- cross-posted to:
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- cross-posted to:
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- [email protected]
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- [email protected]
There is a discussion on Hacker News, but feel free to comment here as well.
Mars has more gravity. I think lunar gravity is low enough to still potentially cause serious problems for humans. I’m not an expert though.
I also think that whenever lunar colonies are going to take off, it’s going to be a real shit show. It’s too easy to put a rail gun over there and take out whole countries. Whenever Ww3 starts, it’s definitely going to leak into space but not as far as mars. Mars is true frontier while earth has a claim to the moon in a way.
It takes 3 days to get to the moon.
Any weapons on the moon would be largely ineffective due to the orbit and the sheer distance involved. 300,000 kilometers makes hitting anything specific on the earth a pipe dream.
It’s still way easier to just launch a point to point icbm for an attack. 30 minutes of flight time is a lot better than a few days.
As for gravity, we don’t know how low gravity for extended periods will effect humans. At least on the moon, if it turns out to be a critical problem, we can send people back in a few days. Mars could take up to 20 months just to get a transfer window and get back. Any mars colony needs to be completely self sufficient from day one, whereas a lunar colony can be built up over time and supplied much more readily until we can figure out how to grow enough food and recycle/harvest enough water.
You can easily take out all enemy satellites if you have a proper colony with defensible positions on the moon I think. You could literally kessler syndrome the bitch and have the only satellite in town. It’s definitely a valid strategic position.
I also think the fact that it takes so long to get to is a plus for some people. If war breaks out or musk starts abusing human right, they won’t hesitate to grab his moon colony. This won’t happen on mars, it’s just too far.
Not that your points aren’t completely valid but you are asking for possible reasons mars might be more attractive than to moon to some. Also, twice the gravity is nothing to scoff at.
That being said, I’m craving any kind of space exploration. It does seem nuts that we don’t have any kind of permanent installations on the moon yet. I’m still pissed the cunt spent 40 b on twitter instead of space.