Message-ID: <0ZRqyM200VcJ83bk5A@andrew.cmu.edu>
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From: space-request+@Andrew.CMU.EDU
To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU
Date: Sat,  2 Dec 89 01:45:44 -0500 (EST)
Subject: SPACE Digest V10 #296

SPACE Digest                                     Volume 10 : Issue 296

Today's Topics:
		     Re: Reasons for Mars mission
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Date: 2 Dec 89 05:23:30 GMT
From: uceng!dmocsny@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu  (daniel mocsny)
Subject: Re: Reasons for Mars mission

In article <128702@sun.Eng.Sun.COM>, jmck%norge@Sun.COM (John McKernan) writes:
> The continental shelves (or Antartica) are no replacement for space
> colonization.

s/replacement/training ground/

Obviously delivering newspapers on your Schwinn balloon-tire is not
the same as winning the Tour de France. But you have to start somewhere.
A good place to start is with the possible. Then when your reach is
greater, you are prepared for the next step. Rome wasn't built in
a day. 

> In the first place these areas have already been colonized,
> ie permanent manned research stations in Antartica and permanent manned
> oil drilling sites on the continental shelves.

These are bases, not colonies. Predominantly male crews rotate
frequently, are supplied entirely from without, and families do not
live there. The continental shelves resemble the North American
Interior when the only Europeans present were a few trappers, hunters,
and chaps panning for gold in stream beds. Their presence was
transient; they didn't bring their families. They were only there
because they could skim a quick economic benefit and get out. They
weren't building a civilization. That didn't happen until the
railroads and farmers arrived.

Of course, the North American Interior already had civilization(s).

> There are proposals for
> increased colonization, such as massive strip mining of the sea bed, or
> mining/drilling operations in Antartica, but political and ecological
> factors will likely stop such plans. If arbitrary groups of people were
> alowed to claim permanent mineral or fishing rights over the continental
> shelves then such groups of people would already exist. And if they were
> required to live were their claims were, I'm sure they'd be doing so
> (above the water because that's easier).

Somehow the above statement just doesn't seem to reflect the pioneering
spirit. I mean, if we haven't got people with the backbone to sweep
aside such trifles as "political and ecological factors", what are
they going to do when faced with hard vacuum and the need to squeeze
water from rocks?

If our intrepid expansionsists will capitulate so readily on the shelves,
where is our hope for the real challenges?

Dan Mocsny
dmocsny@uceng.uc.edu

p.s. Despite the "Law of the Sea," quite a bit of interesting work
(both private and publicly funded) is going on under and on the
oceans. Some of it may yield benefits directly applicable to
space development. The opportunity exists today to stop dreaming
and actually do something...

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End of SPACE Digest V10 #296
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