What do you think about terraforming? (Page 3)

Metaverseguy
Metaverseguy: Submarines are mental hospitals for people that work too hard.
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Metaverseguy
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Metaverseguy
Metaverseguy: Artistic rendering of what Mars might have looked like
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Corwin
Corwin: Very nice. I suspect that Mars did in fact look very much like that about 4 billion years ago... and became very much like the way it is now about 3 billion years ago.

Mars' "heyday" was long long ago... I don't believe there's any way to turn that clock back.

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Metaverseguy
Metaverseguy: When I first saw that picture I agreed with you that it may have looked like that. Then, I did a bunch of research. Now I'm not so sure. They have found rocks that are typically only found at marine environments showing evidence of rivers and lakes, but why can't they seem to find any fossils?

Plants, fish, dinosaurs, everything has fossils in mud or limestone or rocks or whatever here that dates back very far. I doubt the planet would become that developed without some type of primitive life evolving. I mean sure one rover can't do as welling as hundreds of archaeologists on this planet for the past 200 years, but Mars is only 1/3 the size of Earth and the rover has had 3 years to search. Maybe their first priority isn't finding fossils, but this is taking forever.

One of the theories is that there was brief episodes of water after volcanic eruptions, but not a permanent presence of water like Earth has.

I did read that there is a strong possibility that there is plates on Mars, meaning plate tectonics, and a liquid iron core.
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Corwin
Corwin: Had. Not "has".

Mars almost certainly didn't have multi-cellular life... the period of a wet Mars with an atmosphere was brief geologically speaking (0.5 to 1 billion years )... the Earth went over 3.5 billion years with just single-celled organisms.

Microbial fossils are very difficult to find. We more easily find the structures that microbial life leaves behind, like stromatolites, or small spherical structures.

We have found similar things on Mars, but there is always a pesky lack of organic material to be found... it's there... but not in the amounts we would like to find... because we are biased as to how thing work on Earth.

Bottom line -- fantastic claims require fantastic evidence -- to truly "confirm" that life has existed on Mars, we need fantastic evidence... our little robots may not be equipped to provide this.

Be patient.
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Hatman20
Hatman20: it could be done on mars, but only if a way is found to restart its geological activity up to a degree to which would generate a magnetic field.

... Normally I don't like to draw on science fiction in science, but honestly, the idea used in the movie "Core" might do it.

Restarting geologic activity might also have the added benefit of restarting volcanic eruptions on the surface, which could replenish its atmosphere with greenhouse gasses.
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Metaverseguy
Metaverseguy: Why do you think drilling down into the core, would cause tectonic plates to start moving? I've read an article that says Mars is only one plate, but that can't be true because there's mountains and volcanoes on the upper layers. HM-19 do you think it's too far from the sun to have an atmosphere, water, and trees? Mercury and Venus are pretty close and they are too hot. Saturn and Jupiter are farther but they are gas planets not really too cold, but some of their moons are completely icy.
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Aura
Aura: Not just drilling, but setting off a nuke. It wouldn't need to get the plates (if any) moving, just the liquid iron center turning.
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Metaverseguy
Metaverseguy: Aura, do you think there's nukes here to spare? I thought all the nuclear energy was put into power plants. Plus there's no proof that that would be successful and it could blow a giant crater into Mars that would otherwise be useful for real estate or dirt biking.
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Corwin
Corwin: Mars is considered to be just within the "Goldilocks Zone" or Habitable Zone, but because of its small size it cooled faster than the Earth, and its molten core solidified, hence it lost its magnetic field, hence its atmosphere and oceans boiled away into space from bombardment of the solar wind.
It is believed to have been VERY similar to Earth during the first billion years. It had oceans, and a thick atmosphere... but then the planet died geologically.

Mars has evidence of past volcanic activity, but we haven't seen any evidence of plate tectonics. There are no mountain ranges on Mars like the Rockies or the Himalayas that were pushed up from tectonic activity and the collision of plates. This is also why the giant volcano Olympus Mons could grow so high... the magma hot spot beneath it remained stationary... unlike Hawaii's Mauna Kea, which is just one of a long chain of now extinct volcanoes that runs all the way to Russia... the magma hot spot is constantly changing position as the plate drifts. In a few million years Mauna Kea will sink back under the sea, and there will be a new giant volcano down the line to replace it.

To be perfectly honest, I think the idea of terraforming a dead planet like Mars is a pipe-dream. I think the kind of practical terrafroming that we might do one day, is to find an extra-solar Earth-like planet in its primordial stage, and simply seed it with bacteria and algae. Future humans could then return in a few thousand years to an oxygen atmosphere, and then begin seeding it with desert plants and microbes that would create soil.

But, there's a possibility that early life may have already began before we get there... life seemed to have appeared on the Earth shortly after liquid water was present. So in that scenario, terraforming would just be a matter of bringing along our preferred flora and fauna.
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Metaverseguy
Metaverseguy: Thanks for your response Corvin. So you think an Earth-like planet in its early stages (ie with an atmosphere but that has plate tectonics) would be better to work with than Mars? Most are over 2 light-years away and no one has found any worm holes in the galaxy so far. They did find those tardigrades that survived in space so maybe they can survive on the planet. Not sure how that would help us but some genius can probably figure it out.
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Hatman20
Hatman20: Most of what Aura and Corvin said are spot on.

"Why do you think drilling down into the core, would cause tectonic plates to start moving? "

What Aura said. The idea is to use nuclear detonations and wave propagation to get the core spinning. it's the core that generates the electromagnetic field, and the more active the core and mantle is, the more volcanic activity you get on the surface.

"I've read an article that says Mars is only one plate, but that can't be true because there's mountains and volcanoes on the upper layers."

The volcanoes are evidence of past tectonic volcanic activity, but are now dormant. Mars used to be much livelier than it is now. There are dead volcanoes here on Earth too.

"HM-19 do you think it's too far from the sun to have an atmosphere, water, and trees?"

No. In fact, with every mission to Mars, Nasa finds more and more evidence that Mars once had liquid water on its surface (which would've required an atmosphere). Water and an atmosphere is all you really need for the possibility for life.

The main reason Mars is now dead while the earth still has life is down to the difference in size. Mars is 1/3 the size of the Earth. This meant its core slowed down and cooled far faster than on Earth. This caused Mars' electromagnetic field to stop working. Without the protection from radiation the electromagnetic field provides, radiation from the sun slowly strips away any atmosphere.

Mars was probably once Earth like, but thanks to its smaller size, would've died out far faster than Earth.

"Mercury and Venus are pretty close and they are too hot."

Yes, Mercury is far too close to the sun, and is too small to hold a decent EM field and atmosphere anyway.

Venus, on the other hand, suffers from what is called a "runaway greenhouse effect". A runaway greenhouse effect is when a planet's atmosphere acts like a greenhouse. And, the effects of the greenhouse effect (average planetary heating) lead to an excacerbation of and increase in the greenhouse effect. Put simply, it's a vicious cycle.

Technically, the Venus lies just within the Goldilocks zone. But its geologic and atmospheric composition render the planet inhospitable, and far hotter than it normally would be.

" Saturn and Jupiter are farther but they are gas planets not really too cold, but some of their moons are completely icy."

Actually, those icy moons (like Enceladus and Europe) made scientists rethink the idea of Goldilocks zones. They both have cold tectonics, which suggests they may have oceans capable of sustaining life under the ice. Thanks to evidence from Io, it's thought that these moons are heated externally by tidal forces from the gas giants they orbit.

Goldilocks zones have been extended to include moons orbiting gas giants of a certain mass, orbiting at a certain distance, and orbiting at a certain distance from the sun.

"Aura, do you think there's nukes here to spare? I thought all the nuclear energy was put into power plants."

While the concept of nuclear power and nuclear weapons are related, they aren't the same thing.

Nuclear power plants use uranium, a natural element here on earth. They use a controlled slow fission reaction. Uranium is perfect for controlled slow fission, but not so much for nukes. There are too kinds of Uranium: Uranium 235 and 238. In order to get Uranium that can be used in bombs, you need to run it through a centrifuge, and separate out the less common version. The less common version is the one that can be used for bombs.

Long story short, not many uranium bombs were ever built, and they were phased out pretty quickly. They're just terrible, and take a lot of resources to make. Besides, even if uranium were needed for nukes in this project, only 20% of US power comes from nuclear power. Germany, similarly, only gets 20% of their power from nuclear power, and they are demonstrating a precedent for ditching nuclear power (after the japan earthquake, Germany's been getting rid of their nuclear plants)

Most nukes today use plutonium instead. Plutonium is a man made element that's slightly bigger than uranium. It's far better at uncontrolled detonations for nukes. Only a small core of Plutonium is needed (8 pounds, if I remember correctly). This feeds the secondary fuel of a nuke, which is tritium and radioactive lithium. This causes a fusion reaction on top of the fission reaction.

Most bombs today use this method. There are 4,000 nuclear warheads in active service, and another 10,000 nuclear warheads in storage... They've been just sitting there for decades without any use. Trust me when I say the world has more than enough nukes sitting in mothball to use in planetary missions.

"Plus there's no proof that that would be successful and it could blow a giant crater into Mars that would otherwise be useful for real estate or dirt biking."

Lol, Mars dirt biking XD. Sick air dude.

No, there is no proof it would work. I mean, the idea came from a frikkin science fiction movie. However, restarting the EM field would be absolutely needed to make Mars livable. It would protect humans from radiation, and keep any atmosphere made for the planet from dissolving away thanks to that radiation. And there is at least SOME validity in the idea of using explosions to rotate an object.

And I dont think there's any risk of blasting a crater into the planet. Underground nuclear tests have been done here on earth before, and those were just under the crust. They didn't make much of a crater. Deep in the mantle of a planet, the rock and magma would probably be thick enough to mitigate shock-waves from damaging the surface too much. I could be wrong, but that's the idea anyway.

Not to mention, Mars is huge. Those 14,000 nukes I mentioned? Even deep inside the Mantle of mars, it's actually possible all of them might not have the firepower needed to even leave a dent, let alone get the core restarted.

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Hatman20
Hatman20: @ Corvin

While I agree it would be easier to terraform a protoplanet than mars, at the same time, you have to factor in the difficulty of even going to another solar system. A need to terraform another planet would probably arise long before we ever figure out how to leave the solar system. Mars would be the only decent choice.

Not that that's a bad thing anyway. Mars could be used as a proof of concept or prototype for terraforming other planets. Mars is difficult to terraform compared to terraforming a protoplanet. So, if we COULD do it, it would prove we could do it with any planet easier to terraform.
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Metaverseguy
Metaverseguy: Most of the moon missions were successful in the 60's and 80's. There's been a lot of failures to even get back there though. Somehow the space agencies lost the technology to do it correctly. Even Virgin Galactic and other agencies have had trouble getting out of Earth's orbit without major difficulties.

There's such potential for Mars. Probably 80-90% of people are curious about it, and would travel or live there if it was possible. I don't get how they lost the technology to do it honestly. Planes and automobiles have been consistently successful for over 100 years yet with space-technology they had many failures, success and then many more failures. Imagine if Henry Ford had created the first car (which he didn't) and then everyone tossed the diagrams in the trash and to this day we all traveled by railroad and horseback. What if steam engines were the most advanced?

I don't want to get on an environmental rant about "pollution", c02, and other jargon, since I've seen weirder forms of energy outperform classic fossil fuels somehow, but it's going to happen one day whether some people want it or not. And it's going to be normal within the next 200-300 years to visit other planets.
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Hatman20
Hatman20: "Most of the moon missions were successful in the 60's and 80's. There's been a lot of failures to even get back there though. Somehow the space agencies lost the technology to do it correctly."

Actually, the technology wasn't lost. More like, the funding and motivation is what's lost. Going to the moon was the result of political rivalry between the US and Russia. Once the space race was won, there wasn't any real reason to go back.

The only real reason to go back is to use it as a stepping stone to get to Mars. And doing a Mars mission requires a lot more technology than it took to get to the moon. A mars mission would be 2 years long. So, Nasa has been doing what it can to learn how to stay in space for that long. The Mir, ISS, and Space Shuttle programs can all be thought of as a proof of concept for a Mars mission, kind of the same way the Gemini program was a proof of concept for Apollo.

The technology being used today is much better than it was in the 60s. It just needs funding (Ares 1 and V were cancelled a few years ago thanks to Nasa budget cuts). But of course, funding requires interest, and the political interest is gone while the scientific interest is a lot less motivating to people.

"Even Virgin Galactic and other agencies have had trouble getting out of Earth's orbit without major difficulties."

Not really. Private space agencies' goals today involve making things cheaper and more reusable, carrying out NASA contracts to the ISS, and doing space tourism. Since their goal is to make profits, they have even less motivation to develop beyond ships capable of low earth orbit.

"Planes and automobiles have been consistently successful for over 100 years yet with space-technology they had many failures, success and then many more failures. "

For one thing, we use planes and automobiles everyday. They're cheap compared to rockets. For another, they haven't been consistently successful. The further back you look, the higher the accident rates for both become. They are only safe today because of the lessons learned the hard way over the past century.

for another, when it comes to space technology, rockets tend to have many times more things that can go wrong than planes or cars. And the successes in the middle you mention weren't as successful as you seem to think. Russia built 10 N1 moon rockets. Half of them failed on take off, and the other half were scrapped. And the US went to the moon IN SPITE OF dangers. Apollo 1 killed 3 astronauts on the ground, Apollo 10 lost control and nearly slammed into the lunar surface, Apollo 11 had a computer failure in regards to the abort sequence, and had to expend extra fuel to get away from a landing zone rougher than thought (they landed on fumes), and Apollo 13 had a massive explosion and nearly killed 3 astronauts in space. The successes were more down to luck and training more than anything. Another reason why Nasa hasn't tried going back since. We had a lot to learn about space travel.

"Imagine if Henry Ford had created the first car (which he didn't) and then everyone tossed the diagrams in the trash"

Actually, most of the blueprints still exist, and what ones dont can be reverse engineered from examples that still survive from the apollo missions that got scrapped.

More importantly, the Saturn rockets are of little value. Their technology is outdated, and while the SLS is probably inspired by the Saturn 1, using their technology directly is a bad idea. There's a reason Nasa wants to start over from scratch. Saturn was the quick and dirty way to get to the moon, and what Nasa needs now is a cheap, safe, and efficient way to get there.

"I don't want to get on an environmental rant about "pollution", c02, and other jargon, since I've seen weirder forms of energy outperform classic fossil fuels somehow, but it's going to happen one day whether some people want it or not. And it's going to be normal within the next 200-300 years to visit other planets."

Lol. I agree with all this, and I think most people on these threads would too.
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