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Subject: no kings on Mars
Date: Sun, 18 Jun 2000 0:22:29 -0000 (GMT)
From: Terry Kok |
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- --- Dean Calahan wrote:
"what do you care what Bob Zubrin thinks
> about CELSS?" I don't
> mean to be flip, but he's not a king.
Not a king but certainly in a powerful position. That
doesn't stop me from speaking to him as an equal. On
the other hand, he has a lot to say about which way we
go with FMARS and beyond. Why? Because he is a front
man with vision and a lot of speaking engagements.
People DO (not me) hang on his every word. I figure
that a part of our job is to give Bob some friends who
won't treat him like a king. - TK
>
> Also, as far as anything being in any plan, for
> Real-Mars: well, let's get
> real. There ain't no plan for putting people on
> Mars. There are some design
> concepts (some of which are called "Mars Direct",
> "The NASA Reference
> Mission" and so forth). If it were a plan, there
> would be designs. Show me
> the designs. Therefore, saying that CELSS is not
> part of any plan is kind of
> preposterous. Again, I can see where you might think
> I'm being flip. So it's
> not in any widely published "modern" Mars mission
> design concepts either.
> That means, this is our hour! Let's force this thing
> through the
> bureaucracy! Get it built! In my profession
> (software engineering) and I'm
> sure in others, the only reason certain outstanding
> features get into
> products is because the engineers disobey management
> and do it against
> orders.
Right on! - TK
>
> So I guess that ultimately what I'm saying is, that
> I think that to meet
> Terry's objections, the Life Support Group simply
> has to deliver on their
> Mission Statement, which is essentially to design a
> WWTS for F-MARS 2001. A
> system that can be expanded in future seasons to
> ever more complete closure.
> Aside from the fact that it doesn't provide instant
> gratification as far has
> having a closed CELSS for F-MARS immediately, what
> is wrong with this
> approach?
>
From my perspective, there is nothing wrong with
delivering the goods. On the other hand, I am not in
agreement that we should build towards a CELSS by
trying to make individual parts and hope that they
will somehow add up to a CELSS in the end. It is
easier to build the system as a whole and not much
more expensive or complex. This has nothing to do with
"instant gratification". This has everything to do
with designing simple ecotechnics to accomplish
complex interwoven ecologies which are much much
harder to achieve when done as separate units.
Terry
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- ---------------------------------------------
Mars Society Life Support Task Force
Email - life-support@chapters.marssociety.org
http://home.marssociety.org/tech/life-support/
Arctic Base - http://arctic.marssociety.org/ |
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