Plan for human mission to asteroid gains speed

[jimmy olsen]

We have shit to take care of on Earth first.

Like the coming rare metal shortage that will cause our hi-tech economy to collapse. To avoid this we must mine the asteroids.

[Alatriste]

We have shit to take care of on Earth first.

Like the coming rare metal shortage that will cause our hi-tech economy to collapse. To avoid this we must mine the asteroids.

Somehow I guess digging deeper on Earth and/or mining the ocean waters is bound to be quite cheaper...

[Neil]

We have shit to take care of on Earth first.

Like the coming rare metal shortage that will cause our hi-tech economy to collapse. To avoid this we must mine the asteroids.

Somehow I guess digging deeper on Earth and/or mining the ocean waters is bound to be quite cheaper...

Correct.

[Ed Anger]

Another goddamn waste of my taxes.

[Caliga]

I'd rather have my taxes pay for interesting shit like this than welfare for trailer trash and health care for sickly old people.  There's nothing interesting about either of the latter two. 

[Neil]

Another goddamn waste of my taxes.

Since they don't tax you very much, it behooves you not to whine too much about what they spend it on.  Especially when they're the only thing keeping the black people in your state from rising up, storming your property, murdering you and turning your family into slaves.

[DontSayBanana]

They've already been contracted to build the Orion space capsule. There's not much else that needs to be built for a simple mission like that.

To be fair, they're talking about somewhere around 2024 and have only completed the preliminary design review, so there's still an insane amount of stuff that could get in the way and scrap the mission (such as more POTUSes taking away more funding from NASA, for example).

[Jaron]

Timothy, you can't seriously think mining asteroids could ever hope to satisfy demand for raw materials on Earth. Even if we did that, are not asteroids a very limited source? With modern tools even I imagine we could blast one to pieces in a matter of days and ship it all back to Earth. Within a couple years (at best), the entire asteroid belt would be gone.

[Neil]

Even if we did that, are not asteroids a very limited source?

No.  The availible mass of asteroids is enormous.

[Jaron]

I see.

[syk]

Somehow I guess digging deeper on Earth and/or mining the ocean waters is bound to be quite cheaper...

You never know... 

[PDH]

I'd rather have my taxes pay for interesting shit like this than welfare for trailer trash and health care for sickly old people.  There's nothing interesting about either of the latter two. 

Let's solve both problems and shoot trailer trash out to the asteroid belt.