Talk:Settlement Strategies

Using a Lunar Stepping Stone

If we want to keep all various colonization ideas it makes no sense to present an idea in a deficient form. I believe that my portrayal of the to Mars by way of a lunar stepping stone idea is closer to what its proponents have in mind.--Farred 01:44, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

It should have both sides of the argument so I've added back a modified version of my text. Frontiersman 04:15, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

We should present representative arguments in favor and opposed to various strategies, within the limits of what is reasonable for an article and provide links to more thorough discussion. I would change the title from "Develop industry on the Moon and then transport it to Mars" to "Develop industry on the Moon to support Mars colonization." We will not be transporting lunar industry to Mars because different industries are suitable for Luna and Mars. Sending an operating space habitat to Mars with a solar power satellite should help.

This strategy is not just moving the problem to a different place. It is addressing a different set of problems in order to use new resources for colonizing Mars. Also it provides a ready-made market for Mars industry. I would argue that exporting volatiles to Luna would likely be economically viable, because a fully reusable to orbit launch vehicle for use on Mars should be much easier to build than one for Earth because only 20.2% of the energy needed to orbit Earth can get to Mars Orbit. The volatiles should be extremely valuable on Luna. Being continually reused, they would determine the size of lunar industry. Why do you think it would not be viable?--Farred 01:30, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

Since there has been no response as to why trade of volatiles to Luna would not be profitable, I will remove the assertion. When there is some reason for it, it can be added back.--Farred 02:30, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

You've removed far more than such an assertion. Don't remove the counter-argument to this dubious proposal. Frontiersman 21:42, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

Golden Mars scenario

The Golden Mars scenario paragraph seem to fit better in Interplanetary commerce or Earth-Mars Trade. How about keeping a more vague mining business strategy here in this article and moving the detailed gold business to one of the other articles? -- Rfc 21:10, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

It's an example for financial strategy, and financial strategy is a crucial part of colonization strategy. No money, no colony. It may well be that finance should have its own article, summarized in this one. It's about far more than commerce and trade, it's about exploring what the finances of a colony would be like and how one designs a colony based on financial constraints (with the Golden Mars scenario just being an example of such financial constraints). Frontiersman 02:23, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

It's not the only possible example, BTW. We could have "The Hacker Scenario" based on a bunch of computer programmers resettling on Mars and selling their services or code back on earth in exchange for the imports they need. Again the trade and finances are quite central to the colonization strategy that the hackers would pursue (e.g., how self-sufficient they'd have to be would be based on what imports they could afford). Frontiersman

Examples are very good for understanding, so I fully agree with you having examples in Marspedia. The more in number, the better. The more detailed, the better. What I mean is, we can use the wiki technology (links, categories, etc.) for better structuring. The article is already pretty long, which is fine so far, but it will grow even more. The strategy thing is a really big topic. So, how about creating an own article for each example, for instance Golden Mars scenario? This allows to create many more examples, each in its own article, but neatly linked to each other and to Colonization strategy and vice versa. All the example articles may then be in category:colonization business models, which I am creating right now.-- Rfc 19:51, 25 February 2010 (UTC)