# Nuke Mars with T-shirts



## biffzinker (Aug 17, 2019)

Neowin said:
			
		

> On Friday, the founder of SpaceX, Tesla and The Boring Company, tweeted an age-old idea to quite literally nuke planet Mars to make it habitable - a process known as terraformation. Today, he doubled down on this ambitious idea and tweeted two t-shirts up for sale that have 'Nuke Mars' written on them:




__ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1162601565653360640


			
				Neowin said:
			
		

> While terraformation is a novel idea that aims to release the water trapped in the ice on the poles of Mars, thereby releasing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and leading to an artificially induced greenhouse effect on the red planet, researchers and scientists alike have been skeptical about its practicality.



Source: https://www.neowin.net/news/elon-mu...-support-of-nuking-mars-one-t-shirt-at-a-time


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## droopyRO (Aug 17, 2019)

They should sell tickets, for people to push the button that sends the actual missile with the MIRV's. Kim Jong Un would be the first in line.


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## eidairaman1 (Aug 17, 2019)

Very stupid thoughts from Elon Musk...


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## R-T-B (Aug 17, 2019)

eidairaman1 said:


> Very stupid thoughts from Elon Musk...



The difference between stupidity and genius is often the outcome.  Moreso in unattempted feats like this.

That said, I still have my doubts about the feasability of this.  That, and musk has been somewhat...  strange in his tweets lately does not help.  Of course, he's not the only one.


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## biffzinker (Aug 17, 2019)

R-T-B said:


> That said, I still have my doubts about the feasability of this.


Without the molten core to generate a magnetic field it'll be short lived atmosphere. Then there's the radiation fallout to contend with.


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## Space Lynx (Aug 17, 2019)

R-T-B said:


> The difference between stupidity and genius is often the outcome.  Moreso in unattempted feats like this.
> 
> That said, I still have my doubts about the feasability of this.  That, and musk has been somewhat...  strange in his tweets lately does not help.  Of course, he's not the only one.



musk got lost in his own ego a long time ago, it happens to a lot of men in history when they attain some semblance of power/influence.

personally after the first billion, I'd like to think I'd retire and spend a lot of time with my wife and kids, enjoy those memories, showing my kids there is so much to discover on this planet, etc.  to each their own though, everyone has different pursuits and wants in life. I think it doesn't matter what we do as a species, the wheels are already in motion, global warming will wipe out half if not more of the population in our lifetime through mass displacement and famines, and then once mother nature has balanced herself out, she will begin to heal herself once again, as is the case time immemorial. all we have control over is the limited time we are given in this life, and if I had a billion dollars and people that loved me, I would be spending it very differently than Elon. sadly, I have neither of those things.

enjoy your flamethrowers and tshirts elon and bitcoin trolling, such things in time are fleeting, and soon forgotten


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## Grog6 (Aug 17, 2019)

I'd go for terraforming Venus instead.  We can't live there at all; Mars is livable with suits; way better than the moon.

Several large asteroids, timed just so, and we'd have a non-radioactive planet to build an ecosystem on.

One large one to remove most of the current atmosphere. Bonus points for letting it form a moonlet.

One to increase the rotational speed of the planet to closer to 24hours. Bonus points for making it turn the right direction, which it does not currently.

One of highly reactive florine, Calcium, sodium, Potassium,  and oxygen, to bind up all the nasty elements on the surface. Bonus points for mixing in enough rare elements to hit the requirements we need for health.

A large one made of mostly water, to begin forming oceans. The oceans here are 1/4400 the mass of the planet, so several large ones will be needed.

Several large ones made of oxygen and Nitrogen, over time, to build an atmosphere we can breathe.

Then we send a spaceship full of plankton, bacteria, and everything we need to support an ecosystem.

Let it simmer for a couple of centuries, and we're done. 

Of course, hitting mars with several large oxygen/nitrogen asteroids would be easier, and the heat of impact would warm things a bunch.
And since most of the surface is perchlorates, if we take moon rocks of mostly aluminum, we have ready made rocket fuel.

I should send this plan to Elon; I haven't made anyone's stalker/psycho list lately.

I already ordered a Nuke Mars Tshirt, lol.


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## Space Lynx (Aug 18, 2019)

Grog6 said:


> I'd go for terraforming Venus instead.  We can't live there at all; Mars is livable with suits; way better than the moon.
> 
> Several large asteroids, timed just so, and we'd have a non-radioactive planet to build an ecosystem on.
> 
> ...



you are the definition of the hubris of man in relation to size and cosmology. but I like it anyway


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## Grog6 (Aug 18, 2019)

None of those Ideas are new; Heinlein talked about this kind of stuff 50 years ago or longer. See "Misfit", moving an asteroid to be a new navigation station.
Or The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, and how deep the Earth's gravity field really is, lol.

Niven's Ringworld is another order of magnitude more difficult at least.

People don't read anymore, so they're stuck with bad movies, lol.


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## R-T-B (Aug 18, 2019)

Grog6 said:


> People don't read anymore, so they're stuck with bad movies, lol.



They read...  just not books.


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## Grog6 (Aug 18, 2019)

What, the entry text of the new star wars movie? 

Ah, You're talking about comic books, right? You realize that's like two pages of text, spaced int 50 pages of pictures, right?


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## MrPotatoHead (Aug 18, 2019)

People read facebook and insta


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## Grog6 (Aug 18, 2019)

I was joking, sorry.


FB, IG; I stay away from propaganda sites like that. 

Two of my friends have been spouting the most insane stuff for the last two years; It's apparently really good propaganda.


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## Space Lynx (Aug 18, 2019)

Grog6 said:


> None of those Ideas are new; Heinlein talked about this kind of stuff 50 years ago or longer. See "Misfit", moving an asteroid to be a new navigation station.
> Or The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, and how deep the Earth's gravity field really is, lol.
> 
> Niven's Ringworld is another order of magnitude more difficult at least.
> ...



It's still hubris.  We can't even negotiate how many food stamps to allow people in this country. Republicans will never do this, and Democrats won't have the money to do after universal healthcare, free university, and so on and so forth. The idea of Spacex doing it alone is also hubris, this will require decades of work and prob half a trillion in investments if you really wanted to terraform Mars, probably a lot more than that.


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## Grog6 (Aug 18, 2019)

That's no reason not to do it.

All those problems will never be solved; it's not in the governments best interest to do so.

Politicians get too much mileage out of demonization of one group or the other to meaningfully do anything about them, be it on the right or left. Whatever that means now, lol.

My Trumpite buddies I've known since HS don't realize they are firmly on the left as far as their lifestyle; the only thing about them that's conservative is their tweeting subs, and their heavy racism.
They are opoid using, pot smoking layabouts, living off their parents; both are in their 50's.
But they have strong Repub values, lol.

I gave up weed and alcohol 25ish years ago; bought a house, and build high powered drag cars; but I'm as liberal as it gets.

No one starved when we built the moon rockets; today, we do nothing, and people are starving.
Here, if kids didn't go to school and get free lunches, they wouldn't eat. They do summerschool just to alleviate that problem in the summer.

So where does the money go now? Maybe 5 billion plus for a wall, to keep out workers that somehow get hired by the hundreds, without documents?

We have to keep those people out because it shows up how lazy we as a society have become; Americans don't want jobs that require actual work.
I've had engineering job candidates show up with their parents for their job interview. 
They didn't get hired.


You diss universal healthcare; the big problem with healthcare here is we give half the money to the doctors, and half the money to the insurance companies; we need to eliminate the insurance companies, and it becomes a lot better for everyone.

Bernies' health plan was investigated by a repub think tank, and they said it would cost 22 Trillion dollars to do over 10 years.
What we do now will cost 20 Trillion dollars over the same time frame, and that's if costs don't go up.

We just dumped 2 trillion on the debt with Trumps budget; only keeping the status quo.

It doesn't seem so much when he does it, so why not get something out of it for everyone?

Was the Apollo Program Hubris? I don't think so.


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## R-T-B (Sep 16, 2019)

Grog6 said:


> What, the entry text of the new star wars movie?
> 
> Ah, You're talking about comic books, right? You realize that's like two pages of text, spaced int 50 pages of pictures, right?



I was talking about facebook.


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## Grog6 (Sep 17, 2019)

That place isn't even a good comic book, lol. 

I stay away from there.

If you aren't paying for it, You are the product.

And I was joking.


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## dorsetknob (Sep 17, 2019)

Mars
Not enough Gravity to hold any more Atmosphere than it struggles to currently Maintain .
also too week a magnetic Field to make it remotely habitable.
Only way mars would be habitable is either underground or in Maintained Domed Enclosures


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## AltCapwn (Sep 17, 2019)

I just don't understand the idea to terraform when we can't even keep our own planet straight.


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## CrAsHnBuRnXp (Sep 17, 2019)

Grog6 said:


> I'd go for terraforming Venus instead


Let's go terraform Uranus! Herp derp. XD


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## Grog6 (Sep 17, 2019)

So witty.


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## Beertintedgoggles (Sep 17, 2019)

biffzinker said:


> Without the molten core to generate a magnetic field it'll be short lived atmosphere. Then there's the radiation fallout to contend with.



Sorry for quoting an old post; however, Venus does not have a magnetic field yet has a very dense atmosphere.


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## FreedomEclipse (Sep 17, 2019)

biffzinker said:


> Without the molten core to generate a magnetic field it'll be short lived atmosphere. Then there's the radiation fallout to contend with.



But what about the lack of air/oxygen. Shouldn't that affect the thermonuclear reaction?? But at the same time tests between the 30s and 50s have found that any small amount of explosive power is multiplied in an atmosphere with no oxygen. Hence why limpet mines and underwater mines and to a lesser extent torpedos were so devastating during WWII.

Without oxygen, i would probably be right in saying that it wouldnt be an explosion but an implosion but i have not seen or heard of any nuclear tests that test nukes in zero g. At the same time. the implosion could be massive.

But i digress... 

"the absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence. "

"Just because you don't have evidence that something does exist does not mean you have evidence of something that doesn't exist." -Gin Rummy.


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## lilhasselhoffer (Sep 17, 2019)

Why does anyone still believe that Musk is a genius?

Once he made his money, everything else has been a slow slide down hill.
1) The legacy of Tesla is largely going to be efficient battery production, not the cars.  Raise your hand if you've ever seen a Tesla charging station, let alone a Tesla itself.
2) The Hyperloop.  Physics basically made this not feasible from the word go, yet he's now suggesting it can be done underground.  Being immensely clear, vacuum tube transit has been around for a century at this point, and nobody made a mass transit variant not because of lack of trying, but because the materials required to do so violate all versions of mechanics that science and engineering have.
3) Nuke the planet, blanketing it is energy collecting clouds.  Assume a non-trivial amount of the radiation is also trapped, and somehow can create a run-away greenhouse gas effect.  Assuming all of this magic happens, answer a few more questions.  The water is locked away in hydrate crystals, effectively preventing plant life from taking root and sustaining that greenhouse.  Overcome the water storage, and you're left with a hell-scape blasted by enough radiation to render life on the surface functionally suicide.  Develop a system to live underground, now find anybody to volunteer for a literal suicide mission.

Let me suggest that Musk had an excellent time with the Falcon because NASA functionally backed out of development, and the combination of soviet and US technologies with new materials allowed for an incremental improvement in the technology.

Tesla's success is massive production and automation. 

Hyperloop fails for a stupidly simple reason.  Go to any bridge.  Find the expansion plates which are built into every one of any significant length.  Locally we have a bridge less than a mile long, with expansion plates/joints that allow 6"+ of variation on either side.  Apply that same basic materials science (thermal expansion) to a hyperloop 100 miles long and you could have a 600" or 50' long variation.  Once you then factor in temperature differences between the top and bottom of the tube any dream of maintaining vacuum is quashed.

Nuking Mars is another stunt.  He's finally being challenged, and he's doubling down on stupidity rather than admitting he's more of an Edison than a Tesla.  Musk is a business person, who makes grand promises and stands on the back of very smart people who made him seem prescient.  Remove those people, or allow him to shoot off at the mouth without checking, and what you get is a person willing to shove his own foot so far into his mouth that it comes out the other end.



I guess it's good to know more regular people finally understand that he's beyond the pale.  The fine line between genius and stupidity was crossed long ago, and it's time we stop listening. 

Damn, I'm old.  Bill Nye the science guy is now a left wing joke.  The four horsemen are dead.  Atheism, Atheism +, and Atheism ++ have come and gone as relevant cultural things.  Now Musk has finally been recognized for being a nutter supported by scientists and engineers trying to make his crazy work.  It's like watching Feynman being replaced slowly by Bozo the clown, and being powerless to stop it.   Honk, honk I guess.



Edit:


FreedomEclipse said:


> But what about the lack of air/oxygen. Shouldn't that affect the thermonuclear reaction?? But at the same time tests between the 30s and 50s have found that any small amount of explosive power is multiplied in an atmosphere with no oxygen. Hence why limpet mines and underwater mines and to a lesser extent torpedos were so devastating during WWII.
> 
> Without oxygen, i would probably be right in saying that it wouldnt be an explosion but an implosion but i have not seen or heard of any nuclear tests that test nukes in zero g. At the same time. the implosion could be massive.
> 
> ...



Are you trolling?  I ask because I cannot tell the difference.

A thermonuclear reaction is by nature independent of the presence of air.  A large atom is destabilized, decays into two daughter particles and energy, and the resulting material is generally non-stable isotopes and enough released energy to force the process in another atom.  This is why a thermonuclear reaction requires enough local matter and energy to reach a critical mass, otherwise it simply fizzles out.  This is also how carbon rods in a nuclear reactor control heat production (absorb energetic decompositions without breaking down themselves, preventing the chain reaction).

Explosive powders, based upon combustion, don't multiply in an atmosphere with no oxygen by definition.  The chemical reaction requires free oxygen to decompose a longer chain molecule and release energy.  Think something similar to a camp fire, over a much shorter time.  C6H12O6 + 6O2 = 6(CO2) + 6(H2O), or basic glucose decomposition creating the energy that runs you.  Explosives can carry what they need to decompose themselves (TNT for example, C6H2(NO2)3CH3 = 7C + 5H + 3N + 6O ), but then they wouldn't be an explosive powder.  

Regarding the amplified influences of explosives under water...wow.  The speed of a compression wave, which is what an explosion functionally is, is based upon the density of the medium in which it occurs (assuming the goal isn't shrapnel).  basics on sound

This means that under water the compression wave is capable of moving much faster, and therefore creating much more localized damage.  I haven't the foggiest idea how you come to the conclusion that a reaction not requiring oxygen, which is not a compression wave but a massive release of energy which would have the propensity to generate heat , would somehow create an implosion.  Nor do I see how a nuclear decomposition would be influenced by a lack of gravity when achieving the critical mass requires only that enough atoms be present in a small enough volume.  Nor do I see exactly how you believe that the planet Mars has no gravity is a statement based in this universe (less yes, but none?).

Please, for the love of all that is holy tell me you are joking.  If not....I have severe doubts that you should be given anything more dangerous than a soup spoon (given those last few quotes).


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## CrAsHnBuRnXp (Sep 17, 2019)

Grog6 said:


> So witty.


ikr?


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## FreedomEclipse (Sep 17, 2019)

lilhasselhoffer said:


> Why does anyone still believe that Musk is a genius?
> 
> Once he made his money, everything else has been a slow slide down hill.
> 1) The legacy of Tesla is largely going to be efficient battery production, not the cars.  Raise your hand if you've ever seen a Tesla charging station, let alone a Tesla itself.
> ...



Quite the condescending rant you posted there


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## Grog6 (Sep 18, 2019)

lilhasselhoffer said:


> ...
> Hyperloop fails for a stupidly simple reason.  Go to any bridge.  Find the expansion plates which are built into every one of any significant length.  Locally we have a bridge less than a mile long, with expansion plates/joints that allow 6"+ of variation on either side.  Apply that same basic materials science (thermal expansion) to a hyperloop 100 miles long and you could have a 600" or 50' long variation.  Once you then factor in temperature differences between the top and bottom of the tube any dream of maintaining vacuum is quashed.



What's your comparable heat source to expand the rails? 
Hyperloop will be underground, to keep from hitting things; A high speed train is useless if you have to stop every 100 yards.
The track would rapidly match the underground temperature for the location, and the small number of cars on the track wouldn't significantly heat it.
Overlapping joints are also well established tech, but are too expensive for most roadways.
Train rails don't have expansion joints, but they rarely fail. (They do fail sometimes due to extreme heat)
What about the existing high speed trains?
I have not heard this as an actual issue.

...


lilhasselhoffer said:


> A thermonuclear reaction is by nature independent of the presence of air.  A large atom is destabilized, decays into two daughter particles and energy, and the resulting material is generally non-stable isotopes and enough released energy to force the process in another atom.  This is why a thermonuclear reaction requires enough local matter and energy to reach a critical mass, otherwise it simply fizzles out.  This is also how carbon rods in a nuclear reactor control heat production (absorb energetic decompositions without breaking down themselves, preventing the chain reaction).



The important parts of nuclear energy are the neutrons given off that fission the next atom in the chain reaction.
Carbon is not used in control rods, except for the RBMK reactors like Chernobyl, and that was the main reason it blew up. 
Carbon is a moderator of a nuclear reaction, it slows neutrons down, enhancing the fission process.
Boron or Cadmium is used in control rods. The DO in fact break down, and are replaced eventually.
They absorb neutrons, decreasing reactivity.
Cute fact, Reactivity is measured in dollars and cents, lol.
It takes 81 shakes for a nuke to explode. 
A nuke in space has been done: (several, actually)








						Starfish Prime - Wikipedia
					






					en.wikipedia.org
				



Neat fact, no mushroom cloud without air.



lilhasselhoffer said:


> Explosive powders, based upon combustion, don't multiply in an atmosphere with no oxygen by definition.  The chemical reaction requires free oxygen to decompose a longer chain molecule and release energy.  Think something similar to a camp fire, over a much shorter time.  C6H12O6 + 6O2 = 6(CO2) + 6(H2O), or basic glucose decomposition creating the energy that runs you.  Explosives can carry what they need to decompose themselves (TNT for example, C6H2(NO2)3CH3 = 7C + 5H + 3N + 6O ), but then they wouldn't be an explosive powder.



Explosives DO carry their own oxidizers; that's what makes them explode.
An explosion is a detonation wave of ionization propagating thru an explosive medium. (An Explosive)
Gunpowder uses Carbon and Nitrates (KNO3), TNT uses Carbon, Hydrogen, and Nitrates 3x(NO2), Firecrackers use Aluminum powder and KClO3, Etc.
They still work just fine in a vacuum. (Yes, firecracker fuse will burn in a vacuum if you can light it.)




lilhasselhoffer said:


> ...  If not....I have severe doubts that you should be given anything more dangerous than a soup spoon (given those last few quotes).



Seems like that fits you as well.


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## R-T-B (Sep 18, 2019)

lilhasselhoffer said:


> he's more of an Edison than a Tesla.



You pretty much nailed it here...  sadly that's about it.

But then you said this, and my inner child demanded I ignore you forever.



lilhasselhoffer said:


> Damn, I'm old. Bill Nye the science guy is now a left wing joke.


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## INSTG8R (Sep 18, 2019)

lilhasselhoffer said:


> The legacy of Tesla is largely going to be efficient battery production, not the cars. Raise your hand if you've ever seen a Tesla charging station, let alone a Tesla itself.


Err here in Norway they are so popular they are taxis. The entire front row of the doctors office is now charging stations not handicapped spots...Look past the end of your street before making such silly claims...


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