrepreneur that has loftier goals than just being very rich. He wants to achieve real technological steps like making electric cars available to the masses. At the end of the day he's a really good people manager, he doesn't innovate as much as enable innovators. Then take all the credit.

I would credit Tesla for pushing the electric market on. Even if Tesla fail there's no going back now, electric is a real alternative with models from many major manufacturers that weren't there before the Tesla S.

eeguy

Wibbs wrote: »

You sound like a copywriter for one of his PR companies. What does impress me about the guy is the myopic loyalty he inspires in so many, who seem to want him to be Tony Stark. Something another reality distortion field purveyor Steve Jobs was never able to project to nearly the same degree.

You can love him or hate him as much as you want, but you can't knock him for the work he's doing.

Imagine even 10 years ago predicting affordable reusable rockets, or that 400,000 people would preorder an electric car based on an unfinished concept.

I'm no fan of Steve Jobs, but he created a social movement where everyone wanted a smartphone, in a time when smartphones were sh*t.

Would we have the ubiquity of smartphones and 4G and apps and phone banking and free web based communication and the end of international roaming charges without the iPhone? Maybe, maybe not.

In 10 years we could be saying the same things about new technologies ushered in by cheaper access to space and less reliance on oil.

ScumLord wrote: »

I would credit Tesla for pushing the electric market on. Even if Tesla fail there's no going back now, electric is a real alternative with models from many major manufacturers that weren't there before the Tesla S.

Exactly. Is there any other car company that has generated the same interest and loyalty as Tesla?
Every other car company is investing in electric partly due to Tesla's influence on the car market. BMW is actively trying to steal Tesla's customers with their "Wait or Drive" campaign.

Only 16 years ago GM was crushing the EV1 to hinder electric development.

AMKC

kneemos wrote: »

Think The Simpsons Movie or what was that series where a town was covered by a mysterious force field and they all killed each other.

The series you are thinking of is "Under the Dome" and it was a massive Dome that covered the town

Balmed Out

eeguy wrote: »

Exactly. Is there any other car company that has generated the same interest and loyalty as Tesla?
Every other car company is investing in electric partly due to Tesla's influence on the car market. BMW is actively trying to steal Tesla's customers with their "Wait or Drive" campaign.

Only 16 years ago GM was crushing the EV1 to hinder electric development.

To be fair Tesla get a lot of interest simply by being at the top end of the luxury market, the Nissan Leaf is the overwhelming market leader. The more I read about Musk the more I dislike him as a human.