Difference between revisions of "What settlers would miss"
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==Animals== | ==Animals== | ||
| − | ... consume much food, and food is rare on Mars. Horses, dogs and other big pets are impossible in an early colony. Possibly, the settlers can afford some small herbivores as pets. | + | ... consume much food, and food is rare on Mars. Horses, dogs and other big pets are impossible in an early colony. Possibly, the settlers can afford some small herbivores as [[pets]]. |
==Meeting new people== | ==Meeting new people== | ||
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==See also== | ==See also== | ||
*[[Motivation]] | *[[Motivation]] | ||
| + | *[[Morale]] | ||
[[Category: Human Considerations]] | [[Category: Human Considerations]] | ||
Revision as of 15:13, 29 November 2008
What settlers would miss are a lot of things. Especially in the beginning of a colony on Mars the settlers have to face a whole lot of limitations. The new colony is small, little comfortable, and the recollection of life on Earth is strong. The settlers will automatically compare their old and their new life.
In case of a manned one-way mission the old life is unrecoverable gone, but the memory is still alive. Making Mars a new home requires some considerations about the things the settlers would miss.
Traveling
... is dangerous and expensive. Probably the whole life of most settlers would be spent inside the local settlement. The settlers will have to work hard just to keep themselves alive, managing food and energy to make ends meet. Traveling around the planet would consume large amounts of energy, and the new colony can not afford this.
What might help here is a selection of settlers with respect to their personal disposition about traveling. A person who is not interested in traveling on Earth will have no problem with this constraint on Mars.
Blue sky
The Martian sky is red, which can hardly be changed. The coloring of the settlement's rooms can help to counteract the desire to see the familiar blue sky.
Forest, sea, meadow
Wild nature can hardly be placed in a Martian colony. Like in Biosphere 2 some parts can be implemented in large greenhouses. Trees are hardly to grow in a regular greenhouse. Although the effort to build greenhouses with a height of more than 10 meters is disproportional high, it might be worth.
Large greenhouses are necessary anyway. The combination of greenhouse area and living area in the settlement may have a comforting effect on human beings.
Animals
... consume much food, and food is rare on Mars. Horses, dogs and other big pets are impossible in an early colony. Possibly, the settlers can afford some small herbivores as pets.
Meeting new people
... will occur maybe once in a decade, when new settlers from Earth arrive. Seeing the same faces day by day may pose psychic problems. Access to the terrestrial internet and regular video messages might be of high value.
