One-Way Ticket to Mars?

ahogue writes "Paul Davies, who has written several very accessible books on physics and cosmology, proposes an interesting way to get a manned mission to Mars - leave them there. [NYTimes, free reg. req.] While it may sounds shocking at first, the financial and exploratory benefits seem to outweigh the social negatives. Any volunteers?" Reader docanime writes with some sober news: "All this recent talk about Mars rovers and orbiters has made one space fan checking out how well Mars has been deflecting and destroying the space probes. The Mars Scorecard lists all the known fly-by, orbital, and landing attempts/failures made by humans. In case you're curious, Mars is winning 20 to 16."

Parts

[panxerox]

Can't you just hook up one of my legs to a life support system and send it there? at least we will have a "part" of a man there. And I can say I have 1 foot in this world and 1 in the next.

one way ticket to mars

[sirinek]

I nominate George W Bush to be first in line. :)

"Mars needs men!"

[Anonymous Coward]

"Mars needs men!"
A few days after landing...
"Mars needs women!"

Re:one way ticket to mars

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

Send Ahnold to Mahhhs!

I'm starting a collection.

[asdfasdfasdfasdf]

Send paypal donations to [e-mail].

Please let GWB be the first volunteer!

[Anonymous Coward]

Socks!

Re:one way ticket to mars

[grub]

I nominate George W Bush to be first in line.

I would second that if it were a trip to the sun.

Re:Voting

[gyrojoe]

I doubt that Darl would go for it. Where would SCO be without his leadership?

Re:Parts

[jkeegan]

Wow.. I know we all sit in front of computers a lot, but I never thought any of us would get so used to it that we volunteered to give up our legs! :)

Re:Why do a manned mission?

[Anonymous Coward]

Think of it as Earth's hobby.

Re:one way ticket to mars

[Orion442]

By god, I think we have the new Democratic campaign slogan...

Crew suggestions

[Anonymous Coward]

• Darl McBride
  
• Gates and Ballmer
  
• Verisign (all of them)
  
• Justin Timberlake
  
• Metallica
  
• The RIAA, including Ms. Rosen
  

As for the name of the spaceship, I suggest naming it the "B" Ark.

Trouble

[illuminatedwax]

The trouble comes, of course, when the crew gets into an argument over certain marital infidelities, kill each other, and the Martians living there take in the child that was conceived in space and raise him as their own, then send him back to Earth to cause a hippie revolution of a scale that man cannot even comprehend. (or grok)

Or maybe not.

--Stephen
If it's one-way, I nominate the cast of "Space Cowboys." That was a terrible movie.

Credit Companies

[Libertarian_Geek]

Do you think it would be hard to get approved for a credit card a year before you left?

Re:Keep religion out of it.

[Lemmy Caution]

When your peeve-count reaches the 7 digits, you aren't talking about pets. You're talking about the mother of all peeve zoos.

Re:one way ticket to mars

[Anonymous Coward]

And they say Americans have no sense of Arnie...

Re:Shouldn't the ESA be 0-0-1

[Orion442]

No man, Beagle has been too busy digging up Martian dinosaur bones to bother with answering any calls. Its just what dogs do.

I volunteer...

[Anonymous Coward]

The entire United States.

Then the rest of us can get back to living again.

Re:"Mars needs men!"

[cpn2000]

9 months later ...
"Mars needs diapers!"

Re:one way ticket to mars

[FrostedWheat]

Send Ahnold to Mahhhs!

Or at least just make him *think* he had went.

Re:Keep religion out of it.

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, as a practising Satanist, I use "heaven-sent" to mean "trouble coming".

Re:Why do a manned mission?

[bloggins02]

Ummm, because Bush needs to get reelected?

Just a guess :)

Procreation!

[gfilion]

We will need to colonize Mars! Here's what I propose:

General "Buck" Turgidson: Doctor, you mentioned the ratio of ten women to each man. Now, wouldn't that necessitate the abandonment of the so-called monogamous sexual relationship, I mean, as far as men were concerned?

Dr. Strangelove: Regrettably, yes. But it is, you know, a sacrifice required for the future of the human race. I hasten to add that since each man will be required to do prodigious... service along these lines, the women will have to be selected for their sexual characteristics which will have to be of a highly stimulating nature.

Ambassador de Sadesky: I must confess, you have an astonishingly good idea there, Doctor.

Ultimate Survivor XXVII

[Shivetya]

I guess Fox can do this next.

I suggest it be a Celebrity Survivor!

Re:Would you want such a volunteer?

[(H)elix1]

Lets look into this "volunteer" thing: we are looking for a person ready to give up their whole life, move to an almost 100% barren place where he/she will soon die utterly alone!

You are right. Sending Darl is a much better idea.

Re:Sending water

[liquidsin]

These guys [buydehydratedwater.com] seem to have that problem solved already.

Re:one way ticket to mars

[tuffy]

Send Ahnold to Mahhhs!

A great idea. I'm sure he'll have all the martian secrets aired out [imdb.com] in no time.

Re:Why do a manned mission?

[EinarH]

People are living in caves you insensitive clod.

Re:Keep religion out of it.

[CGP314]

..then evidence for a second genesis would await us, providing a heaven-sent opportunity to compare two bio-systems..

Pet Peeve #1977832: I hate it when they use overt religious terms in scientific articles. Keep religion relegated to where it belongs and keep science scientific.

No kidding, if the opportunity was heaven-sent, why do we have to do all the work?


--
In London? Need a Physics Tutor? [colingregorypalmer.net]

American Weblog in London [colingregorypalmer.net]

Re:ONE WAY TICKET TO MY JAPANESE GIRLFRIENDS PUSSY

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey hey, don't hold out on us! If you're going to brag about it, the least you could do is provide some evidence in the form of video and/or pictures.

I mean, rearry. The nerve of people nowadays.

Re:Credit Companies

[AndroidCat]

Before you left? Once you landed, I'm sure that you would get postal mail from Capital One every few days offering you one.

Re:Parts

[UrgleHoth]

Its only a flesh wound.

Re:Politics

[josquin00]

No sissy robots, which can't even cook or do the dishes. No, a real, honest-to-god, white American male.

Which most likely can't cook or do dishes either... maybe not such a bad idea after all.

It worked here...

[Spacejock]

One way trip? How d'you think they colonised Australia :-) Cheers Simon

Re:one way ticket to mars

[jdreed1024]

I would second that if it were a trip to the sun.

No, no, that would be very bad. He'd come back as an evil superhero. Yeesh, haven't we learned anything from the movies [imdb.com]

Re:one way ticket to mars

[Anonymous Coward]

I nominate my sister.

actually she has dreamed of being on of the first/early people to be in a mars biodome, so its not a mean as it sounds at first. though i still wouldn't mind getting rid of her.

Re:Keep religion out of it.

[Dot.Com.CEO]

By "Hebrew" you of course mean "Greek". And by "beginings" you of course mean "birth".

Re:"Mars needs men!"

[magarity]

A few days after landing..."Mars needs women!"

If you didn't think of this until after arriving on Mars, you've been sitting in the basement reading /. waaaaaaaay too long.

Re:Hello

[DaveAtFraud]

Would that be $699 to actually visit Mars or $699 to look at something that might look like Mars but I have to sign an NDA before I get to see it? And would the same fee apply if I just want to visit a Mars-like planet in another star system?

Re:"Mars needs men!"

[digital bath]

Blue: I don't know what the technical military term is, but we're pretty fucked up down here! We need men!
Guy in ship: .....Dude, how long have you been down there?
Blue: Huh?... No, not like that!

gotta love red vs blue [redvsblue.com]. Season two's finally started.

Re:one way ticket to mars

[Pakaran2]

But it's not possible to actually land on the sun! So how can we be sure he got there OK?

Granted it's quite possible to attempt to land on the sun - is that what you're suggesting?

Re:Parts

[Inflatable Hippo]

> Can't you just hook up one of my legs to a life support system and send it there?

"This is one small step for man..."

Re:Parts

[EyeSavedLatin]

Can't you just hook up one of my legs to a life support system and send it there?

Oh sure, and play right into the Martians hands!? Lazy Martians, can't even come to Earth and collect body parts, now we've got people volunteering to send them up to Mars for them! Sheesh!

I volunteer...

[r_j_prahad]

I volunteer my boss! He's so full of hot air he could singlehandedly create an atmosphere.

Re:Would you want such a volunteer?

[Cragen]

Actually, as a "mature" /.'er (over 50), married with two kids and a wife, I might volunteer for the peace and quiet! (Though 'whack' might be an adjective that could stick to me...) I don't think I could, however, stand having to look at that Martian horizon for the rest of my life. Here's to the first Martian SysAdmin!!

cragen

Re:Why do a manned mission?

[Alzheimers]

Plus all humanity is stuck on one planet. That's bad! There are numerous things which could wipe out the entire race. But put humans on other worlds, and you begin to ensure the race has a future.

What would we call it? I dunno...the acronym for "Redundant Array of Inexpensive Planets" probably won't go over very well.

Re:Keep religion out of it.

[Tassach]

The hebrew name of the book is "Bereshit"

Which begs the question, does a Bereshit in the woods?

what's needed is misdirection!

[Tumbleweed]

Anyone who's played Missile Command knows this - we need to send probe missions out in pairs. One is a big, fat, juicy-looking decoy that we send down right around the same time the _real_ mission starts entry of Mars atmosphere. The Martians go for the decoy, and our real mission lands undisturbed.

Either that or we nuke them from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.

FIRST POST FROM MARS

[dekashizl]

Yeah I got first post!!!

Kinda laggy, but everything's looking good up here. I just found a new rock that was like a little bit redder than the other one I found yesterday. Cool.

Please send more corn.

Re:one way ticket to mars

[zaphod110676]

It's possible. It's just very warm. The safest thing to do would be to attempt to land on the sun at night.

Re:one way ticket to mars

[N3WBI3]

I nominate These Losers [sfgate.com]

I'll go

[acidrain69]

Can I bring the redhead from the OSDN personals ad?

Re:Keep religion out of it.

[CelticWhisper]

But what about a **NEON** Genesis? Eh? Eh?

...I'll shut up now.

Re:Would you want such a volunteer?

[UnifiedTechs]

Actually you could probably finance the whole deal by selling the Television rights to MTV's The Real World.

Problem is the producers would want to choose the people and we would end up with a gay guy, a guy with aids, a lesbian girl, and a hot blond bimbo.

Re:Parts

[Anonymous Coward]

If you can convince Christina Applegate (or equivilant) I will definitely volunteer!!!! Yeee-haw! Actually, send 2 super models with me, an unlimited supply of beer and weed, and of course, a shitload of snapple, I will go HAPPILY!!

Apparently it takes 20 minutes to relay information, sounds like good old BBS days to me, oh the memories it would bring back!

We should kick the USSR off our team!

[UnifiedTechs]

Without the USSR on our team the score would be Earth 11 - Mars 6. We need to send them back to the little leagues!

Re:I've thought about this

[Theaetetus]

No need - I'd do it for free. Mind you, I don't think Mars needs graphic designers any time soon...

Of course they do, right after we send up the telephone-handset sanitizers. ;)

-T

Re:Politics

[Arthur Dent]

It's not just that. When I first heard this report, I was really excited. But then I read this report [petroleumnews.com]

If there is life on Mars, it would probably be microorganisms in water deep below the surface of the planet. Dr. Geoffrey Briggs, director, Center for Mars Exploration at the NASA Ames Center, told "Meet Alaska" that NASA is looking at ways to drill on Mars to look for water -- and the life it might contain.

Briggs said NASA has been working with Halliburton, Shell, Baker-Hughes and the Los Alamos National Laboratory to identify drilling technologies that might work on Mars.

and now I'm afraid that this is just another ploy to give multi-billion dollar no-bid contracts to Halliburton.

Re:one way ticket to mars

[mcpkaaos]

Ah yes, the silent majority: a grown-up version of imaginary friends.

Re:Parts

[tamales4somalis]

I'm just impressed he said anything other than "holy fucking shit I'm on the moon!"

Lance Bass

[telstar]

I thought the one-way trip was the plan for that N*Sync guy's trip to space....

Re:one way ticket to mars

[greenstork]

Yeah, except those settlers settled in an area where they COULD BREATHE.

Re:I've thought about this

[Al Al Cool J]

Yeah. And just think how good it will look on your resume!

:-)

Re:Registration Free Link

[Tackhead]

> The people that can make it to Mars, live as long as possible and contribute to science and exploration are not neccessarily the same people that would be willing to take on such a mission.

True. But you could find a few. I'd volunteer for it, and I'd qualify. I know enough about geology that you could say "find me some interesting rocks, break them apart with this hammer, and put them under this microscope and tell me if you see anything interesting", and succeed. (I could also handle orders like "Remember rock AF41Q that you found six weeks ago? Take it off the shelf and put it in the sample return vehicle. Take rock CX29B out of the sample return vehicle, because AF41Q is more interesting.")

Anything else I need to know about geology, I could learn from watching videos and reading textbooks archived onto a set of DVDs that would accompany me during the six-month trip.

Two hours of my time (or yours, or damn near anyone else's) on Mars would teach us more about the history of wherever we landed than we've learned in the past 30 years.

> Tonight on your local cable network: LIVE from MARS; Are they still alive? Any progress with building the return vehicle? What happens between John and Mary? Do not miss their high flying sex experience!"

I'm with you on the Reality TV version of it. You could probably fund the whole mission by selling advertisements and (in states where it's legal) betting on the outcome. "Tonight! The air supply is down to 3% after the oxygen scrubbers went down in Month Six! Can our crew effect repairs in the last hours remaining? And if they can't, tonight will be the grand finale, when we find out who'll be the last one gasping? PLACE YOUR BETS NOW!"

dead

[QEDog]

Then again, didn't the first few groups of settlers die?

Yes, they all died. Have you ever met one of them? Of course not, becayse all the settlers died a few centuries ago.

Re:"Mars needs men!"

[magarity]

The 1,200,000ms ping time is killer

Don't forget, subscribers get to see the next article early.

Re:what's needed is misdirection!

[myowntrueself]

Already did that; it was called 'Beagle'

This is your boss...

[Anonymous Coward]

...don't bother coming into work on monday.

Bloodred Planet

[Doc Ruby]

Mars is teeming with an army of vampires below the surface. There's no life there, only undead. Out of the reach of the Sun's beneficient rays, the vampires merely shun the surface, the way humans shun the depths of Earth, each from primordial fear of the other. The iron content of the Martian soil provides the comfort to the biters, the way humidity comforts humans on Earth.

Now these interplanetary probes threaten the stalemate we've enjoyed for generations. A one-way trip is the only acceptable human mission, lest they bring the pestilence back with them. Meanwhile, join me in developing the sunlaser, which stores the beneficient rays of the Sun in optical storage, for discharge against the horde of biters waiting across the vacuum gap. Stake 'em and bake 'em!

Units

[Anonymous Coward]

I think it's time for a certain country to get with the program, don't you?

Yeah Canada, he means YOU!

Sounds like...

[Skadet]

Though a freeze-dried desert today, it was once warm and wet

*sigh* Sounds like my wife.

NASA interviews for the mission.

[MacDork]

NASA was interviewing professionals they were figuring on sending to Mars. The touchy part was that only one guy could go and it would be a one way trip.

The interviewer asked the first applicant, an engineer, how much he wanted to be paid for going.

"One million dollars," the engineer answered. "And I want to donate it all to my alma mater--Rice University."

The next applicant was a doctor, and the interviewer asked him the same question.

"Two millions dollars," the doctor said. "I want to give a million to my family and leave the other million for the advancement of medical research."

The last applicant was a lawyer. When asked how much money he wanted, he whispered in the interviewer's ear, "Three million dollars."

"Why so much more than the others?" the interviewer asked.

The lawyer replied, "You give me three million, I'll give you one million, I'll keep a million, and we'll send the engineer."