How our immune systems could stop humans reaching Mars

The Telegraph ^ | 9/2/17 | Sarah Knapton

[LibWhacker]

The human immune system is so weakened by space travel that even a simple virus could prove deadly

[...snip...]

Yet although we now have the technological ability to leave Earth, scientists have found another stumbling block to colonising new worlds - our own immune system.

Although it is said we are all made of ‘star stuff’ when it comes to travelling away from our home planet humans are far more vulnerable to the rigours of space than our interstellar origins might suggest.

Billions of years of evolution has effectively backed mankind into a corner of the Solar System that it may be now be tricky to leave.

[antidisestablishment]

Everything listed was called impossible by people just like you.

[higgmeister]

Humans are optimized for life on Earth. Expecting the organism to work property off Earth is foolish. The body was not made for space. It was made for Earth.

Colonizing other planets is immoral, because the people-to-be-born are forced to live in a hostile environment, and they were not given the choice.

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Humans are optimized for walking on Earth. Expecting the organism to work properly in a fast moving automobile is foolish. The body was not made for speeding through life. It was made for walking on The Earth.

Speeding over the ground is immoral, because the people-to-be-born are forced to live in a hostile environment, and they were not given the choice.

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Humans are optimized for life on land. Expecting the organism to work properly on the water is foolish. The body was not made for floating in water. It was made for staying on the land.

Floating on the ocean or lakes is immoral, because the people-to-be-born are forced to live in a hostile water environment, and they were not given the choice.

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Humans are optimized for life on the Earth. Expecting the organism to work properly off the ground is foolish. The body was not made for flying. It was made to be grounded on Earth.

Flying in the sky is immoral, because the people-to-be-born are forced to live in a hostile environment in the sky, and they were not given the choice to stay on the ground.

[ichabod1]

Not so. Our space medicine researchers have very close ties to Russian space agency medical researchers. I don’t discount the article because the scientists are Russian.

[Telepathic Intruder]

Everything on Mars is a danger, but radiation is probably the hardest to do anything about. Most likely everyone would have to live underground, and what’s the fun in that?

[PapaBear3625]

Or if we could create a sustained 1 g drive and shielding for protection, then the drive becomes the gravity- no rotation needed.

At one G, you get to Mars in a few days, so there's no issue with prolonged zero-G.

[loungitude]

Thank you!

[rottndog]

Or better yet, stop wasting huge amounts of money trying to launch fragile human beings into space and instead launch thousands of increasingly advanced probes throughout our solar system to gather much more information in much less time with much less money.

Exactly correct. It is sheer emotionalism pushing manned space exploration. There is virtually nothing that can't be done with drones and automation, at far far less cost than sending people. This is where we should focus our resources now.

We are still in the infancy stages of space exploration...we should have faith and confidence in our ability to develop newer technologies that may eventually make manned space flight more realistic, but we are a long way from there now. Efficient allocation of limited resources...leave the emotionalism out of it.

[editor-surveyor]

.
But the “impossible” didn't come from my post, it came from your immagination.

My post simply pointed out the reality that it simply was not going to happen.

If you can't read something without injecting your own fallacy, that is your problem, not mine.
.

[backwoods-engineer]

Colonizing other planets is immoral, because the people-to-be-born are forced to live in a hostile environment, and they were not given the choice.

Unless there is a way back to Earth, yeah.