Wednesday, March 8, 2017

Terraforming Other Planets for Ultimate Human Arrogance

Terraforming is a word which was invented by sci fi writers probably back in the Fifties, maybe even the Forties, when they envisioned Earth possessing the technological ability to transform other planets to suit our own needs.  There are few things which could endear us more to the Galactic Overlords than going to other planets and ripping all hell out of them because, well, we fuckin' can.

NASA has just offered theory regarding terraforming Mars and it's just about as insane as such a thing needs to be but it could even work.  (Science Alert: NASA Wants to Launch a Giant Magnetic Field to Make Mars Habitable)


Artist’s impression

Credit: NASA Goddard Space Flight Centre


NASA scientists have proposed a bold plan that could give Mars its atmosphere back and make the Red Planet habitable for future generations of human colonists.

By launching a giant magnetic shield into space to protect Mars from solar winds, the space agency says we could restore the Red Planet's atmosphere, and terraform the Martian environment so that liquid water flows on the surface once again.

- SA


Assume the technology is feasible since we're humans and we can build any damn thing if we feel like it but we most often seem to build things no-one really needs.  There may be questioning of whether a thing can be done but there's rarely any for whether it should be.  The same is true in this circumstance.

The team acknowledges that the plan is largely hypothetical at this point, but it's a pretty amazing vision for what might be possible in the years ahead. The researchers intend to keep studying the possibilities to get a more accurate estimate of how long the climate-altering effects would take.

If the concept does prove workable, there's no telling just how much it would alter the prospects of colonising Mars in the future.

- SA

There's no mention of an Ethics Review Board in that matter and, frankly, it's truly concerning.  This ERB notion has come up previously with the Rockhouse in which we want some sort of spiritual representation in concert with scientists for decision making regarding such things and we don't mean sending in any Arkansas ringers to do rain dances.  We want Jesuits and thinkers for this.  They're often marginalized by some ragamuffin from Oklahoma who says Jesus talks to him but we want the real ones and the real brainiacs in the same room to talk this through.

Jodie Foster:  like Matthew McConaughey in "Contact?"

Roger that, Astro Woman.


Further from Russia Today:

“This situation then eliminates many of the solar wind erosion processes that occur with the planet’s ionosphere and upper atmosphere allowing the Martian atmosphere to grow in pressure and temperature over time,” Green and his team of researchers explained in an supplementary paper.

While it may sound far-fetched, the team points to similar systems already in place in orbit around the Earth to protect astronauts from solar radiation. They also believe that were such a magnetic shield deployed to protect Mars, the planet could regenerate atmospheric pressure up to half that of Earth in a matter of a few years.

“This is not terraforming as you may think of it where we actually artificially change the climate, but we let nature do it, and we do that based on the physics we know today,” Green said.

(RT:  NASA proposes shield around Mars to aid human colonization)

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