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Plan for Privately-Funded Moon Base
Anonymous Coward writes "Check out The Artemis Project. A project to have a self-supporting moon base and commercial flights within a decade. According to the FAQ, the project will be paid for by 'shameless commercialism'." The project's leaders say their approach is nothing like D. D. Harriman's, but more along the lines of P.T. Barnum.
In all seriousness, who owns the moon?
No one. The 1967 Outer Space Treaty prevents nations from making claims of soverignity on the Moon and other celestial bodies. Thus, those who claim to own part or all of the Moon are frauds: there is no government that recognizes their claims, no registrar of deeds with whom to file claims, and no court to arbitrate disputes.
(It should be noted that the U.S., and most other countries, rejected a far more restrictive treaty, the "Moon Treaty", in the late 1970s. This would have required any exploration and development of the Moon to serve "all mankind" and would have essentially made commercial development impossible. The treaty was not ratified by the U.S. Senate after a strong lobbying effort by the L-5 Society, a predecessor of the present-day National Space Society.)
That said, property rights in space is a thorny issue today, since many advocates of commercial development of space see the inability to claim recognized property rights on other bodies as a major hurdle. This will become a major issue down the road as commercial space efforts involving the Moon, asteroids, and other bodies ramp up.
" 3) completely pointless - if they tried to use the moon for population-control, like they did with the American West, they'd quickly find out that the moon does not have that much room... neither would have Mars, by the way."
:)
I haven't heard that anyone viewed the American West as population control, more like a whole bunch of people who didn't care for the stuffed shirts back east and wanted their own land came out here on their own -- then populated it like mad rabbits.
Also the issue has nothing to do with the size of Moon or Mars. Both have surface areas comparable to Earth's given the large percentage of water surface here. And we don't build *on* the Moon, we build *in* the moon, and that makes for a huge amount of room indeed, potentially.
But you are absolutely right that space in general is useless for population control, just as America was for Europe. You simply can't pack up and ship off as many people as are born each day, so it will never work for that.
It is *NOT* pointless however. First, sheer tourism -- rich people will pay a lot of money for exclusive vacations. Especially if rumors spread about sex in low gravity. Second, science will progress a lot from having more than one set of planetary data, and several observation points on the universe. Specialized enviroments like microgravity and cheap high vacuum labs also help. Third, it's great insurance for the human race to have independent colonies scattered about the solar system. Fourth, people with heart trouble, e.g., are likely to live a lot longer in low gravity. Fifth, though you can't control population, having those who hate the system most leave for space will reduce tensions. Sixth, its something those crazy humans *will* do, better get used to the idea.
Ahh, it was The Man Who Sold the Moon. Duh.
Good story.
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this place has a lot to work out. they don't say anything about having help from nasa (which scares the crap out of me) or of what their infrastructure will be. as i looked through the site i notice things like 'space control', 'fusion power on the moon', and 'luna for the disabled'. yet a look into the links for infrastructure reveal a blank page. i'm not a tree hugger or anything but i'd like to be reassured that they aren't going to build a landfill on the dark side of the moon or jetison all their trash into space. as it is, what will saftey be like? laws? no one has soverign control of the moon, therefore the a private lunar colony will be much like the internet, built on good intentions but ultimately ungovernable and a relatively dangerous place to live. i don't think that i would want to go somewhere where there is no true way to stop someone from destroying an air-processing factory. i think that artimis has a lot of thinking to do, and i wouldn't expect for this to take off for closer to 50 years than their anticipated 10. america went to the moon in under 10 years but were we prepared to colonize in that amount of time? no. do we have a vehicle (aside from the saturn v, which are no longer manufactured) that is capable of reaching the moon and returning? no. it's taken us close to 30 years to come up with a feesable *idea* on how to colonize something like mars. this colony is for scientists, nasa isn't even worrying about the commercial possibilities. scientists will wear the same clothes for 3 months and live in a room the size of a phone booth, will workers and colonists? probably not. i'm afraid that if this happens in their projected 10 years, we will be hearing within a year that the project will be evacuated or that all of the colonists are dead due to some 'unanticipated problems'. i don't mean to seem pessimistic, but, well, there it is...
Hasn't Artemis been around for absolutely AGES now? I have a feeling that I read about it in a forum somewhere on Slashdot....
Yes, Artemis has been around for a number of years, and I'm not aware of any recent developments that would make it especially newsworthy.
Having said that, when it started it did look rather 'Pie in the Sky', but these days they are looking in a much more credible position!
The Artemis folks have been working hard to refine their mission concept, but I don't know if it's that much more credible now than in the recent past.
The problem with this and other commercial space ventures is the difficulty raising capital. For example, look at the companies developing reusable launch vehicles. Their costs are much lower that Artemis' costs (up to an order of magnitude less) and they have a well-defined market (launching commuications and other spacecraft into Earth orbit.) Yet they have had considerable difficulty raising funds: Rotary Rocket needs "only" $150 million for its entire development process, including building its first flight vehicle, yet has raised only about $30 million.
(Admittedly, the uncertainly in the size of the market for satellite launches, exacerbated by the recent Chapter 11 filings by Iridium and ICO, have made it difficult to show investors that these are viable businesses. This only compounds the problems for Artemis, though.)
Given the current state of venture capital, Artemis might find the most success by billing itself as a unique .com e-commerce startup and watch the VCs stumble over themselves to give it money! :-)
I'm amazed that (at least as of the time I last hit reload) nobody has mentioned the thing that will really make space profitable. It isn't advertising and tourism. It's manufacturing and mining. There things that just can't be made on Earth that can be made in free fall (in Earth orbit). The problem with making stuff in Earth orbit is getting raw materials up the gravity well. If you make things in lunar orbit, and get raw materials from the moon, it gets around most of this problem. There are some other advantages to making some things in space/on the moon. You get all the vacuum you want, and near-absolute-zero temperatures. Vacuum and very low temperatures are expensive to maintain on Earth. And lastly, there's no environment to damage. You can dump all the toxic waste to want, and it can't hurt anyone.
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This space unintentionally left unblank.
Remember, right now they have no product. In fact they'll probably have no product for many years to come. They say they're in no hurry and will wait for the technology needed. That's fine. The technology and the little details will be worked out as things go along. Right now they need the money which is why they ask you to join.
Ask yourselves this, though. How many companies are formed at this stage, but never make it to the "delivering the product" stage?
It needs money.
It needs well thought out details.
It needs a product.
It's vaporware.
Stephen
Still... It would be nice...
Artemis is not the only effort devoted to going to the Moon and making money, although their plan is arguably the boldest. Some other companies with lunar projects:
These and some other commercial lunar projects were discussed at the first Commercial Lunar Base Symposium in Houston in July. This article has some more details about the conference. Those in the Los Angeles area might want to check out the Space Frontier Conference, Sept. 23-26, where commercial lunar efforts will be one of the topics.
Just planting a flag does NOT make the land your territory if you've already signed a treaty agreeing not to claim it. The USA made just such a commitment when they signed the Outer Space Treaty of 1967.
/peter
Who owns Antarctica? It's the same thing. The Antarctic Treaty guarantees that no country will claim it.
There's a good summary of the Outer Space Treaty at wisc.edu
The full text of the treaty is available here
Um.../WHY/ do we want to go to the moon and all?? Is there any practical reason? I don't understand this. Why would anyone want to pay to live in a bubble in the middle of a freezing desert (on one side, and the other a boiling desert) with no atmosphere and a life span of a few seconds after exposure???
-stumped
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
Artemis is primarily the goddess of hunting (ESR's Geeks with Guns might be modern equivalents to this Chick with Bows...).
/.ing to all.
The real goddess of the moon is Selene (look out for "Selenium" in Medeleiev's table). Pale, thin woman with long black hair - the contrary of healthy, athletic Artemis.
However it is true that those two goddesses have often been confused, even in antiquity. This may come from the former identification of her brother Apollon (god of light, sports and music, among others) with Helios (god of the Sun - ever noticed all those sun-related words that begin with "helio" ?), although those two guys are also different gods with different genealogies and all that.
This may explain why those stupid Romans, when they adopted greek mythology, mixed both Artemis and Selene into one single woman - known as Diana, goddess of hunting and of the moon.
BTW, ever wondered where the word "Dianetics" comes from ?...
Try to guess what they're hunting after !
Thomas
Happy
PS: If you're a student of French or any other latin language, mythology can be quite a funny way to improve your vocabulary : many Greek gods - and nearly all Roman gods - have names that can be found in many words of these languages.
NASA is completely unable to get funding to initiate (or follow through) on this sort of project, period. TYhe only way this could _ever_ happen is if it was privately funded. The key is to make it exciting and sexy enough so that people will want to dump TONS of money into it... As a private venture, it cannot be as bloated and as costly as previous government space projects, or it will surely fail.
I will wait to see how this works out, this is definitely something to watch. Also, I wouldn't be surprised to see competitors spring up if this thing looks like it will actually fly (in a financial sense, that is).
Picture it: A far-off shot of the moon base, cuts to a close up of one of the satellite dishes. "Drink Coke", emblazoned vividly on the dish, competes with the "Reebok" emblem on the side of the lunar rover sitting next to it.
WOO!!
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Some things I've noticed while looking around their site:
1) Their primary purpose is to make money (and to "have fun"). I don't know if I'd want to go to a moon base made by someone wanting solely to make money. I wouldn't put it past some managers (who will stay safely on Earth) to cut corners somewhere. And something like that would be disasterous. Their official policy:
To keep costs under control, the spacecraft are built using commercial aircraft standards and procedures.
I don't know if that's good or bad. Are aircraft standards good enough for spacecraft? A spacecraft can't just land somewhere if something goes wrong. OTOH, most all airplane flights have no problems (except maybe delays at airports).
2) Having a lunar colony created by a corporation is not too far fetched. The first European colonies in America were funded by corporations. Unfortunately, the first English colony, Roanoke, was a miserable failure -- everyone was gone (presumed dead) a few years after they arrived. Jamestown (the second attempt) also had a bad record with many people dying the first winter.
3) The lunar colony won't succeed until people have a good reason to leave Earth (i.e. escape a big brother government). Right now, I don't think we have that sort of intolerable situation.
Overall, I think it's a good idea (in principle). One must be wary and not but one's complete trust in this particular company until they prove themselves.
"Save the whales, feed the hungry, free the mallocs" -- author unknown
Hmmmm... moon advertising. I wonder what it would say... "If you lived here, you'd be nowhere near home by now!"
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I read through many of the questions in their FAQ, which immediately threw more questions into my mind. The people involved in this project seem to have a good level of knowledge with regards to space travel and the physics behind it. This is good, of course, since I'd certainly want qualified people if I was going to take this sort of vacation.
;))
But where is the business model? I saw estimates for the feasibility study, project design, and testing. A couple year span is given for each. Where are they getting these numbers? Since they estimate the project to run over a billion dollars, where do they plan to get the capital?
And who's going to risk providing venture capital without a solid plan? They say that they plan to make an immediate profit through the entertainment angle. Well that's fine and dandy, but there is no mention of the overhead associated with doing this. This isn't like a standard vacation. You need lawyers to deal with possible accidents. Special security people would need to protect the enclosed environment from some nutcase going postal.
In short, private enterprise has pros and cons. They avoid the overhead of a government project. However, the people they will be transporting do not have the same level of expertise, trustworthiness, and professionalism as traditional astronauts. This adds to the expense.
Don't get me wrong - I think it would be a beautiful thing if we each had the opportunity to experience space travel. But these guys have their heads in the clouds, and really need to formulate a solid business model before they have any hope of getting off the ground (sorry that was kinda bad
Best regards,
SEAL
So, while the Artemus project will probably turn out to be a failure (although somebody will make lots of money off it anyway, because the aforementioned P.T. Barnum said something about fools and money...), I think it underscores the fact that space exploration needs to be commercialized. Turn NASA into a regulatory body, and hand off space exploration to joint projects between Universities and corporations. If the world governments wants to be a partner on some of these projects, let them pay their share, and enjoy their share of the profits/losses.
He has long been a proponent of the view that space travel will be funded privately and that ultimately, we'll have hotels in space. In fact, I believe he even had some kind of tie up with Hilton, and apparently Hilton is depicted in 2001 (can't recall it myself).
l ife02.htm
Here are some of his predictions:
http://www.suntimes.co.za/1999/03/14/lifestyle/
2012: Aerospace planes enter service. The history of space travel has repeated that of aeronautics, although more slowly, because
the technical problems are so much greater. From Gagarin to
commercial space flight has taken twice as long as from the Wright
Brothers to the DC3.
2013: Despite the understandable apprehensions of Buckingham
Palace, Prince Harry becomes the first member of the British royal
family to fly in space.
2014: Construction of Hilton Orbiter Hotel begins, by assembling
and converting the giant Shuttle tanks previously allowed to fall
back to Earth.
... so the guy that says he owns the moon owns exactly nothing.
That principle applies to everything, by the way, even things for which you've paid money --- your receipt merely gives you some likelihood of marshalling others to defend what you say is yours. There is no other meaning to "ownership", despite what any politicians, lawyers or philosophers may say. It boils down to just this single pragmatic issue.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
Humankind doesn't advance without this kind of pie-in-the-sky fantasizing by a bunch of
dreamers. It's easy to sit back and shoot down the this group's plans, but how does that
help? I believe the superpowers of the mid-21st Century are going to be the nations and
grouips of nations that move into space for commercial exploitation. Unfortunately, not
since JFK has the U.S. had a leader with the vision, the intelligence, the rhetorical ability,
and the chutzpah to ram through a $1 trillion (in today's terms) manned moon project.
Now, as technological prowess has proliferated globally, other nation-states such as
Japan, China and India have developed spacefaring ability, even as the U.S. and Russia
have backed off. Instead of a sort of Pax Americana in the skies, with U.S. space fleets
maintaining fair and free trading routes much as the British fleets did in the 19th century,
we will probably see a free-for-all with inimical, totalitarian powers like China setting up
military bases in orbit while American politicians wring their hands helplessly.
Go, Artemis!
it's = "it is"; its = possessive. E.g., it's flapping its wings.