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Comment Re:Permanent Habitat? (Score 1) 100

If something goes wrong on Mars, you're dead. There's no rescue.

Sudden evacuation might be problematic. But with less serious problems, the lower transit time to Mars vs. Europa might be advantageous. You're dead anyway within about 24 months from the lower gravity and radiation (or suicide, if sickness doesn't get you first).

There's no experience with humans living in low gravity conditions for more than a few days. We have plenty of zero-g experience, but none that would tell us what a few months of 1/3 g would do to the human body.

Radiation is a problem, though. Shielded habitats would be a high priority. Either underground, or possibly by using water (produced on-site) as shielding.

Comment Figure out how to ... (Score 1) 392

... create genetic variety in an artificial way. Hey, if you can get _two_ people (and tons of robots) to another star system, then doing a little bit of DNA-related organic chemistry shouldn't be too hard.

In effect, for a few generations, you could introduce intentional mutations that are known to be somewhere between "marginally harmful" and "beneficial", until the gene pool is large enough that things can be left to random chance again, if the colonists desire.

Comment At some point, colonization will be ... (Score 1) 307

... de facto one-way. If there's a chance of living to a ripe old age where you're going, then voluntary one-way missions are perfectly fine, especially when they come with the opportunity to stake a claim.

If "one-way" implies using your favorite method of suicide after a few months, then no.

Comment Re:Sweet revenge (Score 1) 109

Not carrying out "eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth" (where does that come from? Possibly the WORST example of literary fairness/justice there is.

Definitely not. "One eye for one eye.", at that time, replaced the proven concept of "You stepped on my toe, so I'm going to kill you, every male in your family, rape every female in your family and kill them, too."

At that time, when ever-increasing vengeance cycles and bloody vendettas were the norm, "One eye for one eye." was a huge limitation on any punishments the injured party could dish out. And don't forget the same piece of literature also demands things like having at least two witnesses in order to sentence anyone to death and forbid the common practice of punishing family members of the offender if the latter proved to be too elusive.

Comment Re:Typical government stupidity (Score 1) 185

launch a very large rover for the moon

The moon's close enough that we shouldn't bother with rovers, unless they're left behind by acutal astronauts..

another to Venus

Venus isn't all that interesting since there's no chance for humans visiting it in the forseeable future. And a rover would only survive hours at most. However, placing an airship or balloon probe in Venus' atmosphere (where it could survive for quite a while at the right altitude) might be interesting.

Comment Re:NCSOFT Killed City of Heroes (Score 1) 64

I still think that NCSoft is somehow convinced that a bunch of ex-WoW guys are going to build a WoW-killer.

I'd be happy if they build something that has some of the spirit of CoH/CoV. Weird, colorful, etc.

I'd be even happier if they don't kill it after two years.

CoH/CoV was fun. The right thing to relax for an hour or two after work. That's not enough to see most of the "content" of WoW, and unlike WoW, combat in CoH/CoV was actually fun even if you were just beating up trash mobs on the streets.

Comment Re:Needs oversight (Score 1) 352

but I seriously doubt any jury will convict on just this evidence,

By the time a jury decides not to convict, the falsely accused has already paid quite a bit in lawyers fees and possibly had to post bail.

And there's a chance the jury might chose to convict anyway. You just need the right combination of players in the courtroom.

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