Elon Musk Outlines Vision for Colonization of Mars

Wow, what a great read. Musk is certainly an inspiring visionary. I think a really big problem we'd face even if everything went well is feeding the people who colonize. Bill Nye puts it well, here:

Musk seems to propose food can be included in that 100 to 200 thousand dollar ticket cost as discussed in the paper. But, really the most sustainable option for feeding a planet's inhabitants is for the food to come from the same planet. Seems like it'd be quite a difficulty. If only humans ran on the same stuff rockets did.

I'm very happy that someone with a lot of resources is looking at this. What we can do easily today, in the past was very difficult or impossible. (Five hundred years ago, it was difficult traveling to another continent.)

The point we're at now is that it is very expensive to send men to the moon and so far impossible to send people to Mars. In a hundred years, perhaps trips to Mars will be like flying to another continent today.

But it seems to me that to get from here to there, we still have things to learn and technology to develop, and taking baby steps might be the best way to do this, for example, with a permanent moon base before trying to send people to Mars.

Just my thoughts...

He'll be an old man when he returns....

...if he returns...

... if there's something to return to ...

Touché.

There is always room for Jell-O, put that on board, and make water on Mars.

They can grow algae in space within a small volume required to make enough to survive on, but I expect it might get old, living on your "greens", maybe "reds".

Where is this kid headed?

I hope his cosmic ray insurance is paid up.

I have still seen nothing that remotely resembles protection of the crew/passengers of any craft headed to Mars, that

will not result in overexposure to harmful radiation, cosmic rays, and other particles.

I've didn't read the paper yet,...

I've watched clips (Videos, news clips, documentary's) of his engineers and technicians that work for him... they all look passionate on making it happen... And doing so, they look like they went through a wringer... drawn out, black rings under their eyes... I'm sure a lot of them invested a lot to make this work.

Why?

Of course, one could ask why would we send humans to the moon? At that time, there was an on-going arms race, and space was thought to be the next battlefield. Also, we did not possess the same robotic technological capabilities then, so humans in the loop were a necessity. And the Apollo program was also a point of national pride and even perhaps a distraction from the events in southeast Asia.

As for arguments about deep space travel advancements, we can certainly advance those technologies right here on earth or even in low-earth orbit at significantly lower costs.

I would have a hard time explaining to the taxpayer why this is such a good idea.