Slashdot Mirror
Mars One: Final 100 Candidates Selected
hypnosec writes "The Mars One project has picked the final 100 candidates for the next round of the selection process. Initially, 202,586 people applied and ultimately around 40 will undertake a one-way trip to Mars. “The large cut in candidates is an important step towards finding out who has the right stuff to go to Mars,” said Bas Lansdorp, Co-founder & CEO of Mars One. “These aspiring martians provide the world with a glimpse into who the modern day explorers will be.”
Have they ever put out a viable plan to reach Mars? Why are we re-printing this crap?
I know the idea of going to Mars is pretty awesome but this just reeks of scam. They are claiming they will launch the first people by 2024, a mere 9 years from now. You will note that except for a Donate link there is no mention of funding. They even say "No new technology developments are required to establish a human settlement on Mars", which is demonstrably false.
Why is slashdot giving scammers like this the time of day? This is not a real mission to Mars. This is not even a credible attempt at one. There is no funding, no realistic plan, no details, no technology development, and nothing else that should even give the slightest hint that this is anything more than a scam.
I hope she made the final list.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
But...I can't decide if that bothers me or not. The sheer *audacity* of this project impresses me. I kind of want to see it happen.
Unfortunately, the mission is basically a death-sentence for the people involved. And not because of the one-way nature of the mission, but because the people behind this don't have a clue. I would be amazed if anybody actually made it to Mars alive. Hell, I'll be amazed if they make it into space alive.
Can't help but think of douglas Adams when i read about this venture: These tales of impending doom allowed the Golgafrinchans to rid themselves of an entire useless third of their population. The story was that they would build three Ark ships. Into the A ship would go all the leaders, scientists and other high achievers. The C ship would contain all the people who made things and did things, and the B ark would hold everyone else, such as hairdressers and telephone sanitizers. They sent the B ship off first, but of course the other two-thirds of the population stayed on the planet and lived full, rich and happy lives until they were all wiped out by a virulent disease contracted from a dirty telephone.
These people will be collecting Social Security long before any rocket to Mars happens, and if not, NASA or the governments that fund the project, will choose professional astronauts.
Really, it's a "fun" thought, but simply not realistic.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
202,586 Idiots scammed out of their money.
This may sound trollish, but they got off cheaper than the average candidate who tries to go the 'work-for-NASA' route. Years of intense study (and student loans) to get the right degrees, years of kissing petty bureaucratic ass**, and an intense lifestyle that would put a physician's internship to shame? Seems that a relatively paltry application fee would be getting off light by comparison.
Not saying that the initial round of applicants were smarter, but TBH if this thing actually goes up, they had better odds of going, and at a far lower cost.
** The common saying among NASA astronaut candidates was "suck up to go up" if that helps explain things.
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
Birth is a death sentence.
When it hits the fan, and it will, you'll almost certainly see this:
"Mars One, Earthlings Zero"
I'm sorry, but your opinion seems to be wrong.
Years of intense study (and student loans) to get the right degrees
Yeah, that sucks. You get an engineering degree to go work for NASA, then they don't accept you, and you have to throw it away and go work for McDonalds.
MickeyD's, no. A more likely outcome would be a somewhat moderate salary at some manufacturer, government agency or pharmaceutical corp, or a relatively meager salary at some university. But, consider the result after all the effort and hardships put in.
Let me put it this way: I once had a junior sysadmin who was a former naval aviation officer. He had a degree in engineering, and shot for NASA but didn't make it in. The process burned him out pretty hard, and it took a couple of years for him to recover. He wound up saying 'fuck it' and went into IT, eventually reporting to me, a former USAF enlisted flightline grunt. Take what you will from that...
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
Speak for yourself. I plan on living forever. Been going just fine so far.
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
An Independent Assessment Of The Technical Feasibility Of The Mars One Mission Plan
http://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&...
Undetectable Steganography? Yep, there's an app fo
Lottery tickets are a rip off.
Fake Lottery tickets are a scam, even if they are half price.
The first 10 volunteers for open heart surgery were told they were going to die. They did it anyway, because they had nothing to lose. 1 out of the next 10 survived. Today? Heart *transplants* are done all the time.
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
I would advise people to give this a chance.
Let me clear up some things about Mars One. It is often claimed that Mars One is a scam and has no scientists, engineers, technology, timetable, suppliers or plan. This is just not true!
Scientists and Engineers:
Lansdorp received his Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering from Twente University in 2003. For five years Lansdorp worked at Delft University of Technology and in 2008 founded Ampyx Power in order to develop a new, viable method of generating wind energy.
Lansdorp is also a successful entrepreneur. Here is a ted talk about his last company.
Arno Wielders received his Master of Science in Physics from the Free University of Amsterdam in 1997. He was soon hired by the Leiden Observatory, Leiden University, to work at Dutch Space in the Very Large Telescope Interferometer Delay Line project.
Gerard 't Hooft, Nobel laureate and Ambassador of Mars One
Gerardus (Gerard) 't Hooft is a Dutch theoretical physicist and professor at Utrecht University, the Netherlands. Received the 1999 Nobel Prize in Physics.
Norbert Kraft, Chief Medical Officer, Mars One
Norbert Kraft is an American Medical Doctor with over 17 years of experience in aviation and aerospace research and development as of 2012.[1] His primary area of expertise is developing physiological and psychological countermeasures to combat the negative effects of long-duration spaceflight.[1] He has worked for the Russian Space Agency, the Japanese Space Agency and NASA.[1]
Grant Anderson, Sr. VP Operations, Chief Engineer and Co-Founder, Paragon Space Development Corporation 28 years of experience in spacecraft systems design, requirements formulation and preliminary and detail hardware design. Founded or help found 5 companies, two of which are still operating.
Time table: http://mars-one.com/en/mission...
Suppliers: http://mars-one.com/en/partner...
Technology they want to use: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M...
They don't plan to develop much of the technology themselves, they're planning to buy it from other companies mostly such as SpaceX. Most of this technology exists already. They have written statements of the companies that they are willing and able to supply these things.
Price/Funding:
All they need is the funding, and they plan to get that through broadcasting and sponsor deals. His argument is that the olympics got 6 billion dollars in sponsor deals, so wouldn't a colony/trip to mars get the same? It would certainly help them get funding if people didn't denounce it as soon as they hear the name. The mission is so cheap (6 billion dollars) because it's a one-way trip. Sending people from Mars back to earth is very expensive. Also, they're not a big wasteful government agency.
The falcon heavy for example costs only $77-135M to launch (2013). Technology has come a long way, this combined with the privatization of space has caused costs to drop significantly.
Comparison Olympics/Moonlanding:
http://www.theguardian.com/med...
According to this the 2008 olympic openings ceremony was watched by 1 billion people. According to wikipedia in 1969 (the world population was only half of what it is now, and people weren't as well connected as they are now) the moon landing had 500 million people watching. So, just imagine, how many people would watch a landing on Mars in 2023.
Other:
Not saying they're actually going to be able to pull it off, but there's no evidence that their efforts aren't sincere.
Here is a press conference that answers most of the questions you may have: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
I am aware that reddit AMA was badly received and too