MoonBase
It's time to return to the Moon
Victor-lucas made an excellent post in which he said ....
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Those who advocate for Mars argue that the Moon would be useless to mankind as it has little to no natural resources, and is ultimately a dead planetary body.
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That struck me as being just wrong. I replied. The reply got long. It turned into a post of it's own right.
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This is that post.
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We have BEEN to the moon and brought samples back and analyzed the composition
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The average composition of the lunar surface by weight is roughly 43 percent oxygen, 20 percent silicon, 19 percent magnesium 10 percentiron 3 percent calcium 3 percent aluminum 0.42 percent chromium 0.18 percent titanium and 0.12 percent manganeseNov 19, 2014
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source
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At the top of Earth's atmosphere, measured by satellites, the sun provides 1.366 kilowatts per square meter
on the moon there is no atmosphere to degrade it. It could be concentrated to any imaginable intensity using mirrors, to power the industrial operations. The lunar regolith could thus be smelted for the natural resources using Concentrating Solar power Technology which would use sunlight to heat a fluid, such as a molten salt (available on the moon) , MUCH hotter than the 1,050°F that it can achieve on earth.
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(The moon has no atmosphere and only 1/6 the gravity of earth. MUCH larger solar power concentrators could be built than on earth.)
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Not only that...much, if not most, of the industrial operations could be operated remotely from here on earth. Tele-operation by means of Augmented reality. Tele-operated robots could build a moonbase for the workers before they got there, underground I would expect.
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Obviously at a much lesser cost than Mars.
The moon is only 250,000 miles away.
Speed of light lag could be compensated for many teleoperation tasks.
Hypothetical Future Craig's List Help Wanted Ad.
GAMERS!
Drive a bulldozer on the moon from the comfort
of your mom's basement on earth.
Aluminium Company of Luna, AlCoLa is hiring now.
Video Gaming experience a plus. Very few other requirements.
If you're breathing we're interested in talking to you.
Help us mine the moon!
Texas Space Port
Love it, and I couldn't agree more!
One of my all time favorite books is Robert Heinlein's "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" Maybe that's why colonization has been thwarted for so long - it's simply too high of a ground to allow anyone to take up a position on. Well, anyone from Earth, I mean ... ;-)
The very day that I aquired "The moon is a Harsh Mistress" i retreated to my fortress of solitude (I was a teenager living in the family tornado cellar) I read it straight thru in one sitting (acutally I was lying in bed, but you know what I mean).
I was PISSED OFF that it ended...I wanted to BE MIKE.
That's been a long time. I'm 66 years old right now. I STILL want to be mike.
@everittdmickey, Are you aware of author John Varley? He credits Heinlein as a major influence and even though he has his own universe and style, in his later years, he wrote a series that is an homage to the Dean of Science Fiction.
Take a look at: http://varley.net/ the series is the Thunder and Lightening series.
Cheers!
Oh yeah....Steel Beach was very interesting. I've read his stuff from way back.
Titan, Wizard, & Demon, the Gaea Trilogy, were the books that first got me into his writing. His exploration of clones in his short stories are a lot of fun. Yeah, this whole homage to Heinlein is much more recent and is written how Heinlein writes! Book 4, the final book, just came out.
Do you have anyone you would recommend now? My 11 year old Son is gobbling up Heinlein's Juvenile series and is almost ready to step up into "The Cat Who Walks Through Walls," et. all. I myself have a harder time selecting new authors.
I'm a big cyber punk junkie. Neal Stephenson, William Gibson, Bruce Sterling, Rudy Rucker, etc. Seems like it is harder and harder to find the time to read. Maybe on the moon, there'll be time enough for reading ... :-)
I don't think I'd class The Cat Who Walks Through Walls as Juvenile. I've heard it said that Heinlein's writing can be divided into two periods. That which he wrote prior to Stranger in a Strange Land and then it and everything later. That said, I particularly liked Friday although I didn't understand it when I first read it, I had to read it several times to fully appreciate it. Times ten for The Number of the Beast, at the time I had no idea about alternate realities.
I used to be into CyberPunk pretty heavy, when it first came out, I've read all of what you mentioned.
I've cut back on my book reading a LOT since the dawn of the internet. I only read two or three books a week now.
Not even that really. I'm writing my own books and THAT takes a lot of time.
Oh yeah, no way, I meant he was almost ready to read some of the books that are not in the Juvenile series.
Writing your own books, right on! hrmmm, punny
I still want to be Lazarus Long! :-)