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extropalopakettle
No offense, but....
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 Posted: Sun Sep 02, 2012 4:23 am Post subject: 1 |
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| We're having a hard enough time living on Earth ... Can we ever live on Mars? |
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Courk
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Sun Sep 02, 2012 7:11 am Post subject: 2 |
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| We have people living (for stretches at least) in Antarctica and on the space station. I don't think Mars is too much of a stretch compared to those. Will the average person be able to pull it off? Probably not. I imagine it takes a certain constitution and dedication to your work to live in a small, isolated space. |
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Buzzsaw
Newbie Guidance Counselor
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| Posted: Sun Sep 02, 2012 12:56 pm Post subject: 3 |
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| extropalopakettle wrote: |
| We're having a hard enough time living on Earth ... Can we ever live on Mars? |
"A hard time living on Earth", does that refer to war and general conflict between people?
Living on Mars would be psychologically difficult. Little or no natural world to interact with, pressures of the confinement and feelings of isolation, combined with limited number of humans available to interact with would lend to depression, hostility. The general population would definitely have trouble adjusting and not go crazy. As there is a lid for every pot though I am certain there are some folks out there who would not only do well in that environment but would enjoy the whole thing.
Logistical problems aside though, our amazingly complex natural world has so much to offer, along with better bargains on cigarettes (they are going to be expensive on Mars) I think our species would have to be pretty desperate to be shacking up there. |
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Thok
Oh, foe, the cursed teeth!
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| Posted: Sun Sep 02, 2012 1:25 pm Post subject: 4 |
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| Buzzsaw wrote: |
| Logistical problems aside though, our amazingly complex natural world has so much to offer, along with better bargains on cigarettes (they are going to be expensive on Mars). |
I'm confused about why cigarettes would be more expensive on Mars than anything else. Shipping costs would be prohibitive for everything; most of the stuff you'd want on Mars you'd have to grow or mine there. (Tobacco might actually be easier than a lot of things, since seeds are relatively easy to transport and you just grow it there.) |
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Scurra
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Sun Sep 02, 2012 2:12 pm Post subject: 5 |
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I think it would be something to do with the air usage of cigarettes? You would presumably have to do extra filtering etc. on what is probably an already limited resource.
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Thok
Oh, foe, the cursed teeth!
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| Posted: Sun Sep 02, 2012 2:17 pm Post subject: 6 |
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| Scurra wrote: |
| I think it would be something to do with the air usage of cigarettes? You would presumably have to do extra filtering etc. on what is probably an already limited resource. |
In that situation, cigarettes probably wouldn't be expensive; they would probably be illegal. (An early Mars colony probably isn't capitalist or a democracy for the first 20 or so years anyways; a command economy/government makes more sense early on.) |
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Death Mage
Raving Lunatic
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| Posted: Sun Sep 02, 2012 2:45 pm Post subject: 7 |
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We should send our prisoners to Mars.
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Jedo the Jedi
Paragon in Training
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| Posted: Sun Sep 02, 2012 4:29 pm Post subject: 8 |
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| Death Mage wrote: |
| We should send our prisoners to Mars. |
I concur. Australia turned out all right, why not Mars?
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Buzzsaw
Newbie Guidance Counselor
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| Posted: Sun Sep 02, 2012 4:35 pm Post subject: 9 |
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| Death Mage wrote: |
| We should send our prisoners to Mars. |
I support this idea, and they could be put to work picking up cigarette butts. |
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Death Mage
Raving Lunatic
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| Posted: Sun Sep 02, 2012 8:55 pm Post subject: 10 |
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| Jedo the Jedi wrote: |
| Death Mage wrote: |
| We should send our prisoners to Mars. |
I concur. Australia turned out all right, why not Mars? |
Exactly.
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Thok
Oh, foe, the cursed teeth!
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| Posted: Sun Sep 02, 2012 9:58 pm Post subject: 11 |
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| Death Mage wrote: |
| Jedo the Jedi wrote: |
| Death Mage wrote: |
| We should send our prisoners to Mars. |
I concur. Australia turned out all right, why not Mars? |
Exactly. |
I'm OK with this idea if Death Mage pays for it. |
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Nsof
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Sun Sep 02, 2012 10:27 pm Post subject: 12 |
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Good reading for those interested by colonization of Mars: The Mars Trilogy
| Wikipedia wrote: |
The Mars trilogy is a series of award-winning science fiction novels by Kim Stanley Robinson that chronicles the settlement and terraforming of the planet Mars through the intensely personal and detailed viewpoints of a wide variety of characters spanning almost two centuries. Ultimately more utopian than dystopian, the story focuses on egalitarian, sociological, and scientific advances made on Mars, while Earth suffers from overpopulation and ecological disaster.
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Macros
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 12:29 am Post subject: 13 |
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As long as there's women with three breasts, I think we could manage it ok
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Amb
Amb the Hitched.
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 2:09 am Post subject: 14 |
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And access to the Red-Labyrinth.
BUt actually, I don't think we would succeed. People living in extremes have issues like Vitamin D deficiency. And the radiation level on mars is probably a lot higher. (Especially once WIFI is installed) |
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Jedo the Jedi
Paragon in Training
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 2:38 am Post subject: 15 |
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We would adapt. Maybe life in underground caves could occur. Things like the challenge of living on Mars always produce leaps in technology.
I just want all the annoying and stupid people to go there and stop mucking up things here. A fella can dream...
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Macros
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 5:53 am Post subject: 16 |
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I don't think Mars can hold that many people
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The Ragin' South Asian
Head Poncho
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 9:29 am Post subject: 17 |
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| I'm not sure what Jedo's opinion of me is, but I would volunteer for Mars. |
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Jedo the Jedi
Paragon in Training
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 11:56 am Post subject: 18 |
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Well, somebody has to be there to keep them all from just walking out the airlock. You are the "Head Poncho." On Mars that would just translate to "Leader of the Stupid."
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Thok
Oh, foe, the cursed teeth!
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 12:47 pm Post subject: 19 |
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| Jedo the Jedi wrote: |
| Well, somebody has to be there to keep them all from just walking out the airlock. |
If you're shipping criminals off to Mars, why would you care whether or not they walk out the airlock? |
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Jedo the Jedi
Paragon in Training
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 2:15 pm Post subject: 20 |
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I don't agree with Capital Punishment, so it isn't meant to be a death sentence.
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Thok
Oh, foe, the cursed teeth!
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 2:37 pm Post subject: 21 |
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| Jedo the Jedi wrote: |
| I don't agree with Capital Punishment, so it isn't meant to be a death sentence. |
Frankly, capital punishment is less cruel then sending them to Mars. (Also, walking out an airlock would be a voluntary thing, so it wouldn't be your fault if they did it deliberately. Well except for the whole sending them on a 9 month long journey in a limited space vehicle to a distant planet with few exploitable resources.) |
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Jedo the Jedi
Paragon in Training
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 2:45 pm Post subject: 22 |
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| Thok wrote: |
| Frankly, capital punishment is less cruel then sending them to Mars. |
Would you say the same about Australia? At least they get a chance to do something productive and have a society of some sort, even if it is far and away different from their life on earth.
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Death Mage
Raving Lunatic
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 2:54 pm Post subject: 23 |
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I wouldn't say the same thing about Australia. Australia has natural resources. And other life. Of course all the other life out there will, in some way, attempt to kill you, but it's still other life. They could survive on their own there. On Mars, they'd be confined to whatever safe areas are created for them and have to survive on what supplies are sent to them.
It may still be possible to get it to work. But it would be difficult, and actually require help from the outside.
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Jack_Ian
Big Endian
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 3:29 pm Post subject: 24 |
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I just had an evil thought. 
Tell them you're shipping them to Mars, but really only send them to a prison deep underground.
They can work for privileges, mining etc.
Far cheaper and you can control the environment to make it seem like an oxygen-deprived planet.
Could be a decent plot for a book too.  |
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Chuck
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 3:36 pm Post subject: 25 |
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| They could be made to work for their supplies on Mars by taking pictures, setting up scientific equipment, doing experiments, repairing rovers, and packing samples into return rockets. Space for new equipment could be rented out on their resupply missions to help offset their costs. |
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Jedo the Jedi
Paragon in Training
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 3:50 pm Post subject: 26 |
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I think Chuck has the right idea. I mean, it isn't like the prison system now doesn't or hasn't made the prisoners do productive things for society.
Anyway, ask most any prisoner and I'm sure they would choose Mars over the death penalty. They can at least be known for being one of the first people to populate Mars.
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Thok
Oh, foe, the cursed teeth!
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 3:56 pm Post subject: 27 |
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| Jedo the Jedi wrote: |
| Would you say the same about Australia? At least they get a chance to do something productive and have a society of some sort, even if it is far and away different from their life on earth. |
As Death Mage has said, sending people to Australia is much less cruel than sending them to Mars. (A single equipment failure probably means death for everybody on a shuttle to Mars. A single equipment failure on a ship to Australia can be potentially be fixed by stopping at a port on the way there. The first fleet to Australia took 8 months to get there, but made stops at the Canary Islands, Rio de Janeiro, and the Cape of Good Hope on the way there. A trip to Mars takes 9 months without any stops.)
If you want to exile them to force them to do something useful, Alaska is a better choice. North Dakota is also a better choice. Australia or China would also be better choices.
Finally, we're supposed to be more morally evolved than 19th century England.
| Jedo the Jedi wrote: |
| Anyway, ask most any prisoner and I'm sure they would choose Mars over the death penalty. |
If I was given a choice between Mars and the death penalty, I'd file a lawsuit with the Supreme Court and win. |
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Chuck
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 4:13 pm Post subject: 28 |
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| The Mars Incarceration constitutional amendment will take care of any legal difficulties. |
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Jedo the Jedi
Paragon in Training
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 4:46 pm Post subject: 29 |
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| Thok wrote: |
| As Death Mage has said, sending people to Australia is much less cruel than sending them to Mars. |
Cryochamber?
| Thok wrote: |
| If I was given a choice between Mars and the death penalty, I'd file a lawsuit with the Supreme Court and win. |
Under what cause?
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Death Mage
Raving Lunatic
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 5:04 pm Post subject: 30 |
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| Quote: |
| Finally, we're supposed to be more morally evolved than 19th century England. |
And if Australia had turned out like, well, Africa today, this would be a valid claim. But Australia is a first would country.
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Thok
Oh, foe, the cursed teeth!
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 5:16 pm Post subject: 31 |
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| Jedo the Jedi wrote: |
| Thok wrote: |
| As Death Mage has said, sending people to Australia is much less cruel than sending them to Mars. |
Cryochamber? |
There is no such thing as a working cryochamber.
| Quote: |
| Thok wrote: |
| If I was given a choice between Mars and the death penalty, I'd file a lawsuit with the Supreme Court and win. |
Under what cause? |
Cruel and Unusual Punishment.
| Quote: |
| And if Australia had turned out like, well, Africa today, this would be a valid claim. But Australia is a first would country. |
That has more to do with the Australian gold rushes than the criminals. The number of people who came for the gold rush in 1852 is roughly double the entire number of prisoners sent to Australia.
Now, I'm all in favor of a bunch of people spending their own money to travel to Mars to mine for gold. |
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Dread Pirate Westley
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 7:05 pm Post subject: 32 |
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| Thok wrote: |
| If I was given a choice between Mars and the death penalty, I'd file a lawsuit with the Supreme Court and win. |
No you wouldn't. The Supreme Court would only have appellate jurisdiction in such a case. It would probably reach the Supreme Court, but you couldn't file there originally. |
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Elethiomel
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 7:34 pm Post subject: 33 |
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| Thok wrote: |
| Cruel and Unusual Punishment. |
Surely you could get around that by promising to strap them to a chair and electrocute them once they've landed. |
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Jedo the Jedi
Paragon in Training
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 7:37 pm Post subject: 34 |
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I don't mind taking a different tack. 
Regarding the cryochamber, either we would wait until one was invented (I'm sure it's being thought of if moving to Mars is actually becoming viable) or they would be in a "cell" on the ship. What's so different about a cell on a spaceship compared to one on Earth? They don't get time in the yard?
As for the lawsuit, the punishment certainly is unusual, but I don't know how you could justify "cruel." I mean, we're talking about being on Death Row or having Life without Parole compared to being able to live on Mars. Now, if what is so cruel about this punishment is the fact that the prisoners can't still run their drug business from inside prison, then I don't give a damn. They would be part of a prison society on Mars with actually a lot more freedom of movement throughout the Mars complex (though they still cannot leave the compound).
It really seems to me that prison is prison, one is different than the other due to the location, but I'm not sure what all there would be to complain about. I never suggested we send the prisoners there to die or to live in a sub-standard way. They would be provided for, and they would also be doing research to further the possibility of a large population on Mars.
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Thok
Oh, foe, the cursed teeth!
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 8:27 pm Post subject: 35 |
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| Dread Pirate Westley wrote: |
| Thok wrote: |
| If I was given a choice between Mars and the death penalty, I'd file a lawsuit with the Supreme Court and win. |
No you wouldn't. The Supreme Court would only have appellate jurisdiction in such a case. It would probably reach the Supreme Court, but you couldn't file there originally. |
Semantics. The only way it wouldn't make it to the Supreme Court would be if I won and the state stopped appealing before it got there.
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| Surely you could get around that by promising to strap them to a chair and electrocute them once they've landed. |
Delaying an execution by shipping them on a death trap is both cruel and unusual.
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| Regarding the cryochamber, either we would wait until one was invented |
Are we going to be eating food pills on Mars as well? A working cryochamber is not going to happen in our lifetime; anybody who tells you otherwise is a quack.
| Quote: |
| to live in a sub-standard way |
Until Mars is terraformed (or there is a significant already developed colony on Mars), any prisoner transported to Mars is living in a substandard way. Indoors 24/7 (somebody living on Mars will likely never see the sun), little to no communication with the outside world, likely horrible food quality given what will be there, and at constant risk of a catastrophic equipment failure. And that's assuming they survive the trip to Mars in the first place, which is a 9 month trip where everything that's wrong with Mars is even worse.
It might be a decent idea in 2412, once we've actually gotten all the bugs out. But if you just want to exile prisoners now, ship them off to Afghanistan and have them fight the Taliban. |
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Jack_Ian
Big Endian
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 8:49 pm Post subject: 36 |
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You don't need a cryochamber.
Just place them in a coma.
They'll wake up 6 months later as if only seconds have passed. |
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Elethiomel
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 9:19 pm Post subject: 37 |
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| Thok wrote: |
| Delaying an execution by shipping them on a death trap is both cruel and unusual. |
But if it really is a death trap, then it won't be much of a delay. Just think of the space flight as the actual execution method. Though come to think of it, shipping them to Mars for electrocution isn't really all that energy efficient to begin with. It might be better to electrify them on earth and just launch the corpses to Mars. That way, we wouldn't have to worry about stuff like cryochambers and radiation shielding. |
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Thok
Oh, foe, the cursed teeth!
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 9:27 pm Post subject: 38 |
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| Elethiomel wrote: |
| It might be better to electrify them on earth |
Cut out the redundant part of your comment. (Although I am amused by the concept of shipping corpses to Mars for absolutely no reason at taxpayer expense.) |
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Buzzsaw
Newbie Guidance Counselor
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 10:11 pm Post subject: 39 |
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| How many times fold would it cost to house a prisoner on Mars, vs here on Earth? That's not to mention the vastly different transportation costs. Anyone venture a guess? I would think a conservative estimate would be at least a dozen fold or more. (am enjoying ensuing philosophical discussion though.) |
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Nsof
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 10:16 pm Post subject: 40 |
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| Elethiomel wrote: |
| Thok wrote: |
| Delaying an execution by shipping them on a death trap is both cruel and unusual. |
But if it really is a death trap, then it won't be much of a delay. Just think of the space flight as the actual execution method. Though come to think of it, shipping them to Mars for electrocution isn't really all that energy efficient to begin with. It might be better to electrify them on earth and just launch the corpses to Mars. That way, we wouldn't have to worry about stuff like cryochambers and radiation shielding. |
LOL
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