Anybody here on the Mars manifest?

[Paducah Home Theater]

As to "trashing" Mars, you seem to assume we've learned nothing.  If true, I am with you.  We have no right or reason to survive if we cannot learn to live in environmentally sound ways.

If we have collectively then everybody would stop what they're doing and fix/preserve this planet. The only way to stop it on a new planet is to have a strict dictatorship where the government strongly controls everything that goes on. If that happened, everybody would just ask why we haven't learned anything here on earth, why are we repeating history and duplicating a government structure that is known to turn out horribly for the people. You can't assume that everyone will forever be a strict environmentalist on Mars, you'll have to force it.

Edited February 19, 2015 by MetropolisLakeOutfitters

[CECAA850]

To suggest humankind can trash the Milky Way, much less the universe, is the height of arrogance and silliness.

 

We can only trash what we can reach.  I've seen nothing in my lifetime to suggest we wouldn't.

[Mallette]

I think if we took cue from Europe and countries like Germany, Switzerland and a few others big strides would have been made already. Living rooves alone, and Germany will be at about 80% soloar if I'm not mistaken within the next 20 years or less. But government and the hands that feed them haven't destroyed enough yet to scrape every last $ they can from the earth.

 

I agree, and they are working from what they perceive as necessity.  I am reminded of a German student who spent a summer with me when I lived out on the prairie west of Denton, Texas back in the mid-80s.  He'd come to the US to see the real west.  He did, with a bonus.  First week he was there we were laying out on the storm cellar after dark having a beer.  He was marveling at the stars we could see, and suddenly he said "What is that?"  It took a minute for me to figure out what he was looking at.  Finally, I said "That's home, the Milky Way."  He'd never seen it.  Being in an already overdeveloped country he'd never been anywhere the Milky Way was visible. 

 

I rather doubt that it is now in that same place where we were, and it will continue to disappear all over the world.  I hope you are somewhere it is visible.

 

Dave

[Mallette]

The only way to stop it on a new planet is to have a strict dictatorship where the government strongly controls everything that goes on.

 

Thinking from the past.  I am much more optimistic.  Even here there are those who, though spitting into the wind, live in harmony with the ecosystem.  I salute them, and am starry eyed enough to believe that those who go into space will be the best we have, the adventurers, the scientists, the socially mature.  Those who colonize the moon won't really have the luxury of crapping in their own bed, and I think the gradually terraforming of Mars will be at the hands of those who want it to be verdant and beautiful. 

 

At our current pace of destruction, it is here the dictators may be required in the future to tell us what to eat, how many children to have, and where to live.   I know some who say we are already there in many ways.

 

Dave

Edited February 19, 2015 by Mallette

[Mallette]

You make it sound as though the "we" here are not part of Nature

 

No, I wouldn't say we are not part of nature as that is not supported by available data yet.  That we uniquely diverged from the rest of nature is clear the moment we began to have discussion like this that serve no known function nor have any known precedence in nature.  As opposed to the rest of nature we can observe, we are making this up as we go along and have been now every since that first ape picked up a bone, said "tool" and whacked another over the head.  I still think the 2001 imagery used to illustrate that magic moment captures it better than anything our science has managed to come up with for an explanation as to how and why evolution produced the iPhone.

 

 

 

We didn't arrive as aliens.

 

Unsupported by available research.  Please, no one say I am suggesting we were planted here or are spaceship castaways.  What I AM saying is that the sudden appearance and rapid development of Homo Sapiens remains purely theoretical, and tenuous at best.  We still don't know with any degree of certainty how Homo Sapiens originated.  The connections between the ancient species leading up to Neanderthal are much more documented.  Yes, we have some Neanderthal DNA but not enough to make a case for anything beyond rape or occasional crossbreeding.  Certainly no evidence of a "tween."

 

 

 

They cut down all the trees and do change the meadow forever. They don't even process their own feces, do they?

 

Their actions create an ecosystem that is a paradise and very beneficial to all other species and I rather suspect their feces are much more useful than the poisons we dump in our rivers and streams.  Those areas where they are eradicated suffer.  This is well documented.  Very surprised you'd use that as a comparison to covering the ecosystem with concrete. 

 

Dave

Edited February 19, 2015 by Mallette

[babadono]

species go extinct

yep.

[babadono]

Species emerge,

show me one.

[Jim]

 

Species emerge,

show me one.

 

 

I have to agree with Mark on this, we have emerged from several different variations. Homo Sapiens, Homo Erectus, Neanderthal, Hobbits,and they have found another variation recently I just read about 2 weeks ago.

 

At least that's what I get from emerging. If we interbred with any of the above, we would emerge as the new species of humans. They've already proven Neanderthals bred with us,and prior to that no one believed that, and I'm sure there will be other variations we crossed with.

 

And as crazy as some may say I am with my repsonse coming, I think there is some type of proof within our species where there could have been other worldly species that also interbred with us. Look at our DNA records and there is a distinct area that hasn't been able to have been traced back yet.

 

That "missing link" may have come from another being altogether. Not one of us can say with 100% certainty yes or no to that. Science nor faith has a definitive answer outside of "god created us in his likeness".

[Mallette]

That "missing link" may have come from another being altogether. Not one of us can say with 100% certainty yes or no to that. Science nor faith has a definitive answer outside of "god created us in his likeness".

 

This one I agree with in its entirety.  The record of many species is very, very clear.  The origin of Homo Sapiens is not.  The known record is, evolutionarily speaking, yesterday and yet the links aren't at all clear.  Homo Sapiens and Magdalenian culture just sort of show up.

 

Fascinating, and a lot more research is in order.

 

Dave

[Jim]

I'm really fascinated with how they interpret the "Gods" with just being "Ancient Astronauts" and to me it just fits.

 

If there truly is one god, and I'd like to think there is something out there, I think "god" created things to "grow" and change over time, which I think is limited for this Universe. I also think being we are all energy, that we do come back throughout time to "grow" our "soul" to become that "perfect being". I think that is the version of heaven.

 

I  think there's a multiverse and we are in it as a blip and that it will continue on with many many big bangs. I do think there will come a time that we can "travel between dimensions".

[Mallette]

I'm really fascinated with how they interpret the "Gods" with just being "Ancient Astronauts" and to me it just fits.

 

I've a mass of speculation, but in these discussions think it best to avoid them as they are as endless as space itself.  Such science as we have...and my opinion of that is somewhat less than many...is better.

 

Dave

[Don Richard]

 

Gravity can be explained by any scientist. In fact, it can be explained by most 7th grade science students.

 

Probably the silliest post you've ever made...

 

Dave

 

 

Here's what we know about gravity:

 

It is one of the four fundamental forces that govern the universe.

 

It is the weakest of these four forces, yet it's effects extent across the universe.

 

Basically, gravity is a force based on the attraction of "objects" with mass to each other and is proportional to the masses of the objects and to the distance between them.

 

We can use what we know about gravity to calculate orbits and trajectories.

 

Gravitational constants can be used to convert mass to weight.

 

However, no one yet knows why masses attract each other, or what mechanism allows this to take place. We basically know nothing about the nature of gravity, whether this attraction is wave-based or particle based. At this point, our knowledge of gravity is incomplete and is only theoretical. From a physics standpoint, there is no "Law of Gravity", and there won't be until we have a full understanding of the gravitational force.

Edited February 20, 2015 by Don Richard

[Mallette]

Correct, DR.  Classic Kant.  At this point we only know phenomena and have so far not remotely penetrated to the noumenon.  I am surprised Mark figures every 7th grader understands that.  I am with Socrates in that at least I know that I do not.

 

 

Dave

Edited February 20, 2015 by Mallette

[Jim]

Don,

 

I just watched something and also read the same that they are presenting that gravity is the strongest actually to the scientific community. I can look it up again and post the site if you're interested. They said they've been wanting to present it for a few years but wanted to brace for the backlash

[minermark]

What a great thing to think about, well maybe for a youngin, my thoughts on this lasted about one min.

HOWEVER

Devious thinkin does sneak in there once in a wile

Waay back when they were takin names and interest, i submitted the exwife's name and addy, she was thrilled at the idea, hearing this from sources long ago, she FAILED at the first psyche test, i just wanted a third party opinion

[Taz]

Didn't think so...

Dave

 

Just got back.   Think of Rugged Desert Terran  with no vegetation in site.  No kids running around making noise that interferes with the music.

[Mallette]

Well that's fine, because theories are the very strongest of scientific explanations. Not to be pedantic, but something can not be both a "theory" and "tenuous" at the same time.

 

Bingo

 

 

 

To explain gravity means to explain its function and effects so that it can be a useful prediction tool. And all good junior high students can explain it.

 

Nice hiding place, but no cigar.  Simply adding your qualification doesn't make describing something into explaining it. 

 

 

 

There's a real reason why Science and Philosophy are different subjects, different disciplines with different purposes. If you intended to ask a philosophy question, you should have.

 

Things don't always separate as you would like them into neat compartments.  I think that is one of the things that causes us to butt heads.  I look at the universe as a system without hard lines.

 

S. Hartmann  · J. Sprenger

Tilburg Center for Logic and Philosophy of Science, Tilburg University

While the Logical Empiricists gave us a grand general picture of science, the naturalists’ working assumption has been that aiming at such a picture underappreciates the complexity and diversity of real science. Moreover,

the naturalists moved normative questions into the background. In the third phase, which began in the late 1980s, the dichotomy between normative and descriptive approaches in philosophy of science still persists, but the picture has become even more complex. So we can only list a number of novel trends: Metaphysical questions, which were famously dismissed by the Logical Empiricists, are gaining a considerable interest. Philosophies of the special sciences are booming, and more and more sub disciplines are emerging.  Formal epistemologists are applying a variety of mathematical methods to address normative questions in general philosophy of science. Social aspects of science are systematically studied and mathematically modeled. Another interesting development is the rise of experimental approaches to problems from philosophy of science (e.g., causation) and its combination with formal approaches.

 

For me, the entire concept of a science without a philosophy is both unthinkable, frightening, and something I would not trust.

 

Dave

Edited February 20, 2015 by Mallette

[Mallette]

Just got back. Think of Rugged Desert Terran with no vegetation in site. No kids running around making noise that interferes with the music.

 

Ah, you must mean like Angel Peak, NM.  Used to love camping there for those very reasons.  Always took a system with me as music is magic in those conditions.

 

Dave

Edited February 20, 2015 by Mallette

[Mallette]

As I am the OP and this is related, let's talk Dragon V2.  It's obvious many here have little interest and don't keep up with space news.  Further, even those that do may not see things that some knowledge of the individuals involved suggests.

 

Elon Musk as a single personal life goal, and that is to travel to Mars and return in his lifetime.  Everything he has done since childhood, that is, PayPal, Tesla, and now SpaceX are simply tools to that end.  Neither his shareholders nor the US government appear to consider him to be a bubble headed space cadet.  This whole Mars colony project is based on using his Dragon.  There is no clear evidence that he is involved, but he also is hardly discouraging them. 

 

But let's look closer at his current technology.  Dragon V2 is scheduled to soft land under power late this year, carry humans in 2016, and go into service as ISS crew ship in 2017.  However, that isn't the whole story.  The US need to have manned spaceflight capability is certainly what is funding the development but if you look at the Dragon design you'll see a lot more capability.  If he chose to do so, he could plant a colony on the Moon with his own money by 2020. 

 

The reason is Dragon's basic design is extremely flexible and is easily re-configurable.  Once he's flying the 7 passenger crew ship and soft landing in a routine manner the Dragon can readily be re-configured as a habitat, fuel carrier or supply ship.  Falcon 9 heavy lift version can readily take Dragon to escape velocity and, given the engines are designed for terrestrial soft landing, lunar landing at 1/6 gravity is child's play.  I'm just guessing here at the total number required, but seems to me 4 dragons, two configured as habitats carrying two passengers each, one carrying a combination of fuel and supplies, and one carrying supplies would be more than enough to land an entire complex readily and reasonably comfortably able to support the passengers for quite some time.  After that, crew exchange and resupply is easy.  Why would he do this?  Well, a well chosen landing site near one of the known sources of water as well as good possible other resources would make prospecting for potential wealth easy and also the gradual conversion of the station to self sufficiency.  News of abundant rare earths, titanium, gold...whatever...would spur investment.

 

Can't read the guys mind, but so far his business acumen and uncanny ability to design rockets far more advanced than any previous (with the exception of Delta Clipper...from which I am sure he learned much) suggests he has a lot more in mind than simply being a bus and cargo carrier for NASA.

 

Dave

[Marvel]

Things don't always separate as you would like them into neat compartments. I think that is one of the things that causes us to butt heads. I look at the universe as a system without hard lines.

This is also why the larger faith communities (I'll use that instead of denominations...), have devoted generations to study Faith and Reason, trying to make sense out of how the two fit together.

 

Bruce