Yep,you heard it. The Moon is made of Dust,Dirt, and Titanium. Good news,the moon is more solid than we thought then. Bad news,Alot of people want to MINE to moon now.

Not sure what the problem is; moon has resources we may potentially need, nothing is using it, we can. Where is this even? In order for me to make an informed decision, I need facts. Please supply me with these.

Yay, space wars are just a few more decades to go.

there not going to start minning the moon are they? cuz other wise our dimise is imminate if we use all the resources of the moon AND earths resources

oook, class is in session... I guess. Firstly, simply because the US has planted a flag on the moon, doesn't mean that they own it, in fact Russia is currently re positioning troops in regards to rights to possible oil fields being prevalent in the Arctic North. Can you even imagine the problems with carving up the Moon?

However, the biggest problem arises in the very fragile gravitational pull that the moon and the Earth have on each other. If we start mining it, it'll make the moon weigh less, and the Earth more, we may just lose the Moon or, make it crash in the planet. Likewise, lifting the necessary mining equipment alone would be a Herculean task, and we have 0 experience when it comes to close to 0 gravity mining.

The moon holds another, even more important material that could answer our energy problems for millenia; H3, however the scientific community doesn't even bother with mining it, since they are well aware of the risk, and inevitable end.

You silly humans, the greater your numbers, the smaller your intellect. Honestly, it's like watching a mentally challenged child.

Ok,if it took a freakin merical o even get to the moon..why do we even think we'll be ablle to do all this without somthing happening..(let alone how much this could cost to get all that stuff back aan forth)!!!im in TOTAL AGREEMENT WITH >>6 AS WELL.

>>6 Good point. I was thinking the same thing. Well, except the whole H3 bit. Since I have no idea about it, how is H3 useful for energy? I'm hoping I can lessen my ignorance a little bit lol.

>>9 I'm actually out of the loop with any recent developments, but I'm referring to Hydrogen 3 (3 atoms of hydrogen). There is currently a lot of activity in making a fission reactor, basically a miniature sun, one or a handful of which could easily power the planet. And H3 would be the ideal fuel, at least last I've seen, also it's found naturally on the moon for some reason, while very rare on earth. But yes, the topic is about something else all together xP

>>6 Completely agree - the only real issue we'd run into would be political, as we don't own the moon, and the bureaucracy behind claiming such a thing over other countries would be ridiculous, and potentially conflict-inducing if taken lightly.

I have to question the part about the gravitational force, though. We won't be mining an incredible amount out of the moon, though it's true we run that risk of tipping the balance just enough to fuck up its orbit. However, if this were ever taken up as a large-scale project, I'm sure this is one of the first things astrophysicists would yell at them about, so it's likely not a problem.

The only problem regarding that would stem from mass hysteria due to uninformed majority opinion that our scientists don't take into account these simple mistakes. I mean, even I can think of a solution to that if they're really worried - bring a lot of dirt with you, and replace it :|
It's a dumb solution, but a solution nonetheless. Point being, if I could come up with that, the professionals would be able to do one even better.

In terms of mining it as well, gravity has little to do with it. They'll be mining it by machinery - that much I'm sure you already get. Most likely, they'll build the machinery when they get there, so bringing up parts really isn't a big deal if they ever get the funding necessary to pull off such a stunt.

And it isn't 0 gravity, just low gravity.


I'm curious about the H3 comment you made though. What do you mean, inevitable end? I hope that isn't something against nuclear technology; I'm probably reading into it too much.
If wikipedia is anything to go off of (it hasn't failed me yet), the scientific community is actually very much interested in mining H3 from not only the moon, but other planets and gas giants. The issue is the same with mining the moon though - politics, funding, etc. In addition, H3 is scarce even on the moon - the moon just has a larger amount of that scarce molecule.

If anything, the reason it was deemed not worthy of their time and effort was because of this. The amount of resource it takes to fly up to the moon in the first place greatly outweighs what they would potentially receive from such an endeavor.

"Cosmochemist and geochemist Ouyang Ziyuan from the Chinese Academy of Sciences ... has already stated on many occasions that one of the main goals of the program would be the mining of helium-3, from which operation "each year three space shuttle missions could bring enough fuel for all human beings across the world." which is an extreme overstatement however, as one payload to GTO of current spacecraft designs is less than 4 tonnes. To "bring enough fuel for all human beings across the world", more than one Space Shuttle load (and the processing of 4 million tons of regolith) per week would be necessary."

>>11 Hmm, well, hauling anything into space is a very expensive venture, but I'd like to bring your attention to the Space Elevator! Nifty, portable, and pollutant free ^_^ did I mention that it's still highly experimental and still in it's infancy tho?

I guess that the cool thing about living in our age is that there's so much new stuff going on!

I for one would use the elevators also as a connection between a rather large solar farm, up there... well, where ever you anchor it. At least until they work out the bugs out of the reactor.

The issue with mining the moon, is that it has a low gravity, and while I don't really know, it seems that there is a rather large layer of sediment there as well, how large? will the machinery be able to hold? What if launches sediment while mining, sends it in Earth's Orbit on;y to come back as a mini meteorite shower? Almost childish sounding scenarios, but this should, and probably has gone into consideration during the planning of a possible mining mission; and it may be a reason as to why they aren't in such a hurry. Or they may just want to make the "engine" work, before they stock up on fuel.

The reason why I mentioned this exotic molecule to begin with tho, is because they may just be 2 sides of the same coin.

Fuck the ocean tides, let's cash the moon.

why does it seem to take so long for people to notice this kind of news, i heard it a few months ago

I believe we are looking at the idea of mining on the moon and effecting the ocean? Well I could tell you as a note that the titanium is probably the magnet pushing the ocean to keep it as it is. So what we need to do is not bother the titanium and live out our daily lives as is. Like trying to solve over population problems.

>>15 That isn't how gravity works. It isn't magnetism, it's gravity, based entirely on mass. Even if it was magnetism, the water isn't magnetic.

If your concern is about the mass of the moon though, and 'magnet' was metaphorical, then yes, point taken. That is something that's been discussed a bit in the thread just above.


However, I personally dislike it when people say things like "let's just focus on something more important, like population." You're missing the point entirely. NASA has nothing to do with population issues in the first place, for one thing, and that way of thinking basically dictates to dissolve all organizations not related to social services. It's regressive thought. Why do anything? Why research, why try to better our technology at all when there are things we could do that relate more to our daily lives?

Because that's how science works. One cannot progress without doing these extra things, and it pains me every time people like to give up just because of something standing in their way, flippantly dismissing it as inconsequential while standing atop a self-made pedestal of rationality.

the thing about humans is that when they see something valuable they would do anything to get it. in the end they would regret everything they did and realize that its too late to fix it.

and then misu went on a not too long, but still long discussion on how gravity works and how the moon is something something science.

Output: We should leave the moon alone. Who knows what will happen to it if we mess with it by mining on it. We could bring back some creepy alien bacteria that could wipe all humanity off the earth.......

That's not what I said...

If anything, I said we should go for it, assuming they can come up with a working solution to the mass loss issue. I'd believe it's more complex than you'd think, but less complex than what you'd expect.

Again though, in the end, the only real thing stopping us from doing this is the cost and the political issues. Science-related dangers are the last of the problems on the list - our professional scientists are more professional in science than you think, and it's kind of naive to think they would actively fuck up something as potentially dangerous as this just because of greed and lack of precaution.

actually its pretty easy/normal to think people would screw something up as important as say the MOON for greed and money

>>18 And that is how the Apocalypse will start.

Hahaha! But really in all seriousness mining the moon is something that just shouldnt be done at all

>>20 At worst, it could bring about the end of life on earth as we know it.

Don't be dumb. A scientist's job is to not fuck shit up. It's honestly an insult to the entire intellectual community to say that the most respected members of the science field are literally dumber than uneducated children.

Don't start a rant about humanity's evil nature, that stuff is child's play. Literally, bringing it up as a reason why we shouldn't take up this scientific endeavor is childish.

>>19 I have to say don't mess with it until you are 120% sure it won't effect anything. Nothing with the ocean, nothing with plant life, or anything with DNA. Because they still owe us jet-packs and hover cars.

That's why I LOVE HUMANS! You see a tall mountain and climb it, Why? Cause it's there! You go to the moon, not because it was easy, but because it was hard! In the 1400's You braved the edges of the oceans on a gamble that the Earth was round!
You see a challenge, and you just grab it and reach even higher!
Humans are just so amazing, you have almost limitless potential!
....It's just too bad that a handful of you are daft.

>>24 hurdurr but we mite destry th moon bcuz sientists r allways so the greedy ppl who dun care about killing evry1

I think that's cool, though. Not that I want humans to start mining the moon because I think it's still got a lot of secrets to offer. Who knows, there might be something on the dark side of it that we haven't expected... like alien rocks that want to kill you... >:3

bump for link

Mine...the moon? That's a horrible idea! The rock keeps our wind and ocean currents normal. If we start messing with it we could probably seriously disturb something or another...

I actually read about this online. I don't know if it's entirely related to this, because perhaps the reasons are different, but I've heard rumor that within fifteen years China might own the moon. Might, fifteen years is a long way and it's not entirely positive information considering I don't see how one would go about claiming the moon...but, it was just some interesting information I picked up.

I don't know, I personally believe that if we'll venture into space exploration and colonization, the first "rock" we'll hit would be Mars, with the Moon being our "Interstellar Port" and freight entry point; also equipped with some shinny guns to deal with any incoming dangerously sized asteroids and why not aliens. This will allow the -hopefully by the global government- to mine it, in order to free up some weight and build these installations.
Why Mars? cuz it has Ice, and if we look at the history of the Americas, we should also prepare to call the new inhabitants Martians.

And also like to add that since they might go with a planetary gov. to begin with, if Earth isn't consolidated into one by then, this might make them unify in order to not be one upped.

I dont know about that Kon. I mean...we've set foot on the moon but nobody has been to Mars, yet. I might be wrong but didn't they find water on the moon as well? And as far as China taking over the moon...well everyone thinks they're taking over everything. How exactly does one claim a moon?