It is virtually undisputed that outer space is supremely
cool. It is creepy and mysterious and captures the imagination of people across
the world. People devote their lives to the study of it, whether in the more
abstract and often less accurate joy of science-fiction writing or in the pursuit
of answers through hard study and research. It has warranted the creation of
NASA, which is one of the most amazing things ever to have come out of America.
Outer space is where the secrets of the universe lie; pretty much everything we
can learn about Earth has been learned and all the mysteries left to solve are
somewhat further afield. The only people who disagree tend to be unimaginative
and drab, rather like this idiot, who can’t even structure a sentence properly:
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| Some dickhead's ignorant opinion, courtesy of Facebook |
(I considered ranting for a bit about precisely why this is ignorant and about how beneficial ALL scientific research is, even when it's an accident, but I already did it,
here, so I figured I didn't need to do it again.)
Very recently, NASA’s
Curiosity Rover landed safely on Mars
and has started sending back pictures already. They are amazing. They aren’t
the best quality photographs in the world, but they did come
from Mars. Obviously, this made me very
excited and I enlisted Google and Twitter to take me on a big old nerd binge.
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| Bas Lansdorp |
In doing so, I stumbled across the
Mars One Project. It is a
private enterprise run by Dutch entrepreneur Bas Lansdorp and its aim is to set
up a colony of human beings on Mars over the space of the next few decades. The mission
objective is to “establish the first human settlement on Mars by April 2023”. The
Mars One team has been working on the plan for it since early 2011 and have the
support of a number of “ambassadors”, including the Chairman of the Netherlands
Space Society, the co-creator of
Big
Brother and CERN physicist Prof. Dr. Gerard ‘t Hooft, who was presented
with the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1999 for his work on the quantum structure
of electroweak interactions.
The first forty astronauts to be sent to Mars will be
selected in 2013. They will all have to train for ten years so that they are
prepared for their trip. A replica of the Mars One settlement will be built in
the desert on Earth to serve as a place for the astronauts to prepare and train
as well as to test the equipment. In January 2016, the “supply mission” will be
launched, sending 2500 kilograms of food and other supplies in a SpaceX Dragon
spacecraft. In 2018, a rover will land on Mars to explore the selected area to find the best spot for
habitation. In 2021, two living units, two life supports units, another supply
unit and another rover will have arrived on Mars, prepared for the arrival of the
astronauts. All “water, oxygen and atmosphere” production will be ready by the
beginning of 2022 and the first group of astronauts are due to be launched
towards Mars on September 14th 2022.
The first astronauts will be due to land on Mars in 2023
after an estimated 7-month journey, where the rovers will take them to their new
home. More astronauts will be launched in groups of four every two years so
that the colony will have reached 20 settlers by 2033. The Mars One team plan
to send more hardware up with each additional group so that more and better
exploration can take place as well as providing them with updated technology and providing better quality of life.
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| The plans for the 'settlement' to be built on Mars |
Getting back
from Mars is a hell of a lot harder than getting to Mars – look at how long it
took for us to develop rockets on Earth. The astronauts will not be visiting, but emigrating to Mars, where they will be
expected to stay, possibly for the rest of their lives. They will have to leave everything on Earth behind in the
attempt to learn more about the red planet. Training for the astronauts before
they leave will include staying in simulation bases to see how they cope with
being secluded, away from everything they have ever known and loved, and being
left with only the other astronauts. They must be extremely intelligent and
able to cope in unfamiliar environments, as well as being able to solve any problems
that may occur by themselves, especially those in the first team of four who will be alone for two years on a different planet. They must
also have a knowledge of engineering, in case anything goes wrong with the
technology, as well as the ability to cultivate crops and see to any medical problems. The
team at the moment predict that they may well stay there for the rest of their lives, but it
does not exclude the possibility that the technology necessary for a return
rocket can be sent to Mars after a few years so that astronauts can return if
they wish. Considering the state of technology now, and given the amount of
time for proliferation between now and when the return rocket will be required, this is not an
unreasonable estimate.
The settlement on Mars will include “inflatable components
which contain bedrooms, working areas, a living room and a ‘plant production
unit’, where they will grow greenery”. Within the settlement, the Mars One
website predicts that the astronauts will “lead typical day-to-day lives”. There,
their task will be building and researching. They will have to prepare for when
the other groups land as well learning about Mars. Their research will include how people
and plants respond to life of Mars as well as things like Mars’s geology and
biology. Essentially, imagine everything the scientists throughout history have learned about Earth - forty people are going to be sent to do all of that on another planet.
Reading the information offered by the website does seem like they have thought of everything. It does not go into great detail, but it does offer an FAQ page as well as a contact address for anyone with further questions. The page
explaining why and how the astronauts will emigrate to Mars is quite cool. They claim to have found a place where there is water ice beneath the
surface that can be cultivated to provide hydration for the astronauts. They describe
how everything will be powered by solar panels so that they do not need to go
to the hassle of building a nuclear reactor for energy. They go to a lot of effort to ensure that people know that they understand what they are undertaking.
The Mars One website has a Sponsorship page, inviting businesses
and companies of all sizes to sponsor the project and “play a significant role
in creating World History” and “make the next giant leap for mankind”. However,
the project will mainly be funded by having the whole thing being as a
reality TV show. Suddenly it makes sense that the Big Brother guy is involved; otherwise, he really stuck out as a
bit of a loser in amongst all those people with physics doctorates…
From the selection and preparation of the first astronauts,
right through the launch of the first rover to the point at which a colony has
formed on Mars, everything will be broadcast on television and be made available online
for the public to view. The Mars One team insists that there will be no gimmicky
bullshit like in most reality TV shows, that the integrity of the mission
itself should be more than enough to attract people to watch. I know I would
watch, but I’m a nerd, and generally I hate reality TV, so I don’t really know
if I’m a good example.
I actually think this is brilliant. I don’t know if it will
work. I don’t think that there have been enough critical analyses of the plans
by people who have a lot of in-depth knowledge about all the necessary science
for me to draw any proper conclusions. I have had a look at the Wikipedia entry
for Mars One as well as the one for Prof. Dr. Gerard ‘t Hooft, the most
advertised of the team’s “ambassadors”. I have had a very long look at the
website and I, with my nerdy but nonetheless layman’s knowledge, think it is pretty
awesome, but it only makes sense to remain sceptical before I have a bit more information. They seem very determined that everything go right and well and that
all the science be absolutely fool-proof, so that they are taken seriously and
so that they don’t end up stranding forty well-meaning astronauts somewhere
between Earth and Mars without food or oxygen. It does feel a little bit like that episode of The Simpsons in which Homer went to
space, but science is not about feelings – it is about doing research and
getting results and using the information gleaned from crazy ventures just like
this to make a better world for generations to come.
Now I know I’m not exactly astronaut material right now –
but if Homer Simpson can do it, anyone can. Besides, there is another year before the selection begins and I will be thirty when
the first team is launched, so I've got time to prepare. I won’t lie, I have already signed up for some free online
study groups beginning in January of next year that focus on biology and other things that may come in handy with
my application, but I was already signed up for one about astrobiology and I don’t
have much going on during the time of course, so my nerdism probably would have
led me to do them anyway.
I would like a bit more information about it, maybe some
objective opinions about it from more than a handful of people. I would like to
see the specifics of the plans – more details, for instance, about exactly how
they expect me not to die. If this project really is as good as the website
makes it out be (which it probably won’t be; nothing ever us, but we may as well be hopefully), I would happily
sign up. Never mind that my nan doesn’t like me living as far away as London and
is such a technophobe that there is no way she will trust the video
messaging system, even though I know for a fact that they guys at CERN currently use Skype (Brian Cox did it at Uncaged Monkeys in December 2011; I was there, it was awesome). Never mind that the
minimum age limit is 25. Never mind that it may mean spending most of my life
on Mars and much of the time beforehand training and studying to be competent
enough to go to Mars. Never mind that if I do spend a lot of time studying and
training and then end up not making the final cut that I would have wasted as
much as ten years of my life (provided I start working for it now, or at least in the next six months or so) for
something I never will do. None of that matters.
This is Mars. The planet. This is a chance to go down in
history. This is dangerous and exciting and amazing and unbelievably nerdy. Space
exploration is one of the coolest and most incredible things that mankind has
achieved and it is all done by amazing nerds, which Hollywood will have you believe
are all also total babes. This is not always untrue.
The fact is that Mars is the next thing that mankind has to explore. Maybe we
haven’t learned everything there is to learn about the moon or even the Earth,
but we will, and why shouldn’t we be heading off to Mars too, so we're there ready to start working when everything else is done? We all know it is
going to be awesome, but you don’t have to believe me, because my opinion is
only mine and I am obviously not the best spokesperson for this sort of thing.
Rather, believe Carl Sagan:
