POLL: Which should be colonized first: Space or the oceans? Discuss!

[SagaLore]

Originally posted by: Dr Smooth
We need to improve education and health care quality and access first before we throw our resources down gravity wells like space or ocean colonization.

Not going to happen until the States have 100% control over education regulation, and all schools are privatized.

 

[Zorba]

Originally posted by: OS

Originally posted by: Mith
Space is far more economically feasible than the ocean. Most of the research and materials are available to us to colonize the Moon. I say the first step would be to erect a skyhook from Ecuador and using that we launch LEO-Moon vehicles to ferry back and forth. Now, launching satellites will be much cheaper and communications can be vastly improved throughout the world. Also, once a base is setup on the moon we could launch manufacturing facilities in orbit around the Moon and Earth so that we could use more landspace for residency. Another thing which would help a lot would be the capture of near Earth asteroids and harvesting them for raw materiele in our orbital manufacturing facilities. Much cheaper to do that than haul up all that carbon and iron to the Moon via our skyhook.

As you people can tell I've read way to much Ben Bova.

supposedly once they figure out how to make carbon nano tubes miles long, it'll be feasible to have a space elevator.

A friend of mine at school (he is getting his PhD in Chemical Engineering) is doing research on generating carbon nano tubes. He thinks that he can bring the cost of them down from $100,000 per 1/10 of a gram to about $100 a gram 🙂. It is pretty interesting stuff. He and I have talked about the space elevator thing a lot, and even with nano tubes it would almost be impossible. (Notice I said almost 🙂)

 

[DaveSimmons]

Space, that way if something ever happens to the Earth (asteroid, magnetic field flip, nuclear or biological devastation, zombie plague, ...), the human race would live on in space.

 

[OS]

Originally posted by: Zorba

A friend of mine at school (he is getting his PhD in Chemical Engineering) is doing research on generating carbon nano tubes. He thinks that he can bring the cost of them down from $100,000 per 1/10 of a gram to about $100 a gram 🙂. It is pretty interesting stuff. He and I have talked about the space elevator thing a lot, and even with nano tubes it would almost be impossible. (Notice I said almost 🙂)

Did he say why?

Supposedly another good use for carbon nanotubes is bulletproof body armor.

 

[iwearnosox]

I colonized uranus, it's warmer than I anticipated.

 

[BlamoHammer]

Originally posted by: iwearnosox
I colonized uranus, it's warmer than I anticipated.

<Reads tube>

Damnit! Preparation H does not list this as one of the conditions it cures. Oh well, I'll just eat cabbage and drink beer until you move out on your own volition.

 

[silverpig]

Originally posted by: JulesMaximus
Ocean seem more problematic than space. What with all the storms and such. If we could find an inexpensive way to get people and materials into space I think that would be a better alternative. Both pose similar problems but I think the violence of the sea makes it less likely that people would habitate there for long periods of time.

The violence of the sea is only on the surface. Go down 10 feet and it's as calm there in a hurricane as on a calm day.

 

[Zorba]

Originally posted by: OS

Originally posted by: Zorba

A friend of mine at school (he is getting his PhD in Chemical Engineering) is doing research on generating carbon nano tubes. He thinks that he can bring the cost of them down from $100,000 per 1/10 of a gram to about $100 a gram 🙂. It is pretty interesting stuff. He and I have talked about the space elevator thing a lot, and even with nano tubes it would almost be impossible. (Notice I said almost 🙂)

Did he say why?

Supposedly another good use for carbon nanotubes is bulletproof body armor.

Carbon nano tubes depending on the way they are formed are about 3 times as strong as steel and about 1/6 the weight. So basically a nano tube elevator would still weigh millions of pounds. Also nano tubes are more like the glass particles in fiber glass, they can't be rolled into bars and beams, they have to be put in composites, etc. Although, that by itself may not be a problem. It just is different than the ideas we've heard about the space elevators.

As for nano tubes themselves, there is going to be thousands of good uses for them once the become affordable and once we can grow them to some length (I forgot the max length at the moment but it is very short, I think less then an inch).

 

[Chaotic42]

Oceans.

Of course, if we have the tech to live on or under water perminantly, we have the tech to put large numbers of people in places where few live now, like Northern Canada, the deserts, and Siberia.

 

[dc]

space

the oceans are scary. fear the giant squids, giant octopuses, and other giant sea monsters. 🙂

 

[aircooled]

Since muscles and bones weaken and deteriorate in space, not sure if humans could spend a lifetime there.