" I did a lot of research on Mars for Shadows Live Under Seashells and there is a wealth of resources on Mars to use - provided you have the know how and the ingenuity to manufacture what you need. "
The book As It Is on Mars is a story that goes into great detail on this. Two astronauts come with an inch of dying on Mars after a disaster kills the rest of their crew. They meet up with another astronaut who was on a one-way suicide mission to Mars. They work their tails off and use supplies to build a greenhouse and just enough food to keep them alive. After that they thrive. They contact earth and show them the amazing residence and greenhouse they've constructed, mostly with native materials. People on earth are envious of this "easy wealth" (which they built working 70 hours a week while rationing their food) from Mars that should be shared with earth. Earth gov'ts want to take over their three-person community and get in on the gold rush. They don't realize the real wealth came from hard work, not "Mars". When I say it it sounds far-fetched, but the author will have you suspending disbelief. I don't know why the books is virtually unknown. It's as good as Asimov or Clarke, but I guess he never promoted it well.

Mars is very attainable. I think 68 days is far too pessimistic but the reality is that going is an unavoidable death sentence without immediate and regular supplies being brought to create a self-sufficient environment. I did a lot of research on Mars for Shadows Live Under Seashells and there is a wealth of resources on Mars to use - provided you have the know how and the ingenuity to manufacture what you need.

Andy Weir wrote "The Martian" (amazon) which showed a variety of ways a single human could survive alone on Mars using is intelligence and very little else to sustain himself.

"Some of us do indeed want to set Mars up as a new frontier for freedom. "
I love the notion, but I think it's more practical to find an inhospitable out-of-the-way place on Earth. The colonists will thrive if they can find the sweet spot of trade with the rest of the world without interference from the rest of the world.

"The quickest way to not go to Mars is to go to the moon first."
Robert Zurbin has me sold on this idea too- Mars Direct

We've been mocking this up for quite a long time now.

It should be noted that this group of students do. It represent MIT, nor do they put forth an actual study. This should be particularly embarrassing since MIT itself had a group study Mars colonization several years ago and we concluded the opposite of what this little group has concluded. They are clearly, for some unknown reason, either ignorant of the results or they are ignoring them in order to garner media attention.

The things they claim are fatal problems are things we solved a long, long time ago.

Some of us do indeed want to set Mars up as a new frontier for freedom. The bone loss is a non-issue for one-way colonists.

Bone loss is another example of the adaptability we possess. It happens because the bone density isn't needed (a feedback if physical stress being absent on the bones). This is an area Mars enjoys a tremendous advantage over Luna in. The Gravity on Mars results in a higher resting point. Once the body has adapted the the Martian gravity the bone loss will stop.

This is only a "problem" if you'll be headed back to a deeper gravity well. This for colonists it isn't an issue.

This. This right here is what precious few understand. If I could vote you up yet, I would.

No, this is a terrible idea. There is plenty to do on Mars. We don't need to put water in the Martian atmosphere as it would be a terrible waste of good hydrogen. Mars had an atmosphere with water once, it has it no more. The gravity isn't enough to keep it and the high energy radiation would split the upper levels leading to a faster bleed due to the lack of a solid magnetic field.

We can take along methane, isolate the hydrogen and create water from the Martian atmosphere. Due to the light gravity we can build ridiculously large domes. Domes large enough that you wouldn't see the dome itself while standing in the surface. And we can make the domes there. Again, partially from the "thin air".

Please let's no pollute Mars with their ilk. The moon is a more fitting locale for looters.

The quickest way to not go to Mars is to go to the moon first. The two environments are far too different to be useful for each other.

It may seem counterintuitive, but Mars is the easier, safer, cheaper, and more useful of the two. There is nothing you can "learn" from a lunar colony which would be of use on Mars and not capable of being learned on Earth.

You are even better off going from the Martian surface to Earth's lunar surface than from the Earth's surface. The difference is that drastic, indeed moreso.


A lunar colony without the infrastructure provided by a solid Martian base is a money pit, or as I call it, a "moondoggle".

The Mars One organization, its supporters, and the erstwhile nouveau Martians are pioneers working with their own resources to bring their dream to life. We should be cheering. I am.

Pure (or very high concentrations of) Oxygen is quite dangerous. However, that is an issue if the system in place to regulate the partial pressure of Oxygen breaks down.

It is not just a matter of O2/N2 mix. A person can survive quite well in an O2 rich environment with a lower pressure, or an O2 reduced environment with higher pressure, until Nitrogen Narcosis becomes a problem.

Divers, particularly those that are nitrox or rebreather certified, are pretty familiar with these issues, although they generally think about higher pressures, not lower ones. Climbers think about the O2 pp.

The little green men may still have a religious crisis unless their elite betters can convince them that the rocketship is just a weather balloon..
Let us pray for a happy outcome.

No doubt there are quite a number of chemical processes to get in equilibrium. My point was just that too much Oxygen is not the end game.

I like this idea.
But why can't we just move congress and His Emmaculation to Mars.
The End.

Moot point. Chickenshit wouldn't consider going unless there was a golf course.

Going to mars is pointless. There is nothing to do on Mars.

We should focus our efforts not on getting to Mars, but on making it worth it to go to mars. For example, let's launch a gigantic Nuclear Reactor, crash land it on the Martian Ice Cap, melt the ice, and put water in the Atmosphere.

Maybe it will work, maybe it won't. But it's step 1.

I WOULD AGREE TO THE COST

The other issue is in a hypoxic (O2 rich) atmosphere, the ability to combust (because combustion is the process of rapid oxidation), is greatly increased. Ask the astronauts of Apollo 1. Prolonged health concerns aside, you could turn a relatively safe material (say, the covers for the domes and the equipment used in life support and power generation) into a readily combustible fuel really quickly.

The problem is in the origin of the nitrogen. Normally, plants leach it out of the soil (which is why farmers use nitrogen and rotate crops) in order to grow, but only their decomposition and bacteria in the soil return that nitrogen for use by more plants. Burning the plants ties up the nitrogen as well as the oxygen, so you still have the same problems (only on a longer scale) with making sure your plants can survive.

The real problem being pointed to here is that humans are used to breathing in a nitrogen-rich atmosphere - not an oxygen-rich one. Air pressure is one problem, but air composition is the bigger one - as oxygen levels rise, even normal breathing (which is critical to bodily processes) would tend to bring too much oxygen into the body such as when one intentionally hyperventilates. At some point the excess oxygen (if it can't get flushed out of your system) will kill you.

What they need to be able to do is combine the oxygen through combustion with something in the soil to create a waste-product. No idea what that would be. Terraforming is a lot of art at this point - not much science.

OK, now you have just added more equipment and $$! :)
I know nothing about how much space, power, fuel,
chemicals, etc. CO2 scrubbers use.
But I can see that technically the Oxygen problem could be solved - every pound of mass from Earth used to solve it though gets more and more pricey.
Hopefully you do not need an Ocean for low cost/use of materials operation.

Part of what I got from the brief article is that these guys were not bringing enough stuff to survive - like perhaps a CO2 scrubber in addition to a lighter
(to be used before Oxygen levels would ignite the entire place!).

And the problem with that would be?

Think rotation to produce artificial gravity is not as big a problem as living on Mars.

Still all a waste of money ... unless we want to set up the Gulch on Mars and sign a Constitution guaranteeing individual and economic freedom.

Yes. It is exciting. I agree with the engineer who said that it needs to be mocked up on Earth and with Thoritsu who pointed out that submarines have solved containment problems for decades. (I recall a SF story where a space drive was invented and the inventor bought a submarine to install it in...and off he went.)

Jan