This is all over the NASA website (http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/). I think it is make the beast with two backsing awesome.
Seems to me we should plant a nuke reactor up there somewhere and start a few colonies.
Ambient temp is like minus 100 C which means no cooling ponds needed, just put up a big heat sink. [laugh]
Seriously, next we are going to find a big cavern with a 3-fingered hand control.. then the ice will melt.. and then..
On the equator of Mars, the temp can reach as high as 27 C (80F). Seems to me that we should have seeded the equator with tundra and desert plants and see if anything takes root. Any plants would start making oxygen if they lived.
Alas. I would love to see mars in person....... Big waste of money to go there now, but it would be so cool.
I am surprised no one else posted a thread about this (yes, I searched...)
very cool [thumbsup]
Quote from: ducatizzzz on June 21, 2008, 05:24:47 AM
This is all over the NASA website (http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/). I think it is make the beast with two backsing awesome.
Ambient temp is like minus 100 C which means no cooling ponds needed, just put up a big heat sink. [laugh]
On the equator of Mars, the temp can reach as high as 27 C (80F). Seems to me that we should have seeded the equator with tundra and desert plants and see if anything takes root. Any plants would start making oxygen if they lived.
Yar, read about this yesterday, I think - I was keeping track.
Not starting a flame war, or anything like that: but re 27C at the equator - I think that only happens during summer. Winter even at the equator is too severe for sophisticated plants to survive.
A big problem with mars is its atmosphere - only about 1% (at best) of the atmospheric pressure we have on earth => 'liquid' water both freezes and boils simultaneously.
I love mars. If you want to change your life, read Kim Stanley Robinson's 'Red Mar', 'Green Mars' 'Blue Mars' trilogy. It is a future history (ie not sci fi per se) of the colonization of mars. The trilogy won every sci fi award there is. It is simply breathtaking.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Mars_atmosphere.jpg)
Quote from: roy-nexus-6 on June 21, 2008, 07:36:47 AM
Yar, read about this yesterday, I think - I was keeping track.
Not starting a flame war, or anything like that: but re 27C at the equator - I think that only happens during summer. Winter even at the equator is too severe for sophisticated plants to survive.
A big problem with mars is its atmosphere - only about 1% (at best) of the atmospheric pressure we have on earth => 'liquid' water both freezes and boils simultaneously.
I gotcha, i didn't think about the boiling difference with the decreased pressure. Boyle's Law.. argh. [bang]
STill, they could put a nice Tokamok reactor with chemical facility to produce air.... sort of like Alien? ;D
I wonder what tire compound would work best in the low atmospheric pressure? Something like lunar rovers shod with... what?
but seriously the implications are cool. As a kid I read a Rama series that I enjoyed very much diffent premise but good sci-fi.... I'm rambling sorry.
My story was "Jesus on Mars".. Philip Jose Farmer.
I caught the story too but I didn't think to post it on here.
It's amazing! I love space stuff...I'm such a nerd...I've been checking NASA website daily since a couple days before the Phoenix landed.
Pretty cool! [thumbsup]
Anyone know if (and how) they know it's water, or do they just suspect it is? All I could find was that since it disappeared after being uncovered they suspect it was water. Couldn't it be some other substance which looks like ice?
Quote from: Triple J on June 21, 2008, 12:37:11 PM
Pretty cool! [thumbsup]
Anyone know if (and how) they know it's water, or do they just suspect it is? All I could find was that since it disappeared after being uncovered they suspect it was water. Couldn't it be some other substance which looks like ice?
apparently, they chemically analyzed it by melting it.
Quote from: WannaDucBad on June 21, 2008, 09:34:03 AM
but seriously the implications are cool. As a kid I read a Rama series that I enjoyed very much diffent premise but good sci-fi.... I'm rambling sorry.
Then you'll be happy to know they're making the movie :D
Seriously, guys - the Robinson's Mars Triology is a 1500 page 'how to colonize mars' epic: he's a trained astronomer, and spent 20 years researching it. [thumbsup]
Here is the wiki! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_trilogy
ps contains spoilers!
I suppose it would be to much to ask for the woman with three breasts to be found up on Mars too, eh?
Quote from: Duck-Stew on June 21, 2008, 08:45:12 PM
I suppose it would be to much to ask for the woman with three breasts to be found up on Mars too, eh?
yeah, but she hangs out with this guy:
(http://www.movieprop.com/tvandmovie/reviews/totallrecallkuato1.jpg)
Quote from: roy-nexus-6 on June 21, 2008, 08:05:35 PM
Seriously, guys - the Robinson's Mars Triology is a 1500 page 'how to colonize mars' epic: he's a trained astronomer, and spent 20 years researching it. [thumbsup]
Here is the wiki! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_trilogy
ps contains spoilers!
you on his take or something? j/k the trilogy is truly epic, imo the first one, Red Mars is the best. Kinda lost interest after that as it gets a lot denser in the last two books.
fwiw it is suspected the deepest crater floors on Mercury harbor ice too, as they receive no sunlight.
Quote from: factorPlayer on June 22, 2008, 08:25:45 AM
you on his take or something? j/k the trilogy is truly epic, imo the first one, Red Mars is the best. Kinda lost interest after that as it gets a lot denser in the last two books.
fwiw it is suspected the deepest crater floors on Mercury harbor ice too, as they receive no sunlight.
Yap, I'm paid a commission per sale. In my next post, I'll be including an Amazon link.
I know what you mean about the last two books. Robinson doesn't really write 'sci fi' - as I said, it's supposed to be a future history. So he's not just concerned with how Mars is terraformed,.. he also focuses on how the planet changes the people, the culture - much the same way as Americans and Australians colonists were changed.
From our perspective, water on the moon is probably more important - you can use it to make fuel an oxygen => perfect jumping off point for the rest of the solar system.
Don't forget Europa guys! 100mile deep liquid ocean - and one hell of a view :D
Quote from: roy-nexus-6 on June 22, 2008, 05:39:40 PM
Don't forget Europa guys! 100mile deep liquid ocean - and one hell of a view :D
yeah, but that damn monolith is there....
Now what if they dug a little bit deeper and found a vein of bacon. All our world's problems would be solved and we'd be up there mining it asap.
Quote from: ducatizzzz on June 22, 2008, 05:44:56 PM
yeah, but that damn monolith is there....
[laugh] [laugh] [laugh]
We're saved !