Will humans be able to land on Jupiter or Saturn in the next century?

No. These planets have no surfaces we could ever get to without being crushed. Besides, we will be very lucky if we make it to Mars in the next century. Jupiter's radiation belts are filthy and lethal, and encompass most of the inner satellites we would like to visit such as Europa. My forecast is that we will visit Mars in the next century, perhaps establish a tiny colony on the Moon...and that's it. Everything else would cost too much to do, to get the necessary political and popular support. Even for the next 200 years, I do not see us doing much in the rest of the solar system except on the Moon and Mars, and in Earth orbit. We should very likely have hotels...yes hotels...in earth orbit, because this is relatively easy to do and has a big commercial draw....of course we still have to watch out for orbiting space debris which will be lethal...perhaps even for out Space Station inhabitants.

Having written this, I am amazed at how cynical I have become about space. I grew up in the 1960's which culminated in astronauts walking on the Moon. Since then, I watched as we abandoned the Moon and retreated back to the Earth for essentially political/economic reasons. Everyone I knew could think of 1000 reasons why we should stay there, but Congress would accept none of those 'pie in the sky' reasons. Still, since the Moon landings, we have been treated to many exciting discoveries in space, and the commercialization of the near-earth environment. There are still many idiots out there, who benefit from the fruits of the space program ( satellite communications, computers, medical technology) but still ask 'What good is space when we have starving people down here?'

My cynicism comes from this rather bad lesson that in an instant we can abandon everything we are now doing...because we did it before and lost the Moon! Every YEAR, the entire existence of NASA is argued in Congress. We won't get to Mars that way. If our society refuses to have pioneering dreams we will never do more than what we are already doing....and that is hardly much of an inspiration to our young people, or people like me who still watch 'Babylon 5' and wonder what our future holds for us.


Copyright 1997 Dr. Sten Odenwald
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