{"id":643,"date":"2009-08-12T03:06:00","date_gmt":"2009-08-12T03:06:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/factualfiction.com\/marsartists\/2009\/08\/12\/frustration-with-the-augustine-committee\/"},"modified":"2015-10-30T05:29:04","modified_gmt":"2015-10-30T05:29:04","slug":"frustration-with-the-augustine-committee","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/factualfiction.com\/marsartists\/2009\/08\/12\/frustration-with-the-augustine-committee\/","title":{"rendered":"Frustration with the Augustine Committee"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/1.bp.blogspot.com\/_WmkrvspHR7g\/Sr10uYjg5xI\/AAAAAAAAAdU\/4rRBXLw4vv0\/s1600-h\/info_grays_transBkgrd.png\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/1.bp.blogspot.com\/_WmkrvspHR7g\/Sr10uYjg5xI\/AAAAAAAAAdU\/4rRBXLw4vv0\/s400\/info_grays_transBkgrd.png\" alt=\"\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<div>The <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nasa.gov\/offices\/hsf\/home\/index.html\">Augustine Committee<\/a> seems to be embracing heavy lift but oriented toward a space program of lunar missions, with Mars seen as an eventual objective in the indeterminate future. This is a serious mistake. If anyone reading this blog ever wants Mars to be explored, much less settled, in their lifetime, America must not only develop a heavy lift vehicle such as the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.spacex.com\/\">SpaceX<\/a> Falcon 9 Heavy, or the Ares 5, but, the program must be oriented specifically toward Mars &#8212; not the moon. The moon is a siren call. Mars is an entirely different environment capable of supporting human civilization en mass. With a 24 hour day, vast quantities of water, and all the essential elements found on Earth, Mars offers humanity a permanent second home. Martian exploration will use aeroshells, parachutes, and on site refueling; thermal, pressure, and gravitational environments are entirely different between Mars and the Moon. Lunar equipment and procedures will not evolve into Mars missions.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Asteroid mining and Martian settlement will provide the engine humanity needs to sustain a permanently expanding frontier. <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Mars_Direct\">Mars Direct<\/a> is a low cost straightforward way to settle Mars. Now!<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The <a href=\"http:\/\/www.marssociety.org\/portal\">Mars Society<\/a> is an international organization committed to this moral imperative. Products with variations of the &#8220;Cowards Return to the Moon&#8221; theme can be purchased at cost from <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cafepress.com\/factualfiction\">Factual Fiction&#8217;s online store<\/a>.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>While such a populist theme may seem blunt, rude, or whatever, over the last decade of involvement in space advocacy we&#8217;ve observed a remarkably consistent dichotomy between persons involved in the space community: old political timid bureaucrats predictably favor lunar exploration, with their excuse being &#8220;safety, proximity to earth&#8221;; bold young creative entrepreneurs OVERWHELMINGLY favor Mars Direct, with their rally cry being, &#8220;LET&#8217;S GO!&#8221;<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>This dichotomy is so consistent, obvious, and predictable a simple biological solution to change American space policy suggests itself: testosterone replacement therapy. No kidding. It is time to view lunar exploration with disdain. Heroes go to Mars. Cowards return to the moon!!!!<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Augustine Committee seems to be embracing heavy lift but oriented toward a space program of lunar missions, with Mars seen as an eventual objective in the indeterminate future. This is a serious mistake. If anyone reading this blog ever wants Mars to be explored, much less settled, in their lifetime, America must not only [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48,13,14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-643","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mission-plans","category-philosophy","category-propaganda"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/factualfiction.com\/marsartists\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/643","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/factualfiction.com\/marsartists\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/factualfiction.com\/marsartists\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/factualfiction.com\/marsartists\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/factualfiction.com\/marsartists\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=643"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/factualfiction.com\/marsartists\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/643\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4393,"href":"https:\/\/factualfiction.com\/marsartists\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/643\/revisions\/4393"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/factualfiction.com\/marsartists\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/factualfiction.com\/marsartists\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/factualfiction.com\/marsartists\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}