China want to send men to Mars in an Eco bubble, the US want to send another probe like curiosity.
How things have changed.
A leading light of China’s rapidly accelerating space program has hinted that the country’s taikonauts could in time be able to grow their own food and generate oxygen from plants in bases on the Moon or Mars. Deng Yibing, deputy director of the Beijing-based Chinese Astronaut Research and Training Center, told state-run …
China will soon come to its senses and start pissing its money up the wall trying to turn its ephemeral economic dominance into fleeting worldwide political dominance.
Headlines 2050:
Chinese war in South America/ Bumfuckistan enters its 3rd decade.
China plans rover for Titan.
Funding for CSS (Chinese Space Station) cut.
Federated United States in breakup talks.
British Government to fund Microsat powered by hot air and wishful thinking.
Heres hoping not.....
Surely, the Space Shuttle hijacked the USA manned-plans for 30 years. That is over now. Robotic exploration of the Solar System by NASA has been VERY impressive, though. NASA tried the trendy cheap-probe approaches with MER, Juno, LRO, GRAIL, etc. They have tried the cooperative launch route with Chandrayaan, Dragon, etc. They also have done the superprobes with Galileo, Cassini and Curiousity. NASA is still the foremost voice on what happens with the ISS.
NASA has done more to bring space science into the human experience than everybody else COMBINED.
Perhaps you could prevail upon the ESA to step up its woefully underachieving record.
A space program gives people something really important. It gives them hope, a goal to strive for. As an engineer you are no longer the one who has to make deliberately bad products to suit some brain-damaged business model, but you are the one who is actually pushing forward the boundaries of science of technology.
After the US moon-landing, a whole new generation of engineers grew up. They found things like computers "cool" even though they had no real use for it. They built home-brew computers even before micro-processors became available. This eventually lead to the computer industry we have now, where computers are so cheap, everyone can afford one.
In the west, this generation of engineers is slowly dying out, which can be seen in the current stagnation of engineering. Why bother making a proper mobile phone, when your boss insists on it being useless by forcing bad user interfaces and DRM onto it?
I only hope that this brings the US population out of it's apathy for all things space related.
Although thinking about it, perhaps China, with it's blatant disregard for health and safety and human rights, is actually what we need to push space exploration right now. No mission will be too dangerous.
Never is a very long time. That said, there is no mention of the resources required to create this farm. I'm presuming they would need to take fertile soil, water, food and air for the initial growing period just to get started as well as the resources to construct this astro-farm before the growing can get under way.
Of course, rather than seeing this as "Not. Gonna. Happen." - which with that attitude it won't, they should be seen as obstacles to overcome.
Expecting things like this to happen in our lifetime's just isn't realistic. Space is a huge challenge and it will likely require hundreds of generations passing and improving the baton before we get anywhere near true space travel. But that all started 50 years ago. That is one of the things that makes us Humans great.
Stereotypes aside - I for one hope that they are successful.
The Americans/Russians were only able to really achieve what they did at that time through mostly purloined tech courtesy of nabbed knowledge and personnel at the end of WWII courtesy of research done through not overly ethical but sometimes brilliant invention.
(*Disclaimer - No this isn’t a political comment on the Holocaust/Nazis etc etc)
The palpable fear during the Cold War period drove both competing countries/states/nations to new heights of achievement and the perceived gains in technology, human endeavour, national pride or tactical advantage were the main driving points.
Roll on 50 years.
America has turned into a giant CEO. Its main concerns are making money and telling everyone else what to do. No national feats or achievements.
Invention through necessity has been replaced by invention as the reason to accumulate wealth and keep hold of it.
It dropped the ball on Space exploration and pulled too much funding as it wasn’t deemed “profitable”.
Health and Safety became an industry and solid door. Bureaucracy and middle/side/top heavy/over management is the norm.
Space exploration is now in the hands of private individuals.
Russia has finally turned into what America was 20 years ago, but is catching up very quickly.
China, through its own dubious nature has (mainly) always put the nation first.
It has the manpower and is more bothered about getting it done (sometimes regardless) than getting it patented and sold.
Space exploration is still in the hands of the state
Health or safety is something that is only perhaps guaranteed if you do the work or do it well.
(**Disclaimer - No this isn’t a political comment on the Communist Regime etc etc)
Therefore I believe that it literally and figuratively, Mars will be the “Little Red Planet” unless you decadent Western peeps start looking outwards more.
Let a hundred flowers bloom in Mars habitation modules from the progression of science…
Just a comment on the comments.
When a story like this appears featuring a Western country ( i.e. US to send people/rocket to moon/mars )
Half the comments are usually whining on about how they should be spending the money reducing world hunger and complaining that the whole venture is nothing but a waste of money.
When the Chinese do it - its all "congratulations and good luck"
That one piqued my interest.
Google Translate didn't produce anything for "triffid" when I tried (I assume its inability to do so is why you're asking!).
So I asked a Chinese colleague (who also happens to be a sci-fi buff) and she gave me 三個根 for triffid. Plugging that into Google Translate produces "three root" so I suppose that's as close as you're going to get!
The US talked about manned missions to Mars, but wised up once the costs started getting tallied. We should figure out a faster and more efficient means of getting there (like working ion engines) before we try anything other than Musk's vision of a one way trip (which may be acceptable for China, but the US's post-Challenger reluctance to admit space travel is dangerous precludes this)
of small, small steps - a strategy which at least hitherto seems to be serving them well. And while cultural generalisations äre admittedly suspect, perhaps the Chinese, with their five millennia of continuous civilisation, are more disposed than most to take the long view, even when it comes to projects to put a colony on Mars. Note also that has far as we know and perhaps contrary to the expetations of those who love to hate the country - «with it's [sic !] blatant disregard for health and safety and human rights» , they haven't yet lost a space man or woman. Leaving aside moral aspects, a simple consideration of the training costs involved would militate against risk-taking with the lives of these individuals. Riding a rocket is never risk free, but it strikes me as extremely unlikely that the leadership of the Chinese space programme would exert less care to keep their people safe and sound than their counterparts in Russia or the US....
Henri