[dennisgorelik]

The main reason why practically nobody gets cryopreserved is that Cryonics is a form of scientific scam.

It sells people confidence that their mind can be preserved by freezing it.

http://aidevelopment.blogspot.com/2008/12/cryonics.html

That said, the author seems to be a true believer in Cryonics (however that does not make Cryonics legitimate).

The article has interesting points, but cannot really be trusted, because of multiple outrageous statements.

For example, the author states: "In hindsight, it seems clear that if humanity had decided in 1939 to colonize space, instead of ... war [WW2], we would have ... very likely self-sustaining outposts on the moon and Mars."

As of today, the humanity does not have self-sustaining outposts even in Antarctica. Self-sustaining outposts on Mars are totally unrealistic in the next 100 years. Not only because of technological impossibility, but mostly because of no need for that.

The bottom line: the author is unrealistic dreamer. His ideas might be unusual (which is good), but it's better to be very skeptical and not to trust these ideas by default.

[philwelch]

That WWII reference is especially ignorant. The vast majority of the West spent the entire 1930's trying to choose peace over war. They tried so hard to choose peace over war that when a handful of dictators chose otherwise, they stayed out of their way until the very last minute. It's very ignorant for someone today to accuse people of the pre-WWII era of not trying hard enough to avoid a war, when all of those people saw firsthand the horrors of WWI and for that very reason, tolerated military aggression against other countries as long as possible. In retrospect, the consensus seems to be that the Allies spent too much time avoiding the war, not too little[1].

And even if you include the people of Germany, Italy, Russia, and Japan into the mix, you're making a fallacy about how people actually behave. It would have taken prescience people didn't have, back in the 1920's, to prevent the rise of the dictators of the 1930's. That's how history works.

[1] The only dissenting viewpoint to this that I give any credence is the idea that appeasement was necessary as a delaying tactic so the allies could build up their militaries to match the Germans.

[adrianN]

I don't think (mostly) self sustaining outposts on the Moon and Mars are technologically infeasible. See for example the studies Robert Zubrin did for NASA.

Whether there are sufficient economic incentives to actually build them is unfortunately a different question.

[dennisgorelik]

It's technologically feasible to send a mission to Mars.

It's unfeasible to have self-sustaining colony on Mars.

Mars Direct proposal does not even try to cover self-sustaining part.

[adrianN]

Actually it does, at least as outlined in his book.

[jarek]

Hm... 100 years ago controlled heavier-than-air flight had barely been invented. Do you think it would have been accurate to think then that in 100 years, essentially permanent outposts crewed by several people in modules flying 350 kilometres above the Earth would be unrealistic? Not only because of technological impossibility, but mostly because of no need for that.

[dennisgorelik]

There was (and still is) an obvious need for fast transportation.

There is no real need to live on Mars.

To understand that try to understand first why Antarctica is still not inhabited.

[vorg]

Antarctica IS inhabited (for my definition of "inhabited").

Perhaps the first bases on the Moon and Mars will be small Antarctic-like ones, from every big country on Earth. Perhaps Mars will never be "terraformed", instead the enclosed bases will slowly expand to accommodate expanding populations. Some people on Earth already live totally indoors, and in the future, many Asian cities in polluted environments may have roofs outside, as well as inside, to keep the air clean.

[jarek]

Fast transportation, as needed by most humans, has very little to do with current space programs, most of which use extremely expensive and mostly single-use systems.

Again - there is no real need, right now, to live on Mars, absolutely. Neither is there a real need to live on ISS. Still we are doing it.