Instigator / Pro
4
1417
rating
158
debates
32.59%
won
Topic
#2498
On Balance, Humanity Should Seek to Colonize the Moon by 2040
Status
Finished
The debate is finished. The distribution of the voting points and the winner are presented below.
Winner & statistics
After 1 vote and with 3 points ahead, the winner is...
Intelligence_06
Parameters
- Publication date
- Last updated date
- Type
- Standard
- Number of rounds
- 5
- Time for argument
- Two days
- Max argument characters
- 500
- Voting period
- One month
- Point system
- Multiple criterions
- Voting system
- Open
Contender / Con
7
1737
rating
172
debates
73.26%
won
Description
let's keep trying this insane challenge.
by 2040: Means we should accomplish this goal by this year. Before is preferred. Con can assess impossibility of such a timeframe or waste of resources.
colonize: (of a country or its citizens) send a group of settlers to (a place) and establish political control over it.
The Moon: an astronomical body orbiting Earth and is the planet's only natural satellite. It is the fifth-largest satellite in the Solar System, and by far[13] the largest among planetary satellites relative to the size of the planet that it orbits.[f] The Moon is, after Jupiter's satellite Io, the second-densest satellite in the Solar System among those whose densities are known. [Wikipedia]
No kritics (Ex. "aliens should colonize the moon instead of humanity...")
Round 1
Good potential site for future missions, to Mars and to further: Its gravity is 1/6 of Earth, potentially saving cost in the future. It takes only three days for spacecraft to reach Moon, while months to years might be wasted if bad design for colonization is rushed. As such, the Moon is an excellent starting point for testing ideas, seeing the effects on astronauts, and analyzing if potential costs outweigh the benefits. The future mining with tons of REM resource, H2O, He, is definitive.
Pro wants not colonization, merely the stepping ladder for other missions, the same way a workplace is not to be for living.
The moon is too hard to colonize. It cannot sustain life. Of course, no one can live there locally.
It turns out colonizing the moon is completely meaningless as we have the plan of colonizing Mars by the year 2040. We would have more difficulties sustaining life on the moon than just going to mars and grow stuff there.
Round 2
I am only saying that humanity should *seek* to colonize, not actually succeed in colonizing. Because seeking towards the moon allows for similar foundation to begin looking for Mars, any arguments for Mars also applies to the moon. The ideas are similar in vein. Even if we are only exploring Moon, this could still be said to be progress in seeking to colonize. As such my argument still stands. We can SEEK to colonize on Moon, change mind half way, and say Mars is better, according to situation.
We, so far, have proof that Mars is better and the moon is nothing more than a refueling station. The moon is much harder to sustain populations and there are no such plans so far to colonize the moon compared to Mars.
If we are just *attempting* to colonize the moon, then it is the same logic as that we should "attempt" to rob the bank, no matter if it is justified or not. It's not. We already have the plan of living on Mars by 2040, and that would make the attempt to the moon meaningless.
Round 3
Con has failed to justify colonizing mars other than our existing plans. He has only said it cannot sustain life, but does not counter the possibility to mine it for resources and launch further missions. The stay on there only needs to be temporary, similar to a vacation. Therefore there is no problem with my premise and support.
A colony requires people to operate it. The moon’s gravity is only 16% Earth’s gravity, which is a joke. It is basically impossible for people to live there, and because of the evolution in the earth’s gravity, babies will suffer from fatal diseases, making life unsustainable. This is on top of that the Moon lacks atmosphere, as well as no water and higher chance of asteroids. Comparatively, Mars’ environment is much similar to earth’s. We should not live on the evidently unsustainable moon.
Round 4
Colonize does not require giving birth. No source given that Mars is similar enough to earth to work. Wired counters that Mars is equally impossible to live. So higher time and finance cost leads to moon saving money over time.
Pro bears the BoP. However, his only rebuttal this round is that Mars isn’t compatible either. He did not justify why to colonize the moon.
Colonization requires People living locally. Not being able to produce healthy children meaning it is cannot be continued, and it would be a waste to colonize a place where humanity isn’t able to sustain. Also, Pro did not refute against that neither is the Moon sustainable.
Colonizing the moon is basically us wasting money to live in a worse place. Just, Why?
Round 5
colonize can also mean going there for resources. Nasa.gov says a possibility: " The colonists would mine the Moon and the minor planets and build beamed power satellites that would supplement or even replace power plants on the Earth. " So there are more purposes than making it a living area. That's why the moon can still be alright as a base to begin with. It would greatly reduce costs of future missions, if eventually we choose Mars as well, for the ultimate goal.
Pro’s definition of “colonize” includes sending people there, which is not realistic, and Pro has never proved what kind of tech would we even have at 2040 to ensure sustainability on the moon.
Sending machines are fine, as long as we would have it by 2040, which Pro did not prove. The act of sending people there is no different from human sacrifice, as there are no tech yet for us to sustain on the moon.
We could use the moon like we are already doing now, but according to Pro’s definition, nah.
Vote bump.
Vote.
we could redo this except "We should colonize mars" instead if you want. The edeb8 title of "SEEK to colonize" is a really weird wording
wow you are brave man
100 is not enough.
don't worry. I'll probably extend this to higher characters if nobody accepts in a few days.
thanks for warning me, i probably wouldn't have noticed
done. Though I'm not entirely convinced you can back up that it's a waste of resources using only 20 words.
you need to set constraints to the time-span of the plan, so that Con can argue it's a waste of resources in that span of time.
thoughts on this one?