[inglor_cz]

Does NASA have any planetary colonization program?

They do plan the Artemis mission, but AFAIK that is about establishing a tiny scientific base on the Moon, probably with regular exchange of the crew. I don't think they proclaimed an ambition to settle massive amounts of people there.

For me "living on another planet" is only really SpaceX's goal. Build a semi-independent nation on Mars, with a million or more people necessary.

That is very different from a scientific base project.

[zztop44]

Proclaiming things is very easy.

[inglor_cz]

SpaceX aren't just proclaiming things. They are building a skyscraper-sized fully reusable rocket with completely new engines to get away from the Earth cheaply.

[skissane]

The first crewed mission to Mars is very likely going to be a join SpaceX-NASA mission... to set up a crewed research station. Basically the same thing as Artemis Base Camp, except further away.

Yes, SpaceX wants to ship millions of people to Mars, but realistically they are several decades away from even starting that. You want to get a small permanent settlement on Mars (like a crewed research station), and get some experience with operating it, before you start sending heaps of people. And probably the initial focus will be just on growing that crewed research station (from 20 people to 200 people to 2000 people). And only then will you have enough information to really plan making it significantly bigger. I doubt we'll get there until some time in the second half of this century.

In the medium term, I think the Moon is a more realistic target for the private sector. The total cost per a person-year of a crewed lunar base is a lot less than a crewed Martian base, so you can pay for a much bigger lunar settlement for the same budget. You can also sell lunar surface tourism to the ultra-rich, and hope that economies of scale will gradually drive the price down; your average billionaire can spare a couple of weeks for a trip to the Moon, not the almost 3 years a Mars round trip would take. How about Hollywood filming on-location on the Moon? Reality TV shows? Professional sports competitions? All a lot more feasible given the much lower travel time (about 3 days) and light distance (a bit over 1 light second). I doubt any of these would be massive revenue sources (at least at first), but they'll be economically feasible long before their Martian equivalents become so.

[wolverine876]

I don't think anyone can say what will 'very likely' happen, but NASA often hires many contractors and also does much work internally (e.g., at JPL) for a major project. Also, there may be other national space programs partnering in the mission.

[skissane]

My point is - I doubt the first crewed mission to Mars will be a purely private SpaceX-led venture. Almost certainly be done in cooperation with NASA, quite possibly some partner agencies such as ESA, maybe some other firms involved too (e.g. Axiom). And that mission is essentially just going to be “Artemis Base Camp on Mars”, a long way off Musk/SpaceX’s dream of sending a million people there.

Not saying the dream won’t eventually come true, but it if it does, it will take many decades. Come 2100, I think there will be a lot less than 1 million people on Mars.

[jfyi]

...and they are building it for NASA's Artemis program. SpaceX evaporates the moment the juicy billion dollar public contracts dry up.

Mars is still a pipe dream. You might as well give the credit to Edgar Rice Burroughs for as far as realizing it has come.

[inglor_cz]

"SpaceX evaporates the moment the juicy billion dollar public contracts dry up."

So, not in the foreseeable future, given the new Space Race with China.

Ofc the government is an important customer for any launch provider (not just SpaceX), given that a lot of current space activity is military in nature. That just comes with the territory.

Edgar Rice Borroughs died before the first man-made rocket reached the orbit. Writing about Mars isn't the same as building a ship that can reach it.

I am not a native speaker of English, so I am not sure how much deprecation does the term "pipe dream" contain. But I don't think that manned flight to Mars is wild and unattainable fantasy. I would say that it is on the same level as manned flight to the orbit by 1945 - not yet here, but technically and economically feasible in a decade or two.

[jfyi]

"So, not in the foreseeable future"

I agree, but the point was they are tied to NASA and NASA's projects for the foreseeable future, not that they are going away tomorrow.

"But I don't think that manned flight to Mars is wild and unattainable fantasy"

It wasn't too long ago you were talking about colonization. So which is it? Colonization or a manned flight?

Yeah I believe a manned flight is possible. If we were really motivated it would have been possible before my lifetime, certainly before SpaceX.

Colonization is leaps and bounds beyond that.

[inglor_cz]

"Mars is still a pipe dream."

Well, I reacted to this sentence, which is a bit ambiguous. But I don't think there is a big gap between manned flight and colonization in case of Mars. Mars is very far, which means that from the very beginning, the crews will have to maximize their independence from the Earth.

You can supply Moon bases by cargo from the Earth easily, but people on Mars, even if only dozens during the initial period, will have to optimize everything for self-sufficiency as much as possible.

And if you prioritize self-sufficiency, you need more people, more robots, more factories = in a word, colonization comes naturally from that.