Space exploration, should we ever colonize the moon or are we only focusing on mars?

I agree that we should get some sort of permanent base on the moon first before setting our sights further away. It just surprises me that we haven't been back to the moon for so long. Back in the late 60's everyone seemed to think that there would be a permanent colony on the moon by the turn of the millenium and yet we haven't even been back there since Apollo 17 (?) in 1972.

Thats cause we went to the moon before our time. your cell phone has more memory and processing power then the moon lander did.

It's all baby steps!

I believe that the most logical move would be to get to the moon first, establish a base and then move on to mars. Men do not have to be on the moon first, the initial work can be performed by solar/nuclear powered factory robots that purify metals out of the lunar soil which is high in Titanium and other metals. One the refined metal 'ingots' are dropped these can be processed further to make parts such as Solar Panels, structural members and other basic parts. The basalt/silica in the soil can be used in a number of ways such as light structural members, windows, walls, ceramics and more(NASA). Eventually there should be a small stockpile which would allow Astronauts to build a small base structure. As the size of the base slowly grows more robots could be constructed from parts of both lunar and terran origin, more robots ... more work ... more materials. Eventually this would lead to a base which not only can support itself financially in raw and finished materials, but a base that can be used to build a 'Space Dock' that would be used to build the larger exploratory craft to get us to Mars and beyond. The Moon base could house production facilities such as electronics and machine shops, research labs and even a hotel for the tourist trade. Conceivably it cold become as large or larger than the base envisioned in 2001/2010 Space Odyssey. Eventually the only things that the earth may need to lift to orbit would be oil based products and other organics that are not available on the moon, on the big big big plus side the moon would be sending Helium3 for fusion reactors, refined metals and exotic metals from either zero-gravity or low-gravity manufacturing. With a 'Space Dock' the moon base could use a rail launcher to send the materials automatically to the 'Dock', the dock would then utilise the material for further manufacturing or send the materials back to earth in cargo drop ships.

The growth rate is purely dependent on our ability to design, build, test and deploy the systems needed to get there in the first place. NASA has put the technology call out and a number of universities and corporations are already at work on their ideas.

good post CHUCK, but I have a few questions about it.

Oil? Why would we need oil on the moon? in 15 years when we go there hydrogen fuel cells will be getter more and more popular = because no pollution and they create another plus, WATER.

Your plan would cost some where in the range of over a quarter trillion dollars, far to much money.

and yeah robots do alot, but there are not nearly as quick and efficient flexible as humans are. Grant it it's eisier then Mars because of lagg, a message from earth to mars is around 7 - 10 minutes and earth to moon is only 1 - 2 seconds.

Alot of people on this site seem to ignore on how complex this would be and how costly and hard it would be to build a infastructure on the moon.

I'm not saying I dont want it or it wouldn't be cool, but it would just be to expensive, especially with the fighting in Iraq, were having a hard enough time just trying to fix their infastructure!
I dont see a end to the war on terror ending any time soon, with iran and north korea, it will be hard to get that much money from congress.

[edit on 1-9-2004 by Murcielago]

Heres some other thingies to think about: the rock of the moon is supposed to have o3 (ozone) in it. Thats what the spectrometors say at least. Not only that. Materials (metals espesally) made in micro-gee or no gravity at all have greater strenth from less impurities. Back to the ozone thing.. we can use it. Break of one oxygen molocule and you have the means to create water with (you guessed it) hydrogen. Which in tern would (as other posters agree on) would be a main fuel supply. but micro-meteorites would be quite a worry... what about sun spots? or for that matter... what about higer than normal levels of radiation... sheesh. this is making my head spin. We would have to come up with a better way to travel than to strap a big rocket on our buts and point it in the right direction... maybe like a rail gun system that we could shoot material(s) either at earth for delivery or a the ISS and they could catch it with a absorbsion device ( a net). solar energy would be great on the moon as well. Its endless. the possibilities. We just have to be courageous. How many ships were lost at sea? And the human race is now too politically correct to lose people and materials in space... I just don't get it.

[edit on 1-9-2004 by fivegrandgo]

Originally posted by Murcielago
good post CHUCK, but I have a few questions about it.

Oil? Why would we need oil on the moon? in 15 years when we go there hydrogen fuel cells will be getter more and more popular = because no pollution and they create another plus, WATER.

Oil would be required wherever mankind goes because we use Oil products such as plastics and lubricants, chemicals and processed cheese.

Originally posted by MurcielagoYour plan would cost some where in the range of over a quarter trillion dollars, far to much money.

Considering the return on the investment would be trillions of dollars in metals that we do not have to deep mine for on earth, a ready supply of solar energy to power processing and manufacturing, the development of new technologies, take your pick it is a win/win situation. Yes the initial investment is one way, but it's the Return On Investment that really counts.

Originally posted by Murcielagoand yeah robots do alot, but there are not nearly as quick and efficient flexible as humans are.

A human being would have to travel with llife support and could only work for a limited amount of time on the surface of the moon. As an example a robot designed to scoop up a small load of lunar soil, process it in a solar furnace and drop the yield of whatever particular compound/metal it is programmed to produce could work 24 hours per day, every day. The Robot would only require some small self servicing in regards to lubrication unless it has a fatal breakdown.

Originally posted by MurcielagoAlot of people on this site seem to ignore on how complex this would be and how costly and hard it would be to build a infastructure on the moon.

Yes they do, I consider a plan to build a moonbase in decades, not years. The real beauty of having a base on the Moon is that most of it would be underground where you could have a pressurized environment for people to live and work in. There is more than enough metal on the surface of the moon to provide shielding from micrometeorites.

Oil would be required wherever mankind goes because we use Oil products such as plastics and lubricants, chemicals and processed cheese.

Are you saying we should create all of these on the moon? and not just put all the stuff in a rocket and launch it up there.

Considering the return on the investment would be trillions of dollars in metals that we do not have to deep mine for on earth, a ready supply of solar energy to power processing and manufacturing, the development of new technologies, take your pick it is a win/win situation. Yes the initial investment is one way, but it's the Return On Investment that really counts.

Thats what people thought the ISS would be like. We all know that thing ain't worth all the money that is being sucked into it.

Bringing mining equiptment to the moon would be hard, and we would have to delevop all new equiptment and machines to work effiviently in 1/6 the gravity.
I like the underground concept, that would help out alot plus covering all out building would be layers of kevlar (just like on the ISS) to stop the micro meteorites.

You must be refuring to a nuclear robot or a solar one on a part of the moon that never gets dark, in order to do 24 hrs. a day. Pushing machines like that would be hard on them and they would be prone to break down more frequently and often. Looks at the mars rovers, there doing a good job yes, but there are slow, they could of made them faster but with the advent of speed comes more problems. people are much quicker, despite they have more needs.

Originally posted by Murcielago

Originally posted by Charles StevensonOil would be required wherever mankind goes because we use Oil products such as plastics and lubricants, chemicals and processed cheese.

Are you saying we should create all of these on the moon? and not just put all the stuff in a rocket and launch it up there.

The idea is that petroleum based finished products would be sent to the moon while using as much lunar manufactured goods as they could for building/expanding a base.

Originally posted by Charles Stevenson
Considering the return on the investment would be trillions of dollars in metals that we do not have to deep mine for on earth, a ready supply of solar energy to power processing and manufacturing, the development of new technologies, take your pick it is a win/win situation. Yes the initial investment is one way, but it's the Return On Investment that really counts.

Originally posted by MurcielagoThats what people thought the ISS would be like. We all know that thing ain't worth all the money that is being sucked into it.

A moon base and manufacturing site is not the ISS.

Creating and and thentransporting mine equipment to the moon and then having them being able to operate would caost a how lot then what we think. But think of the benefits, plants that are common to day grown in micro gravity could have a chemical change to it and its chemicals could probably aid to a medical discovery, or low grvity can postpone the growth of cancer. Now why do that all the way at mars whe we can only do on the moon which we know more about its landscape.

Besides if we colonize Mars we to would have to creat artificial gravity and I don't hink thats possible to do that on a planet with much more gravity than the moon. Earth has a stronger gravitational than mars, and mars can possibly also have an effect on bones therefore creating artificial-G.

Gravity:

The creation of artificial gravity even on Mars can be done through mechanical means. The Astronaut only needs periodic sessions to lessen the naturally occuring effects of low gravity.

I have never heard such thing about creatiing artificial gravity on surfaces with plenty of gravity, if you know somewhere on the web with this info please send a link. THankyou in andvance.

umm its just rotating something so it creates artificial gravity....like when you swing a bucket of water and it never spills......well i think we might as well make a rail gun sort of thing and launch ourselves into space which would save the fuel for more important stuff....and that railgun thing can be put all over the solor system for easy super fast transport

its all good saying the moon has less gravity and all that but u still need to get all the material up into space and use just as much resources doing so and even more to build it on the moon i think a space station is more pratical for the now

Originally posted by Rugoolian
its all good saying the moon has less gravity and all that but u still need to get all the material up into space and use just as much resources doing so and even more to build it on the moon i think a space station is more pratical for the now

Did you read this?

Originally posted by Chuck Stevenson Men do not have to be on the moon first, the initial work can be performed by solar/nuclear powered factory robots that purify metals out of the lunar soil which is high in Titanium and other metals. One the refined metal 'ingots' are dropped these can be processed further to make parts such as Solar Panels, structural members and other basic parts. The basalt/silica in the soil can be used in a number of ways such as light structural members, windows, walls, ceramics and more(NASA). Eventually there should be a small stockpile which would allow Astronauts to build a small base structure. As the size of the base slowly grows more robots could be constructed from parts of both lunar and terran origin, more robots ... more work ... more materials. Eventually this would lead to a base which not only can support itself financially in raw and finished materials ...

The idea is to put these small robots on the surface of the moon where they would process the raw material into refined material, other robots would take the refined material and process it into structural components - when you have enough parts, you send a mechanic to assemble the whole thing thus begining human base presence on the moon.

Originally posted by CookieMonster000
umm its just rotating something so it creates artificial gravity....like when you swing a bucket of water and it never spills......well i think we might as well make a rail gun sort of thing and launch ourselves into space which would save the fuel for more important stuff....and that railgun thing can be put all over the solor system for easy super fast transport

You would need very big gun to get enough speed because human doesn't withstand big acceleration.

Originally posted by E_T
You would need very big gun to get enough speed because human doesn't withstand big acceleration.

A book called "The Millennial Project....Colonizing the Gallaxy in eight easy steps" describes just such a Gun

I highly recomend this book to anyone interested in space explortion.

Originally posted by CookieMonster000
umm its just rotating something so it creates artificial gravity....like when you swing a bucket of water and it never spills......well i think we might as well make a rail gun sort of thing and launch ourselves into space which would save the fuel for more important stuff....and that railgun thing can be put all over the solor system for easy super fast transport

I think the rail gun should be for everything EXCEPT humans, were to fragile, We can only with stands 9G's, and not very long either. Shooting something into space with a rail gun is possible but it would be WAY WAY past what we humans can withstand.

[edit on 7-9-2004 by Murcielago]

Originally posted by Murcielago

I think the rail gun should be for everything EXCEPT humans, were to fragile, We can only with stands 9G's, and not very long either. Shooting something into space with a rail gun is possible but it would be WAY WAY past what we humans can withstand.

I would like to take a ride on the rail gun

Originally posted by Murcielago
I think the rail gun should be for everything EXCEPT humans, were to fragile, We can only with stands 9G's, and not very long either. Shooting something into space with a rail gun is possible but it would be WAY WAY past what we humans can withstand.

[edit on 7-9-2004 by Murcielago]

Not if you made it long enough. Not only that emersed in a tank of water you can easily withstand 10 Gs. A long enough rail gun (several miles) can boost even humans into space for a fraction of the cost of rockets.

Again I suggest all of you get that book you can get it on Amazon for a couple bucks.

I really suggest yall read