Category Archives: Moon Colonization

NASA will hold a competition to develop scientific instruments for a potential mission to land on Jupiters icy moon, Europa.

The space agency requested any scientific instruments developed during the contest be geared towards searching for alien life or towards assessing the prospects for colonization.

The possibility of placing a lander on the surface of this intriguing icy moon, touching and exploring a world that might harbor life is at the heart of the Europa lander mission, Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator of NASAs Science Mission Directorate, said in a press statement Thursday.

We want the community to be prepared for this announcement of opportunity, because NASA recognizes the immense amount of work involved in preparing proposals for this potential future exploration, Zurbuchen said.

NASA began designing and testing its Europa Clipper space probe, which is expected to launch sometime in the early 2020s. The Europa Clipper will also investigate the icy moons habitability for human and alien life, but will not land. NASA proposed Europa lander will follow the probe.

Europa may have watery oceans below its ice similar to those of Earths, which may be kept warm by complex gravitational interactions and the moons core. The oceans may be warm enough to support some type of alien life.

Republican lawmakers asked NASA to add more instruments to the Europa Clipper so it can investigate plumes of water ice ejected from Europas surface and deploy several small satellites, which would orbit the moon.

Lawmakers asked NASA to consider a future Europa lander mission in 2016, but the Obama administration wanted to reject the mission and strip down the Europa Clipper to increase funding for Earth sciences, including global warming.

President Barack Obama requested NASAs mission to Europa receive only $49.6 million in 2017, far less than the $175 million the mission got from Congress in 2016.

Follow Andrew on Twitter

Send tips to andrew@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact [emailprotected].

Read more here:
NASA Is Sending A Lander To Search For Life On Jupiter's Icy Moon - The Daily Caller

Beyond Earth presents Titan as a better alternative for human colonization in space

The entire scientific world is currently debating on the best strategies for NASAs future manned mission on Mars. However, a new book called Beyond Earth argues that setting up a human colony so close to Earth is much too challenging. Therefore, it suggests a different destination for a possible long-term human settlement: Titan, the biggest of the Saturns moons.

This might sound like an insane proposal, since Saturn is quite far away and an unmanned spacecraft took seven years just to reach the planet. However, the book is not just a piece of science-fiction literature. One of the authors is Amanda Hendrix, a scientist from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the Planetary Science Institute.

For the book, Hendrix collaborated with Charles Wohlforth, an environmentalist with valuable knowledge on how to make hostile conditions suitable for life. Together, they interviewed many scientists at NASA on the impacts extensive space travel has on humans or how technology might evolve.

What they obtained was a bundle of information on our present and future resources for space travel, combined with a little fiction. Also, the book is a bit easier to understand than any other series documenting the NASA attempts to develop a human exploration mission.

The two authors argue against the current destinations established by NASA for the manned missions. Both the Moon and Mars do not have atmospheres and are abundant in harmful variation. Therefore, any colonies might have limited access to the surface and would have to build everything underground.

On the other hand, Titan has an atmosphere which protects the surface from radiation. Also, it would defend any structures from collapsing. With enough protective clothing and an oxygen mask, humans might be able to venture on the surface of Saturns moon. Besides, they might even benefit from water supplies from the ocean hidden underground.

The authors admit that the distance might be a problem, but they say that those sent to explore Mars would face the same problems posed by long-distance space travel. However, the evolution of technology should allow for the exploration of more distant worlds. Image Source: JPL NASA

See the rest here:
Beyond Earth Offers Titan as a More Sensible Option for Human Colonization - Apex Tribune

Enlarge / Home, sweet colony. Saturn's moon Titan.

For a while now, there's been a debate in the US over how to direct NASA's next major human spaceflight initiative. Do we build an outpost on the Moon as a step towards Mars, or do we just head straight for the red planet? Which ever destination we choose, it'll be viewed as the first step toward a permanent human presence outside of the immediate neighborhood of the Earth.

All of that indecision, according to a new book called Beyond Earth, is misguided. Either of these destinations presents so many challenges and compromises that attracting and supporting anything more than short-term visitors will be difficult. Instead, Beyond Earth argues, we should set our sights much farther out in the Solar System if we want to create a permanent human presence elsewhere. The authors' destination of choice? Titan, the largest moon of Saturn.

Colonizing Titan seems like an outrageous argument, given that the only spacecraft we've put in orbit around Saturn took seven years to get there. Why should anyone take Beyond Earth seriously? Well, its authors aren't crackpots or mindless space fans. Amanda Hendrix is a planetary scientist who's worked at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the Planetary Science Institute. For the book, she's partnered with Charles Wohlforth, an environmental journalist who understands some things about establishing a livable environment. And the two of them have conducted extensive interviews, talking to people at NASA and elsewhere about everything from the health complications of space to future propulsion systems.

An interview with the authors about colonizing Titan

The resulting book is a mix of where we are now, which problems need to be solved to make a home elsewhere, and a future scenario that drives us to solve those problems. In this sense, Beyond Earth is a bit like the recent National Geographic effort Mars, which blended present-day documentary with a fictionalized future. But the book is a little easier to swallow then the miniseries, which shunted viewers between footage of real-life rockets and CGI dust storms.

So, why Titan? The two closer destinations, the Moon and Mars, have atmospheres that are effectively nonexistent. That means any habitation will have to be extremely robust to hold its contents in place. Both worlds are also bathed in radiation, meaning those habitats will need to be built underground, as will any agricultural areas to feed the colonists. Any activities on the surface will have to be limited to avoid excessive radiation exposure.

Would anyone want to go to a brand-new world just to spend their lives in a cramped tunnel? Hendrix and Wohlforth suggest the answer will be "no." Titan, in contrast, offers a dense atmosphere that shields the surface from radiation and would make any structural failures problematic, rather than catastrophic. With an oxygen mask and enough warm clothing, humans could roam Titan's surface in the dim sunlight. Or, given the low gravity and dense atmosphere, they could float above it in a balloon or on personal wings.

The vast hydrocarbon seas and dunes, Hendrix and Wohlforth suggest, would allow polymers to handle many of the roles currently played by metal and wood. Drilling into Titan's crust would access a vast supply of liquid water in the moon's subsurface ocean. It's not all the comforts of home, but it's a lot more of them than you'd get on the Moon or Mars.

There is the distance thing, which Hendrix and Wohlforth acknowledge, but they argue it's a bit besides the point. The radiation and lack of gravity that make long-range space travel a risk would all bite anyone we sent to explore Mars. NASA assumes it'll find solutions, but the authors are critical of the Agency promoting a journey to Mars without already having solved them. Whether we go to Mars or Titan, the solution is speed: less time in space means less risk. And, if we could rocket along fast enough so that a round-trip to Mars with time spent exploring was safe, then we could do a one-way trip to Titan.

So, Beyond Earth is a good look at the current state of human space-exploration technology, as well as how that will hold us back from doing the things we want to do. It's both thoughtful and thought-provoking.

Mixed in with that, however, is a scenario under which Earth will get its act together and do what needs to be done to overcome these technological hurdles. That scenario is driven in part by a very believable desperation, caused by unaddressed climate change that drives wars and radicalization. Low Earth orbit becomes cheap, and then an efficient new thruster is developed. (Unfortunately, the thruster of choice in this scenario is unlikely to ever work.)

The Earth's governments bands together in a massive effort to send colonists to Titan, who almost immediately begin to view themselves as pioneers who boldly settle a new world with no help from anyone. Tensions and cultural differences ensue. This part of the book is a fun yarn, and plenty of it involves believable extrapolations from our current state. Whether it adds to Beyond Earth overall will probably be a matter of personal taste.

While the focus of the book is on leaving Earth, it's hard to escape the sense that Beyond Earth is an extensive argument for staying put. As Hendrix and Wohlforth repeatedly drive home, there's no place we could go in our Solar System that offers anything close to what the Earth provides for us. Going anywhere else would involve a cost that could go a long way toward making our existence here much more sustainable. While I'm all for eventually establishing a presence elsewhere, it would be nice to do so by choice, rather than end up being forced to do so due to our carelessness on Earth.

Continued here:
Forget Marslet's go colonize Titan! - Ars Technica

Al Globus and Joe Strout have an analysis that space settlements in low (~500 km) Earth equatorial orbits may not require any radiation shielding at all. This is based on a careful analysis of requirements and extensive simulation of radiation effects. This radically reduces system mass and has profound implications for space settlement, as extraterrestrial mining and manufacturing are no longer on the critical path to the first settlements, although they will be essential in later stages. It also means the first settlements can evolve from space stations, hotels, and retirement communities in relatively small steps.

This huge reduction in total mass compensates for the greater energetic difficulty of launching materials from Earth to ELEO as opposed to launching from the Moon to L5, the design location of the Stanford Torus. In the early studies, the EarthMoon L5 point was chosen as the location of a settlement for the energetic advantage of launching materials from the Moon. Going from the Moon to L5 requires a delta-v 3 of 2.3 km/sec, and going from Earth to 500 km ELEO is 10 km/sec [Cassell 2015]. Using the velocity squared as our energy measure , Earth to ELEO requires 19 times more energy per unit mass. Analysis suggests that at least 19 times less mass is needed if no radiation shielding is required. Thus, the energetic advantage to launching the mass of a settlement with deep space radiation shielding from the Moon to L5 is balanced by launching far less mass from Earth if no radiation shielding is necessary.

A 500 km circular ELEO using polyethylene shielding was analyzed. Even at 10 kg/m2 shielding, the equivalent of which is very likely to be provided by any reasonable hull, the 20 mSv/yr and 6.6 mGy/yr are met. Indeed, with no shielding at all the general population limit is met and the pregnancy limit is very nearly met. This has an interesting consequence: spacewalks in ELEO may be safe enough from a radiation point of view to be a significant recreational activity.

The total mass of the 4 rpm unshielded (56 meter diameter Stanford Torus, 123 person) space colony could be launched from Earth with about 40 Falcon Heavy vehicles.

The space settlement rotation rate recommendations of [Globus 2015] are: Up to 2 rpm (rotations per minute) should be no problem for residents and require little adaptation by visitors. Up to 4 rpm should be no problem for residents but will require some training and/or a few hours to perhaps a day or two of adaptation by visitors. Up to 6 rpm is unlikely to be a problem for residents but may require extensive visitor training and/or adaptation over a few days. Some particularly susceptible individuals may have a great deal of difficulty. Up to 10 rpm adaptation has been achieved with specific training. However, the diameter of a settlement at these rotation rates is so small (under ~40 meter for seven rpm) its hard to imagine anyone wanting to live there permanently, much less raise children. Rotation at high rates, however, may be useful for a dedicated radiation study station in ELEO.

Note that there are two classes of people that must be accommodated: residents and visitors. For residents a few days of feeling ill at the beginning of a multiyear stay is of little concern. However, if a settlement expects many short term visitors it may be best to keep the rotation rate under about 4 rpm.

The Kalpana One space station design at 4 rpm requires 17 tons/person. The cheapest advertised price today for delivering mass to orbit is the Falcon Heavy, in development, at $90 million for 53 tons to LEO [SpaceX 2015], or $1.7 million per ton. For 17 tons that is about $29 million.

The cheapest advertised price to launch people to LEO is a bit over $26 million/seat on a Falcon 9/Dragon which includes a stay at a Bigelow space station [Bigelow 2015], also in development. It should be noted that this cost must be incurred for settlers going to any space location.

Combining these two costs gives us (rounding up) $60 million per person. This does not include materials, construction or resupply costs. We assume that government or space tourism businesses will conduct most of the research and development cost other than actually building a settlement.

To get the transportation costs to close to one million dollars, leaving some small number of millions for everything else, we need to reduce the cost of launch by about a factor of 50 to around $1.2Million/person. Notice that these are extremely rough calculations, but are sufficient for planning purposes.

Elon Musk is trying to make hundreds of flights per year economic by launching and maintaining a network of 4000-20,000 internet satellites.

To reach a 50 times price reduction will almost certainly require fully reusable launch vehicles, much improved technology and a very high flight rate, probably in the tens of thousands per year. The reusability and technology requirements are generally recognized but for some reason flight rate is often ignored. However, with fewer than 100 launches per year today, a single reusable vehicle capable of two flights a week could, theoretically, satisfy the entire launch market! Even 1,000 flights per year would only require 10 such vehicles. Large reductions in price will not come if vehicles are built in such small numbers. Launch vehicles only make money when they fly, so we need a very high flight rate, probably over 10,000 flights/year.

There are only two applications that, at the right price, could create a market requiring a flight rate of ten of thousands or more per year: space solar power (SSP) and tourism. SSP requires a very large investment up front before any income is generated and is vulnerable to terrestrial competition, particularly as batteries improve.

Tourism was a $2.3 trillion/year industry in 2014.

The rest is here:
Towards an Economically Viable roadmap to large scale space ... - Next Big Future

Moon Express is one of only two teams in the Google Lunar XPRIZE competition with a verified launch contract for its 2017 lunar mission. In October 2015, Moon Express announced that it had signed the worlds first multi-mission launch contract with Rocket Lab USA for 3 lunar missions between 2017 and 2020.

Moon Express sees the moon as critical for humanity to become a multi-world species, and that our sister world, the Moon, is an eighth continent holding vast resources than can help us enrich and secure our future.

MoonEx had been planning to place the International Lunar Observatory (ILO) on the Moon as early as 2018. The plan calls for placement of both a 2 meters (6 ft 7 in) radio telescope as well as an optical telescope at the South Pole of the Moon.

Rick Tumlinson, chairman of Deep Space Industries, plans to land its first prospector on an asteroid by 2020.

Deep Space Industries will use small scouts to explore and study prospective targets. A larger robot will land on high value asteroids to mine and process material. It will use solar power to evaporate and capture water from the sample.

Water, we believe, is relatively easy to harvest from asteroid materials, said Tumlinson.

By 2025 they could be producing serious quantities of resources.

Deep Space Industries and the University of Tennessee were awarded NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program funding for developing technology to slow spacecraft carrying asteroid resources as they return to Earths orbit.

The purpose of asteroid mining is to collect fuel and building materials harvested from near Earth asteroids and provide them to commercial and government missions. One major challenge to making asteroid mining a reality is slowing down the returning mining spacecraft as they approach Earth. Returning from distant destinations, these spacecraft will be traveling at high speeds, so slowing them down enough to slip into orbit is quite difficult.

Current braking methods call for the returning asteroid mining spacecraft to expend a great deal of propellant to slow itself down enough to achieve low Earth orbit insertion. However, propellant is heavy and valuable, so if another way of slowing the spacecraft could be devised, it would significantly help the economics of asteroid mining missions.

The NASA grant will research the manufacturing of an aerobrake system from the asteroids regolith (soil) collected from mining operations. The idea is that the fully laden asteroid mining spacecraft will use the collected material to manufacture a braking system during its journey back to Earths orbit. The aerobrake system would act as a large heat shield that would allow the spacecraft to pass through Earths atmosphere, creating enough drag to slow down the payload without using propellant.

Using aerobrakes instead of propellant will expand by 30 to 100 times the number of asteroids where water and other supplies can be affordably delivered to markets in Earth orbit, said Dr. John S. Lewis, chief scientist at DSI. In the near future, explains Lewis, asteroid resources will support space stations, expeditions to the Moon and Mars, and the transfer of payloads from low orbit to geosynchronous orbit by space-based tugs refueled with asteroid propellant.

Planetary Resources is also focused on water.

You can concentrate that solar energy and heat up the surface of the asteroid and literally bake off the water in the same way youd bake a clay pot, says CEO Chris Lewicki.

Both Lewicki and Tumlinson want to supply building materials in space, which could allow for the construction of super-massive floating structures that would be ungainly to launch from Earth.

This was the old L5 colonization vision.

National Space Society has updated analysis of the enormous growth potential of orbital space colonization and near earth settlement. If the single largest asteroid (Ceres) were to be used to build orbital space settlements, the total living area created would be well over a hundred times the land area of the Earth. This is because Ceres is a solid, three dimensional object but orbital space settlements are basically hollow with only air on the inside. Thus, Ceres alone can provide the building materials for uncrowded homes for hundreds of billions of people, at least.

Original post:
Moon as unprospected eighth continent that will produce trillionaires ... - Next Big Future

It is possible that in future possessing materials for creating firs infrastructure for future mars colonists will be easier than anyone could imagine.

Group of civilian engineers working on Stanford University along with NASAs Ames Research Center managed to create new technology, which will make possible creating concrete from regolith present on the Mars or on the Moon. As all we know, main factor which makes colonization of planets or Moonvery expensive is cost of delivering to orbit any kilogram of payload. In case of creating permanently inhabited base on the Moon or on the Mars it would be necessary to deliver there large amount of materials like concrete to built structures likefoundations orshelters for colonists. Perfect solution would be possessing material for buildingson the spot. Unfortunately regolith which can be found on the Mars orMoon is not perfect material it is loose and it would be very hard to form it into any solid structure like blocks or bricks. Now it seems that scientists found perfect solution.

Team leaded byan associate professor of civil and environmental engineering at Stanford School of EngineeringMichael Lepech, developed technology basing on protein, carbon and regolith. Mixture will create substantial composite similar to concrete after being mixed in low gravity conditions. Proteins were possessed from animals like slaughters, carbonused for experiment wasgenerated by humans and samples of regolith were provided by Nasa. First transformed mixture samplesshowed that they are as strong as ordinary pavement bricks and has similar density and other features.

Technology gives great opportunity to built base on Mars or on the Moon without waiting for delivering concrete or any building materials from Earth. It is possible to create farms with genetically modified organisms producing proteins mixed with carbon and regolith. Such farms could work without any service for a long time being controlled remotely.First buildings could be created by robotic machines using bricks manufactured on robotic farms. First colonists would land, finish buildingsand install additional equipment. It would reduce time necessary for creating safe shelters resistant for space radiation and micrometeoroids which are most dangerous threat for any base on the Moon or Mars.

Read this article:
Regolith into concrete revolutionary technology can help in colonization of Mars - MilTech

Buzz Aldrin wants NASA to privatize LEO and retire the ISS. At the 2017 Humans to Mars conference, according to Space.com, Aldrin remarked that We must retire the ISS as soon as possibleWe simply cannot afford $3.5 billion a year of that cost. Aldrins plan for Mars is heavily dependent on cyclers, shuttle orbits between Earth and Mars that could enable the regular transport of cargo and crew between a Mars colony and Earth. But PCMag points out that the ISS is funded through 2024, so Aldrins vision isnt likely to take off before thenat least not under the auspices of NASA. Private space companies, though, are another story.

Speaking of private space flight: SpaceXs Falcon 9 has had an impressive run, including its recent victory lap as the first previously flown rocket to launch and return to its landing pad again. Now SpaceX has successfully tested the rocket module at the core of the upcoming Falcon Heavy as well. The Falcon Heavyessentially three Falcon 9s strapped togetheris critical to Elon Musks long-term plans for space exploration and Mars colonization. With the core stage having been successfully test-fired, the next step is to assemble all three of the Falcon Heavys rocket boosters and prepare for its first launch.

Theres some brain-candy type news from the TRAPPIST system. How have all its planets stayed in perfectly circular orbits, crammed into the relatively tiny space they occupy, without crashing into each other? They have integer orbital resonances. For every 2 orbits of the outermost planet, the next one in does 3 orbits, the next one 4, 6, 9, 15, and 24, University of Toronto Scarborough astronomer Dan Tamayo told Gizmodo. This is called a chain of resonances, and this is the longest one that has ever been discovered in a planetary system.

Last but not least, Io also shows its angry, angry face in the news this week. Io, the fiery satellite of Jupiter known for being the solar systems one moon most desperately in need of Alka-Seltzer, has long been known for its intense volcanism. Our ability to observe the specifics of the moons volcanic activity have been limited by the difficulty of direct observations from Earth and the relatively limited windows offered by missions like Juno and the earlier Voyager and Galileo missions. Recently, scientists were able to take advantage of a rare orbital alignment between Europa (the icy moon of Jupiter where life might exist in oceans deep below the frozen surface) and Io to track how quickly Ios volcanos produce lava, and how fast that lava flows over the surface.

Scientists tracked lava waves as they moved across the Loki Patera, a formation larger than Lake Ontario. Their findings suggest that the periodic brightening of Loki Patera is caused by lava waves hardening and beginning to sink, at which point a wave of fresh lava replaces them. Scientists recommend that anyone planning to vacation at one of Ios scenic lava lakes pack SPF 5 billion and a full-body asbestos suit.

Now read: Our favorite books about space

View post:
This Week in Space: the ISS, a Heavy Rocket, and a Dance of Alien Planets - ExtremeTech

South Korean President Moon Jae-in and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe spoke by phone Thursday for the first time since Moon took office and agreed to closely cooperate on dealing with North Korea and on building a future-oriented relationship, a senior Japanese official said.

Moon did not express a negative view of the 2015 comfort women agreement, the official told reporters. Instead, he only told Abe that there are cautious opinions circulating in public about the accord, which was signed to put the issue of comfort women to rest finally and irreversibly, the official said.

Comfort women is Japans euphemism for women forced to work in Japans militarys brothels before and during the war.

Moon also said the two countries should wisely resolve history-related issues, the official added.

According to South Koreas Yonhap news agency, however, Moon used stronger rhetoric in describing public opinion in his country.

President Moon noted the reality was that most of his people could not accept the agreement over the sexual slavery issue, Moons chief press secretary, Yoon Young-chan, was quoted as saying.

During his election campaign, Moon pledged to renegotiate the deal with Japan.

During their 25-minute conversation, Abe told Moon that he would like to properly manage the bilateral relationship in light of the accord.

Abe also said hed like to host a trilateral summit in Tokyo with his Chinese and South Korean peers as soon as possible, and hold a bilateral meeting with Moon as well. Moon agreed, the official said.

Moons attitude during the call appeared to significantly relieve senior bureaucrats in Japan who were concerned he would take a tougher stance and be reluctant to cooperate with Japan and the United States in dealing with North Koreas provocations.

A high-ranking Japanese official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Moons willingness to meet Abe marks a clear difference from the attitude of former South Korean President Park Geun-hye. Park had long refused to meet Abe because of issues related to Japans brutal colonization of the Korean Peninsula from 1910 to 1945.

In the 2015 comfort women agreement, Abe issued an apology over the issue and arranged for 1 billion to be deposited into a South Korean foundation for the dwindling survivors.

Many South Koreans, however, are critical of the deal, saying that Japan has yet to admit its legal responsibility for compensation and that the agreement was made without consulting the former comfort women, who mostly back the agreement.

Read more here:
Abe and Moon agree to work on 'future-oriented' ties in first phone chat - The Japan Times

SEOUL South Korea's new president launched international efforts to defuse tension over North Korea's weapons development on Thursday, urging both dialogue and sanctions while also aiming to ease Chinese anger about a U.S. anti-missile system.

Moon Jae-in, a liberal former human rights lawyer, was sworn in on Wednesday and said in his first speech as president he would immediately address security tensions that have raised fears of war on the Korean peninsula.

Moon first spoke to Chinese President Xi Jinping and later to Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, with how to respond to North Korea's rapidly developing nuclear and ballistic missile programs, in violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions, dominating talks.

"The resolution of the North Korean nuclear issue must be comprehensive and sequential, with pressure and sanctions used in parallel with negotiations," Moon's spokesman, Yoon Young-chan, quoted Moon as telling Xi.

"Sanctions against North Korea are also a means to bring the North to the negotiating table aimed at eliminating its nuclear weapons," Yoon told a briefing, adding that Xi indicated his agreement.

Moon has taken a more conciliatory line with North Korea than his conservative predecessors and advocates engagement. He has said he would be prepared to go to Pyongyang "if the conditions are right".

Regional experts have believed for months that North Korea is preparing for its sixth nuclear test and was working to develop a nuclear-tipped missile capable of reaching the United States, presenting U.S. President Donald Trump with perhaps his most pressing security issue.

Trump told Reuters in an interview last month major conflict with North Korea was possible though he would prefer a diplomatic outcome.

North Korea says it needs its weapons to defend itself against the United States which it says has pushed the region to the brink of nuclear war.

"Threats from North Korea's nuclear and missile development have entered a new stage," Japan's Abe told Moon in their telephone call, according to Japanese Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Koichi Hagiuda.

"How to respond to North Korea ... is an urgent issue. I would like to closely cooperate with the president to achieve the denuclearization of North Korea," Abe told Moon.

But Abe also said "dialogue for dialogue's sake would be meaningless" and he called on North Korea to demonstrate "sincere and concrete action", Hagiuda said, adding that Moon shared Abe's views.

Japan has been concerned that Moon will take a tough line on feuds stemming from the bitter legacy of its 1910-1945 colonization of the Korean peninsula and could fray ties at a time when cooperation on North Korea is vital.

Moon told Abe to "look straight at history" and not make the past "a barrier", though he raised South Korea's dissatisfaction with a 2015 agreement meant to put to rest a dispute over Japanese compensation for South Korean women forced to work in Japanese brothels before and during World War Two, Korea's presidential office said.

(For a graphic on South Korea's presidential election, click tmsnrt.rs/2p0AyLf)

'IMPROVE UNDERSTANDING'

While South Korea, China and Japan all share worry about North Korea, ties between South Korea and China have been strained by South Korea's decision to install a U.S. anti-missile system in defense against the North.

China says the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) undermines its security as its powerful radar can probe deep into its territory.

China says the system does little to curb the threat posed by North Korea's nuclear and missile programs, which it has been pressing ahead with in defiance of U.S. pressure and UN sanctions.

The deployment of THAAD was agreed last year by South Korea's previous administration after North Korea conducted a long-range rocket launch that put an object into space.

Moon came to power with a promise to review the system and he told Xi that North Korea must cease making provocations before tension over the deployment could be resolved, officials said.

In the first direct contact between the South Korean and Chinese leaders, Xi explained China's position, Yoon, the South Korean presidential spokesman said, without elaborating.

"President Moon said he understands China's interest in the THAAD deployment and its concerns, and said he hopes the two countries can swiftly get on with communication to further improve each other's understanding," Yoon told a briefing.

South Korea and the United States began deploying the THAAD system in March and it has since become operational.

Xi told Moon South Korea and China should respect each other's concerns, set aside differences, seek common ground and handle disputes appropriately, China's foreign ministry said in a statement.

As well as clouding efforts to rein in North Korea's nuclear ambitions, the THAAD deployment has also led to recriminations from Beijing against South Korean companies.

Moon explained the difficulties faced by South Korean companies that were doing business in China and asked for Xi's "special attention" to ease those concerns, Yoon said.

China has also denied it is doing anything to retaliate against South Korean businesses.

(Additional reporting by Ben Blanchard in BEIJING and Kiyoshio Takenaka in TOKYO; Writing by Jack Kim; Editing by Paul Tait, Robert Birsel)

SEOUL North Korea demanded on Thursday the handover of "terror suspects" who plotted to kill leader Kim Jong Un with a biochemical substance, repeating accusations it made last week that U.S. and South Korean spies were behind the plan.

LONDON U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim on Thursday that Washington was committed to protecting its NATO ally, a spokeswoman said, as Turkey fumes over a decision to arm Kurdish fighters in Syria.

WASHINGTON CIA Director Mike Pompeo said on Thursday there are large caches of weapons in Venezuela and a risk of them falling into the wrong hands as the country grapples with economic crisis and street protests.

The rest is here:
South Korea urges 'parallel' talks and sanctions to rein in North Korea - Reuters

The human race got its eviction notice last week. Be out by 2117 sharp, or the sheriff is going to toss out all our stuff on the cosmic curb, leaving our sorry selves to seek warmth and shelter in whatever intergalactic library we might happen to find.

That is the word from the prodigious thought process of Stephen Hawking, who, as late as last fall, thought planet Earth might have another thousand years of tread on the tires.

"Professor Stephen Hawking thinks the human species will have to populate a new planet within 100 years if it is to survive. With climate change, overdue asteroid strikes, epidemics and population growth, our own planet is increasingly precarious, according to the BBC.

Bummer. You just cant get a good warranty on a planet these days. Looks as if we should have gone for the extended care plan. It is great blanket coverage. If your planet gets hit by an asteroid or falls into the toilet, you are covered.

And falling into the toilet is pretty much what has happened to us. When the Chinese whose smog is so thick they have to fake photos of tourists standing in front of a blue skyline have become the worlds leading environmentalists, you know you have a problem.

And it is unlikely to get any better. When the only thing Congress can agree on is that Americans need to be stripped of their health care, then I dont expect much action in the direction of saving the planet.

And I know we are not dealing with a crackpot-style, doomsday prediction here, but, in all due respect, I think Hawking might have overplayed his hand. Even the most progressive Congress ever would not be able to do much in 100 years, not as far as star travel and colonization are concerned.

As for colonizing Mars or the moon? That is kind of like leaving one charred cinder for another. On Earth we have chopped down all the trees, dried up all the lakes, killed off all the wildlife and burned up the atmosphere. And you want to go to the moon? How is that going to help?

Of course, along with climate change, Hawking mentions some other potential body blows, including asteroid strikes, epidemics and overpopulation.

So, if we are about to be blown up by an asteroid, I suppose an escape hatch to Mars makes sense. Better a bad planet than no planet.

And overpopulation? Let me guess, Americans will want everyone else to go to Mars, and we will stay here, since we deserve it more because that is how we think.

Epidemics are a bit different because the decision is pretty much out of our hands. It is hard to move to a new neighborhood when everyone is convulsing on a gurney.

But the fascinating endgame to me is death by artificial intelligence and it is going to have to be artificial, since we dont have any of the natural stuff left.

Here is the way it works: We develop artificial intelligence capable of figuring out the conundrums of space/time travel that currently prevent us from exploring deep space.

But this artificial intelligence, not being stupid, concludes that giving the human race a new planet is like giving Boris Yeltsin a new liver what is the point, since we will just destroy the new one like we did the old one.

So the artificial intelligence thinks it over for about 30 seconds and then crushes us like a bug.

Either way, it looks as if planet Earth is going to be one big amusement-park ride from here on out. Might as well sit back and enjoy it.

Read more from the original source:
Earlier eviction notice posted for planet Earth - Herald-Mail Media