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Isn't it impossible to live on mars [sic] enless we all were filthy rich?
Nov. 15,2001
Well, people on Mars will, indeed, be "filthy rich." Even if Mars has
1% as many resources as the Earth, these resource will be shared by far
fewer people than on Earth. If the population of Mars were, say, one
million, they still
would each have access to 100 times the quantity of natural resources
compared to the ten billion or so which will be sharing this planet in
the near future. Furthermore, because of the somewhat smaller gravitational
field around Mars, that planet will have much easier access than Earth
to the undescribleably vast resources of the Asteroid belt. -- Not only
will Martians be "filthy rich," getting to Mars is bound to become much
cheaper than it is now. The flights to the Moon were made with very
primitive electronics. Today we have microchips, computer aided drafting,
and industrial robots. The only reason space launches are still
as expensive as
they are is in part due to NASA's unwise decision to pursue an unnecessarily
complex space plane program. Imagine if airplanes were designed to land
on highways or on railroads; flight would be prohibitably expensive.
Airplanes are designed to fly in the air, rockets are designed to send
things up into space, and capsules are designed to bring them back down
to earth. The key to cheap access to space is a large booster like the
Saturn V which is flown frequently to be mass produced, and which
incorporates some reusable components. -- Finally, even if transportation
costs remain high for some time and Martians are not initially filthy rich
once a person gets to Mars, staying there is not outragously expensive.
People who arrive at Mars by birth would provide a cheap way to
populate the planet and these people, as they conquer this new world,
would make unique and profitable contributions to humanity through their
culture, ingenuity, and ideas.
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