Comments by "Winston Smith" (@kryts27) on "Why Musk Is Wrong About Mars" video.

  1. Ah, solving our problems on Earth is morally correct but practically impossible. Have about 180 governments agreed on anything significant? No? Quad erad demonstrandum. So starting afresh on Mars, especially if you are first there seems workable. One-nil to Musk. But Mars is very inhospitable, with no oxygen, little water, average surface temperture of -65 degrees celcius, while it's surface has global dust storms every three years, ancient barren soils with strange chemistry (Mars may smell like gunpowder) and is bathed in deadly cosmic ray radiation because of thin atmosphere and no magnetosphere. One-all. Lastly, it takes enormous amounts of resources and fuel to go into Earth orbit, fly to Mars (over a 6 month period) and go into Mars orbit and land (much of the fuel is burnt in the early stages). Over 50 years ago, NASA spent 318 billion dollars to build the technology and land just 12 humans on the moon using the Apollo Program. Musk's Starship vehicles are not any notable improvement over 1970s technology (except in computer guidance). Not cheap, never available to even a millionare. We can assume getting to Mars will be equivalently more expensive. 2-1 to common sense. Game over.
    1
  2. I disagree that AI is a technological improvement. Without safety algorithms (e.g. Asimov Robotic Laws) humans are very vunerable to it.
    1