Will we ever go back to the Moon?

[72ronin]

(At the risk of sounding like a science geek/hippie throwback from the 70's lol...)

How can such a marvelous and uniting opportunity like a combined effort to return to the moon not be contemplated?
Obviously theres a little problem with financing it these days but with a worldwide combined effort, which would be a powerfull uniting tool to say the least, surely we could pull it off.

I understand the complications of radiation from the sun/cosmos etc the van allen belts etc. But come on, can you think of something as powerfull and uniting for us to do this again?
Before you give me a lecture on current world economics, i do get that, it is simply not a viable goal.

Our magnetosphere / atmosphere etc here on Earth are essential for us to survive, so obviously i know we just arent going to be able to go beyond these obstacles anytime in the near future for any extended period of time. And i do agree that it is important to continue with directing our efforts to probe further into space as we are now and what money we can put to it goes there.
But is it not equaly important to get that first step established, a foot out the door so to speak. Maybe little by little we could establish a subterrainian base on the moon? =Sounds ridiculous i know, but again, can you think of something that could unite the world for a powerfull cause above and beyond our current goings on?

 

[MA-Caver]

We haven't followed Arthur C. Clark's vision of having bases and transports to/from the moon because the moon turned out to be awfully disappointingly barren. If it had valuable minerals to mine/harvest then yeah chances are this e-mail would've been sent to or from the moon. As Spock once described a planetary body... "essentially a great rock in space." Another reason is that we're too damned busy trying to take over the world and waging war upon one another and sucking the earth dry of it's present resources.
Utopian world wide harmonious joint ventures to reach the stars belong to the dreams and visions of sci-fi geeks like Wells, Clarke, Roddenberry, Sagan and others, as well as those who read/watch such wonderful stories.
Oil barons and warmongers have no use for it unless they can either conquer or make a (HUGE) buck off it.


(yeah feeling awfully cynical today).

I saw an article just yesterday where with the use of high powered telescopes and satellites we can see the tracks on the lunar surface left by the Apollo missions. Conclusion of that article stated that if/when we go to the moon it'll be more likely used with robots roaming around the surfaces running tests like we're doing on Mars. Mankind won't take another small step or giant leap for a long while yet.

 

[Archangel M]

Until theres an Economic reason to I don't think so. For all the "spirit of exploration" hype...throughout history humans move around for basic human reasons, escape political pressures, search for wealth, gold, wars, etc. We are not going to have the will to make that sort of effort without similar goals IMO.

 

[fangjian]

Most people wouldn't care. It would have to be something like Mars for the general public to even be a little bit interested. And even if we did do this, it's not 1969 anymore, everybody's attention span would quickly steer away from that accomplishment as well.

 

[Sukerkin]

The moon is a treasure trove of resources, most particularly those useful for nuclear fusion, so it can't be all that long before commercial interests start looking in that direction. Of all the things that Obama has done, cancelling much of the space borne enterprises of the USA is the worst hitting for long term prosperity and ascendency of the West. Once you lose that expertise, it's very hard to get it back and, to use a phrase that sounds like it should be a cliche {}, surrender the orbitals and you surrender the world.

http://www.wired.com/science/space/news/2006/12/72276

 

[Archangel M]

Although..I hear that the private "Space X" craft is supposed to be getting up to the space station before the end of November.

http://www.dailytech.com/SpaceX+Dragon+Test+Flight+to+ISS+Scheduled+for+November+30/article22473.htm

 

[Archangel M]

If one thinks about it..were not a large portion of famous explorers nothing but guys on government backed private enterprises?

 

[Em MacIntosh]

All useful exploration can be done with telescopes and automated devices. By the time we're ready for human space travel we'll be the ships.

 

[cdunn]

The moon is a treasure trove of resources, most particularly those useful for nuclear fusion, so it can't be all that long before commercial interests start looking in that direction. Of all the things that Obama has done, cancelling much of the space borne enterprises of the USA is the worst hitting for long term prosperity and ascendency of the West. Once you lose that expertise, it's very hard to get it back and, to use a phrase that sounds like it should be a cliche {}, surrender the orbitals and you surrender the world.

http://www.wired.com/science/space/news/2006/12/72276

At 25 ppb, to get one pound of he-3 requires the refinement of 20,000 tons of lunar soil. Going all the way to the moon for He-3 is... senseless. More efficient to put solar wind collectors at the Lagrange points.

The problem with the American space program is that we made the wrong decisions in the '70s and '80s, then doubled down on them. We poured a shitload of money into the shuttle system, which never achieved its directive, and didn't have a replacement system in place once we realized that they were never going to achieve their mission and were obscenely unsafe to boot. Mercy killing them and forcing a redesign of the system is the right step forwards; it's just a damn shame that playing at austerity means that the nation will die before it the space program can be refocused.

 

[Sukerkin]

There is much more reason to go to the moon that that, Chris; He-3 was just the first thing that occurred to me (probably because I heard it being discussed on a Radio 4 science programme last week ).

 

[cdunn]

Still, we're not there because it's a money loser.

 

[Empty Hands]

Still, we're not there because it's a money loser.

For shipping 3He back to Earth, or for use as a way station to the asteroid belt? Most of the analyses I've seen use the Moon for extracting O2, H2O and fusion materials for further travel. Hauling those materials up the Earth's gravity well must change the money calculus considerably, and the asteroid belt is where the real money is from what I understand.

 

[MA-Caver]

For shipping 3He back to Earth, or for use as a way station to the asteroid belt? Most of the analyses I've seen use the Moon for extracting O2, H2O and fusion materials for further travel. Hauling those materials up the Earth's gravity well must change the money calculus considerably, and the asteroid belt is where the real money is from what I understand.

Yeah that may be true... but like I said, until we stop wanting to kill each other, sucking the planet's resources dry and looking to rule the world the $$ that could be used to fund these ventures isn't going to be there.
Private trips into space are going to be just as expensive where regular lay-people wouldn't be able to afford it... unless someone figures out how to make space travel as the same cost as air travel.

 

[Xue Sheng]

You wanna go to the moon

Well one of these days

 

[cdunn]

For shipping 3He back to Earth, or for use as a way station to the asteroid belt? Most of the analyses I've seen use the Moon for extracting O2, H2O and fusion materials for further travel. Hauling those materials up the Earth's gravity well must change the money calculus considerably, and the asteroid belt is where the real money is from what I understand.

Still not enough to justify the fuel cost of leaving the Earth's gravity well at all, unless we actually have fusion drives. Even assuming a near terrestrial distribution of ores, adding hundreds of pounds of LOX-LH per pound of retrieved ore is economic suicide, and you'll notice we're still going back and forth to the grocery store using fossils. And since we, as a society, actively refuse to address that...

 

[Sukerkin]

Why so negative, Chris? If we don't do it then as a species it's back to the Iron Age for us. At the end of the day, the whole point of taking initial steps is to develop the technologies to improve the economic realities. Most of the cost of space travel at present is escaping the gravity well. Establish an automated manufacturing base on the moon and that cost is largely defrayed.

As with the canals of a couple of centuries ago, we don't need speedy recovery of materials, just a constant flow, so you can use such things as low-powered ion thrusters to bring mining drones back to the moon that were launched to asteroids via linear accelerators. It's all sci-fi right now and that's the way it'll stay if we don't pull our socks up.

Expand, explore, exploit ... or wither and die on this solitary rock.

 

[cdunn]

I am negative because we can't pull our socks up enough to do highway repair, let alone space exploration.

 

[Cyriacus]

Why, though?
Were already Researching GeoEngineering.
Weve nothing to Worry about until the Sun decides to Inevitably Explode.

 

[72ronin]

Profit would have to take a back seat, so i guess theres the reason it isnt concentrated on. I suppose NASA etc has contemplated this and the fact it isnt happening proves it is not viable/or neccesary? So not even step 1 space station, step 2 Moon then mars etc
All i can say is it must have been an incredible experience to watch humankind walk on another body in space, during the late 60's early 70's for the first time.
So thats that.

Mars? If the Moon is left alone becouse it is not resource rich enough-or diverse i should say, Hows Mars looking. If it at one time had a stronger atmosphere, then that signifies some important building blocks to work with?
Did its core slow/stop or something, leading to it losing its magnetosphere and in turn atmosphere?
Lets say the rover reports enough diverse resources to plan the next step, then what? There is only so much robotic equipment that we can transport. We need to get something there to bore into the ground. The way i see it is, we just arent going to be able to do things any other way. If we go there, we have to work from there, there is no returning of resources to Earth or anything like that, that cant be the priority, its establish resources to build on and jump into the deep end lol.

We could send unmanned probes to the center of the bloody universe lol, but until we get another human being stepping foot on another planet/Moon, people just arent going to be open to a bigger vision for us all.

 

[Sukerkin]

The important point is that if we do not develop and expand our space-faring capability then we are going to die as a species. It's not a theoretical "If" it is a statistical "When".

That astral media whore, Apophis, is probably going to miss us this time around, altho it will pass within the orbital radius of the moon (if I recall correctly). Next time, after 2036, who knows where orbital perturbation is going to send it?

http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2009/oct/HQ_09-232_Apophis_Update.html