Link tags: mars

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Why Not Mars (Idle Words)

I’ve come to believe the best way to look at our Mars program is as a faith-based initiative. There is a small cohort of people who really believe in going to Mars, the way some people believe in ghosts or cryptocurrency, and this group has an outsize effect on our space program.

Maciej lays out the case against a crewed mission to Mars.

Like George Lucas preparing to release another awful prequel, NASA is hoping that cool spaceships and nostalgia will be enough to keep everyone from noticing that their story makes no sense. But you can’t lie your way to Mars, no matter how sincerely you believe in what you’re doing.

And don’t skip the footnotes:

Fourth graders writing to Santa make a stronger case for an X-Box than NASA has been able to put together for a Mars landing.

Visions, Ventures, Escape Velocities: A Collection of Space Futures – Center for Science and the Imagination

A collection of short stories and essays speculating on humanity’s future in the solar system. The digital versions are free to download.

The Improbable, Bold History of Space Concept Art – How We Get To Next

A brief history of space concept art—Norman Rockwell, Chesney Bonestell, Robert McCall, Pat Rawlings, David Meltzer …all the classics.

Meet the Father of Modern Space Art | Atlas Obscura

A profile of Chesley Bonestell. It’s amazing to think how much of his work was produced before we had even left this planet.

Manifesto of the Committee to Abolish Outer Space – The New Inquiry

Fear and loathing in Houston.

  1. Humanity will never colonize Mars, never build moon bases, never rearrange the asteroids, never build a sphere around the sun.
  2. There will never be faster-than-light travel. We will not roam across the galaxy. We will not escape our star.
  3. Life is probably an entirely unexceptional phenomenon; the universe probably teems with it. We will never make contact. We will never fuck green-skinned alien babes.
  4. The human race will live and die on this rock, and after we are gone something else will take our place. Maybe it already has, without our even noticing.
  5. All this is good. This is a good thing.

The Radiation Threat to “The Martian” (PDF)

This is something that has been bugging me ever since reading the book:

While Andy Weir does a good job of representing the risks faced by Mark Watney, stranded on Mars and confronting one life-threatening challenge after another, he is silent on the threat of radiation, not just to Mark but particularly to the crew of the Hermes as they contemplate executing a daring rescue mission that more than doubles their time in deep space.

Well, this paper answers all my questions.

Mars Weather

A handy way of quickly finding out how the weather in your area compares to the weather on Mars.

UK-led Beagle 2 lander found on Mars - News stories - GOV.UK

This is quite amazing!

I remember getting up on Christmas day 2003 (I was in Arizona), hoping to get news of Beagle 2’s successful landing. Alas, the news never came.

For something that size to be discovered now …that’s quite something.

28 Months on Mars - NYTimes.com

Curiosity’s journey so far, nicely visualised.

The Elon Musk interview on Mars colonisation – Ross Andersen – Aeon

Elon Musk talks engineering, the Fermi paradox, and getting your ass to Mars.

Google Night Walk

A nice stroll around Marseilles at night without any of the traditional danger.

BibliOdyssey: Channelling Martian Maps

Beautiful 19th century maps of Mars.

YouTube - Mars Science Laboratory (Curiosity Rover) Mission Animation

The plan to get Curiosity Rover onto the surface of Mars (ignore the cheesy sound effects in space).

Mars Science Laboratory (Curiosity Rover) Mission Animation

Interview @MarsPhoenix - Universe

An interview with Veronica McGregor, the human being behind the wonderful MarsPhoenix Twitter account.

Planet Douche : Attus Apparel - Threaded for Liberation

Popping one collar is pretty gay. Popping 3 or 4 collars is super gay. Popping 24 collars ...that shit is hot.

Twitter / MarsPhoenix: Are you ready to celebrate?...

In the future, all great scientific discoveries will be conveyed in 140 characters.

Twitter / MarsPhoenix

The Mars Phoenix probe is twittering its journey to the red planet.

Google Mars

That partnership between Google and Nasa is beginning to bear some fruit.

dog or higher: phone sex with mars - or why latency matters as well as bandwidth

Brian Suda has a theoretical solution to real-time interplanetary communication: "I get on my tachyon voip phone and make a call from mars to earth at 9:00am it takes 10 minutes to travel there, but the tachyons travel backwards (so i think) that would be