Not that I WANT to terraform Mars...

Just out of curiousity, is anyone aware of a large-engineering-project
working with a complex-poorly-understood-system where
small-scale-testing-was-impossible -- that worked the first time?

"Dr. Omni" wrote:
>
> From:
> To:
> Sent: Monday, July 16, 2001 4:40 AM
> Subject: [spacesettlers] Not that I WANT to terraform Mars...
>
> > ...but how would I go about giving the place a magnetic field? It
> > needs one, if people are to run around in the open.
> >
> Not exactly. The most megalomaniac terraforming plans involve dropping
> comets in the Martian atmosphere instead of thickening it using local
> materials only. So, using that method, you could made an atmosphere
> arbitrarily thick, and block cosmic radiation with passive shielding only. A
> planetary magnetic field would not be needed in that scenario.
>
> Oh, I've just remembered that there is also a "partial terraformation" plan
> that would involve vaporizing the soil (e.g., by using a giant concentrating
> mirror in orbit) and dumping zillions of tons of carbon dioxide into the
> atmosphere. Again, you would have a thick atmosphere made up of a greenhouse
> gas. The planet would become a kind of hot, steamy planetary rainforest (or
> so the terraformers hope), were plants and genetically engineered animal
> could thrive, but where humans would have to use breathing masks.
>
> Lucio Coelho
>

--
Al Globus
CSC
aglobus@..., (650) 604-4404
http://www.nas.nasa.gov/~globus/home.html

The dinosaurs weren't spacefaring. We are. I don't think that's an
accident. Maybe we are life's taxi to the stars.