The Case for Lunar Property Rights 387
longacre writes "Who owns the moon? In a thought provoking piece, Instapundit blogger/law professor Glenn Reynolds gives us a brief history of earthlings' discourse on lunar property rights, a topic which has stagnated since the 1979 Moon Treaty. Is it possible to claim good title on land that is not under the dominion of a nation? He goes on to plead his case for the creation of lunar real estate legislation. From the article: 'Property rights attract private capital and, with government space programs stagnating, a lunar land rush may be just what we need to get things going again.'"
Possession is nine tenths of the law. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Possession is nine tenths of the law. (Score:5, Interesting)
The investors laugh. This planet we will own, they ask, is it Earth? No? Well, then, how much is it worth? The investors explain to the Mars expert: Owning Mars-getting all the way to Mars and back-is getting to first base. In order to have a successful venture, a venture to invest in, the property must be valuable.
How valuable? $10 billion? Hardly. A successful, manned Mars mission, according to the most optimistic estimates, would take a minimum of 10 years from planning to completion. Venture capital firms, in order to justify their high-risk investments, seek a minimum of 10 times growth in their investment over five years. And they want to be able to "cash out"-to sell their initial investment if they want to. Assuming that the $10 billion would be spent smoothly over the 10 years (i.e., tying up the capital an average of five years), means that after the successful mission, Mars would have to be worth at least $100 billion in order to justify the investment of $10 billion. A hundred billion is almost $3 an acre.
Now, even after a successful, manned Mars mission, why would other investors pay the original venture capitalists $100 billion for Martian land? (Why would they even pay $100 million, or one million?) The land would be almost completely undeveloped. For anyone to invest in such a risky proposition, there would have to be a reasonable chance for the land to be worth at least 10 times as much five years later-one trillion dollars, 15 years after the beginning of the original project.
That's almost $30 an acre. Today, you can still buy range land in New Mexico for $40 an acre. And that is with Earth's atmosphere included, and substantially lower transportation and energy costs.
location, location, location (Score:5, Interesting)
So what can you do on the Moon that would make it so fabulously valuable? Beats me. The only unique resources the Moon has (exceedingly low temperatures in the shade, unbelievably good vacuum) you can also get in orbit, where you don't have to worry about any gravity at all, and can build eight-mile wide factories out of gossamer and shoe strings, if you want.
But it could happen. Suppose it turns out 1/6 gee allows you (don't ask me how) to grow perfect crystals of membrane-bound proteins fast and easy, something nearly impossible to do on Earth. That could lead to the possibility of rational design of fantastically valuable drugs, e.g. genuine cancer cures and the like. What would that be worth? Very likely far more than $100 billion. (The cholesterol-lowering drug Lipitor will have earned its inventors about $65 billion by the time its patent expires in 2010.)
Re:location, location, location (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:location, location, location (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm not seeing a lot that you can do on the moon.
Escape proof prisons beyond the rule of law (ala Gitmo)?
Re:location, location, location (Score:4, Funny)
So what can you do on the Moon that would make it so fabulously valuable?
You could mine the cheese.
Re:location, location, location (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, you may have answered that question yourself: speculative investment. There are companies (and even individuals) who can afford to throw a billion dollars away on pure speculation. Let's say there's a 50% chance the land will never be worth anything; a 49% chance you'll eventually at least recover the costs and maybe make a small profit (e.g. in a century or two when moon tourism is viable); and a 1% chance that some discovery makes the land incredibly worth valuable. It might well be worth dumping some otherwise idle capital into securing a piece of the land at dirt cheap prices just in case it turns out to be a goldmine.
The real question is, who assigns property rights? What makes them meaningful? Maybe the UN should allocate a bunch of land to each country with a reasonable claim (i.e. viable spam programme) with the caveat that they actually have to stake out their lands for their claim to be cemented. Something like placing solar powered beacons every few hundred square kilometres, and after a certain deadline other countries can start beaconing "your" land (inaction would be an indication you don't want the land). While this won't be particularly appealing to most countries due to the enormous cost involved, if someone decides to go for it (e.g. Russia) then are the US and China and anyone else interested going to sit back while other countries get internationally-recognised moon real estate?
Realistically the US would probably just block the resolution before it left Earth, but it's an interesting idea: essentially forcing a space race with a real concrete, complicated mission.
Re:location, location, location (Score:5, Funny)
I am the son of the former Nigerian Ministry for Lunar Development and I have a large sum of money held in his locked bank account...
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Re:location, location, location (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyone who invests in lunar real estate before any kind of lunar authority is established, backed up by force, is an idiot.
Re:location, location, location (Score:4, Insightful)
Hey, look, the US is planning to establish a permanent moon colony by 2020. As is China. There will be some fireworks over this, folks.
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Well... you could build a casino, with blackjack, and hookers. You know the rest.
Re:location, location, location (Score:5, Informative)
Helium-3. Lots on the moon, little on Earth. Can be used to build fusion reactors.
http://www.spacedaily.com/2004/041126084122.6pp9f0wx.html [spacedaily.com]
Re:Possession is nine tenths of the law. (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Possession is nine tenths of the law. (Score:4, Insightful)
Hence your idea actually has some merit to it. If we force people to go to the moon, and "fence off" a bit of their property this could help speed up the space industry.
Re:Possession is nine tenths of the law. (Score:5, Interesting)
Government sale of property isn't so much about raising money, it's about managing a limited resource.
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Yep. We should just let whoever wants to use any land just take it. If someone disputes a claim, they can settle it like Real Men, with an arm-wrestling match, without involviment from any sissy lawyers or bureaucrats.
Re:Possession is nine tenths of the law. (Score:4, Insightful)
Markets only work if everything is already (notionally) somebody's property. If it isn't, you don't get a market, you get anarchy. Whoever has the biggest gun wins. The moon ends up owned by competing warlords. Developed countries have moved on from there on Earth. It would be nice if we could carry those lessons thay we've learned into space with us.
Re:Possession is nine tenths of the law. (Score:4, Insightful)
10 meters of fence and the moon is mine! (Score:5, Insightful)
Bert
Who'd hate to see the moon mined for He3. We're already wrecking a planet, we should have learned something from that.
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Re:Possession is nine tenths of the law. (Score:4, Funny)
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1) Columbus wasn't the first to "discover" North America. Vikings found it about four centuries before he was even born, and nomadic people from the Asian continent were already there.
2) Columbus discovered Cuba (and thought he was in India) which leaves the entire North American Continent proper up for grabs even if you ignore #1.
=Smidge=
Re:Possession is nine tenths of the law. (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Possession is nine tenths of the law. (Score:4, Informative)
Columbus never went to NORTH america - he mostly visited Bahmas and Cuba and some of the other island there and some part of south america.
Re:Possession is nine tenths of the law. (Score:4, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Convention_on_the_Law_of_the_Sea [wikipedia.org]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_law [wikipedia.org]
Thats one of the reasons that nations with space craft on the Moon, Venus and Mars are adamant about the objects not being abandoned, similar to the US listening devices clamped onto Soviet communication cables saying who owned said super-secret listening devices.
So, for example, Mars Pathfinder is not derelict, but jetsam, flotsam or lagan which is remains the property of their original owner. The American bird that was shot down by the Navy this year, might technically be a derelict and could be salvaged legally, had it come down mostly intact.
Re:Possession is nine tenths of the law. (Score:4, Informative)
It isn't and it doesn't.
Mars Pathfinder isn't any of those four legal states - it is clearly and plainly the property of the USG. Period. This is plainly spelled out in the various treaties that address the issue.
This same principle is found in Maritime Law, where government property always remains government property unless the government specifically gives up jurisdiction. (This is the legal principle under which the US Government supervised the salvage of the Hunley - since the USG had assumed control of all CSA property at the close of the Civil War, and neither government had ever yielded title.)
The various treaties that address the topic are quite clear - in space, as on earth, government property remains government property forever unless specifically yields title.
Gravity well (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Gravity well (Score:4, Insightful)
Look at it this way. Say you're speeding above my mailbox in a low-flying plane at 300 MPH. Can you, at the moment you pass over, "just drop" a bag of dogshit onto my mailbox to express your opinion? Nope. The only way you can hit the mailbox is to throw it backwards at 300 MPH, which is pretty tough, pretty expensive if you need rockets and stuff to get that kind of velocity.
It's a little easier to hit the Earth with rocks from the Moon, because you can make use of the Earth's atmosphere; you only have to graze the atmosphere and friction will do the rest, gradually, although when you're counting on friction heating to use up a metric fuckload of kinetic energy, you may have additional problems keeping your bombs from melting and vaporizing, unless they really are just rocks.
Furthermore, the real stiff part of the gravity well is only from the surface to low Earth orbit. You can almost as easily reach the Moon from there as you can reach the Earth from the Moon. So the Lunies are going to have to extend (and enforce) their territorial claims down to within about 150 miles of the Earth's surface if they really want to be safe from reprisals. Good luck with that. Remember the Chinese ASAT test? Relatively easy to blow stuff out of low orbit.
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Let's hope so! (Score:2)
Oh God! That's all we need.
Rockets flying really slow with one of their blinkers on all the way. Those big fuel guzzling RV rockets with the little shuttles on the back. Old guys pontificating how in their day, they held their breath on the Moon - and loved it, none of this space suit crap that makes today's youth so soft! How he could have bought the Sea of Tranquility for $5.00 and look how rich he could be - especially with the malls going up,
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Hill of beans (Score:4, Informative)
In other words, property rights are unenforcable, and none of the existing governments on earth have any real say. What government is going to spend 10 billion on space hardware to settle a legal property ownership/squatting claim?
In yet other words, possession is 9/10 of the law. Go ahead and argue about the other 1/10, because you don't matter.
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That's all well and good if prop
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Any offworld settlement had better be self-sufficient, or you have much bigger problems than local authorities at your supply depot. And if it's self sufficient, who cares about some local authority hundreds of thousands of miles (and billions of dollars) away?
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Since no state can claim ownership then the property laws of that state do not apply, so any claims of private ownership under those property laws do not apply? Only international property laws can apply
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No property rights on ANY land (Score:4, Insightful)
Property is liberation (Score:5, Interesting)
In short, property rights are helpful for development and reducing poverty, even though it's not immediately obvious. That does depend on the value of land use being higher than the costs, something that's not true everywhere on Earth, let alone the moon.
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But we have that damn ego that keeps forcing us to kill and conquer and enslave. In the name of *WHAT*?
You want to play the analogy game? (Score:3, Interesting)
In short, Christianity has clearly failed even though it's not immediately obvious.
You can come up with irrelevant analogies all you like, that does nothing to prove that people do not have a HUMAN RIGHT to a home. This is a simple biological fact. Huma
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I know where you're going. You want to play the "definition of right" game. That's fine, but fails on the same point. You're talking theory and I'm talking fact. People need shelter. That ain't a theory and no amount of debate will change it.
Re:No property rights on ANY land (Score:5, Insightful)
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Because food is so cheap... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:No property rights on ANY land (Score:5, Interesting)
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2. Because it is an insanely inefficient use of land both in terms of housing and in terms of food production. In other words, it means less land for food and less food produced on that land.
3. Because we can easily create more living space with landfill, by building up, or by using land where food doesn't grow. We can't currently create 'la
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I can own land. But that's because I'm not a penniless hippie.
Thank you for saving me the time. (Score:2)
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Oh, one other thing: I want a pony, and I want it now.
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OK, let's imagine the locale where you were born.
You get 1000 sqm, as does everyone else in the region.
You each have a child...whups - now your plots are each 500 sqm, as each child is now 'entitled' to their 'fair share', right?
Oh, and the people on either side of you decided that they are going to each have 9 kids.
Since your utopian idea requires that it be reasonably close to where you were born, suddenly your plot of land is now 150 sqm. Gee, too bad if you built a house on one of tho
The year was 1970... (Score:5, Funny)
American intelligence learned of these plans. A great opportunity arose to foil them. But instead the American President, "Tricky Dick" Nixon, demurred. "Let them go ahead and paint the moon," he said.
"But Mr. President, surely the image of the Soviet Empire covering the moon..."
"After they've painted it red," said Nixon, "we'll paint the logo of Coca Cola."
The power to tax is the power to destroy (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The power to tax is the power to destroy (Score:5, Insightful)
Heinlein (Score:5, Informative)
Do rights exist if you can't assert them? (Score:2, Insightful)
Keep in mind (Score:2)
Of course some don't even bother with a fence. They just draw it on a map... a big splotch that says "MINE!"
The moon is already being sold... (Score:4, Interesting)
There was a show on this on the UK Channel Four a few months ago. The UN passed a resolution saying no country can stake a claim to the moon, but some joker realised it said nothing about individuals, and claimed it for himself. He has been selling lots on the moon for years, raking in millions.
They interviews people who have bought it, some of them are quite serious. One said she couldn't afford land for her kids on earth, but she got them something on the moon, for the future.
Re:The moon is already being sold... (Score:4, Interesting)
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From what I can remember about this guy's inconsistent logic; it seemed to depend on a loophole in international law, plus application of 19th century US property claim laws. Exactly how any nation's property laws are applicable to the moon is never explained. Particularly whe
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Nice piece if paper you have there
Wow! - Reynolds missed 1959 Antartica Treaty (Score:2)
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The question is not whether lunar rights are good (Score:3, Insightful)
The question is not whether lunar rights are good, but whether any 'property' rights in land are. The arguments against property in land are strong. When someone creates something - adds value to raw material - it's reasonable that that person should have strong rights to the object created; they've put the work in. No-one (except the Dutch) creates land. People argue that 'improving' land gives the improver the right to it, but
Property rights in land all date back ultimately to theft: through the appropriation of a resource which was common to the whole community, and making it private to one individual. Mostly, that theft has been accomplished with the aid of serious violence, often genocide. It's a basic principle of the rule of law that you can never have good title to stolen property; so you can never have good title to land.
Property in land creates persistent inequity in societies over generations, leading to highly stratified class systems and drastically reduced social mobility. It creates kakocratic societies, which reward the most dishonest and dishonourable; and it prevents communities from making efficient planning choices about their lands.
Extending what has done such drastic harm to the Earth to other planets is the opposite of good sense.
beautiful theory.... (Score:4, Interesting)
Fact is, ownership of land has zip to do with any kind of ethereal moral justification. People want it because it makes them feel safe. Other people allow it because experience shows that when people are allowed to own land they take care of it better, preserve its resources better for the future, are more agreeable to allowing others temporary and conditional use of it (instead of defending it fanatically), et cetera and so forth.
When land is held "in common" that just tends to mean a free for all where everyone grabs as much as he can of what's valuable about it as fast as he can before someone else beats him to it, with zero thought for the future. Sad fact o' life. All the lovely theories about how things ought to work, with, say, some other species, whose actions were driven strictly by pure logic, are quite nice -- but useless in practise.
Re:beautiful theory.... (Score:4, Insightful)
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The majority of humans seem to be completely at odds with humanity in general & the environment in which they exist - Seems like the vast majority lost something around 500BC that we never got back - the ability to share and live within our surrounds.
Re:beautiful theory.... (Score:4, Interesting)
It's simple (Score:5, Funny)
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Euoprean countries did this in North America too (Score:5, Insightful)
If you want to claim the moon, you have to put a fort up there. Because who cares if Joe Shmoe in Pasadena California bought the Danjon Crater for $2,500, when the Chinese put a guy up there with bazooka? Bazooka wins, end of story.
Want to claim parts of the moon? Put force of arms up there. No other way about it. Don't like this fact? Take it up with human nature and human history. This is the only way this process has ever worked
Re:Euoprean countries did this in North America to (Score:2, Interesting)
Bigger Question (Score:2)
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Spacex and Bigelow are counting on this (Score:3, Informative)
No doubt about it; Bigelow and Spacex will be pushing private ownership hard.
Re:Spacex and Bigelow are counting on this (Score:4, Funny)
Lunar colonisation is not a zero sun game.
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While were there though, why bother with nuclear reactors? Energy is hugely abundant, during daylight it's about 8-10kw per square meter, store in a thermal reservoir and your looking at round the orbit power. (Heat engines work REALLY well in space)
Sunlight and a shallow gravity well, might in and of themselves be huge resources. I'm not the fir
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In fact, my understanding is that even one built for space (zero Gs) is a none issue. Only containment is an issue.
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go there, stake a claim, defend it, it's yours (Score:4, Informative)
Put aside all the theories, bar-room lawyers, treaties that aren't worth a dam' and the fools who are willing to hand over money here on terra-firma. All that will go out of the window (or would that be viewing port) as soon as someone finds a resource there that can turn a profit. Once that happens you've got a very slow gold rush on your hands. All the people back on earth who paid for a "claim" can yell all they want, they'll be drowned out by everyone else laughing.
However the chances of anyone, or country, raising the capital to go there and set up a commercial enterprise are very small. The chances of them being able to turn whatever they find back into ca$h are even smaller and the chances of making more than the hundreds of billions they spend are infinitesimal.
That's the reason so few people live in the Gobi Desert. It's thousands of times more hospitable than the moon (or mars, for that matter) and millions of times cheaper to get to. However there's nothing there worth having.
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That applies only if you intend to go there and stay. If you plan on coming back to Earth and then selling a product you acquired from the moon, you're going to be subject to whatever laws exist in that nation or nations, on Earth.
It belongs to the Nazis (Score:3, Funny)
And in 2018, they are coming back. [ironsky.net]
My montly communist slashdot rant (Score:3, Funny)
Lunar property rights? Most people call him crazy. (Score:4, Funny)
A slight spoke in the wheels (Score:2, Interesting)
1. Some unique characteristics of each plot of land that relate to specific advantages of that land (so people will bid for the land, with the hopes of future returns to compensate for that bid, future returns being realised through an investment strategy)
2. Someone previously owning the land (so a price is set at what the bidder will pay the seller)
In this case, what form of propety allocat
I wonder if aliens have lawyers ... (Score:3, Funny)
Moon weapons... (Score:2)
How about the south pole ? (Score:2)
Let's repeat our mistakes! (Score:2)
Hey, I have a great idea, let's repeat all our mistakes on this planet on every other one we visit! First, what we do is we start right back up on the next planet with this idea of parceling land out to people as if they weren't all interconnected by being on the same planet.
I have a better idea, let's try some other models which are intended to produce a stable system instead of making life a less-than-zero-sum game, like for example when you buy property you buy property to a certain value of property;
we already have "property rights" (Score:2)
What people actually mean when they say that they want "property rights" is that they want to divide up the moon among people who then want to lean back and let other people do the hard work of exploring. In fact, that's quite analogous to patents, where people patent an application without implementing anything, and then wait for others
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Only because Thor Heyerdahl [youtube.com] chose not to plant a flag.
Antarctica strikes me as a good model that could also be used for the moon, as both are uninhabitable and relatively hard to reach. Not sure if a ban on mining would be necessary though. Would it be possible for human mining actions to alter the moon's orbit? I'm guessing not. And there aren't any ecological issues to worry about.
I wouldn't worry about companies owning stars, they'd only be able to charge for starlight that left the star after th
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When you own land you own rights to build on the surface. This usually excludes mineral rights, and does not
preclude air rights. By your "logic" the whole universe has already been spoken for.