I have full confidence that, given enough time, Musk can create the technology necessary to ferry people to Mars and establish a colony. That's an engineering problem, and as we've seen he's very adept at building companies to tackle those.
But the key problem then becomes: why would people want to spend $0.5m to deal with all the inconveniences of being a first settler on Mars? It takes months to go there, and once you're there you'll be stuck in cramped quarters with only basic amenities. Plus the health risks of radiation and equipment failure.
So people need to be compensated for these inconveniences and risks with a salary greater than they could make on Earth. This means that you need a functioning Martian economy. People won't go en masse without it making economic sense for them to do so. But in order for that to develop, the colony needs to produce something of value.
To draw an analogy to the European settlement of North America, the first permanent European settlements were port towns for exporting resources like furs and minerals back to Europe. In this way, the North American economy was bootstrapped off of the European economy.
The same thing needs to happen here where we need to bootstrap a Martian economy off of the Earth economy by exporting resources back to Earth.
Since you ask the question, you are clearly not the target audience.
As Spider Robinson has written to similar questions, some folks have another column in their life ledger, labelled 'satisfaction'. You can't see it, so their behavior seems irrational.
Furthermore, its not clear that money on Earth will have any meaning on Mars. You can't take it with you, in a way. To go to Mars at all, requires a sacrifice of your entire life on Earth, in exchange for a chance at a new life.
I would do this, sacrificing all I have on Earth, for the chance to do something really important.
I don't see that as a problem. If I'm not otherwise committed when we have a colony, I'd be the first to go.
After that, OTHER PEOPLE will find ways to monetize. People went to America because it was an untouched land of opportunity, not because somebody told them they could export furs. It was clear that there was opportunity but unclear what it might be.
I can think of many things that could make your rich on Mars. Any kind of sports/competitions in reduced gravity, space hotels/amenities (things that makes space more like home) and indeed mining of raw materials. And these are just the first things that come to mind. There's probably better ideas.
The early European-American settlers still had a basic expectation of the availability of natural resources. In the case of Mars, natural resources aren't simply an unknown, we know Mars to be a desolate place largely free of any valuable resources. This knowledge may change with boots on the ground, but the risk to those explorers far, far exceeds the risk taken by those early colinists.
If I walked into a bank with a job offer on Mars for, say, 4x my Earthly salary, they might be willing to loan me $500k. I might be willing to pay it even if I'd only make 3x my salary after the loan payments.
If this becomes a reality, banks would come out of the woodworks willing to provide the necessary financing -- at significant interest rates, of course. But that would open up the pool of candidates quite a bit beyond just those who have $500k in assets.
Clearly not a student of history :-) The first people out the door and on their way will be the people who are sick and tired of the way this planet is run, they'll have new ideas about how things could be done. This is not entirely unlike the folks who sold everything they owned, bought a wagon and headed west.
Motivation was land ownership, and presumably a colony would make some rules about letting you own a chunk of Mars. Perhaps you could become a water farmer.
Designing an electric car that people actually want to buy is a lot more than an engineering problem, too. Why would somebody want to pay 50k on a car that can only drive a few hundred miles before needing a couple hours to recharge? It all seems so simple now that Tesla is gaining traction, but it was considered a huge risk just a few years ago.
I'd say that Elon truly excels at coming up with creative ways to overcome barriers... and those barriers aren't always engineering related.
Elon thinks people with enough money to go there for the thrill of it will be the first to do so, not people who can't earn enough money right now, and would do it mostly for the money, just like a lot of people have volunteered to go to war for the salary they would earn.
But I can see that happening later on, in an effort to get "normal" people moving there.
And early colonists might likely be scientists with funding from other organizations rather than out of pocket. $500k/person to send a team of specialists plus a few million more for their equipment and get a much more thorough examination of martian geology and biology (or biologic potential). Then you get support personnel, then other ventures associated with establishing more longterm potential for individuals (growing and preparing food stuffs, manufacture of goods where local resources are available rather than shipping, etc).
Normally, settlers leave their home land because they don’t have anything to lose. So they look for new things that may improve their lives; just look at the history. Why on earth, rich people want to go to Mars? They cannot drive a Ferrari; they cannot build a mansion either. Just to prove that they are cool people?
Paul Graham said: “Live in the future, and then build what's missing.” Probably Elon Mask is trying to apply this rule. Well, at least I don’t get it.
You are equating money to happiness. I'm sure that there are plenty of very wealthy people out there that don't feel like they have anything to lose, and they might as well do something spectacular instead of continue to try to fill the void with more material items.
Did you ever try to see who all those settlers who built America were? There is only a handful of names remained. Thousands and thousands are unknown. Do you think those thousands found happiness? They only fought to survive.
Before getting the town of 80,000 to a living status, thousands and thousands will fight to survive and will die immaturely. Of course, this brings happiness to those who helped to settle 80000 on Mars. They will enjoy on Earth.
I assume the settlers you are referring to are those that came from Europe. America had been settled for a very, very long time before those people came along. Anyhow... I know some people that trace their lineage back to the Pilgrims. They are a pretty proud bunch.
Just because you are fighting for survival doesn't mean you can't be happy doing it.
I think that attempting to relate this to previous colonization efforts on this planet is flawed. The motivation of the "colonists" would be completely different.
I don't really understand what you are trying to get at. Are you saying that nobody would want to go? Or that anyone who does want to go is being irrational? The first seems obviously false, and the second seems completely irrelevant.
The fact is there are people who would go, it doesn't really matter to them if you understand their motivation.
Rich people are winning a game. Its a way of making your life meaningful. Its not a very good way.
Making a future for mankind - that's a very cool game. I'd go in a heartbeat, and I'm doing fine in America (more than fine - been a startup founder many times, money in the bank).
So, knowing that there may be no return, you are ready to leave everything and start over in an extremely unknown environment. The support may be a few years away. You leave your family, friends, and relatives for making a meaningful life? Doesn’t this look more like suicide?
I think there are many much better ways to make a future for mankind. Just look at the children in Africa. Technology innovations can do a lot on earth.
If that's a sincere comment I expect you're already in Africa helping the children. Else, maybe you are doing something for yourself or your family. This is more like that.
Of course I'd not go if it was suicide. But technology can overcome lots of hurdles. Colonists in the past had the same decision to make, and here we are in America to prove it.
I just know that every photograph I see of Mars landscape, I feel a rush, I want to run to that far horizon and see what's there.
With a city of 80,000 people on Mars, you can sure bet someone would start building/selling rovers for people to cruise around in. And there will definitely be contractors willing to build up your bubble-house to mansion standards.
People on HN are for the most part in awe of this vision(colonizing Mars). I find interesting to confront this vision with a mystic's opinion.
Why?
Because both scientists and mystics seek to acquire knowledge, although the path undertaken is of a significantly different nature. One seeks outside himself, the other inside.
Here is a rephrasing of a quote of Meher Baba (a respected spiritual master):
What will man find on mars? nothing but himself. (He said it about the moon)
I am genuinely curious to know the opinion of the HN crowd about the fundamental disagreement between these two visions?
The answer to "why?" is just as easily given: "why not?" No more need be justified.
>Because both scientists and mystics seek to acquire knowledge, although the path undertaken is of a significantly different nature.
One has a testable process that can be shared with other people, the other doesn't. You can call your search for truth whatever you like, but the process makes all the difference. Alchemists sought truth, etc, etc.
>"What will man find on mars? nothing but himself."
So what? How should that at all influence whether it happens or not? It is like saying "Wherever you go, that is where you are". True, but unhelpful. You can use it to justify or not justify undertaking whatever action, depending on how you choose to interpret it at the time. "Finding myself" (on whatever level you choose to define 'Find' and 'myself') on Mars sounds awesome, not disappointing.
It's not necessarily contradictory. Such an experience would change the life of the participants. While not the goal of the experience, the end result might be the same.
PEOPLE STOP trying to find good reasons whether we should colonize Mars or not.
Interplanetary colonization will happen. It's just a matter of time. Now we have a visionary man named Elon Musk that has proven himself by realizing the impossible not once not twice but 4 times.
Let's all support him and contribute our 2 cents to make it happen in our times.
AMEN
I rather doubt any bank would lend you money if you intend to use it to put yourself on Mars. Maybe unless they were satisfied the risks were low enough and confident that you would continue to have an income of money that could be used to pay back an Earth debt. Even then there is the issue of collateral.
I suspect Mars will be only for those with a total net worth of at least 500k (selling all of your Earth assets to get there probably makes sense).
Some suggest that if they could melt the core of Mars, which is solid right now, it would create the magnetic field that Mars dearly needs to keep the atmosphere on its surface, and also to protect the people there from the radiations. But yeah, that doesn't sound very easy either, and who knows what kind of problems it could create if attempted (like awakening the large vulcanos, or worse).
We're probably 5-10 years away until they can even send a rocket to Mars with humans, and another 10 years until the idea of a colony can begin to take shape. It's all very exciting, though.
It seems to me there are two types of people interested in the colonizing of Mars. Those who think it will happen eventually, and those who want to make it happen. Elon seems to be firmly in the "I want to make things happen camp." With his involvement in Telsa, SolarCity, and the rumors of the hyperloop thing, it seems like he applies this attitude towards just about everything he is interested in, no matter how outlandish.
I suspect he probably doesn't spend to much time thinking about what would be cool if other people did something. He may consider it idly once in a while, but I would be surprised if he considers it seriously while also not involving himself in it.
>>It seems to me there are two types of people interested in the colonizing of Mars. Those who think it will happen eventually, and those who want to make it happen.
The funny thing is that colonization of Mars is not something that will happen without the latter group. There is currently no economic sense in going there, which bars it from happening on its own.
Quite right. The precursors to runaway technological advance (or other meanings of "technological singularity") could definitely make economic sense, meaning that a singularity could occur without the same sort of semi-irrational drive and vision that the "make it happen" people provide. While those people are necessary for Mars colonization, they may not be for a technological singularity.
Here's an idea. Elon Musk says he'll have the re-usable rocket ready in the next few years, and he says it will be a huge thing for the space industry, and what will basically make travelling to Mars possible. Is anyone else even anywhere near close to that? Probably not. So what if he does something crazy such as open sourcing the design of his re-usable rocket, with the condition that anyone who uses pieces or the entirety of the design has to give back the improvements as well. I'm not sure what effect this would have on his company. It might push him to focus even more on execution, but I think it would also greatly accelerate this space flight race.
The good thing about this is that any future rocket or spacecrafts that would use at least some of the ideas in that design, would be forced to open source everything else. So in a way, he could create something like the Linux kernel of the space world, and we could see a lot of innovation coming out of that, all of which would have to be turned back into open source, and help future, greater innovations appear even faster.
He wouldn't do it. Same reason why he's always said they don't patent SpaceX designs. China would use the patents as an instruction manual and leapfrog them without open sourcing their own designs. It's the fear anyway.
It would be possible to create a "ITAR Free" design. Also, there are a number of open source projects that are using NDA'd technical information. The other option is that each country have their own "group" and obtain export licenses between member groups. This is basically how the JSF program operates, each member country has the export clearance needed.
http://www.copenhagensuborbitals.com/ Copenhagen Suborbitals are probably the closest to actually having an open source spacecraft. They do have this on their website;
"We intend to share all our techninal information as much as possible, within the laws of EU-export control."
But the key problem then becomes: why would people want to spend $0.5m to deal with all the inconveniences of being a first settler on Mars? It takes months to go there, and once you're there you'll be stuck in cramped quarters with only basic amenities. Plus the health risks of radiation and equipment failure.
So people need to be compensated for these inconveniences and risks with a salary greater than they could make on Earth. This means that you need a functioning Martian economy. People won't go en masse without it making economic sense for them to do so. But in order for that to develop, the colony needs to produce something of value.
To draw an analogy to the European settlement of North America, the first permanent European settlements were port towns for exporting resources like furs and minerals back to Europe. In this way, the North American economy was bootstrapped off of the European economy.
The same thing needs to happen here where we need to bootstrap a Martian economy off of the Earth economy by exporting resources back to Earth.