Zubrin's stacked arguments

--- In spacesettlers@y..., "Combs, Mike" wrote:
> From: victoriatangoman [mailto:tango_dancer@h...]
>
> If you look at some of my previous calculations, you'll see that
an
> Island 3 habitat of the far future, is going to require a huge
> infrastructure on the moon (Zubrin is right about a billion tons,
> but of course nobody would lift that from the earth)
>
> Zubrin is right that that's the correct mass for an Island 3
habitat, but
> disingenuous for leaving his readers with the impression an Island
3 habitat
> is needed to get SPS-from-space-resources started. In fact, he
doesn't call
> it "Island 3" because the very name makes the point obvious that
this isn't
> how the process is intended to start off.
>
> A Stanford Torus would mass 10 million tons, a Bernal Sphere would
come in
> at under 4 million tons, and a simple Space Manufacturing Facility
would
> mass much less still. O'Neill was happy to admit that SPS would
precede
> large, Earth-like
> habitats, and not the other way around, but Zubrin pretends not to
know this
> in order to attempt to make O'Neill's arguments look foolish.
>
> Regards,
>
> Mike Combs

Mike, I agree with you 100%. I've read Zubrin's work and I think he
is intellectually dishonest. My respect for him has plemmeted into
the cellar.

I think it is completely fine for him to be a proponent of Mars
exploration, and even for him to critic space settlement, but to
purposely misrepresent the facts in order to knowingly mislead
people is just dispicable.

I enjoyed his scenario for Mars Direct. He should argue for it to
stand on its own legs. If he feels that he needs to demolish
O'Neill's vision, then he should argue his point forcefully, but
HONESTLY. I could respect a critic who actually points out flaws in
O'Neill's vision. Nothing wrong with that.

As it is, Zubrin's lack of ethics and character on this issue leads
me to denounce his vision to who ever I can. Which is a shame,
because I think a Mars Direct mission would be soooo much easier to
implement with a space manufacturing infrastructure in place.

I see him as a man who is so blinded by his vision, that he's sold
out his intellectual ethics, in order to gain any little support,
from an uninformed public, all to accelerate his own personal
prospects for going to Mars. I wonder how he would react if a Mars
Direct mission did go ahead, but without Zubrin on board. It'd be
interesting to see the character of the man then. We'd see how
strong the cult of personality was, wouldn't we?