Colonization of the solar system
21 Nov 2010, 6:05 pm
Macbeth wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
Macbeth wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
I would rather go with trying to develop more Star Trek Tech such as Warp Drive.
If a single UFO story is true and if it was extraterrestrial in origin, it is logical to assume there is some way to go FTL.
If a single UFO story is true and if it was extraterrestrial in origin, it is logical to assume there is some way to go FTL.
not necessarily. If one flies close to the speed of light, then time goes slow in the space vessel compared to what it is on the ground.
ruveyn
Here is the issue though, unless one finds a way around the light barrier, travel to other solar systems is pointless.
While next to no time for you may have passed, it could be centuries for everyone that you knew. They would all be dead and long gone by the time you reached your destination. Heck your species may have forgotten about the mission you were sent on (assuming they still exist) by the time you get back.
Unless there is a way around the light barrier, space travel outside of a solar system just isn't worth it and too dangerous to attempt.
Actually, if you get a spacecraft up to about 96.8% the speed of light, it would make a trip to Alpha Centauri in one year aboard ship. That is one way though, however, a round trip would last about 8 years for an observer on Earth.
Alpha Centari is a system with 3 stars, I don't recall any planets being discovered in that star system. Additionally you can't maintain that speed due to the lack of inertial dampeners a ship with people on board couldn't accelerate fast enough to reach that speed until some point midway through the journey and then they would have to decelerate. Additionally if they ran into any small speck of dust we could see the ship being destroyed (no shielding to protect hull of ship from intersteller debris).
So if any alien culture has visited our planet one time or repeatedly they would need the following: energy based deflector shields, Inertial Dampeners (so inhabitants of ship isn't turned to puddy), Structural Integrity Fields (so ship can survive strain of acceleration and deceleration), and extremely powerful reactor (either a Quantum Singularity based Generator or a matter/antimatter reaction chamber), and some sort of Faster than Light Drive.
The closest star system is 4.3 Lightyears away and I don't think it has planets.
Additionally the longer the time duration of the trip the more hazardous it becomes. A 20 year trip on a ship that has a living crew would be extremely dangerious, then you have to factor in food or if you are using suspended animation you have the crew unable to react if something happens.
I would say if any alien race has visited us, then they probably have a FTL drive which would eliminate many of the dangers as well as bypass the time-dilation effects of traveling near the speed of light.
You keep saying its dangerous. Why do you feel that it is any more dangerous than in-system travel? If something goes wrong you are as screwed as if you were just outside the atmosphere when you are dozens or hundreds of light-years away. Space doesn't get MORE dangerous as you get further away. It stays just as dangerous (very).
People spend a lot longer than 20 years in quite confined circumstances on Earth, say whilst in prison, and the only thing that makes THAT dangerous is the fact its full of criminals. Its probably a fair guess that any long range space mission would be crewed by people psychologically profiled to be suitable for spending a long time in limited areas, who aren't criminals or nut-jobs. Various Navies seem to do quite well with very long trips in confined areas, so maybe long range space crew should be drawn from them rather than Air Force officers for the short term stuff?
As for suspended animation crews not being able to react to problems: does that not rather depend on a) how long it takes to get OUT of Sus-An, whether its a problem that can be solved by the crew, and c) whether you thought to keep the crew on rotation. Some in, some out. Seems like a sensible way to make the trip safer and more pleasant.
The longer the mission the more likely something onboard the spacecraft will break down or cease to function, what if that happens to be a critical system that can't be replaced. Without a part back home, you'd essentially be in deep trouble.
Same applies in near earth orbit. Multiple redundancy is designed for this. There is more than one door on a Space-shuttle, for example.
Well since they are retiring the Space Shuttle, I'm not sure if they will still be able to do this in the advent of an emergency, but in the advent of damage that is severe enough a shuttle can't re-enter safely a shuttle has enough reserves for the crew to survive long enough for another shuttle to be launched or a Russian Spacecraft to be scrambled.
Some things can't be fixed in a space walk because you may not have what is needed to fix it. Say something happened to our mars mission while it was in Martian Orbit odds are they may not be able to survive long enough to get to them.
21 Nov 2010, 6:20 pm
Inuyasha wrote:
Macbeth wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
Macbeth wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
I would rather go with trying to develop more Star Trek Tech such as Warp Drive.
If a single UFO story is true and if it was extraterrestrial in origin, it is logical to assume there is some way to go FTL.
If a single UFO story is true and if it was extraterrestrial in origin, it is logical to assume there is some way to go FTL.
not necessarily. If one flies close to the speed of light, then time goes slow in the space vessel compared to what it is on the ground.
ruveyn
Here is the issue though, unless one finds a way around the light barrier, travel to other solar systems is pointless.
While next to no time for you may have passed, it could be centuries for everyone that you knew. They would all be dead and long gone by the time you reached your destination. Heck your species may have forgotten about the mission you were sent on (assuming they still exist) by the time you get back.
Unless there is a way around the light barrier, space travel outside of a solar system just isn't worth it and too dangerous to attempt.
Actually, if you get a spacecraft up to about 96.8% the speed of light, it would make a trip to Alpha Centauri in one year aboard ship. That is one way though, however, a round trip would last about 8 years for an observer on Earth.
Alpha Centari is a system with 3 stars, I don't recall any planets being discovered in that star system. Additionally you can't maintain that speed due to the lack of inertial dampeners a ship with people on board couldn't accelerate fast enough to reach that speed until some point midway through the journey and then they would have to decelerate. Additionally if they ran into any small speck of dust we could see the ship being destroyed (no shielding to protect hull of ship from intersteller debris).
So if any alien culture has visited our planet one time or repeatedly they would need the following: energy based deflector shields, Inertial Dampeners (so inhabitants of ship isn't turned to puddy), Structural Integrity Fields (so ship can survive strain of acceleration and deceleration), and extremely powerful reactor (either a Quantum Singularity based Generator or a matter/antimatter reaction chamber), and some sort of Faster than Light Drive.
The closest star system is 4.3 Lightyears away and I don't think it has planets.
Additionally the longer the time duration of the trip the more hazardous it becomes. A 20 year trip on a ship that has a living crew would be extremely dangerious, then you have to factor in food or if you are using suspended animation you have the crew unable to react if something happens.
I would say if any alien race has visited us, then they probably have a FTL drive which would eliminate many of the dangers as well as bypass the time-dilation effects of traveling near the speed of light.
You keep saying its dangerous. Why do you feel that it is any more dangerous than in-system travel? If something goes wrong you are as screwed as if you were just outside the atmosphere when you are dozens or hundreds of light-years away. Space doesn't get MORE dangerous as you get further away. It stays just as dangerous (very).
People spend a lot longer than 20 years in quite confined circumstances on Earth, say whilst in prison, and the only thing that makes THAT dangerous is the fact its full of criminals. Its probably a fair guess that any long range space mission would be crewed by people psychologically profiled to be suitable for spending a long time in limited areas, who aren't criminals or nut-jobs. Various Navies seem to do quite well with very long trips in confined areas, so maybe long range space crew should be drawn from them rather than Air Force officers for the short term stuff?
As for suspended animation crews not being able to react to problems: does that not rather depend on a) how long it takes to get OUT of Sus-An, whether its a problem that can be solved by the crew, and c) whether you thought to keep the crew on rotation. Some in, some out. Seems like a sensible way to make the trip safer and more pleasant.
The longer the mission the more likely something onboard the spacecraft will break down or cease to function, what if that happens to be a critical system that can't be replaced. Without a part back home, you'd essentially be in deep trouble.
Same applies in near earth orbit. Multiple redundancy is designed for this. There is more than one door on a Space-shuttle, for example.
Well since they are retiring the Space Shuttle, I'm not sure if they will still be able to do this in the advent of an emergency, but in the advent of damage that is severe enough a shuttle can't re-enter safely a shuttle has enough reserves for the crew to survive long enough for another shuttle to be launched or a Russian Spacecraft to be scrambled.
Some things can't be fixed in a space walk because you may not have what is needed to fix it. Say something happened to our mars mission while it was in Martian Orbit odds are they may not be able to survive long enough to get to them.
And this is why it makes sense to have multiple backups in place in orbit around Mars and perhaps on the surface before a human expedition is initiated. Robotics and automated systems are becoming more and more the areas to develop in space exploration. It should be perfectly possible to have all the materials for total replacement and repair in place before the human components are sent.
21 Nov 2010, 6:35 pm
Sand wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
Macbeth wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
Macbeth wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
I would rather go with trying to develop more Star Trek Tech such as Warp Drive.
If a single UFO story is true and if it was extraterrestrial in origin, it is logical to assume there is some way to go FTL.
If a single UFO story is true and if it was extraterrestrial in origin, it is logical to assume there is some way to go FTL.
not necessarily. If one flies close to the speed of light, then time goes slow in the space vessel compared to what it is on the ground.
ruveyn
Here is the issue though, unless one finds a way around the light barrier, travel to other solar systems is pointless.
While next to no time for you may have passed, it could be centuries for everyone that you knew. They would all be dead and long gone by the time you reached your destination. Heck your species may have forgotten about the mission you were sent on (assuming they still exist) by the time you get back.
Unless there is a way around the light barrier, space travel outside of a solar system just isn't worth it and too dangerous to attempt.
Actually, if you get a spacecraft up to about 96.8% the speed of light, it would make a trip to Alpha Centauri in one year aboard ship. That is one way though, however, a round trip would last about 8 years for an observer on Earth.
Alpha Centari is a system with 3 stars, I don't recall any planets being discovered in that star system. Additionally you can't maintain that speed due to the lack of inertial dampeners a ship with people on board couldn't accelerate fast enough to reach that speed until some point midway through the journey and then they would have to decelerate. Additionally if they ran into any small speck of dust we could see the ship being destroyed (no shielding to protect hull of ship from intersteller debris).
So if any alien culture has visited our planet one time or repeatedly they would need the following: energy based deflector shields, Inertial Dampeners (so inhabitants of ship isn't turned to puddy), Structural Integrity Fields (so ship can survive strain of acceleration and deceleration), and extremely powerful reactor (either a Quantum Singularity based Generator or a matter/antimatter reaction chamber), and some sort of Faster than Light Drive.
The closest star system is 4.3 Lightyears away and I don't think it has planets.
Additionally the longer the time duration of the trip the more hazardous it becomes. A 20 year trip on a ship that has a living crew would be extremely dangerious, then you have to factor in food or if you are using suspended animation you have the crew unable to react if something happens.
I would say if any alien race has visited us, then they probably have a FTL drive which would eliminate many of the dangers as well as bypass the time-dilation effects of traveling near the speed of light.
You keep saying its dangerous. Why do you feel that it is any more dangerous than in-system travel? If something goes wrong you are as screwed as if you were just outside the atmosphere when you are dozens or hundreds of light-years away. Space doesn't get MORE dangerous as you get further away. It stays just as dangerous (very).
People spend a lot longer than 20 years in quite confined circumstances on Earth, say whilst in prison, and the only thing that makes THAT dangerous is the fact its full of criminals. Its probably a fair guess that any long range space mission would be crewed by people psychologically profiled to be suitable for spending a long time in limited areas, who aren't criminals or nut-jobs. Various Navies seem to do quite well with very long trips in confined areas, so maybe long range space crew should be drawn from them rather than Air Force officers for the short term stuff?
As for suspended animation crews not being able to react to problems: does that not rather depend on a) how long it takes to get OUT of Sus-An, whether its a problem that can be solved by the crew, and c) whether you thought to keep the crew on rotation. Some in, some out. Seems like a sensible way to make the trip safer and more pleasant.
The longer the mission the more likely something onboard the spacecraft will break down or cease to function, what if that happens to be a critical system that can't be replaced. Without a part back home, you'd essentially be in deep trouble.
Same applies in near earth orbit. Multiple redundancy is designed for this. There is more than one door on a Space-shuttle, for example.
Well since they are retiring the Space Shuttle, I'm not sure if they will still be able to do this in the advent of an emergency, but in the advent of damage that is severe enough a shuttle can't re-enter safely a shuttle has enough reserves for the crew to survive long enough for another shuttle to be launched or a Russian Spacecraft to be scrambled.
Some things can't be fixed in a space walk because you may not have what is needed to fix it. Say something happened to our mars mission while it was in Martian Orbit odds are they may not be able to survive long enough to get to them.
And this is why it makes sense to have multiple backups in place in orbit around Mars and perhaps on the surface before a human expedition is initiated. Robotics and automated systems are becoming more and more the areas to develop in space exploration. It should be perfectly possible to have all the materials for total replacement and repair in place before the human components are sent.
The problem is the more mass a spacecraft has, the more fuel it needs which of course adds even more mass. Further since we right now have to use physical matter to shield from radiation you have yet another issue that forces mass to be added. There is a limit to how massive a craft can be for us to be able to launch it using current technology.
Also the mass issue is why a lot of rockets are segmented to break away at key points during liftoff.
21 Nov 2010, 6:45 pm
Inuyasha wrote:
Sand wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
Macbeth wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
Macbeth wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
Inuyasha wrote:
I would rather go with trying to develop more Star Trek Tech such as Warp Drive.
If a single UFO story is true and if it was extraterrestrial in origin, it is logical to assume there is some way to go FTL.
If a single UFO story is true and if it was extraterrestrial in origin, it is logical to assume there is some way to go FTL.
not necessarily. If one flies close to the speed of light, then time goes slow in the space vessel compared to what it is on the ground.
ruveyn
Here is the issue though, unless one finds a way around the light barrier, travel to other solar systems is pointless.
While next to no time for you may have passed, it could be centuries for everyone that you knew. They would all be dead and long gone by the time you reached your destination. Heck your species may have forgotten about the mission you were sent on (assuming they still exist) by the time you get back.
Unless there is a way around the light barrier, space travel outside of a solar system just isn't worth it and too dangerous to attempt.
Actually, if you get a spacecraft up to about 96.8% the speed of light, it would make a trip to Alpha Centauri in one year aboard ship. That is one way though, however, a round trip would last about 8 years for an observer on Earth.
Alpha Centari is a system with 3 stars, I don't recall any planets being discovered in that star system. Additionally you can't maintain that speed due to the lack of inertial dampeners a ship with people on board couldn't accelerate fast enough to reach that speed until some point midway through the journey and then they would have to decelerate. Additionally if they ran into any small speck of dust we could see the ship being destroyed (no shielding to protect hull of ship from intersteller debris).
So if any alien culture has visited our planet one time or repeatedly they would need the following: energy based deflector shields, Inertial Dampeners (so inhabitants of ship isn't turned to puddy), Structural Integrity Fields (so ship can survive strain of acceleration and deceleration), and extremely powerful reactor (either a Quantum Singularity based Generator or a matter/antimatter reaction chamber), and some sort of Faster than Light Drive.
The closest star system is 4.3 Lightyears away and I don't think it has planets.
Additionally the longer the time duration of the trip the more hazardous it becomes. A 20 year trip on a ship that has a living crew would be extremely dangerious, then you have to factor in food or if you are using suspended animation you have the crew unable to react if something happens.
I would say if any alien race has visited us, then they probably have a FTL drive which would eliminate many of the dangers as well as bypass the time-dilation effects of traveling near the speed of light.
You keep saying its dangerous. Why do you feel that it is any more dangerous than in-system travel? If something goes wrong you are as screwed as if you were just outside the atmosphere when you are dozens or hundreds of light-years away. Space doesn't get MORE dangerous as you get further away. It stays just as dangerous (very).
People spend a lot longer than 20 years in quite confined circumstances on Earth, say whilst in prison, and the only thing that makes THAT dangerous is the fact its full of criminals. Its probably a fair guess that any long range space mission would be crewed by people psychologically profiled to be suitable for spending a long time in limited areas, who aren't criminals or nut-jobs. Various Navies seem to do quite well with very long trips in confined areas, so maybe long range space crew should be drawn from them rather than Air Force officers for the short term stuff?
As for suspended animation crews not being able to react to problems: does that not rather depend on a) how long it takes to get OUT of Sus-An, whether its a problem that can be solved by the crew, and c) whether you thought to keep the crew on rotation. Some in, some out. Seems like a sensible way to make the trip safer and more pleasant.
The longer the mission the more likely something onboard the spacecraft will break down or cease to function, what if that happens to be a critical system that can't be replaced. Without a part back home, you'd essentially be in deep trouble.
Same applies in near earth orbit. Multiple redundancy is designed for this. There is more than one door on a Space-shuttle, for example.
Well since they are retiring the Space Shuttle, I'm not sure if they will still be able to do this in the advent of an emergency, but in the advent of damage that is severe enough a shuttle can't re-enter safely a shuttle has enough reserves for the crew to survive long enough for another shuttle to be launched or a Russian Spacecraft to be scrambled.
Some things can't be fixed in a space walk because you may not have what is needed to fix it. Say something happened to our mars mission while it was in Martian Orbit odds are they may not be able to survive long enough to get to them.
And this is why it makes sense to have multiple backups in place in orbit around Mars and perhaps on the surface before a human expedition is initiated. Robotics and automated systems are becoming more and more the areas to develop in space exploration. It should be perfectly possible to have all the materials for total replacement and repair in place before the human components are sent.
The problem is the more mass a spacecraft has, the more fuel it needs which of course adds even more mass. Further since we right now have to use physical matter to shield from radiation you have yet another issue that forces mass to be added. There is a limit to how massive a craft can be for us to be able to launch it using current technology.
Also the mass issue is why a lot of rockets are segmented to break away at key points during liftoff.
The backup systems to be put in place around and on Mars are obviously things to be sent ahead on multiple launches and assemblies in Earth orbit. No need to do it all in one go. And the experience of these multiple launches will sophisticate understanding of means and methods.
21 Nov 2010, 7:18 pm
The "disintegrating totem pole", as Pournelle calls it, was designed because NASA was trying to find a quick-and-dirty method of lifting large amounts of mass off Earth to meet the ten-year deadline Kennedy had set for the first man on the Moon (and they beat it by two years!). Boeing had a design proposal for a reusable spacecraft, the Dynasoar, on the drawing boards as early as 1962, but the bid came in higher than that for the Saturn V launcher.
For a Mars mission, there's really no need to launch the whole thing from Earth's surface all at the same time; instead, you'd want it to be assembled in Earth orbit, and launched from there (one SF writer tells of a conversation he had once with Robert Heinlein, whose primary training was as an engineer; the writer wanted some dramatic difficulty for his story's lunar mission, and noted that once you're in orbit, you're halfway to the Moon. Heinlein replied, "No, once you're in orbit, you're halfway to anywhere"). Ideally, you'd send unmanned missions out with supplies first; they could then wait in Martian orbit for the humans, like a middle-of-the-desert gas station, only without the flies and mummified sandwiches.
Launching from orbit also dramatically simplifies mass calculations, since you won't have to lift all that mass against a full 1-g field. In fact, that's where a lunar base might come in handy - if you feel you need a massive shield against solar or cosmic radiation, pull loose a few thousand tons of lunar regolith, a bit at a time. Much easier to boost it up out of a 0.166-g field...
_________________
Sodium is a metal that reacts explosively when exposed to water. Chlorine is a gas that'll kill you dead in moments. Together they make my fries taste good.
22 Nov 2010, 11:14 am
Inuyasha wrote:
It isn't just shielding for the crew, it is shielding for the electronics and even wiring. Radiation can cause all kinds of havoc with electronics.
Its a fair assumption that if they were going to shield the crew, the vital systems would be WITHIN the shielded area, rather than just bobbing about where anything can get to it.
_________________
"There is a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart,
that you can't take part" [Mario Savo, 1964]
The_Face_of_Boo
Veteran
Joined: 16 Jun 2010
Age: 41
Gender: Non-binary
Posts: 32,886
Location: Beirut, Lebanon.
22 Nov 2010, 1:54 pm
ruveyn wrote:
The_Face_of_Boo wrote:
Humans have to develop effective terraforming ways before colonizing any non earth-like planet.
Fat chance. We don't even know how to terraform our own planet.
ruveyn
Oh I dunno. We seemed to be on the right track for terraforming it to a level where a carbon monoxide-breathing lifeform could exist comfortably. I imagine its just an adjustment in the kind of "pollution" we pollute with to terraform one for us to survive. A car which spews out breathable oxygen as a by-product. A factory that leaks potable spring water into the eco-system.
_________________
"There is a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart,
that you can't take part" [Mario Savo, 1964]
22 Nov 2010, 6:44 pm
Macbeth wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
The_Face_of_Boo wrote:
Humans have to develop effective terraforming ways before colonizing any non earth-like planet.
Fat chance. We don't even know how to terraform our own planet.
ruveyn
Oh I dunno. We seemed to be on the right track for terraforming it to a level where a carbon monoxide-breathing lifeform could exist comfortably. I imagine its just an adjustment in the kind of "pollution" we pollute with to terraform one for us to survive. A car which spews out breathable oxygen as a by-product. A factory that leaks potable spring water into the eco-system.
Carbon monoxide is a deadly poison.
iamnotaparakeet
Veteran
Joined: 31 Jul 2007
Age: 38
Gender: Male
Posts: 25,091
Location: 0.5 Galactic radius
22 Nov 2010, 7:10 pm
Sand wrote:
Macbeth wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
The_Face_of_Boo wrote:
Humans have to develop effective terraforming ways before colonizing any non earth-like planet.
Fat chance. We don't even know how to terraform our own planet.
ruveyn
Oh I dunno. We seemed to be on the right track for terraforming it to a level where a carbon monoxide-breathing lifeform could exist comfortably. I imagine its just an adjustment in the kind of "pollution" we pollute with to terraform one for us to survive. A car which spews out breathable oxygen as a by-product. A factory that leaks potable spring water into the eco-system.
Carbon monoxide is a deadly poison.
As is carbon dioxide. Except for plants, they seem to like it just a little. But, don't you remember that according to the evolutionary version of history that oxygen wasn't even that high in concentration prior to plants. Evil little things, polluting the atmosphere killing themselves off. If it weren't for animals which take in oxygen and resupply carbon dioxide where would life be on Earth?
22 Nov 2010, 7:29 pm
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
Macbeth wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
The_Face_of_Boo wrote:
Humans have to develop effective terraforming ways before colonizing any non earth-like planet.
Fat chance. We don't even know how to terraform our own planet.
ruveyn
Oh I dunno. We seemed to be on the right track for terraforming it to a level where a carbon monoxide-breathing lifeform could exist comfortably. I imagine its just an adjustment in the kind of "pollution" we pollute with to terraform one for us to survive. A car which spews out breathable oxygen as a by-product. A factory that leaks potable spring water into the eco-system.
Carbon monoxide is a deadly poison.
As is carbon dioxide. Except for plants, they seem to like it just a little. But, don't you remember that according to the evolutionary version of history that oxygen wasn't even that high in concentration prior to plants. Evil little things, polluting the atmosphere killing themselves off. If it weren't for animals which take in oxygen and resupply carbon dioxide where would life be on Earth?
Carbon dioxide is no more a poison than water. They both can kill you by depriving you of oxygen but carbon monoxide destroys the chemistry of your breathing system.
iamnotaparakeet
Veteran
Joined: 31 Jul 2007
Age: 38
Gender: Male
Posts: 25,091
Location: 0.5 Galactic radius
22 Nov 2010, 8:01 pm
Sand wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
Macbeth wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
The_Face_of_Boo wrote:
Humans have to develop effective terraforming ways before colonizing any non earth-like planet.
Fat chance. We don't even know how to terraform our own planet.
ruveyn
Oh I dunno. We seemed to be on the right track for terraforming it to a level where a carbon monoxide-breathing lifeform could exist comfortably. I imagine its just an adjustment in the kind of "pollution" we pollute with to terraform one for us to survive. A car which spews out breathable oxygen as a by-product. A factory that leaks potable spring water into the eco-system.
Carbon monoxide is a deadly poison.
As is carbon dioxide. Except for plants, they seem to like it just a little. But, don't you remember that according to the evolutionary version of history that oxygen wasn't even that high in concentration prior to plants. Evil little things, polluting the atmosphere killing themselves off. If it weren't for animals which take in oxygen and resupply carbon dioxide where would life be on Earth?
Carbon dioxide is no more a poison than water. They both can kill you by depriving you of oxygen but carbon monoxide destroys the chemistry of your breathing system.
Yes, particularly by being nondetachable from hemoglobin. However, you might be right about how horrible water is. Also, dihydrogen monoxide is extremely dangerous, even a teaspoon of it can be lethal.
22 Nov 2010, 8:07 pm
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
Macbeth wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
The_Face_of_Boo wrote:
Humans have to develop effective terraforming ways before colonizing any non earth-like planet.
Fat chance. We don't even know how to terraform our own planet.
ruveyn
Oh I dunno. We seemed to be on the right track for terraforming it to a level where a carbon monoxide-breathing lifeform could exist comfortably. I imagine its just an adjustment in the kind of "pollution" we pollute with to terraform one for us to survive. A car which spews out breathable oxygen as a by-product. A factory that leaks potable spring water into the eco-system.
Carbon monoxide is a deadly poison.
As is carbon dioxide. Except for plants, they seem to like it just a little. But, don't you remember that according to the evolutionary version of history that oxygen wasn't even that high in concentration prior to plants. Evil little things, polluting the atmosphere killing themselves off. If it weren't for animals which take in oxygen and resupply carbon dioxide where would life be on Earth?
Carbon dioxide is no more a poison than water. They both can kill you by depriving you of oxygen but carbon monoxide destroys the chemistry of your breathing system.
Yes, particularly by being nondetachable from hemoglobin. However, you might be right about how horrible water is. Also, dihydrogen monoxide is extremely dangerous, even a teaspoon of it can be lethal.
Evidently I have been living dangerously.
iamnotaparakeet
Veteran
Joined: 31 Jul 2007
Age: 38
Gender: Male
Posts: 25,091
Location: 0.5 Galactic radius
22 Nov 2010, 8:22 pm
Sand wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
Macbeth wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
The_Face_of_Boo wrote:
Humans have to develop effective terraforming ways before colonizing any non earth-like planet.
Fat chance. We don't even know how to terraform our own planet.
ruveyn
Oh I dunno. We seemed to be on the right track for terraforming it to a level where a carbon monoxide-breathing lifeform could exist comfortably. I imagine its just an adjustment in the kind of "pollution" we pollute with to terraform one for us to survive. A car which spews out breathable oxygen as a by-product. A factory that leaks potable spring water into the eco-system.
Carbon monoxide is a deadly poison.
As is carbon dioxide. Except for plants, they seem to like it just a little. But, don't you remember that according to the evolutionary version of history that oxygen wasn't even that high in concentration prior to plants. Evil little things, polluting the atmosphere killing themselves off. If it weren't for animals which take in oxygen and resupply carbon dioxide where would life be on Earth?
Carbon dioxide is no more a poison than water. They both can kill you by depriving you of oxygen but carbon monoxide destroys the chemistry of your breathing system.
Yes, particularly by being nondetachable from hemoglobin. However, you might be right about how horrible water is. Also, dihydrogen monoxide is extremely dangerous, even a teaspoon of it can be lethal.
Evidently I have been living dangerously.
Quite possibly:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yi3erdgVVTw[/youtube]
http://www.dhmo.org/
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