I grew up watching Star Trek and, once believing humanity was capable of far more nobility than it is, the idea that we are going to one day spread to the stars is both sad and hilarious.
We couldn’t make Earth work. We couldn’t stop knowingly damaging a basically infinitely forgiving environment that recycles our water, air, and waste auto-fucking-magically. We had to multiply with no consideration, emit fuel waste to harm that virtuous system with reckless abandon eyes wide open, and literally engineer materials from the earth that the Earth couldn’t easily re-absorb not to use out of engineering necessities, but to make infinite useless pop figure crap out of it. We just had to stop growing/metastizing our people, and just as importantly our economy, aka our Ferngully smog monster Earth thrashing machine, and live within our still exceptionally bountiful means. Nope, moooaaaaar!
Yes, a dozen or two perfect specimen, perfectly trained apex humans can go to Mars and grow potatoes in a tent to inspire us, but an actual colony of hundreds or thousands of regular humans, some of which inevitably born into a place where a single thoughtless, reckless, or GREEDY action can easily mean boom, everybody dead in an instant, womp, womp try again? Lol, have you met us?
Bezos, Musk, Zuck doesn’t matter. If those antsy, insatiably greedy fucks or those like them ever tried to leave with a hundred human laborers or a hundred humanoid robots, they’d be dead within 6 months of landing, because they’d keep pushing shit beyond their tolerances to INCREASE production or ACCELERATE construction beyond the original plans they already half assed and took liberties with.
That’s why, to me, taking funding away from international agencies and those like NASA was the death knell of humanity’s space faring dreams and final confirmation we don’t have it in us. Space colonization in its early forms would take a level of sustained human selfless cooperation we just aren’t capable of, especially factoring in that our most successfully greedy fucks have been allowed to coopt that dream and turn it into an absolute nightmare of being born into an internment colony having to work 12 hour days to pay for the recycled air you consumed that day until Elon blows you up trying to adjust his suite’s 02 saturation to 30% by lowering everyone else’s to 15% because he was bored and needed to get just a lil moar than everyone else yet again to feel superior.
The idea that the rich could escape earth and not die here in the climate wars is total cope from nepo babies
One thing this comic misses and is silly is that billionaires would die without the working/slave class and they know it. They need someone to produce their food, their luxury goods, nd maintain the machines. They don’t have that in space or mars. If the atmosphere becomes literally poisonous they will probably build a dome around their mansions.
They’d die with the slaves too.
The Earth is the only place where humans can live. A tiny number of humans can just barely live in orbit really near the earth as long as people on the earth keep spending millions to regularly send up supplies.
Problems that would have to be solved before humans could live somewhere else:
- Growing food
- Getting water
- Producing oxygen and getting rid of CO2
- Surviving radiation
- Surviving in a different gravity
- Repairing anything
- Manufacturing anything
Growing food is the obvious one. Even on Earth at 1G with ideal sunlight and low radiation, there has never been a successful closed biosphere. Surely you’d have to perfect closed biospheres on Earth before trying anything outside of earth, and then hope nothing goes wrong. When something goes wrong with the biosphere experiments on Earth they just open the door (or more often cheat and pretend it’s still working while sneaking in food / oxygen from outside). And, even if you could get a closed biosphere to work, it would be the blandest vegan diet imaginable. To have any variety in your diet you’d need a massive, complex biosphere.
Water, oxygen and CO2 it’s the same problem. Sure, we have an idea of how to recycle them in theory. But, in practice it’s much more difficult. On the ISS they recycle about 80% of the water. Seems pretty good, but that means they still need deliveries of 6000 to 9000L of water per year, and that water is used for oxygen. On Earth, you can’t lose water. The worst that can happen is that it escapes into the atmosphere where the atmosphere and gravity trap it, and it eventually returns to the ground in the form of rain. On Saturn or Jupiter water released into the atmosphere wouldn’t escape into space – but humans couldn’t live on Saturn or Jupiter. Everywhere else the atmosphere is to thin or too hot, or the gravity is too weak to prevent water from escaping. So, even if you could get orders of magnitude more efficient at recycling water, and almost never have leaks, eventually you’d need a resupply.
Radiation is another huge one. The earth is protected by its magnetic field and thick atmosphere. Astronauts in the ISS are still mostly protected by that field because they’re orbiting close enough, but they lose the protection of the atmosphere. 1 week on the ISS is like 1 year of background radiation on Earth. And, that’s your best case. Go anywhere else and you will be cooked by radiation. The astronauts who did a quick 1 week jaunt to the moon were probably OK, but for actually living elsewhere you’d need a lot more protection. Maybe you could do that if you lived underground, but say goodbye to the idea of living in a dome or something.
Then there’s gravity. Humans evolved to live in 1G. Astronauts who spend even just a few months in zero G often have permanent problems as a result. And, that’s fully grown adults whose bodies were formed in 1G environments. Who knows what would happen in childbirth, or to a baby’s development in anything other than 1G.
Finally, repairing and manufacturing. The modern world is very specialized, and often repair parts are made in a factory on the other side of the world. Electronics fail, and they’d fail a lot more in space where they’d be exposed to radiation. You could probably make a small facility in space that could repair basic electronics, but if a computer chip failed, there’s no way you could make a semiconductor fab on another planet. Even on Earth it’s a thing so specialized that it’s only done in a handful of countries. 3d printing is cool and all, but it is extremely limited. Even the finest setting on the most advanced machine is very coarse compared to what can be done in specialized factories. You’re also very limited in the kind of “filament” you use. Even if you use a metal filament, you can’t make something much more complex than a wrench, and that wrench wouldn’t even be like a good wrench which is made from heat-treated steel. So, you couldn’t really live a modern life on another planet, but you also couldn’t live a 17th century life where windmills were the most advanced devices around, because you wouldn’t have wind, or flowing water, or trees to built things with, or anything else.
If humans really wanted to be a multiplanetary species, and were willing to spend absurd sums of money over decades to support a base on another planet while it got up to speed, then eventually, it might be more-or-less sustainable, as long as it had the ability to capture asteroids and so-on. Even then, life there would probably suck compared to life on Earth. Even compared to an earth ravaged by wars, climate change, etc.
The slaves are eating the cricket bars in the other vault
Those domes better be rocket proof. Or just rock proof.
They’ll have killer drones that israel is currently testing on children in Gaza to keep you and the rest of the non loyal unwashed masses away silly.
Also, they need customers.
The rich don’t do any work and don’t buy what they sell
They can easily be a planet away and still extract wealth from the people left behind. If pollution causes people to die quicker it doesn’t matter to them
If pollution causes scarcity then they become richer
If pollution causes extinction then they are dead so it doesn’t matter
Hmm, that really sounds like a win-win situation 🤔
Once the economy collapses, they just hoard slaves and servants and pay them with scraps.
Mmm, delicious, moist scraps…
Wow, no panels showing how beneficial to shareholders it all was. Won’t someone think of the shareholders?
Why do people always get so upset about spaceflight? There are plenty of other things the oligarchs can be legitimately criticised for yet people always obsess about this.
Because it’s become obvious to many people that these problems of climate and class-based wealth accumulation, cannot techohopiumed out of. Space exploration did lead do useful technology and scientific advancement, but in our current era our relationship to space is no longer star trek, it’s snowpiercer in space. The average person no longer has a positive view because they are crushed under a capitalist class that seeks to leave them behind, hence the comic.
Not to mention that any and all new research isn’t coming out of these companies, and is locked behind a paywall. They are actively stifling innovation by hoarding the data that used to give us neat things like Velcro.
Spaceflight is really important to humanity. Mining resources and proving concepts should be done. Having it carried out by corporations isnt ideal but thay doesnt mean it is better to stop. Let them burn their cash on r&d. Space is really high risk with inconsistent profitability.
If you think corporations are going to outlay the capital to develop a realistic extra-planetary mining technology soup to nuts and in comparable time to public investment, you should be licking Elon Musk’s boots.
Let them burn their cash on r&d
Damn if only we could use that cash for something else.
You cant mine without reliable spaceflight, which is whats being proven now. Obviously spacex’s cash would not be used to buy everyone dinner if they stopped spaceflight operations, so im not sure how your take is in the realm of reality. If you want to attribute spacex’s work to elon alone then thats your business.
You cant mine without reliable spaceflight, which is whats being proven now.
The following interplanetary flights to Mars: Sojourner (1997), Spirit (2004–2010), Opportunity (2004–2018), Curiosity (2012–present), Perseverance (2021-Present), and Zhurong (2021-2022) weren’t enough to “prove out reliable space flight” for you?
You need MarsCoin to do it?
I would argue that you mentioned events that were rare and much prepared (also omit failed attempts), while what is required for any resource extraction must be mass-available. On the other hand, I don’t think any space resource mining will be reasonable, as I expect it to require more resources than provide.
There have also been failures at a rate that would make human space flight concerning. Why wouldnt more experience be better? You are saying we didnt learn anything about space flight with each mission?
I dont know what mars coin is. Why do you generalize my appreciation for spaceflight to other unrelated opinions? Im not a group of people, im an individual who you know nothing about. Stop with the weird guessing of my beliefs.
We’re not mining anything in space anytime soon. The climate crisis will end that possibility long before we can develop automated systems sufficient to get the mechanics in place and ore safely back to wherever it’s needed on Earth.
Right now spaceflight is just another profit vehicle for billionaires. The don’t get paid because of the work the companies do, they get paid because the stocks they have from those companies keep going up.
Lemmy commenter used layman heuristics!
Lemmy commenter missed!
I think this comic might be suggesting that they’re leaving the planet since it’s all used up and the worker is sitting there with nothing left on the planet as the rich flys off to another planet? I don’t think it’s specifically angry at space flight.
Excuse me, none of you are paid to reflect on our planet’s ability to sustain life being killed for the benefit of a few fantastically wealthy people.
Get back to work!
Are those piss jugs?
Asking the real questions.
Can’t eat the rich if you can’t reach the rich.
*slaps side*
You can fit so many tech bros in this thing.
Sorry fat politicians, maybe next trip.
Edit: Mystery Rocket SLAMS Dome Over Mysterious California City
Hmm, do you think if we over-reported the reliability statistics, we could get the tech bros to strap themselves to missiles sooner?
Or maybe convince them that DIY submarines are a good cheap alternative
I hear the Mariana Trench is beautiful this time of year
Don’t worry, that rocket is new shepherd, so you can eat him when it comes back down in 30 min. New shepherd doesn’t get to orbit, it just does 100km hops straight up.
I just want to say you have such a musical, even melodious name. DaDaDaDa-DA, it flows so well <3
I like it too lol. But I cannot take credit for the cadence:
Insert boiling frog story
Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problemRockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problemRockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem Rockets are not the problem I love spaceflight I love spaceflight I love spaceflight I love spaceflight I love spaceflight I love spaceflight I love spaceflight I love spaceflight I love spaceflight I love spaceflight I love spaceflight I love spaceflight I love spaceflight I love spaceflight I love spaceflight I love spaceflight
Peter?
