I was going to make a joke that The Verge’s definition of “easy” seems to be different than mine, but the first sentence in the actual article is “Sending people to Mars won’t be easy”. I get the feeling the writer and the editor are not in speaking terms.
Well duh. We haven’t even solved living on the ISS for more than a year at a time yet.
That is primarily an issue with the lack of gravity’s effect on the human body. It is hard to get enough exercise to maintain strength in muscles, maintaining bone density, and other bodily functions so that the astronaut can have a regular life back on Earth.
Mars has enough gravity that bodily atrophy should not be a significant issue for people that return, and it shouldn’t be an issue at all for people who stay on Mars.
There are a ton of other massive hurdles on Mars, but they are not related to the cautionary limitation on individual’s trips to the ISS.
Mars has enough gravity that bodily atrophy should not be a significant issue for people that return, and it shouldn’t be an issue at all for people who stay on Mars.
That’s actually totally unknown. It could be, or it could be that you need almost a full G to stay healthy.
Surprised the article doesn’t mention the recently published A City on Mars — a book by Kelly and Zach Weinersmith, of Bea Wolf and SMBC. It talks about lots of other stuff but covers this too.
Prove that you can do it on the moon first then we can talk about Mars.
The only real estate upside to Mars is a tenuous wisp of atmosphere. Other than that, the Moon is superior in every way.
I’d consider a Moon colony, a floating Venus colony, a Titan colony or a space station. You couldn’t pay me enough to go anywhere else, since there’s nothing there to spend it on anyway.
Edit: Or interstellar stuff, I guess.
