Should Mars be terraformed?

I think what you're outlining here is very sad. I certainly hope it won't come to that, ever.

 

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as you can see most countries do not really have a problem, and you don't have to stop child benefits, perhaps you can make a system so that only the first child recieves normal child benefits.
And if we can keep imigration in check then that will be sufficient for most countries.

 

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No offense, but I can't tell shit from that graphic.

 

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What does the color-scale bar represent?

 

sorry
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_territories_by_fertility_rate
It is a list of countries by total fertility rate (TFR): the expected number of children born per woman in her child-bearing years, based on 2008 data

dark blue means a average of 1 or less child per woman light blue is a average between 1-2 for example germany has a average of 1.41 children per woman
So far 53 countries have a TFR of less then 2. So any of these countries that are still growing is because of their emigration or their even lower mortality lists

 

But you must remember, theres a high mortality rate for African children, out of the seven maybe 2 become healthy adults.

I vote for nuclear power, it's safe, and more eco friendly than other energy sources, produces tons of energy and with the newest machines that purify it, it will last a few million years before we run out of nuclear material.

Only thing i can imagine some countries will have an issue about is that the USA owns 60% of the world's uranium reserves, more than the Arab states hold in oil

 

gues again?

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Nuclear is pretty good far better then coal and gas
but I hope there is some future in solar islands

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I remember a study saying that if 1/3 of all the roofs (private+industrial) in Germany were covered in solar panels then there would be no need for any power station (for germany)

 

Sure, on sunny days.

There are much better options than solar energy, I think. And I don't know the effect, but blotting out large (?) chunks of the ocean would interfere with the carbon cycle, as lot's of CO2 is absorbed by the oceans to be used by phytoplankton and things. If you blotted out, say, 1% of the equatorial oceans, I don't know how that would interfere with this cycle.

A better option I think is to put solar panels in space, orbiting around the moon, or leading/lagging the earth as it goes around the sun. The benefit of this is that there is little environmental impact on earth, outside of the trouble of getting them into orbit.

 

107306500km² of ocean 1% of that is 1,07E15m² covered with cells producing 120W/m² or 1,28E17watt today humans only use 1,5E13 watt, so it really is no use to cover more then 1/1000 of 1% of the oceans to cover all earths energy demands. Still a awful lott considering how fast solar panels are evolving these last couple of decades.

The effects should be minimal but to reduce further the damage to phytoplankton you can build it somewhere where the water is 2000 meter deep over a dead zone. Yust pray that this titanic doesn't sink

 

I mant uranium reserves. The US is not mining the hell out of their reserves like other countries. But im pretty sure theres atleast 10 uranium deposits historically, how many are active today i do not know.

 

Sorry for my post 203

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The graphic illustrates my point 4

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Terraforming Mars

Terraforming Mars is not an option for the advancement of mankind. The rise in population will force the issue in the next century. Food shortages, global warming and the fuel shortages will eventually previal.

However, ironically using global warming could also be a saviour to mankind on mars. Im forming research into the terraforming of mars over a 120yr cycle. To do this we need to examine and interpret a multitude of variables across various science disciplines. I could do with a number of budding scientists in physics, chemistry and IT do help develope this research further.

Anybody who is interested in taking this from conceptual level to logical practical levels please get in touch.

 

Not if our efforts at "terraforming" the earth is an example.

Early inhabitants of Mars, or a planet near it where only asteroids are left, may have tried that already.

We will learn to go with the flow and do what the cosmos clearly tells us to do, or become extinct with a flush.

 

Terraforming Mars is idiotic. Its low gravity (can't hold an atmosphere well) and lack of a magnetic field (deadly radiation) would make living their nearly impossible. Colonizing the planet by building habitats under the ground is another question.

~String

 

False and false. It's true that Mars's low gravity would mean that any atmosphere we created would slowly leak away, but it would happen on a timescale of millions of years; a very short time in terms of the lifetime of a planet, but for human purposes any atmosphere we created would be permanent.

It's true that Mars will always lack a magnetosphere, but it wouldn't need one to support life. Contrary to popular belief, the magnetosphere isn't necessary for the earth to support life. It's true that it blocks about 80% of incoming charged particles from the sun, BUT the vast majority of those particles would be stopped by the atmosphere long before reaching the ground even if the magnetosphere wasn't present. If mars had an atmosphere thick enough to breath, that would provide substantial radiation protection. Also, since it's much farther from the sun than the earth, it only receives about half as much solar radiation anyway.

 

Most of the articles I've read on the subject suggest that the thicker atmosphere that is a major part of a mars terraforming would filter out much of the radiation. This article says that an atmosphere 100m thick would make mars safe for humans.

 

Wouldn't most of the atmosphere just disappear into space rather quickly?
Mars has no magnetic field like Earth.

 

yup true.

We need to upscale our terraforming engineering...which I bet in future will become one of the options of study. Imagine, ability to change rotation of a planet or its position relative to the sun, perhaps introduce magnetic field somehow...

 

Rather quickly, on a geologic scale of time is quite different from a human one. The atmosphere would probably last hundreds of thousands of years, maybe millions. Also, we could replenish it by slamming the occasional comet into mars.

 

you do realize that we can't slam the comets into Mars, because we will be living on Mars.