Lunar Base Construction
is a Technology centric issue
We need to go back
Earth cannot sustain humanity forever, we must boldly go out into the cosmos in search of new places to exist. Obviously that will take a very long time, but we need to begin sometime soon and somewhere close. The moon makes an excellent choice because it has several useful resources and spacecraft built there will be able to be launched without as much expenditure of fuel as needed from Earth.
There are also the scientific reasons to go, as the moon may be able to tell us more about the Earth as it formed and can help us develop the means to go elsewhere.
Here, here. There's a great old Robert Heinlein essay called "Spin-Off," which is actually taken from testimony he gave to a congressional panel back in the '70s. It details all of the revolutionary technologies that have come from our efforts to solve the mechanical problems presented by space exploration - and of course, the list would be quite a bit longer today. Space exploration, he noted, was one of the few federal programs that has paid for itself many, many times over.
Yes, however as Rep. Ron Paul said, "We need to understand that the more government spends, the more freedom is lost..." Incentive programs for private investment, such as the The Commercial Orbital Transportation Services program created by NASA, while costly at first (more government spending), are the first baby steps to a whole new world of space exploration options.
Mass habitation of a moon or planet other that earth will never happed. The hurdles are in surmountable. Nations today can't agree on what time it is let alone a titanic undertaking of this scale. Small privatly sponsored groups maybe in the unforeseeable future as an experiment maybe. Hell, The climate alarmist are spewing fear of death and destruction here on earth in the seeable future caused by a fractional increase in CO2. If this incredibly small atmospheric change due to whatever reason is threading mass death and destruction of mankind here on earth, Manufacturing one somewhere else is best left to Trekies.
Honestly how can you deny that the earth is being used up? I don't think anyone here is saying the moon is a vaiable alternative to earth but it is as the poster said, a start. Eventually we will have to expand to survive and if we can't even get set up on the moon what are the chances of getting anywhere else. My dream would be to live in a solar system/galaxy whereve where I can travel to various planets easily and freely and I honestly believe it will happen some day, not, mind you in my time but for a generation yet to come and I want to help man kind achieve that.
lunar based construction is unachievable. Escaping earths gravity with the materials to build a barn can't be done let alone a sophisticated base of operations. Humans will not survive extended non gravitational expose and artificial gravity generation is a dream on any large scale. Go to Mars............Your kidding right
Habitation or at least setting up to search for minerals on other planets or the moon that we need here is a fairly smart move. If we can not provide a means to live there for the long run, at least we could rotated people in and out and bring back what we need here. That way at least we are not digging up earth and causeing more problems for us here at home.
So true. That cost would be impossible today, but then again hundreds of billions of dollars wasted over a piece of sand on the other side of the planet makes sense. After a few years of that kind of money we could have a hell of of set up on the moon. Especially if NASA was forced to do the same thing the military needs to do and get away from overpriced contracts.
