/k/ here. Sorry if I'm breaking any board rules.
How would we go about terraforming Mars?
Is there enough gases trapped in the ice caps that carpet bombing them would release enough CO2 to create a sufficiently pressurized atmosphere? Is there enough oxygen and water in the ground to provide for biochemical processes?
What kind of time frames and challenges would we be up against?
What specific actions would need to be taken?
I'm willing to wager that there isn't enough trapped in the ice. Having little atmosphere isn't as big of a deal as the Microgravity problem, as well as the lack of a magnetosphere which would mean constant bombardment of harmful solar radiation during the day. The magnetosphere also would help keep the atmosphere on the planet, as the sun is stripping the atmosphere away, albeit very slowly.
>How would we go about terraforming Mars?
not science, please fuck off
>How would we go about terraforming Mars?
Slam another planet or decently sized moon into it then wait thousands of years for it to settle down. By then we likely would have better technology which could terraform other planets in other solar systems.
Musk has a mind to nuke the poles, that might release enough water. The lack of a magnetic field is a large problem as well. We had a thread a while ago about crashing one of mars' satellites into it, the consensus was that it would take millennia for the dust to settle.
Really no matter what, surface life on mars is very, very distant. Any colony in the next thousand years is gonna have to be entirely underground, shielded from the radiation.
...
>How would we go about terraforming Mars?
We don't bother. Build enclosed cities. The monumental investment of time and money required to terraform mars is a poor investment when it could be colonized without undertaking a grandiose and poorly conceived attempt at geoengineering. The technology needed to keep a colony functioning on mars would be simple compared to the technology required to set up the supply line and infrastructure needed to undertake a millennia long geoengineering/terraforming project (mature radiation shielding for spacecraft, mature large-scale artificial gravity systems, mature oxygen regeneration and ISRU technology, etc.).
I don't think anyone talking about terraforming has any clue how much sheer tonnage of shit is required
Look at what we are doing in regards to earth with CO2
All we're done is possibly increased the CO2 concentration by 100 ppm
By burning materials just dug up from the earth
And then you think we can terraform MARS?
> How would we go about terraforming Mars?
We can't. Terraforming is a science fiction plot device, not something we could actually do.
> Is there enough gases trapped in the ice caps that carpet bombing them would release enough CO2 to create a sufficiently pressurized atmosphere?
Not even remotely.
> Is there enough oxygen and water in the ground to provide for biochemical processes?
There's no free oxygen. If you want oxygen, you'd have to extract it from water or CO2 or rock. And you'd need to do that faster than the iron in the rock absorbs it.
> What kind of time frames and challenges would we be up against?
The main challenge is the impossibility. It's not a matter of toggling from Mars' current state to some other stable state. It's a matter of dragging Mars' environment away from its equilibrium state and holding it there.
>How would we go about terraforming Mars?
Can't. Atmosphere's too thin, there's not enough gravity to sustain one if you somehow built it up, and no magnetic field to protect it from the solar wind blowing it away.
Leave that sad-ass little planet alone, like it belongs. It sucks.
Asteroids are the best bet, they won't add much mass but they will add elements to the atmosphere and their masses will make it much easier to redirect their orbits to exactly where we want them to hit; likely the poles, where the debris will coat the ice, decreasing it's albedo and making it significantly easier to heat and then it too can vaporize and thicken the atmosphere making more things like water vapor and carbon dioxide availible for plants and microorganisms to do their thing mostly unassisted.
Yes it is, it's also engineering. Now lead the way and fuck off first.
>How would we go about terraforming Mars?
Crash something larger than phobos into it and sit and wait. Without restarting the core of mars terraforming it is a pipe dream and definately not within our life time
>600 years to terraform mars
What the fuck is this idiot smoking?
>he thinks "terraforming" is more than a meme
>How would we go about terraforming Mars?
You don't because that's stupid.
There's nothing wrong with a nice enclosed subterranean mall to live in. It's a great place for human society to get used to being a multi world species before greater expansion.
By the time terraforming becomes plausible we will have discovered multiple Earth-like planets and probably have the tech to travel there. Please stop bringing up terraforming, it makes you seem like a retard.
>terraforming Mars
>>/x/
>The monumental investment of time and money required to terraform mars is a poor investment when it could be colonized without undertaking a grandiose and poorly conceived attempt at geoengineering.
Yes.
Also, The monumental investment of time and money required to colonize mars is a poor investment when literally every investment on earth pays more profit.
>How would we go about terraforming Mars?
We don't, digging into the ground and making habitats makes 100% more sense in every way imaginable. First we need to get people ON mars before we can even THINK about terraforming.
Seriously if terraforming was so easy we'd do it to Africa and a fuck load of other places that could produce O2 to combat our C02 footprint.
>We don't, digging into the ground and making habitats makes 100% more sense in every way imaginable.
Yes, on earth. Habitats above ground make even more sense.
I meant on mars.
I know, which is no less idiotic than OP's terraforming suggestion. We're not running out of real estate development oppoprtunities on earth any time soon.
>We're not running out of real estate development oppoprtunities on earth any time soon.
>Lets put keep all eggs in one basket, because I like it better, fuck what others want and what's best for humanity overall
Waste of time since we cant change the gravity, just build artificial enclosed habitats instead.
>Eggs in a basket
This bullshit has been debunked many times, no need to beat a dead horse.
the amount of the earth that humans(whites) are allowed to live on is rapidly shrinking
I hope you're a troll and don't expect a serious response to this level of idiocy.
Do you live in a cave?
If Hillary wins, America will become a white minority country where open oppression of whites is acceptable.
Lichens and time.
Lots of time.
Did you know that it is haram for Muslims to explore space?
I'm not even kidding, Google it. Mars might be our best hope to get away from them.
this
>How would we go about terraforming Mars?
Don't bother, terraformation is a pointless and juvenile fantasy. Concept exists solely for autists to write bad sci-fi on Mars but still have the option of showing silly facial expressions without helmets.
bbbut...
we still can colonize it, right?
>terraformation is a pointless and juvenile fantasy
Thank you Alexander Pope,
now fuck off, and try to
quash some other ideas.
this reddit tier elon musk le mars le hyperloop science is annoying
You can't really argue that setting up self-sustaining off-world colonies wouldn't drastically improve our species security.
Most of the things that could kill the species on earth would also kill it on mars; there are not many exceptions.
Among those exceptions, some can be mitigated by developing better shelters on earth, e.g. underground or underwater.
Generally it's a question of opportunity cost for the same spending; I'm assuming limited funding for this goal because no one really gives a shit. (Neither should they, humantiy is overrated)
>Most of the things that could kill the species on earth would also kill it on mars; there are not many exceptions.
I'm not really sure what you mean by that. A dinosaur-killer asteroid hitting Mars would kill everyone there as dead as one hitting Earth would, yes. But the chances of both planets getting hit simultaneously, or within a small timeframe, is so unlikely that you might as well call it impossible.
There's a very narrow selection of existential threats that would kill everyone across multiple locations in the solar system. Gamma ray bursts or a fucking alien invasion, pretty much.
Spreading humanity outside of Earth would rule out all planetary-scale calamities as something that threaten the entire human species.
Robert Zubrin devotes one or two chapters in his book "The Case for Mars" to the topic. You should read it if you're interested.
Interstellar travel will remain a dream because traveling at relativistic speeds won't happen due to the extreme energy demands.
>A dinosaur-killer asteroid
Not that user, but the dinosaur-killer asteroid left the deep sea virtually untouched. So what he said about "some can be mitigated by developing better shelters on earth, e.g. underground or underwater" applies here. So no need for spreading to another planet for that specific purpose.
Yeah.
The Number 1 thing the Mars Atmosphere need in order to be more habitable is PRESSURE
It really doesn't even matter too much what it is comprised of, it just needs to be thicker
Mars lacks a magnetic shield like earth has and Nasa's Maven probe has shown that Mars is losing atmosphere even today
If we could dump heavy gases like Flouro carbons or pollutants mars could hold a thicker atmosphere
If the atmosphere is thicker the planet will warm up and liquid water could exist on the surface without boiling away or freezing
From a human standpoint we could use machines to break apart the CO2 into breathable Oxygen, and if there was sufficient pressure at the surface you wouldn't even need a space suit just an oxygen mask
> But the chances of both planets getting hit simultaneously,
In order to be useful as a backup, the martian colony would need to be self-sufficient to the point of being able to survive on its own for as long as it takes for earth to recover then create (or at least maintain) a space program capable of recolonisation.
While this isn't strictly impossible (unlike terraforming), it's still many orders of magnitude beyond our current capabilities.
Even with a concerted effort, it will be a century or two before we could create an off-world colony which a) doesn't need a continuous stream of supply missions, and b) won't suffer 100% mortality the first time that something important fails.
That's assuming that humans can survive long-term in Martian gravity. This isn't actually a given.
This would be a process that would take upwards of thousands of years to truly get it Earth-like.
Start by gathering nickel/iron asteroids and sending them to the surface to build the planet up. Not all at once, of course, but over the course of years the mass would build up. If heavier elements could be found to speed up the increase in mass especially if radioactive isotopes are present. Throw in a few hundred comets for water, methane, and additional CO2 to build the atmosphere. At some point there would be enough material that the pressure under the surface would heat and melt material, much of it nickle/iron, that would start producing a stronger magnetic field.
Yadda yadda, we get to where we can get O2 in the air to breath and have surface gravity closer to what we are familiar with...maybe about .75 - .85G.
Terraforming, no.
Colonizing with intent to establish it as an industrial center, however, has some merit.
Unfortunately, the moon is probably a better candidate for exoindustry what with its proximity and the abundance of fusion fuel trapped in its regolith.
Well doing anything on mars with large amounts of atomic explosions is also going to offset both its rotation speed and axis, aswell as its revolving path in relativity to the sun. I say we just light a campfire and let it burn for a billion years, theres really no simple solution and the amount of variables are in the millions. Bombardment would increase temperature, however not magnetic field until there is seismic activity inside the core of the planet. Putting bombs inside the planet would cause it to expand and create fissure and earthquakes. Containing a small amount of fission inside the planet would perhaps cause it to implode. Planets are formed from already heated material that cools on the outside, and your core stays moving like fluid. Relatable to a tootsiepop. Once those lolliopos are hardened and 20 years old, there no way to make it brand new again. By restoring the energy lost from the core, through a series of chain reactions and movements burrowing into the planet we may be able to reheat the core of the planet, thus restoring the magnetic fields strength temporarily. It would need to be sustained or somehow magnified to rebuild the planets atmosphere. Then we could work on heat and balancing the atmospheric elements.
Would it be possible to mass produce polonium through a mars satellite & transporting it to the surface to produce a negative polarity on the planet? Im not sure if the sun is positive negative or what.
This.
Basically, we just have a small self sufficient economy, that produces everything it needs.
It would have heavy industry just as we do here on Earth with one difference, no need to make things green or environmentally friendly--just dump all the CO2 and greenhouses gases into the air that you want and don't bother trying to make it clean. In 10,000 years who knows what will happen.
this is pretty much it.
No need for terraforming.
space.com
While NASA is exceedingly coy about it, there are more than a couple of indications that there is an extant biota on Mars.
>space industry
>gravity well
Humans are 100% destined for extinction. We cannot as a species exist without our biota; That is our planet and the other organisms which live on the surface. We can make a pretty sad attempt at recreating it but we cannot exist without it for any length of time. It would be far easier to just reengineer humans or use artificial constructs which are much better suited to space.
Human legacy may be in space, but not humans we are done. Also this.
>Human legacy may be in space, but not humans
That makes it even less rational to pay for it.
>fug you i got mine :DDDDDDDD
America sure has gone to shit.
My nigga it would just be easier for us to change our biology than to change than to change an entire planet.
Changing the creature to fit the planet will be quicker than changing the planet to fit the creature.
>self-sufficient
That's what I fucking said.
But you're right in that developing a colony to the point that it could operate completely self-sufficiently would be a lengthy project.
If you think there's value in paying so that future robot overlords can have a space future, you're gone with the pixies.
Keep sucking Elon's dick and bumping shit threads like this whenever you can while misrepresenting and insulting everyone who disagrees, I'm sure it will win you many donors and investors.
> implying any other countries (except for China all of a sudden) invest in space travel.
>except for China
top kek
youtube.com
that presenter makes me want to punch his fucking face
>fug you i got mine
Go to hell, you parasitic little shit.
Fake ass photo of mars
When are you guys gonna realize NASA is a satanic Freemason organization
...
Why don't you go back to masturbating to Atlas Shrugged, you ridiculous fuck. You're living up to the other user's caricature a bit too much.
>and probably have the tech to travel there.
Literally, LITERALLY never happening.
You're fucking stupid and don't belong on Veeky Forums.
First, the entire asteroid belt has about 5% of the mass of Earth's moon. So you couldn't "build the planet up" by doing that.
Second, learn the rocket equation. Redirecting an object from the asteroid belt to Mars requires enough delta-v so that you'd expend more reaction mass than the object itself weighs, making the entire process an exercise of utter stupidity. Because you'd either have to bring that reaction mass from somewhere (like Mars or Earth), meaning if you left it there you'd have more mass in the first place. Or you use part of the mass of the asteroid as reaction mass, which reduces the mass to "build the planet up" even further.
You're talking out of your ass
All of you idiot are talking about shit that's not even real. We haven't even gone to the moon you fucking retards
What about the alcubierre drive?
You mean the thing that needs more energy than there is in the entire universe to work?
Requires "negative energy" which doesn't exist.
>calls people retards
>believes the moon landing was an hoax.
>acknowledging obvious bait
>How would we go about terraforming Mars?
You don't. It is impossible to terraform mars within the time span humanity has to live as a species. You are talking 100k years of planetary bombardment using asteroids, moons, and comets. 15-20k years for shit to settle down for space travel in the solar system to be viable again. 100k years for the planet to stop being so fucking unlandable due to new plate tectonics. 500k years for things to be somewhat close to being able to seed terraforming lifeforms on it. Antoher 500k years to wait for all that shit to come to fruition enough to set foot on it and breath the air.
Granted that something doesn't fuck up along the way.
Why? Because Mars' core is cold, which won't protect anything, and Mars' doesn't have enough mass to keep an atmosphere.
No, there's not enough gravity. The human body will be like Jello and having children on it is just going to be a lesson is how horrific you can fuck up a human body in 0.38g.
What about something like dark energy which pushes away objects in space? Couldn't that be used to move the space around the ship?
I see you suffer from the delusion that people owe you money and status because of your space hobby.
Newsflash parasite: We owe you fucking nothing.
More like 50 million years to even make a dent in the planet's atmosphere. It took three billion years for Earth's biota to oxygenate this atmosphere, and that was in a comparative safe haven.
>libretardian
Funny how you would mock that, given that the US military could stage a coup at any time, shoot your gaylord Musk in the head and confiscate all his assets for their own luxury.
On second thought, perhaps you're right. Maybe they should.
hello alex jones
I didn't say they will stage a coup, you goddamned imbecile. I said they could if they chose to, which is undoubtedly true.
The only reason your gaylord Musk has property rights and personal liberties is because the men with guns allow him to.
And in return, his imbecile fanboys mock the rights and liberties of others. You know what, parasite? You'll get the damage you deserve in the end. You must be by far the shittiest person I've met online in a long while.
>muh military threat
Are you scared of your own shadow too ?
Typical Elton Musk fanboy: Cannot even read.
Jesus Christ, this board is overrun by imbeciles.
sshhh...they're tracking your internet traffic right now. dont say anything bad about them cumkid ;)
>How would we go about terraforming Mars?
Cockroaches and moss
>could
>if
A lot of shit "could" go down "if" those two words had any weight at all.
bu..but.. the globalists user..
It's not as simple as people think.
>"OH WE WILL COLONISE MURS BY 2020"
seriously, think for two fucking seconds and you realize just how hard it is to do.
Colonize
Terraform
Choose one, my underducated friend
>missing the point
You mock individual rights and liberties and pretend we owe you money and status for your space hobby, you imply collectivism should be the norm.
I point out the only thing keeping the men with guns from shooting Musk and taking his stuff as Mao would have done is that we have an opposite norm, for better or worse.
I never said your shitposting is likely to change that, although you're clearly trying your best and history is full of examples where cultural shifts drastically change to new equilibriums in a short timespan, especially when combined with other contingent factors. If you take social peace or constitutional rights for granted, you're naive.
1/3rd Earth gravity is probably pretty ok in reality. Solar radiation sharply drops off between Earth and Mars too, enough that even the thin Martian atmosphere does a decent job of warding off what little makes its way that far out. If humans can manage to thicken Mars' atmosphere enough to produce Earthlike pressures, the lack of a magnetosphere won't even matter because no radiation will be getting through anyway.
On top of this, Mars loses its atmosphere at geologic timescales and is well within the possibility of human replenishment. The rate of loss is incredibly slow.
We aren't running out of undeveloped land here on earth any time soon, you're right. What we have run out of, however, are places free of hopelessly outdated laws and broken regulatory systems and corrupted corporations where the intrepid and enterprising can flourish and drive our species forward. There is literally no place on Earth like that any more, and I doubt there ever will be again. The need for a new frontier is vastly more important than the majority of people will ever realize and cities beyond Earth's surface are our best bet for that.
The moon is closer but poses more serious energy storage, gravity, and resource issues that Mars does by a long shot. It's also generally a much more extreme environment; radiation levels on the surface of the moon are dramatically higher than those on the surface of Mars, not to mention the extreme temperature swings the moon sees (Mars is much more temperate). The moon also doesn't put us any closer to the asteroid belt while it's Mars' backyard.
If you can get the transit issue figured out Mars is a vastly superior option to the moon. That issue is a hard one, but far from insurmountable.
That said, there's no reason we can't colonize both at the same time and in fact if congress wasn't sucking the dicks of Boeing and Lockheed we'd probably be able to do exactly that.
I doubt that any government will give you money or even permission to create permanent settlements in space without strong influence on their part.
It would be irrational for them to do so because a permanent off-world presence implies potential weaponization of the gravity well, and no sane agent wants additional enemies with WMDs like that.
None of that matters of course since it's all science fiction anyway. Unless there's a technological singularity starting from earth, self-sufficient off-world colonies won't be a thing for a long time to come.
>None of that matters of course since it's all science fiction anyway. Unless there's a technological singularity starting from earth, self-sufficient off-world colonies won't be a thing for a long time to come.
We don't know that unless we fucking try. Fucking hell, what's with the insane levels of risk aversion that have crept both into the space industry and its spectators over the past 40 years? Of course nothing is ever going to happen if everything has to be 300% safe and likely to return profit immediately.
The issue is not lack of technology or cash. The issue is that everyone has turned into overcapitalistic chickenshits.
>The issue is not lack of technology or cash.
Sure it is.
It's really not. That's where most of the space industry gets it wrong: you're not supposed to keep doing the same outrageously expensive shit, you're supposed to try to find vastly cheaper and better ways to get the same result.
Can you imagine if silicon valley had adopted the same mindset that plagues spacefaring today? We'd all still be putting around on 6502s hooked up to monochrome displays, if the general public owning computers even came to be a thing.
We're not *supposed* to do anything; I for one would be perfectly happy if no human feces ever touched the surface of mars.
It's only people like you who have become so obsessed with it that you think it's some kind of quest for the holy grail.
Libertarianism is basically anarchy for the rich.
That idiot Ron Paul was backed by a Texas billionaire.