Maybe it was unclear, I meant, tautologically and just for emphasis, that the science that was done for the previous mission was (of course) done.
> Now, that science is done.
That said, building a base on the moon is pretty pointless, and I think we shouldn’t do it. If we’re going to become a spacefaring species, we’re going to have to learn how to live in space. The conditions on each planet, moon, whatever, are all pretty different, so we’ll probably need different bespoke solutions on each one.
We should perfect the art of building self-sustaining orbital habitats, because those aren’t redesigned from scratch every time. Let’s iterate on the space-station.
Energetically going downwell is a big cost. The only reason to go onto a planet is to get resources that aren’t already present in less energetically disadvantageous locations.
Sending mass from the moon to earth is energetically positive and you can build mass drivers and space elevators on the moon that are only powered by electricity. So assuming an ambitious space program, there is every reason to do this, except that it costs money.
There are a lot of great benefits to planets, protection from radiation and meteors being among them, also a free source of gravity which is pretty important to us as a species.
It is a free source of, like, some amount of gravity. But we don’t know how our biology will respond to the wrong amount. Meanwhile an orbital habitat can be spun to get us the right amount.
In order to get to a planet in the first place, you’ll have to have a ship that can fly through space without the occupants getting irradiated. The biggest problem will be convincing them to get off the ship I think.
In the colonial era they were mostly colonizing already populated areas. The land was mostly more hospitable than the ship because
* Humans evolved to live on Earth
* In many cases there were people to trade with or steal already tended land from
We could look at Arctic expeditions I guess. They mostly didn’t colonize for some reason (despite the region being wildly more hospitable than anywhere off Earth).
I think we can both agree that the reality is any sort of off-world colonization is going to be unpleasant and difficult beyond imagine with no simple solutions. I think we are much closer to being able to construct conformable habitats on other celestial bodies than we are to being able to make megastructures in outer space. Long term artificial structures will probably be the way to go, but I think to get there we will need to be able to setup base camps on nearby celestial bodies.
Do you think establishing a human base on the moon has value?