We are about to pass 8,000,000,000 people on earth!

[Kulindahr]

Unfortunately, or fortunately, even if the deaths of WWI and WWII would not be of any significant impact to the burden on the planet. Mass shootings are only a media theatricality in terms of numbers impacted, much like serial killers, just a social ill at the fringes of society. If the COVID pandemic had been at Spanish Flu levels of fatalities, the reduction in population would still not be significant in planetary terms. It would take a plague the level of the Black Death, something like Ebola in Panavision format for there to be a global easing.

One thing that is not discussed is the concentration of humanity in various environments. There are vast expanses of land in every country that have no significant populations, not to mention the portions of the planet covered by water. Whereas we don't want to "spoil" natural habitats that are yet preserves, there are nonetheless many areas that are habitable without wiping out some flora or fauna. Of course, it means we expand with clean energy, biodegradable waste disposal regimes, and similar changes.

Overpopulation is not simply a numbers problem. We might well exist in the billions that we see today with half or even less than half the impact through more nature-friendly living.

One big issue: we can't supply even half the people we have on the planet with all the clean-energy devices -- starting with batteries -- because they depend on materials that tend to be in the category "rare earth metals". Just the mining for those at the moment is extremely bad for the environment; if mining has to move to less abundant deposits it will just get worse.

 

[Kulindahr]

8 billion people. Honestly once you start getting to super-high numbers, the sheer number of people on this planet is just astounding.

An aside - I wonder how many of those 8 billion people are LGBTQ+?

Not nearly as large a percentage as a century ago since the odds of being born gay increase along with a boy's birth number.

 

[NotHardUp1]

One big issue: we can't supply even half the people we have on the planet with all the clean-energy devices -- starting with batteries -- because they depend on materials that tend to be in the category "rare earth metals". Just the mining for those at the moment is extremely bad for the environment; if mining has to move to less abundant deposits it will just get worse.

Absolutely. This flocking to electric vehicles, while ignoring coal burned to produce charging power, and the disposal of highly, HIGHLY toxic metals in batteries, is a fool's game.

In my own industry, aerospace, this frenzy to support the space trips to the Moon and Mars, using the SLS, the largest rockets ever made,, callously ignores the inconvenient truth that the continued rocket launches, even putting satellites in orbit, burns an incredible amount of oxidizing carbon-based fuel, and putting ozone-damaging chemicals DIRECTLY into the upper atmosphere. Imagine the number required to build a space station, Moon base, or Mars station.

 

[Vannie]

How many hot guys out of 8 billion?

 

[Peloso]

 

[Kulindahr]

Absolutely. This flocking to electric vehicles, while ignoring coal burned to produce charging power, and the disposal of highly, HIGHLY toxic metals in batteries, is a fool's game.

In my own industry, aerospace, this frenzy to support the space trips to the Moon and Mars, using the SLS, the largest rockets ever made,, callously ignores the inconvenient truth that the continued rocket launches, even putting satellites in orbit, burns an incredible amount of oxidizing carbon-based fuel, and putting ozone-damaging chemicals DIRECTLY into the upper atmosphere. Imagine the number required to build a space station, Moon base, or Mars station.

Electric cars are one of those things, though, that are driving development of new battery technology that use more environmentally-safe materials. I came across an article the other day that talked about batteries being made with graphite and aluminum that actually work better than nickel-lithium or whatever else Tesla is working on, both storing more energy per unit weight and charging faster, and another one being researched that uses carbon "sponge" and silver... the technical details mostly lost me, but if I understand it right "carbon sponge" is made from layers of graphene that are purposely of lower quality so there are holes/gaps in the lattice, and somehow electrons love to pack themselves into those gaps -- weird to read that intentionally making flawed material is something we might want!

As for rocket fuels, the decision to go with updated solid boosters like the shuttle used was utterly moronic and not just for environmental reasons! The main engines do it right; their exhaust is just water vapor with an occasional hydrogen or oxygen ion due to imperfect combustion. SpaceX is doing it right, too; methane doesn't church out toxic substances as it burns. So we know how to launch spacecraft that are environmentally safe; where that's not being done it's politics mucking things up.

Personally, however much I want to see people go to Mars, I don't think we should send anyone until we've built a rotating space station with one ring that has Mars-equivalent spin gravity (plus one matching the moon, one matching the Earth, an since there's a gap, one with spin-grav halfway between Mars and Earth) so we can study the long-term effects of Martian gravity before playing Russian roulette with astronauts' lives. While we're doing that we'll almost certainly learn how to mine asteroids, and if NASA's analyses are correct there are some near-Earth asteroids that each hold as much rare-earth metals in ore than all the known sources on Earth -- sure, that will mean the stuff is expensive, but getting those materials from asteroids would save the Earth a lot of grief. Of course there's a bonus: in refining out the rare earth metals, all the other metals in those asteroids can also be refined out, and by putting some factories in orbit with that space station a great deal of what we might launch from Earth could be built in space, including a rotating ship that would never land, just carry people from Earth to Mars.

 

[Harke the Boeotarch]

Personally, however much I want to see people go to Mars, I don't think we should send anyone until we've built a rotating space station with one ring that has Mars-equivalent spin gravity (plus one matching the moon, one matching the Earth, an since there's a gap, one with spin-grav halfway between Mars and Earth) so we can study the long-term effects of Martian gravity before playing Russian roulette with astronauts' lives. While we're doing that we'll almost certainly learn how to mine asteroids, and if NASA's analyses are correct there are some near-Earth asteroids that each hold as much rare-earth metals in ore than all the known sources on Earth -- sure, that will mean the stuff is expensive, but getting those materials from asteroids would save the Earth a lot of grief. Of course there's a bonus: in refining out the rare earth metals, all the other metals in those asteroids can also be refined out, and by putting some factories in orbit with that space station a great deal of what we might launch from Earth could be built in space, including a rotating ship that would never land, just carry people from Earth to Mars.

Is that going to happen in our lifetime? The first manned Moon landing was over half a century ago.

 

[NotHardUp1]

No. Any attempt at industrial human occupation of asteroids or the Moon or Mars is going to end in instant death when some unplanned event, or simple failure happens. Because we went to the Moon and stayed for mere days, suddenly there's the presumption we can get by with leaving crew there for months like our ISS. It's much more dangerous that far out, to say nothing of Mars.

Once a crew dies a horrible death like that, it will make the US flight from nuclear power look like a quiet checkout line at the library.

 

[Harke the Boeotarch]

No. Any attempt at industrial human occupation of asteroids or the Moon or Mars is going to end in instant death when some unplanned event, or simple failure happens. Because we went to the Moon and stayed for mere days, suddenly there's the presumption we can get by with leaving crew there for months like our ISS. It's much more dangerous that far out, to say nothing of Mars.

Once a crew dies a horrible death like that, it will make the US flight from nuclear power look like a quiet checkout line at the library.

It could be done. But after the Sovjet Union had ceased the pissing contest was over.

 

[Kulindahr]

Is that going to happen in our lifetime? The first manned Moon landing was over half a century ago.

The first manned moon landing was untried technology -- tested to death, perhaps, but tests and the real thing are different. Today's rockets rely on a half century of learning, which means things can move much faster than back then, as SpaceX is showing.

Will it happen in our lifetimes? It certainly could, especially if it starts looking like China is getting ahead of the West. The smart thing would be to get as many nations involved as possible, but that's a decision that won't be made on the basis of what's good for the mission but on political concerns, e.g. not letting China get a look at current U.S., (British) Commonwealth, and EU technology; since my political fortune-telling is confined to guessing what new presidents will be like based on their previous lives, I won't even venture a conjecture on the matter other than to note my doubts that any of today's leaders have the vision necessary to propose such a thing, so while we ought to be getting started on building a test-bed rotating station suitable for providing one-g spin-gravity, starting with low rotation and slowly working up while Biden is still in office, I doubt anyone will even entertain the idea until SpaceX has shown the ability to get the materials into space at a tenth of the cost per kilogram as the Shuttle. Right now a test station could cost $300 billion (if Russia was still launching missions), but if the Starship cargo version proves as capable as envisioned it could be done for a third of that or less. Presently there are at least fifty ( ! ) companies working on anything from modules to an entire station, at least three of which are aiming for rotating versions -- notably Orbital Assembly Corporation with its intention of a tourist destination and later a commercial station and the Gateway Foundation's Von Braun Rotating Space Station--

with an outer ring primarily for tourists and other temporary lodging and an inner ring for research. They're all kind of waiting on SpaceX at this point due to the promised decrease in launch costs, so while various plans call for starting construction in 2024 or 2025 those are subject to being pushed back. I expect to see at least one of these begun by 2030.

 

[Kulindahr]

No. Any attempt at industrial human occupation of asteroids or the Moon or Mars is going to end in instant death when some unplanned event, or simple failure happens. Because we went to the Moon and stayed for mere days, suddenly there's the presumption we can get by with leaving crew there for months like our ISS. It's much more dangerous that far out, to say nothing of Mars.

Once a crew dies a horrible death like that, it will make the US flight from nuclear power look like a quiet checkout line at the library.

Crew deaths didn't stop Apollo or the shuttle, and given that corporations are planning space stations, Moon bases, and asteroid mining, loss of one crew will just mean a pause while the occurrence is studied in order to improve safety.

Once SpaceX is running Starships to LEO, geosynch, and the moon, Musk's intent is to have one ready to launch on a few hours notice to do rescues. He's talked about a fuel station in orbit so if there's an emergency on the moon that rescue vehicle can refuel in LEO an boost faster to the moon. And with China planning to build a base on the moon and one on Mars, the U.S., EU, Japan, and others aren't going to let them have it all to themselves.

And human nature is odd; it's entirely possible that some accident on the moon will result in more support for exploration.

 

[NotHardUp1]

While America poured money into NASA via Apollo and then the shuttle, she didn't invest in sustainable clean energy, key infrastructure, or mass transit.

It is still true that we cannot have guns and butter. The Russians are about to revolt once they have to pay for the Ukrainian War in an era in which they have grown accustomed to affording more material goods.

We pressed on into Apollo as a miltary competition, and even today, NASA's biggest customer is the US military.

The pace of space exploration is going to be much slower than futurists depict, and that crawl will make it a ready target in the face of economic realities.

The increased costs of global warming and associated climate disasters will continue to increase and become the priority it should have been all along. Space won't be the answer to that. Ocean exploration, desalinization, fossil fuel replacement, aquaculture, and EMP hardening are going to become immediate crises outpacing space dreams.

All that before we address the widely known brain drain that is occurring in aerospace as a smart generation retires and a much less motivated, less-accomplished generation shrugs and declines to work to achieve the same technical skills in America.

 

[Peloso]

I read something by a former astronaut about why we shouldn't worry about the rich and powerful escaping into space while the rest of us burn. It described the tremendous difficulties space travel poses on our bodies. Just taking a shit is an arduous undertaking. And the food absolutely sucks. Unless there's a KFC on Venus, I can't imagine someone like Trump putting up with that.

As for the general population, we couldn't get half of them to put on a surgical mask two years ago. What makes you think they will happily spend the two hours it takes to put on a spacesuit?

 

[Harke the Boeotarch]

All that before we address the widely known brain drain that is occurring in aerospace as a smart generation retires and a much less motivated, less-accomplished generation shrugs and declines to work to achieve the same technical skills in America.

What generation are we talking about?

 

[Alistair]

Crew deaths didn't stop Apollo or the shuttle, and given that corporations are planning space stations, Moon bases, and asteroid mining, loss of one crew will just mean a pause while the occurrence is studied in order to improve safety.

Once SpaceX is running Starships to LEO, geosynch, and the moon, Musk's intent is to have one ready to launch on a few hours notice to do rescues. He's talked about a fuel station in orbit so if there's an emergency on the moon that rescue vehicle can refuel in LEO an boost faster to the moon. And with China planning to build a base on the moon and one on Mars, the U.S., EU, Japan, and others aren't going to let them have it all to themselves.

And human nature is odd; it's entirely possible that some accident on the moon will result in more support for exploration.

We’ll have long destroyed the biosphere before we’re ready to send mass people into space. All the space trash will insure that, with the biggest culprits SpaceX and StarLink, and the Chinese. Elon refuses to set StarLink orbits that won’t interfere with other satellites. They’ve even had to move military satellites to keep from running into a starlink. I doubt the Chinese are trying to avoid collisions either.

So the 8 billion plus people will be stuck on earth for a very long time. The only hope for the future is that the space Junk will form rings around the planet.

 

[NotHardUp1]

What generation are we talking about?

Not strictly a single generation, but the aerospace industry has spoken for two decades about the growing brain drain, and has raised the alarm for STEM careers.

But, the type of engineer who toiled away at NASA or a private company in the 50's, 60's, or 70's was a different type of person than the typical workers today. Talk to anyone in the sciences. You're seeing more quality escapes and failed processes. People are both lazy and sloppy in increasing numbers, and it's resulting in losses and failures.

 

[NotHardUp1]

And the food absolutely sucks.

The peanut butter Space Food Sticks were ok, as long as you like flour mixed into your peanut butter.

 

[Harke the Boeotarch]

Not strictly a single generation, but the aerospace industry has spoken for two decades about the growing brain drain, and has raised the alarm for STEM careers.

But, the type of engineer who toiled away at NASA or a private company in the 50's, 60's, or 70's was a different type of person than the typical workers today. Talk to anyone in the sciences. You're seeing more quality escapes and failed processes. People are both lazy and sloppy in increasing numbers, and it's resulting in losses and failures.

Could it be the ever expanding need for formal education that is in their way?

 

[peeonme]

Let's Put Everybody into Texas

www.zo.utexas.edu

perspective...

 

[NotHardUp1]

Could it be the ever expanding need for formal education that is in their way?

In America, it would be more the case that degrees mean less mastery than they did decades ago. There has been a broad weakening of education across the board.

And be very sure, the engineers that put Voyager, Mariner, and Apollo into space were degreed.

If you mean the newer generations cannot afford college, that's simply not true. The best of the class still get full scholarships, and PELL grants pay for up to 50% of a poor student's annual costs. Much has been said about the skyrocketed cost of college education, but that is a worst-case scenario, pricing at prestige schools instead of adequate pricing at community and state colleges. The hype also ignores the financial aid given to the best students, which can be very generous indeed.

Sadly, there has been a history of abuse with federal academic programs and job re-training vocational assistance. In Albuquerque, I personally listened to "homeless" people brag about taking single courses, getting aid, and free laptops, which were really folks scamming the system.