A report from India today (actually yesterday) indicates that our closest planetary neighbor, the Moon,may not be as harsh as previously thought.
Yes, I know this was already diaried today but why not another? This is really awesome news.
I love the sky. No really. I moved to a rural area in March of this year and by and large it hasn't been that great a transition. Except, for the night sky.
When I walk the dog at night I can see more stars then I ever saw living in the city, or even in bland-suburbtopia. I can see the Milky Way splayed across the sky. I see meteors and satellites. I like to wonder who's looking back--it'd be an awful waste of space if we were alone, I guess. That's probably the only good thing about living in the country---the sky.
I also read a lot of science-fiction, thus the title of the diary. Robert Heinlein wrote one of the best works about lunar colonization in recent history. Nothing else has really compared, in terms of stories about our Moon.
At any rate, it has long been speculated that the dark, shaded craters on the Moon, primarily at the Moon's poles, could be places where ice could form. Such ice would be a boon to colonization, as the water could be used to create air, water the colony, create rocket fuel (H3) and so on. Such ice would be, as it is on Earth in liquid form, the lifeblood of the colony. The rest of the moon was harsh. It's why Heinlein gave the book its title. There's almost no atmosphere on the Moon, for one thing and the surface temperatures are wack. Add in one-sixth of Earth gravity and you've got a harsh setting for any life, not just human.
Now in the '60s some of the lunar rocks had moisture in them. It was assumed at the time that said moisture was from the Houston air--there aren't many places in the US where the air pretty much is water most of the year-- and that was that. But as the US faltered in its space program (aside: Kepler is probably one of the best things NASA has going for it right now) those plucky Indians built their own space program, and they sent a probe to the moon and the news is just all around exciting and awesome and full of win.
What this means, to me, is:
- Colonization, if we or any other nation wishes to pursue it in the medium-term, won't be as difficult (at least, at the Lunar end). It will still be hard and hazardous, but the immediate problem of finding water to drink and turn into air any future denizen of the Moon can breathe and so on.
- The Moon can become a stepping stone for further exploration.
- Given the huge benefits the Apollo Program ended up having on technology that we all use on a daily basis (we're using quite a few right now to play on this site), perhaps a real return to space by us or some other nation could do the same, again. Think of the implications for solving the climate crisis which is important but I've yet to see really capture the public imagination beyond the current "Green" fad.
- Even IF we (we as in Humanity) don't do anything, the discovery itself may spark the imaginations of millions of children to want to be more then financial services techs and other assorted paper pushers.
Obviously there are going to be naysayers and well, that's their opinion. I'm the type to believe that as a species that naturally wants to explore, some government on Earth will make the first, abeit expensive, step.
I'm definately going to look at the Moon a lot differently when I look up at the sky at night from now on. Maybe in a century, people will be living there. That'd be totally cool.
UPDATE
here are some more links about this insanely amazing discovery:
Discover Magazine
The Moon is Not so harsh a Mistress (I see I was thinking the same title as this author--I swear I didn't see this as I was writing.)
The same satellite also determined that the moon was entirely molten. Sadly, contact was lost with the probe in late August. (this site has a lot of popups)