I was reading this...

First post-Columbia astronauts named (http://msnbc.msn.com/id/4916029/)
From the website:
"The introduction of the 11 new astronauts comes as the space program is in flux, with shuttle missions grounded until at least next March in the wake of last year's Columbia explosion. NASA is planning to permanently ground the shuttles in 2010 to redirect efforts for a return to the moon by 2020. "

Now, I wonder why we are going to the moon again. Is it to simply collect rocks and add them to our collection or to estabilish a colony at the moon?

I think it's more then time for us to estabilish a colony there. What's the point on sending people to collect rocks? We can do that with robots for a cheaper price. I think it is total waste of money to send them just to collect rocks, don't you think?

So... should we waste billions of dollars to collect rocks or use the money well and estabilish a colony? How would we have a colony at the moon? Do we have enough technology for that? We will have it by 2020?

And of course, if we have a colony there, we can always get more rocks. ;)

Wouldn't it be cool to goto the moon for holidays? :)
Is there anything more romantic then being at the moon rather then staring at it? :D :D

We should definitely build a colony on the moon. Both for exploration and for a launchpad to the rest of the solar system.

We will have to be prepared to suffer losses in this endeavor though. Are we prepared to lose an entire colony on the moon? The public outcry would be enormous, but it is inevitable that accidents will happen. The moon is a lot farther away than an orbiting space station. It would take time for a rescue team to arrive.

And yes, a theme park would certainly be on the list of cool things to do on the moon. It would have the added benefit of possibly being able to make a profit as well. As distasteful as it is for space to become as commercialized as the earth, it is the only way for space travel to become mainstream.

I also think that we need to build a colony on the moon

1. a good place to test and develop Mars mission equipment (and any other space technologies)
2. launchpad to Mars and other planets
3. using the dark side of the Moon for radioastronomy
4. raw material mining, also H3
5. further development of self sufficient biosphere technologies
6. theme park

I don't think that a Moon colony is necessary. In fact, I think that the Moon is way overrated for all those points above except perhaps 3 and 4.

For testing Mars mission equipment, places on the Earth are much more suitable than anywhere on the Moon, for reasons totally unrelated to the logistical advantages of staying here.
The Moon has a 28 day day-night cycle, while those of Mars and Earth are within 40 minutes of each other.
Lunar temperatures range from -170 to 130 degrees centrigrade, compared to -90 to 5 degrees on Mars and -40 to 35 on Earth.
The surface of the Moon exists in perfect vacuum, while Mars has an atmospheric of 6 to 9 millibars.
Why can't self sufficient biospheres be developed on Earth, with our 24 hour day-night cycle and ready-made soil? They would be incredibly difficult to implement on the Moon as plants would require artificial light for two weeks at a time - precisely when the energy for such expenditure is least available.

Even as a launchpad to other planets the Moon is not all it's cracked up to be. It requires less propellant to travel from Earth to the surface of Mars than it does to go to the Lunar surface. This is because of the ability to aerobrake for little propellant cost at Mars.

Why not just build a large space station and keep it orbiting above the Earth. Then you could build things inside or outside of it to travel to other places in the cosmos. This way you would be closer to Earth in case of an emergancy to bring people back home or if someone needed medical treatment that couldn't be handled onboard the station. It would cose alot less to build and be usefull for decades if they keep it in the proper orbit.

Or a large space cruiser thingy. maybe it could be outfitted to mine NEAs, and make them into stuff

What's the point on sending people to collect rocks? We can do that with robots for a cheaper price. I think it is total waste of money to send them just to collect rocks, don't you think?

The Apollo missions collected 300kg of lunar rocks. They are still producing interesting science!

After the Apollo missions, the Soviet Luna probes collected samples robotically. In three missions, they managed to return 300 grams of the Moon to Earth. Only 0.1% of the Apollo haul.

At that time, manned missions had a much greater payoff than robotic. I don't know how we'd go today - I'd like to see some robotic rovers sent to the Moon before sending people, but I think that there is still value in sending people to collect rocks. Even with the advances in the last 35 years, people can still examine more rocks more quickly, cover more ground, make better decisions on what is interesting, and manipulate the environment much more than a robot.

Space.com article (http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/solarsystem/moon_rock_analysis_000522_MB_.html)

I think some human exploration will be required before establishing a permanent presence anyway.

My response to the poll would be "Both!"

Lunar temperatures range from -170 to 130 degrees centrigrade, compared to -90 to 5 degrees on Mars and -40 to 35 on Earth.
it'd be better if the technologies can be used in a large variety of environments and have a safety gap, thus they'd be not only mars compatible, but also open space
Why can't self sufficient biospheres be developed on Earth, with our 24 hour day-night cycle and ready-made soil?
aye, we can, but we don't have the hazards here on earth that are "up there"
I'm more thinking here of protection from radiation and meteorites, etc
a field test on the Moon would show up many problems that we wouldn't prethink here on earth (or so I think, because reality in most cases overthrows theory, there's nothing better than a good field test imo :) )

They're both good points Avatar, and I agree with them. It's just my layman's opinion that the difficulty and expense of doing these things on the Moon will outweigh the benefits.

Ok. So Theme Park is winning... :D
I always remember of "I Dream of Jeannie" when I discuss about bringing rocks from the moon... :D :D

No there are more important things pending than doing timepass on moon.

Humans should spend their billions in building a space colony that supports gravity by means of centrifugal force. It is surprising that U humans haven’t yet done this even after knowing the illeffects of zero G.

here is my idea use the moon as a mining center they have proven that you could make a sky hook on the moon today with materals off the self for you that down know a sky hook is a big wire running to large object in geo orbit around a planet and then a line extending above that point so you can leave orbit... with little fuel cost...

so here is what we do pull large heavy metal Asteroids into goe orbit around the moon and mine the crap out of them then once they are spent send them crashing into the moon and have all the good stuff sent to earth slow boat style and have them land where ever you want with new advancements in heat sheilding you could have it renter and not burn up just slowing down a few milion pounds of iron/copper whatever...

If space makes money they we will go to space as long as we make no money from it we will not go... people will be more willing to lose lifes in space if we are getting a tangibal good out of it...

I answered that we should go to build a colony but I think considering the moon as a launching site for exploring the solar system is basically crazy. Lots of your fuel would be burned just leaving the gravity well.

The colony I want to see established is one that would provide materials to the Lagrange points for major construction at those sites, where we can build ships and launch them as well as start the processes that need to happen to build space colonies. Materials from the moon can be sent to the Lagrange points using an electromagnetic mass driver powered by solar energy.

I answered that we should go to build a colony but I think considering the moon as a launching site for exploring the solar system is basically crazy. Lots of your fuel would be burned just leaving the gravity well.
Which gravity well!? There's no gravity in the moon. And the gravity of our planet is weak over there.


The colony I want to see established is one that would provide materials to the Lagrange points for major construction at those sites, where we can build ships and launch them as well as start the processes that need to happen to build space colonies. Materials from the moon can be sent to the Lagrange points using an electromagnetic mass driver powered by solar energy.
Huuum.... what are Lagrange points...? :confused:

There is gravity on the moon, one sixth that of earth, if I remember correctly.

The Lagrange points are places where the gravity from two or more bodies holds things steady in relation to the masses. You can find more at http://www.hobbyspace.com/Links/spaceLife2.html . Scroll down for links describing Lagrange points in detail.

There is gravity on the moon, one sixth that of earth, if I remember correctly.
1/6? I thought it was a little bit less then that... Still, the escape velocity is much lower then on earth. So the gravity well of the moon is way easier to leave then the one of the earth, right?


The Lagrange points are places where the gravity from two or more bodies holds things steady in relation to the masses. You can find more at http://www.hobbyspace.com/Links/spaceLife2.html . Scroll down for links describing Lagrange points in detail.
That's cool. I had thought of that before, but I thought the gravity could make us travel faster. Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to be the case... :(
Still, I see it as if they were streams in the universe... ;)

Yeah, I find the stuff exciting as heck. The Lagrange points act as extremely mild gravity wells. All it takes is a nudge to send a ship on its way. The forces cancel each other out at those points. There are two stable ones Earth - moon L4 and L5. We can launch probes around the solar system from there quite easily using a concept that has already been used to greatly lessen the fuel needed for a solar paticles studying satellite that was successful. Solar sails and/or hybrid fueled systems can send robots for research and heavy machinery that would be needed to ferry asteroid material around.

At the L4 and L5 points, we can build huge colonies. An MIT class once studied the concept of space colonization with such structures and estimated some 300 times the area of the earth could be made available for human habitation within the next 75 years.

Yeah, I find the stuff exciting as heck. The Lagrange points act as extremely mild gravity wells. All it takes is a nudge to send a ship on its way. The forces cancel each other out at those points. There are two stable ones Earth - moon L4 and L5. We can launch probes around the solar system from there quite easily using a concept that has already been used to greatly lessen the fuel needed for a solar paticles studying satellite that was successful. Solar sails and/or hybrid fueled systems can send robots for research and heavy machinery that would be needed to ferry asteroid material around.

At the L4 and L5 points, we can build huge colonies. An MIT class once studied the concept of space colonization with such structures and estimated some 300 times the area of the earth could be made available for human habitation within the next 75 years.
Are you already making plans for a vacation? :D
The thing is: who would like to live on this kind of place? maybe if we can mimic the earth on those places.... but otherwise, I don't think there would be a whole lot of people interested...

Hopefully we also invent a ay to be immortal before then, so that we can go there... :D

At the L4 and L5 points, we can build huge colonies. An MIT class once studied the concept of space colonization with such structures and estimated some 300 times the area of the earth could be made available for human habitation within the next 75 years.

Do you have a link on these MIT studies? 300 times the area of Earth sounds just a LITTLE (ha ha) bit ambitious, especially if these huge space constructs were to have any kind of artificial gravity. Are you talking about concentric hollow cylinders with varying rotation rates? What about tidal effect from Earth and Sun? If the Moon were mined to provide the building material, you probably wouldn't have much of a Moon left; certainly, its mass would be considerably reduced - and the Lagrange Points subsequently shifted.

300X Earth's area sounds more like Jupiter, enclosed in a solid shell at a radius where the gravity is 1 G. The next step would a ringworld completely encircling the Sun. Let's be sensible, huh? :rolleyes:

Getting back to the original topic of this thread: the Moon should definitely be colonised. A low-gravity world would be good for leisure, mining and precision manufacturing, while still having the basic utility of ground underfoot. Industry there would be free of any need for environmental restrictions, and essentials such as oxygen & water could be derived from the polar crustal ice deposits - rather than shipped out in inconvenient bulk. Plus, there is no reason to suppose that Lunar dust would not be a viable soil for cultivation, once exposed to air and water - with maybe a little fertilizer, to kick-start the nutrient cycle in vegetation. :D

Even the long period of daylight could be advantageous, for collection and storage of solar energy. This would supplement, maybe even replace, nuclear power generation during the 2-week night. As stated by others, the far side of the Moon is the perfect place for radio-astronomy and SETI. It's the only landin the whole Solar System permanently shielded from Earth's radio cacophony.

At the L4 and L5 points, we can build huge colonies. An MIT class once studied the concept of space colonization with such structures and estimated some 300 times the area of the earth could be made available for human habitation within the next 75 years.
I also have a question about this. Where we would get the material to build such thing? certainly not from earth, because to build something 300 biggere then the earth, we would need at least 300 times more material that we can find here!!!!! :eek:

I believe the details of the class' study were presented in the book "The High Frontier" by professor of the class, Gerard K. O'Neill http://www.space-frontier.org/HighFrontier/

It is interesting that on the NASA education site concerning space colonization http://www.nas.nasa.gov/Services/Education/SpaceSettlement/ they list a link to data on "When?" with the brief description "Good question, when do you start working on it?" The link doesn't work at the moment, good enough for government work I guess. For some links this appears pretty up to date http://www.spaceref.com/redirect.ref?url=members.aol.com/oscarcombs/settle.htm&id=2078

Sure sounds like a pretty outrageous claim, 300 times the area of Earth within the next 75 years but that was only for the known technologies of the 1970s. Perhaps the time could be less if humanity really decided to do it. Moon materials would only be for a couple of the first colonies. By their completion we should have already ferried asteroid material to areas we can get our space based automated factories to churn out some more. Their location would not be limited to near Earth. I enjoyed the Ring world series of books but consider the concept as pretty far fetched.