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Category Archives: Moon Colonization

Elon Musk Really Thinks That SpaceX Can Send Humans to the Moon ‘Sooner’ Than 2024 – Science Times

Posted: August 28, 2021 at 12:27 pm

SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk claimed that his firm might be ready to fly to the Moon in the next three years.

Musk responded to a question about the timeframe on Twitter on Saturday, saying that SpaceX's lunar lander will be ready for its moon trip "probably sooner" than 2024.

In April, SpaceX won NASA's lunar lander contract, beating over Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin and Dynetics, a division of Leidos.

Artemis, a NASA program, will launch humans, including women, to the Moon in 2024. If Musk's long-term goals are achieved, SpaceX will build a reusable lander called Starship to ultimately transport humans to Mars.

In response, Elon Musk was contacted by Twitter user Everything Artemis (@artemis360_moon). This unofficial account follows news about the Artemis Program.

Everything Artemis noted that NASA began its SpaceX Lunar Lander Payments and hoped SpaceX would work quickly. Hence, the netizen asked Elon Musk if he is already preparing the Lunar Starship for its mission this 2024. Elon Musk said: "Probably sooner."

ALSO READ:Elon Musk's SpaceX Orbital Stack to Roll Its 1st Orbital Test Flight 'In a Few Weeks'

The SpaceX HLS idea is a modified version of the Starship, developed at SpaceX's launch site in Boca Chica (together with the Super Heavy rocket). According to the newest mockup and earlier remarks by Musk, the HLS Starship will have a larger cargo capacity since it will not require heat shields, flaps, or huge gas thruster packs.

NASA is currentlyattempting to go backto the Moon by 2024. They'd had to rush things, reprioritize some mission aspects, and rely on contractors (namely SpaceX) to help fill in the gaps. They've teamed up with the ESA and other space organizations to see this through. In contrast, Russia and Chinahave teamed upto establish a rival lunar exploration and colonization program.

(Photo: Getty Images)BOCA CHICA, TX - SEPTEMBER 28: SpaceX CEO Elon Musk updates the next-generation Starship spacecraft at the company's Texas launch facility on September 28, 2019, in Boca Chica near Brownsville Texas. (Photo by Loren Elliott/Getty Images)

Blue Origincontested SpaceX's victoryandsued NASA, whileDyneticsobjected to the space agency's verdict. At the end of July,GAOdismissed the protests. On July 30, the day the Blue Origin and Dynetics objections were denied,Tesmaniansaid NASA paid SpaceX $300 million of the entire $3 billion contract allocation.

Universe Todaysaid Musk offered SpaceX's assistance here, stating that they could get this other critical mission component ready sooner. Of course, there are the well-publicized delays that have dogged the Space Launch System (SLS) and the Orion capsule from the start. As a result, it's been suggested that NASA contract out the responsibility of returning the Artemis crew using the Starship and Super Heavy.

Although no launch date has been established, SpaceX is preparing for Starship to make its first orbital journey worldwide. The ship has been placed through its paces, with remarkable results, but a few early prototypes have blown up.

The Starship and its booster rocket areover 400 feet tallif assembled. If you add the pedestal, the Statue of Liberty rises nearly 300 feet tall.

RELATED ARTICLE: Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin vs. Elon Musk's SpaceX: Who Won the Space Race?

Check out more news and information on SpaceX in Science Times.

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Elon Musk Really Thinks That SpaceX Can Send Humans to the Moon 'Sooner' Than 2024 - Science Times

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On Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs and Steel – The Daily Star

Posted: at 12:27 pm

Guns Germs and Steel was first published in 1997 and received the Pulitzer Prize for nonfiction the following year. Reading this book has been an incredible experience. Each time I put the book down for the day I had to gasp for air because I had been totally immersed, rather like deep sea diving and looking at the world in a new dimension.

The depth and breadth of the knowledge that Diamond has passed on is vast, and the questions that he has raised remain a challenge. One does not have to agree with his opinions but the book serves to activate the mind in a hitherto unknown manner.

Jared Diamond is one of the US's most celebrated scholars. A Professor of Geography and Physiology at the University of California, he is equally renowned for his work in the fields of ecology and evolutionary biology and for his ground breaking studies of the birds of Papua New Guinea. Other than the Pulitzer, his prizes and honours include the U.S National Medal of Science, the Tyler Prize for Environmental Science, and election to the U.S National Academy of Sciences etc. As a biological explorer his most publicized finding was the rediscovery, on the New Guinea highlands, of the Golden Fronted Bower Bird which had not been seen for almost a century.

Guns, Germs and Steel starts around 11000 BC and is divided into four parts, within which, each chapter covers different issues. To summarize the book, if at all possible, the author states that he was inspired by a question from Yali a local politician in New Guinea who asked him, "Why is that you white people developed so much cargo and brought it to New Guinea when we black people had little cargo of our own?"

Throughout the book, Diamond seeks an answer to that query but not from a racist point of view. He is an American and his constitutional belief that 'all men are created equal' forms the premise of his research.

Using the equality of man as his cornerstone, he examines in great detail the growth of certain ancient human settlements in the world and the reason why some of them achieved the basics of food production earlier than others. Food production and food surplus being the basic requirement for humans to move upwards into the next stage of development. Diamond, however, does not make any references to the Indus Valley civilization, and when writing about linguistic development, fails to mention the Indo Aryan group of languages. His emphasis in on the parts of the world that he is familiar with, New Guinea, Australia, New Zealand, North and South America and Europe and Africa with most of his focus on the America's and Australia/ New Guinea.

Diamond compares world history to an onion, "One has to keep taking off the layers. History is not just one damned fact after another. There really are broad patterns to history and the search for their explanation is as productive as it is fascinating."

Diamond commences by giving an analysis of the world prior to 11000 BC. He proceeds to write about the effect of geography on shaping societies on Polynesian Islands, with human movement from the mainland to Islands, across the seas, in ancient times being his prime focus. Continuing with migration, he covers the defeat of the Inca Emperor by the Spanish. The result of the victory, was the subsequent colonization of the New World by Europeans, the resultant disappearance of most groups of Native Americans and the biggest population shift of modern times.

The second section talks about the rise of food production and how farmer power forms the root of Guns, Germs and Steel. He puts forward his theory that geographic differences provided the greatest advantage in the onset of food production and the major reason why people from certain areas flourished over others. His views are especially important in the context of geographic changes that are likely to be caused by climate change.

Diamond goes from food to guns germs and steel in the third section in which he covers the evolution of germs, writing, technology, government and organized religion.

His views on the evolution of germs and the connection to domesticated animals is of particular importance in the present pandemic as he states that given human proximity to the animals that are kept as pets and those that have been domesticated, the human body is getting constantly bombarded by their microbes. He cites four stages in the evolution of a specialized human disease from an animal precursor with the first being the diseases directly transmitted to us from our pets and domestic animals. Examples of such diseases are cat scratch fever from our cats and leptospirosis from dogs. Human beings are similarly liable to pick up diseases from wild animals such as the tularemia from skinning wild rabbits.

In the second stage, a former animal pathogen evolves to the point where it does get transmitted directly and causes epidemics. However, the epidemic dies out for any of several reasons, such as being cured by modern medicine, or being stopped when everybody around has already been infected and either becomes immune or dies. He gives the example of Onyong-nyong fever which appeared in East Africa in 1959 and proceeded to infect several million Africans. The fact that the patients recovered quickly and became immune to further attack helped the new disease to die out quickly.

Interestingly, Diamond refrains from mentioning Spanish flu although it killed millions all over the world. The final stage of this evolution of germs is represented by the major long established epidemic diseases which remain confined to humans.

He emphasizes the importance of lethal microbes in human history and uses the European conquest and depopulation of the America's as an example. "Far more Native Americans died in bed from Eurasian germs than on the battlefield from European guns and swords." Small pox, measles influenza and typhus competed for the top rank among the killers. The Aborigines of Australia and the Maori population of New Zealand faced similar extinction.

The book ends with a whirlwind tour of the histories of Australia and New Guinea, East Asia, Austronesian expansion, a historical comparison of Eurasia and the Americas, and Africa.

A singularly fascinating in Guns Germs and Steel is the detailed description of the defeat of the Inca Emperor on the 16th of November 1532 on his home turf in Peru, by the Spanish Conquistador Francisco Pizarro with only 168 Spanish soldiers. Diamond traces the chain of causation in this confrontation and the role played by guns, germs and steel.

Pizarro's military advantage lay in the Spaniards steel swords and other weapons, steel armor, guns and horses. In comparison, Atahualpa's troops were foot soldiers and had only stone, bronze or wooden clubs, hand axes, plus slingshots and quilted armors.

The Inca Empire was divided because of a battle between Atahualpa and his half-brother. The reason for this civil war was that an epidemic of small pox had spread among native South American Indians, after the germ arrived with Spanish Settlers in Panama and Colombia. The disease had killed the Inca Emperor Capac, his designated heir and most of the court officials. These deaths led to a contest for the throne between Atahualpa and his half-brother with the latter gaining ascendancy of the throne but not having the necessary training for the position.

Diamond concludes by making a passionate plea for history to be treated as a science in much the same way as Political Science and Economics and recommends a Nobel Prize be established for history.

At times, Diamond meanders, in other instances he places too much information for the reader to digest but it is an incredible journey that he takes us on. The book is as meaningful as it was when first published and perhaps in the context of the present human versus virus encounter even more so.

Shireen S. Mainuddin is a former banker and a member of The Reading Circle.

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Let’s Put the Kabul Collapse Behind Us and Look to a Profitable Future – Outsider Club

Posted: at 12:27 pm

There's been a lot of finger pointing and head shaking over the past week as Afghanistan rolled over for the Taliban in record time.

Of course, most of us had the luxury of sitting at a distance and marvelling as the chaos unfolded, second-guessing and bemoaning all the blunders of the last 20 years that brought us to this point.

And that's going to go on for a while as political pundits and politicians (many of which bear at least some responsibility for this disastrous undertaking) feign outrage and indignation for new infotainment.

Not me though.

I don't need to sit here and whine and scold and condemn.

We all know what happened. We all saw it in real time.

So what I want to do is look forward.

No lamentation of the massive failure that was Afghanistan is going to change anything.

And it surely won't make you any money.

Looking ahead toward the technologies that will revolutionize combat in the decades ahead, though?

That could be profitable indeed.

For example, way back in 2018, I wrote an article about military robotics drones.

I even offered a special report on the three best drone stocks to buy. And one of those stocks, Kratos Defense and Security Solutions (NASDAQ: KTOS), surged for a 115% gain.

A year later, when everyone else was making fun of the newly announced Space Force, I once again seized the opportunity to profit.

I found a rocket-maker, recommended it, and watched it jump 40% when it was bought out just like I said it would be.

No doubt, following the Pentagon and its enormous budget is a great way to find potential profit plays.

And that's why, when everyone else was watching the Kabul collapse, I zeroed in on another story.

It seems the Department of Defense is looking for ways to use commercial rockets to rapidly transport cargo and potentially troops across the globe.

Indeed, it turns out rocket trips aren't just for billionaires and wealthy thrill-seekers.

So join Outsider Club today for FREE. You'll learn how to take control of your finances, manage your own investments, and beat "the system" on your own terms. Become a member today, and get our latest free report: "5 Defense Contractors Crushing the Market."

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And this is something I noted previously, when the Space Force was first established.

The list of its potential responsibilities included the following:

Well, now the Air Force Research Laboratory has designated its new Rocket Cargo effort a Vanguard program, making it a top science and technology priority.

Logistics speed is at the heart of military supremacy, the AFRL said. If a commercial company is in advanced development for a new capability to move material faster, then DoD needs to promptly engage and seek to be early adopters.

The latter part of that statement means the Space Force is looking to partner with commercial space companies. And AFRL Commander Major General Heather Pringle told reporters that the main goal is to deliver up to 100 tons of supplies and equipment anywhere on the planet within tactical timelines.

So the military clearly envisions procuring this capability as a service rather than buying or building its own rockets.

And as it happens I just recommended a new space stock (another rocket company) that has already signed several deals with the U.S. Space Force.

It's even set to put a small Space Force satellite into orbit this week as part of a capabilities demonstration.

If all goes well this company, which just listed on the NASDAQ in July will have a long and profitable partnership with America's newest military branch.

So I once again encourage you to check out my latest report here.

Fight on,

Jason Simpkins

@OCSimpkins on Twitter

Jason Simpkins is Assistant Managing Editor of the Outsider Club and Investment Director of Wall Street's Proving Ground, a financial advisory focused on security companies and defense contractors. For more on Jason, check out his editor's page.

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So, join Outsider Club today for FREE! You'll learn how to take control of your finances, manage your own investments, and beat "the system" on your own terms. Become a member today, and get our latest FREE report: "Three Big Profit Opportunities in Solar"!

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Last Stop on the Way to the Cosmos? No Thanks. – The New York Times

Posted: August 22, 2021 at 3:19 pm

On an isolated archipelago off the coast of Georgia, where the vestiges of Americas Gilded Age aristocracy keep sprawling estates in tropical wilds, a controversy is roiling over a proposed spaceport.

On one side of the fight are the commissioners of Camden County, Ga., who have put nine years and close to 10 million taxpayer dollars toward the construction of a rocket launch facility on the mainland that they say will bring jobs, tourism and cachet to the area of about 55,000 people.

On the other are residents of the nearby barrier islands and coastline who fear falling debris, toxic plumes and catastrophic fire.

The heirs to the Coca-Cola fortune have homes on one of these islands, as do descendants of the Carnegies and other families known for generational wealth, so its easy for the spaceports most ardent champions to paint opposition to it as elitist.

But the fears arent based on nothing: Last September, one of the same class of rockets for which Camden County is tailoring its application tumbled from the sky in flaming pieces, igniting fires on public land near its launch site on Kodiak Island in Alaska. In 2014, a different type of rocket, launched from Wallops Island, Va., flew for six seconds before it fell to the ground and exploded, burning 15 acres and blowing windows and doors off buildings over a mile away.

And at Space Xs launch site in Boca Chica, Texas, there have been multiple massive explosions, which the company has referred to in public statements as awesome. One 2019 mishap the official term for when a rocket fails to launch, veers off course or explodes and comes crashing back to Earth caused a fire that consumed some 130 acres of a nearby state park before the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service was notified of the blaze.

The two barrier islands in the rockets proposed flight path, Cumberland Island and Little Cumberland, are federally protected sanctuaries where endangered sea turtles nest, horses run wild, and some of the worlds fewer than 400 remaining North Atlantic right whales calve off the coast.

The islands are also home to dozens of historical sites, including settlements established by formerly enslaved families and Grey Gardens-style crumbling estates. John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette were married here at the First African Baptist Church, a one-room chapel built of heart pine, in a secret ceremony in 1996.

The biggest controversy, however, is that the proposed rocket trajectory would come very close to peoples homes, blasting over populated areas only five miles downrange a situation that would be without precedent in U.S. history, according to a 2019 Federal Aviation Administration memo.

The National Park Service and Department of the Interior have recently questioned the safety of the plan. A diverse group of critics, including fishermen and shrimpers, sea turtle researchers, island residents, and the chieftess of the Gullah/Geechee nation have pushed to halt it entirely.

A spokesman for the F.A.A., which regulates the commercial space industry and is charged with supporting and promoting its growth, said in a statement to The New York Times: Every proposed launch site presents unique circumstances. The agencys decision about whether the site is appropriate for rocket launches is expected in September.

Increasingly, private companies with money to burn including Jeff Bezoss Blue Origin and Richard Bransons Virgin Galactic are spending billions to launch rockets and C.E.O.s toward the cosmos.

Businesses are springing up to support those goals, in addition to loftier aims including moon tourism and Mars colonization. But there is already plenty of money to be made in less speculative space pursuits.

Peter Beck, the chief executive of Rocket Lab in New Zealand, builds and launches spacecraft that carry GPS and radar satellites into orbit. So far, his company makes one of the only small-grade orbital launch vehicles in operation, but its only a matter of time until other companies crack the code. The race is part of what Mr. Beck calls a gold rush moment.

Space is incredibly integrated into our everyday lives, he said. If you turn off GPS, then all the ships and planes go around in circles, Seamless never turns up, even Tinder doesnt work. All of that is coming from space.

The space industry is expected to reach $1 trillion or more in value by 2040, according to a report by Morgan Stanley. Satellites are a huge part of that. According to Mr. Beck, over 100 other companies are working to design and launch the kind of small-satellite-carrying rockets (about the size of a semi-truck trailer) that his company makes.

There are currently 12 spaceports in the United States where companies can launch this type of rocket, and most are federally subsidized. But as of June 2020, another dozen spaceports were in the works.

Steve Howard, the Camden County administrator, has spent a decade preparing for this moment.

Mr. Howard, 49, envisions a future where astronauts make classroom visits, local students graduate into aeronautics jobs and high school robotics clubs are funded by rocket manufacturers. This part of the Georgia Coast could come to be known as Silicon Marsh, he said part of a space corridor of innovation that could extend from Cape Canaveral to South Carolina.

This area was a mill town. That mills gone now, Mr. Howard said of the county. Its largest employer is the Kings Bay naval submarine base. Weve got to make sure we have economic diversity, he said. What can we do to build for the future?

Supporters, including retired military generals, Cape Canaveral commanders and the Georgia Hunting and Fishing Federation, feel the spaceport is the countys best hope.

But critics hate the open-endedness of Mr. Howards proposal: The county wants to use the site of a former chemical plant for the port, without knowing what company may lease the space or further develop it. This makes it hard for a community to know just what they are signing up for.

There is some historical precedent. In 1965, NASA contracted the Thiokol Chemical company to test solid-propellant rocket engines designed for the Moon mission. Testing took place at a plant in Camden County. Also, at one point, Cumberland Island was a front-runner in NASAs search for a site for the Kennedy Space Center. (Cape Canaveral won.)

But that legacy includes tragedy. In 1971, an explosion at the plant killed more than two dozen people, two-thirds of whom were, as The Atlanta Constitution reported during the personal injury hearings in 1984, poor Black women from rural Camden County who earned slightly more than the then-minimum wage of $1.60 an hour.

Bought and then abandoned by another chemical company, the site has been contaminated with toxic waste and unexploded ordnance for decades. The spaceport proposal calls for much of that to be cleared away without explaining how.

Life magazine declared us the gateway to space in the 60s, Mr. Howard said. This is an opportunity to make history again.

The largest and southernmost of Georgias 14 barrier islands, Cumberland is more than double the size of Manhattan, covered in saw-toothed palmetto and live oak, ringed with white sand and marsh, and home to wild boar, deer, alligators, armadillos and over 300 species of breeding or migrating bird. Only 300 visitors are permitted per day.

Those staying at the islands lone hotel, the Greyfield Inn, where rooms start at $855 per night, arrive via private ferry from Amelia Island, just south of the Florida-Georgia border. (Campers can take the National Park Service ferry from St. Marys, Ga.) The 15-bedroom Colonial Revival manor was built in 1901, a gift from Thomas and Lucy Carnegie to their daughter Margaret Ricketson, whose own daughter Lucy Ferguson first opened the home to paying guests in the early 1960s.

The white house with its wide porch is still furnished with the Carnegies velvet couches and dusty books; there is no Wi-Fi or television. The living room window sills are lined with animal skulls and crystals, and the walls are hung with Carnegie portraits, including a painting of Lucy seated upon a buckskin, wearing a red head scarf and sheathed knife. (Not pictured: her pet buzzard.)

Lucys granddaughter Janet Ferguson, known as Gogo, lives part-time just beyond the bicycle barn of the Greyfield compound, in a house with an art studio where she makes and sells jewelry and tableware cast from locally scavenged armadillo scales, boar tusks and jacaranda seed pods. (One of her brothers, Mitty Ferguson, runs the inn with his wife, Mary.)

Ive spent my entire life on the island seven generations of my family lived here, Ms. Ferguson, 70, said over the phone.

She was here 25 years ago for the Kennedy-Bessette wedding. (It was Ms. Ferguson who molded their wedding bands from the ribs of a rattlesnake.) And her family remembers 25 years before that when the Thiokol-Woodbine explosion on the mainland shook the island, rattling the inns windows.

Ms. Ferguson is one of the islands few private stewards. In the early 1970s, the Carnegies sold or deeded most of the island to the federal government, so the National Park Service could preserve the wild coastal forest as a national seashore.

Since 2015, the National Park Service has been sending anxious letters to the F.A.A. about the spaceports environmental impact. After the 2020 presidential election, those letters have become more strongly worded but the F.A.A. still has the final say.

We never wouldve entrusted the island to the government or anyone knowing that a space launch site would be in our future, Ms. Ferguson said.

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It was to be protected in perpetuity, for the wilderness experience and the enjoyment of the public, she said. It feels like this is really going to alter that.

If the spaceport moves forward, the part of Cumberland Island most affected will be the islands least populous north end, 12 miles north of the Greyfield. It can be reached by appealing to one of the few people on the island with a permit to operate a motor vehicle and then riding up on a bumpy sand road (slowed by the occasional alligator sighting). Or hiking.

By either of these methods, youll reach the homestead of Carol Ruckdeschel, a 79-year-old self-taught biologist and the founder of Wild Cumberland, a conservation nonprofit. She moved to the island in the employ of a wealthy family in the 1970s and has lived in this loamy wilderness in a rustic, hand-hewn building next to the First African Baptist Church, for the most part alone, ever since. A 1973 New Yorker profile by John McPhee referred to her as the wild woman of Georgia.

Do me a favor. Dont call it pristine, she said of Cumberland Island. Beyond its postcard-perfect scenery, she sees the roads, limited beach traffic and other land management strategies in conflict with the wilderness.

In a brimmed hat over gray pigtails, with a compass in her pack, Ms. Ruckdeschel trekked to the islands northernmost beach and pointed out the oyster-lined marsh of Christmas Creek, a brackish waterway that separates the land she lives on from Little Cumberland.

Overhead is the proposed rocket flight path. The straight-east trajectory goes right over my house, Ms. Ruckdeschel said, pointing up at the invisible arc a rocket would take across the sky.

Typically, any land or marine space in the flight path of a rocket would be off-limits to humans for hours before tests or launches. But in Georgia a constitutional amendment was passed in 2006 that precludes removing citizens from their land if commercial gain is involved.

Camden County officials have proposed some creative alternatives, including monitoring island occupation by heat-seeking drone, or instituting a first-of-its-kind authorized persons status that would allow locals to stay put during launches if they register at various established checkpoints.

Should residents wish to relocate on a launch day, the latest application materials read, county personnel would need to escort them, or offer appropriate temporary accommodations, along with V.I.P. viewing passes for the hassle.

This is little comfort to landowners. Jennifer Candler, 57, who has a small apiary on her familys estate near Ms. Ruckdeschels homestead, said that to her knowledge, no county official has reached out to anyone in her family to discuss drones, evacuations or checkpoints.

I understand Camden County officials goals for this revenue stream jobs, tourism, for a generation growing up with a spaceport in their backyards and the inspiration that could provide for them for a career in science or as an astronaut, she said. But then I look at the other spaceports around the country and none of them have people right in their launch trajectory.

For Richard Parker, a 64-year-old journalist with a home on Little Cumberland, the possible repercussions could be apocalyptic.

This is not a place where fire is a natural part of things, he said. Palmettos burn hot and fast. These live oaks are hundreds of years old.

The fire preparedness plan that Camden County submitted seems unworkable to him. The homes on Little Cumberland are not mansions but well-worn beach houses some kit ranchers from the 60s, others modest stilted homes finished in weather-faded wood. Residents here made their own agreement with the Department of the Interior in the 1970s to fold the island into the national seashore while continuing to own it privately, adhering to rigorous conservation principles.

On the more rustic and more remote Little Cumberland, the tap water smells like sulfur, the power goes out often, and the sand dunes have grown so high over the years that they obscure some homes second-story windows. Municipal and county services are nonexistent.

If a patch of the island goes up in flames, the call made is not to a fire department, but to a phone tree of neighbors. Wooden trunks, set out along the islands few sand lanes, contain tools for wildland firefighting: rakes, pickaxes, backpacks that can be filled with water, and fire extinguishers.

The Spaceport Camden team maintains that mishaps are highly unlikely, and the chance of debris landing on Little Cumberland are extremely remote. But on the off-chance of fire, the suggested emergency preparedness plan involves marine landing craft with firefighters and rescue A.T.V.s.

That plan apparently has made certain assumptions from looking at satellite images taken at low tide, Mr. Parker wrote to the F.A.A. An actual visit to the island, he wrote, would have revealed 30-foot dunes across the entire north point of Little Cumberland preventing A.T.V. access to the interior, and no water or air evacuation possibilities.

The wooden trunks have been successfully used by residents to put out small blazes, Mr. Parker noted, but trying to imagine them as recourse against flaming fuselage, he just shook his head.

There have been two plane crashes here, said his neighbor Rebecca Lang, a 44-year-old chef and cookbook author, whose father bought a two-acre plot on the island for less than $8,000 in 1969.

One hit a house and burned it down, she said. So its not like were making this stuff up. (That was in the late 1980s, and the house belonged to the parents of Rob Portman, the senator from Ohio.)

Were normal people, and we knew nothing about space four years ago, said Shelley Renner, another landowner on Little Cumberland who is also a board member of 100 Miles, a coastal conservation group.

Ms. Renner has worked with Mr. Parker, Ms. Lang and other neighbors to develop a baseline understanding of F.A.A. evaluation processes, rocket failure probability rates, casualty areas, overflight exclusion zones and debris dispersion areas. There has been nary a cocktail party in the past half decade where these topics are not discussed, she said.

Do you know how many hours weve spent at this point? she added. Literally thousands of hours.

The stalemate has steadily deepened, compounded by a growing lack of trust.

Ms. Langs husband, Kevin Lang, 45, a partner at a law firm in Athens, Ga., and a publicly vocal opponent of the spaceport, said that F.A.A. officials he met at public hearings didnt seem to be aware that Little Cumberland Island was inhabited.

Some of that confusion may have arisen from testimony by a former Georgia state representative, Jason Spencer, who resigned from office in 2018 after appearing on Sacha Baron Cohens Who Is America? He said in State Senate hearings early on that the residential island was very fairly much barren and told constituents there were no voters in the flight path.

Brian Gist, a lawyer with the Southern Environmental Law Center Senior in Atlanta, said that Camden County refused, with a few minor exceptions, to provide documentation about the project and was essentially forced to disclose any details through public records requests.

Mr. Howard, meanwhile, thinks that environmental advocacy organizations have inflated the risks to bolster their own fund-raising efforts.

People say, Hey, safety, safety. But whats the real impact? Mr. Howard said. If you look at Kennedy Space Center, their spaceports in the middle of the wildlife sanctuary on seashores.

The science and data will show you, fireballs and things like that, it just cant happen based on the fuel thats left on the rocket, the trajectory, the elevation, the safety and the environment, he said. Plus, the rocket itself goes quick.

According to risk models produced by consultants, he said, the chances of someone getting hurt, or worse in the six to 10 seconds a rocket would take to pass over the archipelago range from less than 1 in 10 million to less than 1 in 1 billion.

His team has run the numbers again and again, he said, adding, this spaceport, Im confident, will be the most vetted of all time.

But these risk models are based on a representative rocket the team is betting will be sleeker and safer than the ones made by Rocket Lab and it has yet to be invented.

That idealized super-small, super-nimble orbital vehicle was conceived by industry experts including Andrew Nelson, a Spaceport Camden consultant whom the county government has paid more than $1 million so far. He was formerly the C.O.O. and president of XCOR, a space travel company that filed for bankruptcy in 2017 after selling a number of $100,000 tickets to space on a rocket that was never built.

From the Scottish Highlands to the Hawaiian islands to the Michigan coast of Lake Superior, at least a dozen other communities are weighing the gains that could come from a spaceport against the possible disruption to fragile, biodiverse environments.

Legal challenges and petitions have been generated by constituencies on all sides.

G. Scott Hubbard, a Stanford aeronautics professor, former director of the Ames Research Center at NASA and the chair of the SpaceX Safety Advisory Panel, predicts that this kind of development (and disputes over it) will become more common across the United States in the coming years.

In the first 50 years of aviation from Kitty Hawk 1903 to 1953, there were more than a million aircraft built and used multiple times, he said. We gained a lot of experience very fast.

But space is different. In the first 50 years of the space program, there were only 45 launches total worldwide, he said. The difference in experience here is huge.

He thinks that trying to build a spaceport in a populated area complicates things for the commissioners in Camden County. But he cant predict whether humans in the flight path will prove insurmountable to spaceport construction.

My personal opinion is that there is an overpopulation of spaceports right now, but this is how new businesses start, he said. At the beginning of the 20th century, every bicycle shop was building cars.

The future of commercial space development, then, leaves bystanders in two camps: those who champion forward movement often at a relentless pace in the name of progress, and those who are focused on protecting what already exists, and is already valued.

These companies are vying for the licensing, grabbing up everything they can in space, with no regard for the impact down below, Ms. Ferguson said.

The Spaceport Camden team sees tons of possibilities for the down below. What if 10 years from now, county initiatives soar, weve got green tech, satellite tech, Department of Defense initiatives, your child or your neighbors child cannot only graduate but become an individual who contributes to the next space race? Mr. Howard said.

Lately, he has found himself invoking one of his favorite quotes, from Jeff Bezos: If you absolutely cant tolerate critics, then dont do anything new or interesting.

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NASA Space Construction: ISS Tests Regolith 3D Printer for Artemis Lunar Program; Is this the beginning of space colonization? – Space Bollyinside -…

Posted: at 3:19 pm

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The Redwire Regolith 3D Printer The Northrop Grumman Cygnus Cargo Ship resupply missionsuccessfully sent up 8,200 pounds of cargo for NASA to the International Space Station. The cargo included crew supplies like fresh apples, tomatoes, kiwi, a pizza kit, and a cheese smorgasbord.

What were also of most importance were the science and research equipment and investigations included in the cargo. One, in particular, is the Redwire Regolith 3D Print study. By reducing the launch mass of construction materials, this allows for more space for other necessary cargo that can keep the explorers living on the planetary body for longer.

The Redwire Regolith Print study aims to demonstrate 3D printing on the space station using a material simulating regolith or the loose rock and dust found on the surfaces of planetary bodies such as the Moon and Mars, Stuffsaid. Being able to construct habitats and other infrastructures using resources already found on the planetary bodies can significantly reduce launch mass and cost, NASApointed out. The results of this study could help determine whether or not it is possible to use regolith as a raw material, as well as use 3D printing as a construction technique in space.

Redwire Space (@RedwireSpace) August 11, 2021 #ICYMI: Our Redwire Regolith Print launched from @NASA_Wallops yesterday aboard NG-16. This payload will use our existing 3D printer aboard @Space_Station to print 3 slabs using lunar regolith simulant! (: @NASA) pic.twitter.com/240ymugIyD

The Artemis Lunar Program Read Also: NASA Moon Mission 2024: Elon Musk Pitches to Make Spacesuits for Moon Landing!

Artemis Exploration Spacesuit Testing NASAs investigation on the feasibility of a Regolith 3D Printer to solve the infrastructure construction on the surface of planetary bodies ties with its upcoming Artemis missions. Elon Musks SpaceXis working with NASA to bring back humans to the moon and possibly live there by 2024. The NASA Artemis missionwill land the first woman and first person of color on the Moon and use the findings learned on the Moon to take the first set of astronauts to Mars.

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NASA Space Construction: ISS Tests Regolith 3D Printer for Artemis Lunar Program; Is this the beginning of space colonization? - Space Bollyinside -...

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Gardening could be an essential part of astronaut self-care – The Counter

Posted: at 3:19 pm

In addition to cucumbers, basil, mint, tomatoes, parsley, Bunchek is also growing varieties of peas, beans, broccoli, cauliflower, and new pepper and mustard green cultivars, all of which were selected either because of their size, shape, or other physical characteristics, or for their nutritional value.

So often in space, were constrained by power, volume, mass, things like that, said Wheeler. We try to look for shorter growing species, maybe dwarf varieties within those species. Growing sugarcane thats 12 feet tall just isnt a good match. They also want varieties that grow quickly and have high yields.

In addition to size and shape, theyre looking at the nutritional content of plants, and specifically for nutrients that can be difficult to deliver by other means, or that degrade over time, like Vitamin C and Vitamin B1.

Youre not going to get a lot of nutrition out of lettuce, Wheeler explains. But: Choose a colored variety, then you can get anthocyanin. Thats a pigment that has some antioxidant qualities.

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Gardening could be an essential part of astronaut self-care - The Counter

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NASA recruits for a year-long simulation mission to Mars – Tech News Inc

Posted: August 16, 2021 at 1:56 pm

The US Space Agency announced in a statement the launch of a test campaign for a future manned mission to Mars. The simulation will immerse the candidate astronauts in the Red Planets extreme conditions for a year beginning in the fall of 2022.

distance moon, March destination for NASA. The US agency takes another step towards conquering the red planet in Press release issued on August 6 Announcing the highly anticipated implementation of a series of manned mission simulations on Mars. His name is Shabiya (Crew health and peer performance exploration), the first test campaign will take place in a habitat that reproduces the planets living conditions in the southern United States. Three courses, each lasting one year, will be organized starting fromAutumn 2022.

If NASAs ambition is to land astronauts on the moon again, Artemis missions It is a real starting point for the Mars adventure. The most optimistic forecast predicts the first flights to Mars between 2028 and 2030. Yet the utopia of a Mars colony faces the harsh reality of facts: the constraints of the round trip and daily life there.

Given the optimal approach between Earth and Mars, astronauts would have to live in the confined space of a space shuttle for several months, between 200 and 350 days. This trip requires an improvement in time spent on the nearby planet, and the researchers want to install future Mars explorers while 360 to 500 days. L Atmosphere Mars is so weak that it makes life in the open air impossible, which is why in order to recreate these harsh living conditions, NASA called the company icon To build a base of 157 m2 Allowing ambitious adventurers to immerse themselves in a realistic replica of the habitat of Mars.

3D printed, Mars Alpha Sand Dunes It will be installed in the heart Johnson Space Center, in Texas. The mission will test the astronauts ability to resist isolation and allow them to conduct several experiments: managing food supplies, responding to unexpected accidents or even exports from regions of Mars thanks to Virtual Reality.

Exploration of Mars is beginning to take shape, but it is still difficult to implement. Elon Musk, very optimistic, hopes to bring the next generation of astronauts to the planet At the earliest in 2026 Thanks to his company, Space X. But researchers like Sylvester Morris insist on the hostility of life on Mars and the impossibility of true colonization. On the microphone of France Inter, NSastrophysicist Last August 4, the French reported that they live on Mars. It was not a matter of life, but a matter of survival..

While waiting to see the first humans set foot on the Red Planet, new teams of astronauts are expected to set foot on the Moon in the middle of the decade during the Artemis missions, 50 years after the end of the Apollo program in 1972. New challenges and the introduction of new technologies should pave the way for colonization space for scientific purposes. NASA hopes to shape the next human on our natural satellite by 2024.

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District working to improve Indigenous relations – My Muskoka Now

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District of Muskoka Logo. (Courtesy of District of Muskoka)

The District of Muskoka has revamped its strategy to work more closely with Indigenous Peoples.

The Strengthening Indigenous Municipal Relationships Strategy 2.0 was approved by District Council at its August meeting. According to Tina Kilbourne, team lead for the districts Continuous Improvement Unit, the previous version of the strategy established both a formal land acknowledgement statement, as well as the Muskoka Area Indigenous Leadership Table.

Kilbourne says that through the table, the district consults on municipal matters with the Wahta Mohawks, Moose Deer Point, Chippewas of Rama, Georgina Island, Wasauksing, and Huron-Wendat First Nations, as well as the Moon River Mtis Council. Kilbourne says the District does not have active participation from Chippewas of Beausoleil First Nation, but that theyre working on it.

Another shortfall the new strategy is meant to address is the lack of representation for Indigenous People who do not live on a reservation.

Right now at the leadership table we have all the Nations at the table, but what we arent representing is the urban Indigenous or off-reserve Indigenous voice, says Kilbourne. We thought the best way to do that would be to establish a Muskoka Indigenous Alliance, have people from that attend our leadership table, and then wed be capturing all the voices.

Kilbourne says Parry Sound-Muskoka MP Scott Aitchison and MPP Norm Miller have also been invited to sit at the leadership table to strengthen relationships at all levels of government with First Nations. Since Indigenous elections often do not coincide with municipal, provincial, federal elections, or each other, she says work will need to be done to make sure the table continues beyond the term of its current membership.

Other parts of the revamped strategy include:

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Space Colonization – Top 3 Pros and Cons – ProCon.org

Posted: August 11, 2021 at 12:22 pm

While humans have long thought of gods living in the sky, the idea of space travel or humans living in space dates to at least 1610 after the invention of the telescope when German astronomer Johannes Kepler wrote to Italian astronomer Galileo: Let us create vessels and sails adjusted to the heavenly ether, and there will be plenty of people unafraid of the empty wastes. In the meantime, we shall prepare, for the brave sky-travellers, maps of the celestial bodies.

In popular culture, space travel dates back to at least the mid-1600s when Cyrano de Bergerac first wrote of traveling to space in a rocket. Space fantasies flourished after Jules Vernes From Earth to the Moon was published in 1865, and again when RKO Pictures released a film adaptation, A Trip to the Moon, in 1902. Dreams of space settlement hit a zenith in the 1950s with Walt Disney productions such as Man and the Moon, and science fiction novels including Ray Bradburys The Martian Chronicles (1950).

Fueling popular imagination at the time was the American space race with Russia, amid which NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) was formed in the United States on July 29, 1958, when President Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act into law. After the Russians put the first person, Yuri Gagarin, in space on Apr. 12, 1961, NASA put the first people, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, on the Moon in July 1969. What was science fiction began to look more like possibility. Over the next six decades, NASA would launch space stations, land rovers on Mars, and orbit Pluto and Jupiter, among other accomplishments. NASAs ongoing Artemis program, launched by President Trump in 2017, intends to return humans to the Moon, landing the first woman on the lunar surface, by 2024.

As of June 17, 2021, three countries had space programs with human space flight capabilities: China, Russia, and the United States. Indias planned human space flights have been delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic, but they may launch in 2023. However, NASA ended its space shuttle program in 2011 when the shuttle Atlantis landed at Kennedy Space Center in Florida on July 21. NASA astronauts going into space afterward rode along with Russians until 2020 when SpaceX took over and first launched NASA astronauts into space on Apr. 23, 2021. SpaceX is a commercial space travel business owned by Elon Musk that has ignited commercial space travel enthusiasm and the idea of space tourism. Richard Bransons Virgin Galactic and Jeff Bezos Blue Origin have generated similar excitement.

Richard Branson launched himself, two pilots, and three mission specialists into space from New Mexico for a 90-minute flight on the Virgin Galactic Unity 22 mission on July 11, 2021. The flight marked the first time that passengers, rather than astronauts, went into space.

Jeff Bezos followed on July 20, 2021, accompanied by his brother, Mark, and both the oldest and youngest people to go to space: 82-year-old Wally Funk, a female pilot who tested with NASA in the 1960s but never flew, and Oliver Daemen, an 18-year-old student from the Netherlands. The fully automated, unpiloted Blue Origin New Shepard rocket launched on the 52nd anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing and was named after Alan Shepard, who was the first American to travel into space on May 5, 1961.

The International Space Station has been continuously occupied by groups of six astronauts since Nov. 2000, for a total of 243 astronauts from 19 countries as of May 13, 2021. Astronauts spend an average of 182 days (about six months) aboard the ISS. As of Feb. 2020, Russian Valery Polyakov had spent the longest continuous time in space (437.7 days in 1994-1995 on space station Mir), followed by Russian Sergei Avdeyev (379.6 days in 1998-1999 on Mir), Russians Vladimir Titov and Musa Manarov (365 days in 1987-1988 on Mir), Russian Mikhail Kornienko and American Scott Kelly (340.4 days in 2015-2016 on Mir and ISS respectively) and American Christina Koch (328 days in 2019-20 in ISS).

In a 2018 poll, 50% of Americans believed space tourism will be routine for ordinary people by 2068. 32% believed long-term habitable space colonies will be built by 2068. But 58% said they were definitely or probably not interested in going to space. And the majority (63%) stated NASAs top priority should be monitoring Earths climate, while only 18% said sending astronauts to Mars should be the highest priority and only 13% would prioritize sending astronauts to the Moon.

The most common ideas for space colonization include: settling Earths Moon, building on Mars, and constructing free-floating space stations.

Elon Musk, founder and CEO of SpaceX, stated, I think there is a strong humanitarian argument for making life multi-planetary, in order to safeguard the existence of humanity in the event that something catastrophic were to happen, in which case being poor or having a disease would be irrelevant, because humanity would be extinct. It would be like, Good news, the problems of poverty and disease have been solved, but the bad news is there arent any humans left. I think we have a duty to maintain the light of consciousness, to make sure it continues into the future.

According to some philosophies, humans are the only beings capable of morality, and, thus, preserving humanity is the highest moral imperative. Following from that premise, Brian Patrick Green, Director of Technology Ethics at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University, concluded, Because space settlement gives humankind the opportunity to significantly raise the chances of survival for our species, it is therefore a moral imperative to settle space as quickly as possible.

Some theorists, including Gonzalo Munevar, PhD, interdisciplinary Professor Emeritus at Lawrence Technological University, believe colonizing space will increase clean energy on Earth, provide access to the solar systems resources, and increase knowledge of space and Earth. The benefits to humanity created by the resources and knowledge create a moral obligation to colonize space.

Sheri Wells-Jensen, PhD, Associate Professor of English at Bowling Green State University, argues that the moral imperative goes even further than simple preservation: [W]e have a moral obligation to improve: that is, to colonize yes, but to do it better: to actively unthink systems of oppression that we know exist. To spread ourselves without thought or care would probably result in failure: more planets spiraling toward global warming or space settlements filled with social unrest.

Fred Kennedy, PhD, President of Momentus, a space transportation company, explained, Ill assert that a fundamental truth repeatedly borne out by history is that expanding, outwardly-focused civilizations are far less likely to turn on themselves, and far more likely to expend their fecundity on growing habitations, conducting important research and creating wealth for their citizens. A civilization that turns away from discovery and growth stagnates. Kennedy pointed out that while humans still have problems to resolve on Earth including civil rights violations and wealth inequality, Forgoing opportunities to expand our presence into the cosmos to achieve better outcomes here at home hasnt eliminated these scourges. We shouldnt avoid exploring space based on the false dichotomy of fixing Earthly problems first.

Humans are not a species of stagnation. Jeff Bezos, Founder of Amazon.com who traveled to space in 2021, asserted that exploring space would result in expanded human genius: The solar system can easily support a trillion humans. And if we had a trillion humans, we would have a thousand Einsteins and a thousand Mozarts and unlimited, for all practical purposes, resources and solar power unlimited for all practical purposes.

Space, in particular, is connected to exploration and growth in the human imagination. In 2014 Elon Musk stated, Its obvious that space is deeply ingrained in the American psyche SpaceX is only 12 years old now. Between now and 2040, the companys lifespan will have tripled. If we have linear improvement in technology, as opposed to logarithmic, then we should have a significant base on Mars, perhaps with thousands or tens of thousands of people.

While Earth is experiencing devastating climate change effects that should be addressed, Earth will be habitable for at least 150 million years, if not over a billion years, based on current predictive models. Humans have time to explore and colonize space at the same time as we mend the effects of climate change on Earth.

Brian Patrick Green stated, Furthermore, we have to realize that solving Earths environmental problems is extremely difficult and so will take a very long time. And we can do this while also pursuing colonization.

Jeff Bezos suggested that we move all heavy industry off Earth and then zone Earth for residences and light industry only. Doing so could reverse some of the effects of climate change while colonizing space.

Munevar also suggested something similar in more detail: In the shorter term, a strong human presence throughout the solar system will be able to prevent catastrophes on Earth by, for example, deflecting asteroids on a collision course with us. This would also help preserve the rest of terrestrial life presumably something the critics would approve of. But eventually, we should be able to construct space colonies [structures in free space rather than on a planet or moon], which could house millions. These colonies would be positioned to construct massive solar power satellites to provide clean power to the Earth, as well as set up industries that on Earth create much environmental damage. Far from messing up environments that exist now, we would be creating them, with extraordinary attention to environmental sustainability.

Space Ecologist Joe Mascaro, PhD, summarized, To save the Earth, we have to go to Mars. Mascaro argues that expanding technology to go to Mars will help solve problems on Earth: The challenge of colonising Mars shares remarkable DNA with the challenges we face here on Earth. Living on Mars will require mastery of recycling matter and water, producing food from barren and arid soil, generating carbon-free nuclear and solar energy, building advanced batteries and materials, and extracting and storing carbon from atmospheric carbon dioxide and doing it all at once. The dreamers, thinkers and explorers who decide to go to Mars will, by necessity, fuel unprecedented lateral innovations [that will solve problems on Earth].

Briony Horgan, PhD, Assistant Professor of Planetary Science at Purdue University, explained that terraforming Mars is way beyond any kind of technology were going to have any time soon.

In one widely promoted plan, Mars needs to first be warmed to closer to Earths average temperature (from -60 C/-76 F to 15 C/59 F), which will take approximately 100 years. Then the planet must be made to produce oxygen so humans and other mammals can breathe, which will take about 100,000 years or more. And those two steps can only be taken once Mars is thoroughly investigated for water, carbon dioxide, and nitrates.

A 2018 NASA study concluded that, based on the levels of CO2 found on Mars, the above plan is not feasible. Lead author Bruce Jakosky, PhD, Professor of Geological Sciences at the University of Colorado at Boulder, stated, terraforming Mars is not possible using present-day technology.

If a workable solution were found and implemented, a project of that magnitude would cost billions, perhaps trillions.

Billionaire Elon Musk explained that the SpaceX Mars colonization project would need one million people to pay $200,000 each just to move to and colonize Mars, which doesnt include the costs incurred before humans left Earth. Returning to the Moon would have cost an estimated $104 billion in 2005 (about $133 billion in 2019 dollars), or almost 7 times NASAs entire 2019 budget.

But, a person has yet to set foot on Mars, and no space station has been built on another planet or natural satellite.

Further, as Linda Billings, PhD, Research Professor at George Washington University, noted, all life on Earth evolved to live in Earth conditions If humans cant figure out how to adapt to, or arrest, changing conditions on Earth then I cant see how humans could figure out how to adapt to a totally alien environment.

If humans have the technology, knowledge, and ability to transform an uninhabitable planet, moon, or other place in space into an appealing home for humans, then surely we have the technology, knowledge, and ability to fix the problems weve created on Earth.

Lori Marino, PhD, Founder and Executive Director of the Kimmela Center for Animal Advocacy, asserted, [W]e are not capable of enacting a successful colonization of another planet. The fact that we have destroyed our home planet is prima facie evidence of this assertion. It is sheer hubris to even consider the question of whether we should go or not go as if we are deciding which movie to see this weekend because we really are not in a position to make that choice What objective person would hire humanity to colonize a virgin planet, given its abysmal past performance in caring for the Earths ecosystem (overpopulation, climate change, mass extinctions)?

Some assert that leaving Earth in shambles proves we are not ready to colonize space in terms of cultural, social, or moral infrastructure, regardless of technological advancements.

John Traphagan, PhD, Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Texas at Austin, argued, Colonization has the odor of running away from the problems weve created here; if we do that, we will simply bring those problems with us. We need a major change in how we think about what it means to be humanwe need to stop seeing our species as special and start seeing it as part of a collection of species. In my view, as long as we bring the [idea] of human exceptionalism with us to other worlds, we are doomed to repeat the same mistakes we have made here.

As novelist Andy Weir explained, The problem is that you still dont want to send humans to the moon. You want to send robots. Humans are soft and squishy and they die. Robots are hard and nobody gets upset when they die.

Bioethicist George Dvorsky summarized the hostile nature of Mars: The Red Planet is a cold, dead place, with an atmosphere about 100 times thinner than Earths. The paltry amount of air that does exist on Mars is primarily composed of noxious carbon dioxide, which does little to protect the surface from the Suns harmful rays. Air pressure on Mars is very low; at 600 Pascals, its only about 0.6 percent that of Earth. You might as well be exposed to the vacuum of space, resulting in a severe form of the bendsincluding ruptured lungs, dangerously swollen skin and body tissue, and ultimately death. The thin atmosphere also means that heat cannot be retained at the surface. The average temperature on Mars is -81 degrees Fahrenheit (-63 degrees Celsius), with temperatures dropping as low as -195 degrees F (-126 degrees C).

Meanwhile, lunar dust is made of shards of silica and cuts like glass. The dust clung to the space suits of Apollo astronauts, scratching their visors and getting in their eyes and throats, which could result in bronchitis or cancer. And the radiation on the Moon is about 200 times higher than on Earth, in addition to other problems colonizing the Moon would cause humans.

Humans would have a host of illnesses to deal with due to climate differences on Mars or the Moon: cancer, radiation illnesses, reproductive problems (or sterility), muscle degeneration, bone loss, skin burns, cardiovascular disease, depression, boredom, an inability to concentrate, high blood pressure, immune disorders, metabolic disorders, visual disorders, balance and sensorimotor problems, structural changes in the brain, nausea, dizziness, weakness, cognitive decline, and altered gene function, among others. Astronauts who have spent just a year in space have demonstrated irreversible health problems.

Humans havent even attempted to live in Antarctica or under Earths seas, which have many fewer challenges for human bodies, so why would humans want to live on a planet or on the Moon thats likely to kill them fairly immediately?

Discussion Questions

1. Should humans colonize space? Why or why not?

2. If humans were to colonize space, where should we start: Mars, Earths Moon, or another celestial body? And what should be done on that body: residences, industrialization, or another purpose? Explain your answer(s).

3. If humans were to colonize space, how could life on Earth change? And would these changes be good or bad? Explain your answer(s).

Take Action

1. Analyze Christopher Schabergs position that Were Already Colonizing Mars.

2. Consider the language used to talk about humans living in space with Bill Nye.

3. Explore George Dvorskys position that Humans Will Never Colonize Mars.

4. Consider how you felt about the issue before reading this article. After reading the pros and cons on this topic, has your thinking changed? If so, how? List two to three ways. If your thoughts have not changed, list two to three ways your better understanding of the other side of the issue now helps you better argue your position.

5. Push for the position and policies you support by writing US national senators and representatives.

Sources

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52 Years Of Moon Landing: Voyages Of Discovery, Voyages Of Profit – Outlook India

Posted: July 21, 2021 at 12:53 am

Its been 52 years now! 20th July 1969! A memorable day for humanity. On that day, two people represented the whole world in breaking the boundaries of Earth and started an era of explorations beyond Earth by stepping on the hitherto unexplored soil of Earths nearest neighbour in the cosmos, the Moon.

It was not only a story of technological excellence and competency, but also a tale of the human minds eternal quest for the unknown and our intention for going beyond our natural habitat, our environment to conquer distant alien worlds. It was 8:17 p.m. on 20th July, that Eagle, the Lunar Lander of the Apollo 11 mission touched down on the Moon. Soon after Neil Armstrong stepped onto the soil of Moon. Edwin Aldrin followed and for two and half hours they ventured, moved and performed experiments on the Lunar surface. It must have been quite an exciting and thrilling experience for them. Much more unique than their extensive training on simulated lunar environments and landscapes on Earth. They were part of the Apollo 11 Mission, now a subject of every science textbook around the world. On their module named Eagle, they landed and later safely returned back to the orbiting module named Columbia, where another astronaut, Michael Collins waited for them. Rest is history. Throughout the world people were enthralled with the scratchy images of Neil Armstrong climbing down the stairs of the spacecraft, jumping gently onto the Moon. His first statement will remain forever a poignant utterance oft-quoted by multitudes of people thereafter for motivating further conquest of space.

Thats one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind. A statement probably made in the excitement of a successful landing on the Moon, but with a profound effect on generations of space scientists all over the world.

It was the beginning of an era of increasingly more technologically advanced missions to the Moon. From 1969 to 1972 six Apollo missions successfully landed on the Moon. Altogether 12 astronauts stepped onto the moon and carried out complex manoeuvres trying to get as much information possible from the lunar surface, atmosphere, interiors and the possibility of the presence of water molecules.

The Mission to Moon started in earnest when Soviet Russia sent numerous spacecraft to the Moon, some to orbit, some to land under the Luna Programme. Luna 1 had the first successful flyby. Luna 2 crashed into the moon. Luna 3, in 1959, orbited the moon and sent the first close up pictures of the moons surface and far side. Russia continued with their lunar programme by sending almost regularly different spacecraft. Some were successful in sending us data that earlier nobody was aware of, but at other times their missions were failures.

One has to remember that the prevalent period was also of tremendous international conflict, mistrust and competition. The Cold War was raging. The USA and its allies were up against arms with Soviet Russia and the Soviet Block countries to prove their excellence in financial, defence, science, technology and global powerplay. The initial success of Soviet Russia in reaching the Moon galvanized the Western Block, especially America. It was the American President, John F. Kennedy who wanted to create a masterstroke for his nation and in 1961 made it a national goal to land an astronaut on the moon and return them safely to Earth within a decade! It was a tall order, given the level of preparedness and prevalent technological efficiency of NASA which was established only in 1958. Mostly to compete with Russia and to win the race of supremacy in space science, NASA had its Mercury and Gemini Programmes to test the possibility of a manned mission to the Moon and return safely to Earth. These projects and their partial successes along with the interest of the scientists, political leaders and general public paved the way for the ambitious Apollo Programme, which in today's money, had a budget of about $225 billion! It seemed that the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 was instrumental in strengthening the resolve of American technocrats and the scientific community to proceed at a breakneck speed and win the race to the Moon thereby partly winning the imaginary Superpower Challenge between the USSR and USA.

The purpose of the Apollo missions (1963 -72) was to achieve the goal of landing an astronaut on the moon and bringing them back to Earth safely. The first Apollo mission (Apollo 1) ended in a disaster where 3 astronauts died in a fire during a flight pre-test.

The next manned mission was Apollo 7. Apollo 7 spent more time in space than all the Soviet space flights combined up to that time. Apollo 8 splashed down in the Pacific Ocean after travelling over 800,000 Km. and orbiting the moon ten times. Apollo 9 was the first manned flight in Earth's orbit and the first manned flight of the lunar module. This flight paved the way for Apollo 10, which was the first to travel to the moon with the entire Apollo configuration.

Apollo 11 started its journey from the Kennedy Space Flight centre on 16th July 1969 on a Saturn V rocket and ultimately the lunar lander slowly settled on the moon on July 20, at around 20:17 UT (IST: July 21, 1:47 hrs.) Commander Neil Armstrong and lunar module pilot Buzz Aldrin formed the American crew that landed the Apollo Lunar Module Eagle. Armstrong became the first person to step onto the lunar surface six hours and 39 minutes later on July 21 at 02:56 UT (IST: 8:26 hrs). Aldrin joined him 19 minutes later. They spent about two and a quarter hours together outside the spacecraft and collected around 20 Kg. of lunar rock to bring back to Earth. Command module pilot Michael Collins flew the Columbia orbiter alone in lunar orbit while they were on the Moon's surface. Armstrong and Aldrin spent 21 hours, 36 minutes on the lunar surface, at a site named Tranquility Base at the Sea of Tranquility ( Sea basically meant plain land on the surface of the Moon), before lifting off to re-join Columbia in lunar orbit. They returned to Earth on 24 July, 1969 after the 8 days travel and crashed onto the Pacific Ocean from where they were collected.

The next three years saw the successful landing of five more spacecraft named Apollo 12-17. Apollo 13 could not land because the crew faced a crisis when the oxygen tank on the service module leaked and they had to come back to earth just orbiting the Moon in a loop. It was a high drama of how they survived the ordeal, which was later made into a popular movie released in 1995 of the same name.

Then there was a pause in Moon missions. That probably started a rumour that the Americans have not at all landed on Moon and staged the whole event in a well-orchestrated make-believe movie set on the Earth itself. Initially, the rumour may have been fuelled by the fierce competition between the superpowers and an effort to demean the tremendous achievement. But later on, the conspiracy theory caught on and reached every corner of the Earth. NASA and other scientific bodies have categorically and repeatedly refuted the conspiracy claim by proper explanations and information.

But, the question remained. Why did space agencies lose interest in Moon? The conspiracy theorists had a field day. But truly speaking, the scientific community was continuously gaining more knowledge about our cosmic neighbour through a stream of space crafts which mostly circled the moon, but some of them landed and sent back data and even in one case some samples as well.

In the past, our interest in space and the moon in particular was driven primarily by scientific curiosity and an interest in trying to understand the past, present and future of the moon. Numerous missions helped the scientists to gather a volume of data about its surface composition, environment and other physical parameters. It slowly dawned onto the global space community that huge deposits of minerals andthepresence of water ice can open up enormous possibilities for the future. The Voyages of Discovery gave way to Voyages of Profit!

The hint of the presence of water ice at the permanently shadowed polar regions and discoveries of hydroxyl ion on the surface material, called regolith, fuelled the imagination and aspirations of the scientific community to create a base on the moon as a precursor of starting off a human colony in the future. It was considered profitable to extract the mineral and other chemical deposits. Especially, two factors galvanized the dream of further manned moon missions. One definitely was the presence of water, albeit in solid form. Water separated into hydrogen and oxygen can be tremendously helpful for any space activities and further colonization of the Moon. The oxygen can be used to create an artificial bio-sphere to make habitable zones and use hydrogen and oxygen to refuel spacecraft on their return journey to Earth. In this context, one should note that it was Chandrayaan 1 which for the first time definitively identified hydroxyl ions in the lunar surface by first smashing an impactor in a controlled manner on November 14, 2008, and showing the presence of the molecule in the ejecta of the impact. It also showed through a specific instrument called Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M3), fabricated in collaboration with NASA and Brown University, the presence of about 600 million tonnes of water ice in the polar region of the moon. These discoveries generated enthusiasm in scientists to explore the Moon in a much intensive way.

The second important aspect of further moon explorations and human presence is the existence of a magic element called Helium-3. A school of scientists believe that the atomic structure of helium-3 promises to make it possible to use it as fuel for nuclear fusion, the process that powers the sun, to generate vast amounts of electrical power without creating the troublesome radioactive by-products produced in conventional nuclear reactors. In calculations they have shown that only a few tonnes of Helium 3 can generate enough power for a big country for a year, thereby reducing our dependence on fossil fuels for energy generation. But the process is questionable and difficult. Yet, scientists are quite interested to try out the option, and the moon can provide a reservoir of this magical element that is scarcely found on Earth.

Moon can also play another important role in space exploration. Because of lesser gravity than Earth (1/6) rocket lunches can be easier and less fuel consuming. Moon can be used as an interplanetary rocket launching base.

To date more than 100 missions have been sent towards the moon, only half of them achieved success, some partially though. But if one gets into the statistics, till date, 38 orbiters, 21 landers and 11 rovers have successfully operated and fulfilled their moon missions. At present 3 landers and 2 rovers are present on the moon and 4 orbiters are operational and sending huge amounts of data to the Earth.

Staring from the success of Chandrayaan 1 in 2008, India and ISRO have started an exhaustive programme of the further moon and even planetary missions. Chandrayaan 2 launched in 2019 was the next step. Though a large number of people felt disheartened when the communication with the Lander named Vikram along with the Rover, named Pragyan was lost just 2.1 km above the lunar surface during their controlled descent, to the scientific community Chandrayaan, 2 is mostly successful, since it is orbiting the moon as planned and sending back valuable data for better understanding of the moon, paving the way for future human travel and habitation. Chandrayaan 3 is being planned for a launch in possible 2022 or 2023. The pandemic situation has made it difficult to maintain the schedule earlier planned. ISRO in collaboration with the Japanese Space Agency, JAXA is also planning for the Lunar Polar Exploration Mission sometime in late 2024. ISRO will be fabricating the Lander module whereas, JAXA will provide the orbiter and the rover.

A number of Missions to the moon are being planned. The USA is planning for a manned mission in 2025. Russia, China & Japan have shown interest in human travel to the Moon sometime in the 2030s. So, the future is exciting. The Cold war accelerated Voyages of Discovery to the Moon and the new possible Hot War being anticipated by some may dictate heightened activity for reaching out to the Moon again, this time for benefit of the human society. Though the agreement was drafted and implemented by United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs in 1984, stating that the Agreement provides that the Moon and its natural resources are the common heritage of mankind and that an international regime should be established to govern the exploitation of such resources when such exploitation is about to become feasible, it is to be seen how different countries interpret them. Whether the tensions generated at the South China Seas gets replicated in future at the various seas(plain lands) on the moon named as Tranquility, Serenity, Fertility or Crises. 52 years back when Apollo 11 astronauts left the moon and returned to Earth, left a plaque on the moon with the message, We came in Peace for All Mankind. Whether the present human civilization still respects the sentiments in todays world is to be seen.

(Dr. Debiprosad Duari is the Director of Research & Academic at M. P. Birla Planetarium, Kolkata, West Bengal. Views expressed in this article are personal and may not reflect the views of Outlook Magazine.)

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52 Years Of Moon Landing: Voyages Of Discovery, Voyages Of Profit - Outlook India

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