this post was submitted on 21 Nov 2023
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Is someone actually proposing that we're simply going to dump would-be colonists on Mars with a shovel and some O2 tanks then wave goodbye? Like, no shit we still need to work things out but that just means it's unknown, not impossible.
This book seems unnecessarily pessimistic. I don't know why I would spend money on doomscrolling, Kindle Edition.
Plugging our ears and going “NYAAAAAA” isn’t going to help. We need pragmatists to ask hard questions to cover all the bases, and force us to anticipate problems. Being aware of potentially fatal issues isn’t “doomscrolling”.
The authors aren’t saying that we should never, ever try to colonize Mars. They’re only saying that there are a LOT of questions to answer before we try.
Which is why you don't hear NASA going "yep we're good to go! No scientifically obtained issues to worry about!" Also sometimes you have to answer the questions through physical experimentation, which is why we send science teams before we send spacecraft full of colonists.
Books like this fall under the same grouping as those who hate Elon Musk so much that they have to also think space travel is dumb/bad as well because they can't remove the douchebag from the field his company operates in.
Space colonization is the future, it doesn't matter if it's ten years or a thousand. We are going to leave this planet. Case closed. The earth will not sustain us forever even in our wildest renewable energy/living fantasies.
you really should read it, this characterization is bullshit.