so your answer would be "no", and you agree with me completely. Humans won't be living on mars within the next 50 years, which is consistent with the interest thus-far. Thanks for your support.

...and you think that means we'll have people living on mars within 50 years?

I'm using the cross-country inconvenience to support my argument that mars ain't the next step any time soon. Nothing more.

you just listed more than 7 hours. And you're upset with my 8 hours?

Let's see, how does that go? Soap, Ballot, Jury, and Ammo?

We seem to be at Jury...and it's not going well.

What's that other one? "That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."

Hmm, what to do, what to do...?

Strat

Sorry pal, but it's illegal to pitch a tent at the gate. Besides, my television won't be very watchable with all of those big terminal windows, and I like my privacy too much given all the people.

So, for us normal humans with a 3'000 square-foot house about 30 minutes away from the terminal:

we pack into small luggage
we call the taxi
we wait for the taxi
we ride the taxi
we get to the airport early, so as to not get there late
we wait in line
we check in
we check our luggage
we walk through about three miles of airport hallway
we wait in line
we go through security
we wait in line
we walk onto the plane
we wait, for nothing
we taxi out to the runway
we wait for the previous plane
we de-ice in the winter
we take-off
we land
we taxi
we wait for an open gate
we wait in line
we disembark
we walk through three miles of hallway again
we wait for luggage
we walk to the door
we wait for a taxi
we ride the taxi
we arrive at our destination

oh yeah, we also bought the ticket and waited for our flight-time.

So, right now, as you read this, don't pretend, stand up, and go 3'000 miles in any direction. Find out how long it takes. I'm sure there isn't a plane going where you want exactly when you want it, but even if there is, all of the above takes time.

EIGHT HOURS. Do it, and wear a watch when you do.

I live in Canada. My government's actually really quite fantastic. But yeah, we do pay taxes don't we. But we also have no actual problems.

Although, while we're on the topic, most of the wonderful fun-driving roads in the U.S. were built as a make-work project back when there were no jobs and the government just paid people to build roads from nowhere to nowhere. That sounds pretty socialist to me.

In any event, there are school shootings and riots in the streets on a monthly basis. That's just embarassing.

we have not had people travel through space -- i.e. to the moon or to orbit. No human has gotten up and gone.

What we've had is about thirty thousand humans get up, to send five humans. Much like your arm is attached to your body, those astronauts are attached to the space program, and hence to the ground.

Your hand can move around seemingly freely around your body, but only within the range of your arm. Sending your hand even thirty feet from your body is a much more difficult task.

That's what I'm saying the trip to mars really is. Orbit and moon don't have significant communication delay. So you can ask for help and you can get it. Advice, opinion, analysis. "Houston, we have a problem." . . . and then dead silence for a length of time long-enough that the problem has changed.

How many tries did it take to get to antarctica -- which I think is a really great example. So is everest. Congrats, after many attempts, someone got there. Who's gone back to build a house? Do you want to go build one?

stand up right now, and be 3'000 miles away within 8 hours. You can't do it. You don't live in the airport. The plane doesn't leave right now. There's a line. There're about three miles of airport hallway. The taxi isn't at your door yet. You haven't packed. You haven't gone through security. You don't have your ticket. The plane is sold out. You live thirty minutes away from the airport. The airplane doesn't take off from the gate. It's also not the next plane to take the runway.

Stop making shit up that you read in a newspaper. Get up, and make the journey yourself. Not for pretend. Do it in actuality. It takes eight hours -- in the summer.

I'd forgotten about the infinite nuclear energy. That's going to be my new example. Especially because we very much could have infinite nuclear energy, except for about six dozen cultural issues, legal issues, and our all-time-favourite deterant of civilization advancement: perceived property values.

wyoming has radiation? communication delays? nothing to see, or to do? No medical equipment?

You're pretty sure about gravity not messing with you? It takes three days to die of thirst. It takes a week to die of thirst given one extra bottle of water from the transport ship. I don't know what that gravity would do to your digestive systems.

But isn't that the point? "Pretty sure" just ain't sure enough.

Oh yeah, and the effects of the gravity can guarantee your death immediately, even if you won't actually die for another two months.

Why don't you try it, then tell me how long it takes. Remember, cradle to grave. Door to door. Not take-off to landing. Not plane door. Not airport door. House door to house door. Did you drive to the airport? Did you walk through three miles of airport hallways? Security line? Wait to taxi? Did you get there early so you wouldn't be late? Did you spend extra time packing into smaller luggage?

Right now, this instant, as you read this, if you were to stand up from whereever you are sitting and want to be 3'000 miles away, how long would it take?

Do you get to wait for the taxi? The bus? Your luggage?

It's eight hours from a residential suburb house in new york to a residential suburb house in california. And you want to go to mars tomorrow.

yeah, that's probably a good 100 years away, if not 500. Aside from dangers like radiation, nutrition, and other oh-so-subtle big things like gravity -- each of which is likely to kill a human long before they need their first water source -- there are also dangers in the trip itself, like radiation, nutrition, gravity, the vessel, going stir-crazy, and the time itself. Before all of that, there's the money, the interest, and the law. There's the communication delay, the medical equipment that doesn't exist, and the general goodbye-ness of it all. Oh, and then there's the actual "success" part -- ten failures does not a landing make. And finally, and I can't stress this enough we aren't going to mars the day after settling on the moon; and we sure as hell aren't going to mars before settling the moon.

So, figure another twenty years before ten humans live on the moon (the way they do on the space station now). Figure another twenty years before the moon is routinely stable, reliable, and worthwhile. Then figure fifty more years to actually give a damn about mars.

"eventually" appears as the heading on my to-do lists too. There's "now", "today", "tomorrow", "this week", "next week", "this month", "next month", "soon", "later", and "eventually". I think it 25 years I've yet to even start even one task from the "eventually" section.

Technology moves very quickly these days. Humans still don't. How about building a transit system that lets me get from new york to california in under EIGHT HOURS! then you can work on mars.

As much as I appreciate and generally agree with your point, I'd remind you of something Bjorn Lomborg - no stranger to controversy - pointed out: if you want to talk about a disease, you talk to a doctor, no question. If you want to talk about climate, you talk to a climatologist, again, no question.

But if you're making a value judgement - deciding which of those things is more important, or which you need to spend limited dollars fixing - NEITHER the doctor nor the climatologist is appropriate. That is rightly the realm of politics, insofar as politicians are the avenue by which the public's will is exercised.

If you actually believe that, then that is sad...

Part of the reason America exists is to break away from being ruled by people out of touch with average citizens. The idea was to have citizen leaders who would leave their private lives, go serve the country for a few years, then return home...

Instead you now have people who have never actually lived in the private sector, who know nothing about building a business, paying bills, and living within your means...

These people have spent their entire adult lives spending "other people's money", they do not know what a $10/hr job is really like, what it is like to hire and train employees is like, etc.