Posted on 05/17/2015 5:16:42 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
It’s no secret that uncurbed climate change and population growth are going to (and already have) put stress on the planet. But the situation is getting so bad that one prominent NASA scientist says we have to start thinking about terraforming Mars and that, in order for the human race to survive at current levels, we will eventually “need at least three planets.”
“The entire ecosystem is crashing,” Dennis Bushnell, chief scientist of NASA’s Langley Research Center said Thursday. “Essentially, there’s too many of us. We’ve been far too successful as the human animal. People allege we’re short 40-50 percent of a planet now. As the Asians and their billions come up to our living systems, we’re going to need three more planets.”
Bushnell was discussing the release of The Millennium Project’s “State of the Future,” an annual report that looks at global challenges and how they might be solved. He said that Mars is a good start, but we’d soon need even more space to live.
“If NASA terraforms Mars, that’ll take about 120 years, and that’s only one planet,” he said. “We’d need more shortly.”
It’s not the first time someone has floated the need for humans to colonize other planets, but usually such ideas are proposed as a way for the human race to survive in the event of a cataclysmic asteroid collision or nuclear war. In 2012, the World Wildlife Fund also suggested the three-planet idea, stating that we're using about 50 percent more resources than the Earth can support, and that by 2050 we’d need three planets to sustain that rate.
Bushnell didn’t say when he thought we might need three planets or what planets those might be—Mars is a good start, but beyond that, the Solar System is looking pretty barren as far as terraform-able planets go.
This is how seawater irrigation would work.
"The point isn’t to be alarmist or cynical, says Jerome Glenn, CEO of the Millennium Project. It’s about identifying the challenges Earth faces and finding a way to rise above them. “We have no right to be pessimistic. We have to find out what’s intelligent to do to make this species survive,” he told me. “If you think the problems aren’t going to get better, then why try. And if you think there aren’t problems, then why change anything?”
In any case, Bushnell wasn’t suggesting that we absolutely need to leave the Earth—he was saying that we need to stop consuming like we are. He’s got one solution in mind: Salt water farming.
Halophytes, a class of plant that grows well in salt water, could potentially be used to create biofuel by growing plants in the middle of the oceans (or at least using salt water to irrigate plants we do have in agriculturally-unproductive parts of the world). Scientists are working on the possibility, and an MIT project suggested that some pilot programs started in India, Pakistan, Laos, Algeria, and other poor countries should be started sometime this year, but so far, not much progress has been made. Bushnell says it’d solve most of our problems.
“If you grew halophytes on wastelands using seawater, in 10-15 years you’d have fuel that cost $50 a barrel. That’s half of what petroleum costs today,” he said. “With that, you could solve land, food, water, energy, and climate. All of that comes together.”
If we can’t do that, it just may be time to start buying land on Mars.
God has a different thought on it.....
But what happens to our sun (and solar system) when it goes super nova? (Guess the so called experts did not take this into account!)
Our sun is too small to go supernova.
Type II supernovae Let's look at the more exciting Type II first. For a star to explode as a Type II supernova, it must be at several times more massive than the sun (estimates run from eight to 15 solar masses).
A transition that was cancelled and restarted.
Hopefully it’ll be ready in 2021 as planned.
Our Sun isn’t large enough to go supernova. It will go through a red giant (helium-fusion) stage, run out of helium, and the active core will shrink again. The lighter stuff will blow away like a dandelion fluff, leaving a white dwarf, which will continue to cook along for billions more years.
It's no secret that uncurbed climate change and population growth are going to (and already have) put stress on the planet. But the situation is getting so bad that one prominent NASA scientist says we have to start thinking about terraforming Mars and that, in order for the human race to survive at current levels, we will eventually "need at least three planets. The entire ecosystem is crashing," Dennis Bushnell, chief scientist of NASA's Langley Research Center said Thursday. "Essentially, there's too many of us. We've been far too successful as the human animal. People allege we're short 40-50 percent of a planet now. As the Asians and their billions come up to our living systems, we're going to need three more planets."IOW, NASA is paying for idiotic Malthusianic nonsense, instead of space exploration. OTOH, Elon Musk is using the same "Earth is running out" alibi to build his Mars colonization project. Extra to X-Planets and APoD.
No need reading beyond the first sentence.
I vote we send this guy and his colleagues on a one way trip to Mars as the advance party. After all, life here is getting intolerable, right?
Or we save a lot of money (no rockets, no life support, etc) and just put him in a habitat that simulates the Martian environment. At the surface of Mars, atmospheric pressure is the same as it is 40 miles altitude on Earth.
If it’s a NASA official, it is a risible idiot.
Our back yard is part of the ecosystem, and it is flourishing
with huge trees and plenty of bright greenery.
The entire ecosystem? I don’t think so.
Otherwise, there will be no ethanol to destroy our car engines,
and everyone knows that there will be plenty. GMO corn crops
are everywhere. Just don’t eat the stuff.
Add some lab goggles for extra importance.
Back in Junior High we used to call guys like this “Space Cadets”
What’s so great about keeping the human race alive into perpetuity?
If there were no humans, so what. We wouldn’t know anyway since we all die eventually.
As for myself...
I listen to what these self-appointed ‘elites’ say. I read what is published by them and I examine their actions as best as I can both public and how they appear to live privately and I have come up with the following.
1. The ‘elites’ no matter what country or political system they exist within want to be the rulers of all those ‘under’ them.
2. They would be the happiest in a Feudal society with them selves as the Nobles and every one else as ‘lackey’ or peasantry.
3. They live within ‘bubbles’ or possibly fish tanks where they do not interact with the outside world. Because if they did they would see that humanity does not encroach upon ‘mother nature’ to the extent they think it does.
4. If they did have the ‘power’ that they crave then the lives of anyone else that is not an ‘elite’ or recognized within their cliques would be worth spit on a hot concrete sidewalk.
The galactic core explosion will reach the Ringworld soon enough.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.