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Speaker 2: And welcome back to George Nori with you doctor Jim Bell.
Speaker 2: With this gym at its closest ebb, when Mars is
Speaker 2: at its closest point, how long would it take to
Speaker 2: launch an astronaut crew to get to Mars just to
Speaker 2: get there.
Speaker 3: Just to get there, generally three to six months, well,
Speaker 3: just to get there. Yeah, and then and that's using
Speaker 3: current rocket technology that could get low to be a
Speaker 3: smaller number in the future this technology improves, But then
Speaker 3: you have to wait for the planets to line up again.
Speaker 3: So you either plant the flag and turn on a
Speaker 3: run home real fast and take another three or six
Speaker 3: months to get back, or if you're actually going to
Speaker 3: spend some quality time there, do some exploration, start a settlement,
Speaker 3: or if you have to try to recreate your own
Speaker 3: fuel to get back, living off the land and converting
Speaker 3: the atmosphere or ice and surface into rocket fuel, you
Speaker 3: got to wait, you know, another Earth year or year
Speaker 3: and a half sometimes more for the planets to line
Speaker 3: up again for that next three to six month trip
Speaker 3: back to the Earth.
Speaker 2: Would they have a lander similar to what we had
Speaker 2: on the Moon.
Speaker 3: That they could. There's more gravity on Mars. It's three
Speaker 3: eighths instead of one sixth, and so it has to
Speaker 3: be it can't be that fragile. It has to be
Speaker 3: a little beef here. It also has to be able
Speaker 3: to survive dust storms. Dust Storms are not an issue
Speaker 3: on the Moon without an atmosphere, and so it's a
Speaker 3: little bit of a harsher environment. Sand and dust gets
Speaker 3: blown around all over the place on Mars. So you know,
Speaker 3: there's different concepts and ideas for what those landers might
Speaker 3: look like. Many different companies and NASA are you know,
Speaker 3: putting forward ideas for that, but no final decisions have.
Speaker 2: Been made in your opinion, Jim, do we go back
Speaker 2: to the Moon or go back to Mars? Or go
Speaker 2: to Mars first?
Speaker 3: Well, right on the edge of going back to the Moon,
Speaker 3: I mean, you know, the Artemis two mission is supposed
Speaker 3: to launch this fall, followed by Artemis three, which is
Speaker 3: the first crew back to the Moon. Artemist two will
Speaker 3: be like you remember Apollo eight, looping around the Moon
Speaker 3: testing out the systems, getting into the lunar environment and
Speaker 3: coming back home don't land. And Artemis three intended to
Speaker 3: be the first landing on the Moon and then a
Speaker 3: series of missions afterwards to follow on. So that's just
Speaker 3: a few years away. If things can stay on schedule,
Speaker 3: you know, budgets don't get slashed like we were talking
Speaker 3: about earlier. So we'll have to see. And I do
Speaker 3: believe that going to the Moon it will be great
Speaker 3: practice for going farther on into the Solar System permanently
Speaker 3: as a human speedies. I think we have it. We
Speaker 3: have it in our destiny to explore and to be
Speaker 3: a species that lives on other worlds. Partly because we're
Speaker 3: driven to do that. We've always been driven as explorers
Speaker 3: as a species all across the globe. Partly because we
Speaker 3: know that we can rewrite the textbooks for our kids
Speaker 3: and teachers and understand the worlds around us and how
Speaker 3: the Earth fits into the planets around us, and where
Speaker 3: do we come from? Where are we going those kinds
Speaker 3: of things. And also it's because of national pride and
Speaker 3: American leadership, you know, we do those things. These are
Speaker 3: things that we can do together as a nation by
Speaker 3: pulling our resources, both our money resources and our neurons,
Speaker 3: our brains to do difficult things like that. I think
Speaker 3: we're on the edge of going back to the Moon.
Speaker 3: Let's do that.
Speaker 2: I'm all for space exploration, but are we wasting our
Speaker 2: time going back to the Moon.
Speaker 3: I don't think so. I think we have a lot
Speaker 3: to learn. Like I said, it's been fifty years since
Speaker 3: we've been out there, and you know that the technology
Speaker 3: is totally different now, and where you know we're we're
Speaker 3: in a race, like you said, we're in a race
Speaker 3: for technological leadership on our planet and on other planets.
Speaker 3: So I don't think it's a waste. I think it's
Speaker 3: also it still is inspirational to people, to kids and
Speaker 3: their teachers, just like it was to us when we
Speaker 3: were growing up. And it is a way that our
Speaker 3: nation can continue to lead the world and show people
Speaker 3: what America can do. So I don't think it's a
Speaker 3: waste at all. I think we have a lot to
Speaker 3: learn by going back, and we're going to use those
Speaker 3: lessons that we learn out there close home at the Moon,
Speaker 3: not too far away. In case something goes wrong, we
Speaker 3: can hop into a lifeboat and come back. That's not
Speaker 3: going to be the case when we go to Mars
Speaker 3: or past Androids or other planets in the Outer Solar System.
Speaker 3: There won't be any lifeboats like that. So we've got
Speaker 3: to get good at to get good at living off
Speaker 3: the land and using this new technology in ways that
Speaker 3: can keep us keep us going.
Speaker 2: One of the arguments a gem of space exploration has
Speaker 2: always been to leave planet Earth in case we have
Speaker 2: to to start a new civilization elsewhere. But is that
Speaker 2: really practical?
Speaker 3: Well, I mean sure, it's technically it's true. Right, Technically, technically,
Speaker 3: if there are people living off of our planet and
Speaker 3: something catastrophic happens on our planet, like a unnuclear war,
Speaker 3: like an asteroid impact, like a major plague, you know
Speaker 3: that that wipes everybody. You know, there's all any number
Speaker 3: of things you've seen the science ficture movies to any
Speaker 3: number of things that could happen that could potentially wipe
Speaker 3: out our species. There have been enormous mass extinctions as
Speaker 3: bees in the past, at least five major extinctions that
Speaker 3: wiped out ninety percent or more of all species on
Speaker 3: the planet. Probably large impacts, maybe volcanic explosions, that kind
Speaker 3: of thing. So yeah, technically it's an insurance policy. But
Speaker 3: I don't think that's why we should do it. I
Speaker 3: think that's a byproduct of being explorers and going out
Speaker 3: there and pushing our bodies and our technology to the
Speaker 3: limit in order to learn new things, to discover things,
Speaker 3: to inspire our kids, to inspire our fellow citizens, and
Speaker 3: have our country lead the world in space.
Speaker 2: Well, doctor Jim Bell, author of the Art of the Cosmos, Jim,
Speaker 2: where do you stand on the possibility of intelligent life
Speaker 2: out there in the universe somewhere?
Speaker 3: Oh, my gosh, it's got to be one hundred percent.
Speaker 3: I mean it's got to be, right. I mean, you
Speaker 3: just look at the numbers. We've talked about this in
Speaker 3: the past, right, the numbers haven't changed. There's still there's
Speaker 3: still astronomical right, that's the word for it, right, that
Speaker 3: hundreds of billions of stars in our own galaxy, hundreds
Speaker 3: of billions of galaxies. Now we know astronomers have been
Speaker 3: discovering over the past few decades that most stars, these
Speaker 3: sun like stars, have planets, mostly more than one, maybe
Speaker 3: up to ten. So you know, now we think there
Speaker 3: may be ten million Earth like planets in our galaxy alone,
Speaker 3: maybe more. That's a wild guess. And so I think
Speaker 3: it's there there personally, and I can't, of course, I
Speaker 3: can't prove it right, But I believe that the numbers
Speaker 3: support hypothesis that there is other intelligent life out there.
Speaker 3: I think the big problem, George is Albert Einstein and
Speaker 3: his stupid speed of light. That's the big problem. The
Speaker 3: problem is we won't be able to communicate with each
Speaker 3: other because we're so far away from each other. It
Speaker 3: doesn't seem to be any evidence evidence of intelligen of
Speaker 3: life and our own solar system besides ourselves here on
Speaker 3: planet Earth, and we don't have any evidence in the
Speaker 3: dozens hundreds of nearby stars that have been searched so
Speaker 3: far with radio telescopes and other means for intelligent life.
Speaker 3: Doesn't mean they're not there, we just don't have any
Speaker 3: evidence for. But likely if there are other intelligent civilizations
Speaker 3: or beings out there, they're just very widely separated because
Speaker 3: space is so vast, and it's a little sad. Maybe
Speaker 3: it's a little sad to me that maybe we're so
Speaker 3: far apart from each other that we just can't communicate
Speaker 3: it ever know for certain that we're all out there together.
Speaker 2: The second man to walk on the moon, Buzz alder And,
Speaker 2: is still with us. He's ninety five years old. God
Speaker 2: Love him there aren't many left.
Speaker 3: No, that's true. I think there's only there's a handful
Speaker 3: of three or four maybe, yeah, yeah, But Buzzes and
Speaker 3: buzz is still very active and promoting missions to cycle
Speaker 3: between the Moon and Mars, get people out there. Another moonwalker,
Speaker 3: Jack Schmidt, Harrison Schmidt, who was a US senator as well.
Speaker 3: He's still very active working with some of these companies
Speaker 3: sending missions to the Moon, like the Intuitive Machines company
Speaker 3: that sent a mission up just yesterday which is on
Speaker 3: its way. So yeah, they're they're they're getting their dwindling though,
Speaker 3: the Apollo moonwalkers and the Apollo generations dwindling, and so
Speaker 3: it's exciting to work with so many young people, so
Speaker 3: many early career people now who are just as turned
Speaker 3: on about space, space exploration and space leadership for America
Speaker 3: as as as we were when we were young.
Speaker 2: When are we going to get those astronauts back then
Speaker 2: got stuck going to the International Space Station?
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, you know, I don't know exactly why. I
Speaker 3: think there is a plan to get them back fairly soon.
Speaker 3: But you know, I don't know those two astronauts, but
Speaker 3: I know enough astronauts to know that probably that's really
Speaker 3: where they want to be, right They train and train
Speaker 3: and train to go into space. They want to be
Speaker 3: up there, and they're doing useful work while they're up there.
Speaker 3: So I didn't I don't personally not feel bad for them,
Speaker 3: but at some point their mission does need to come
Speaker 3: to an end and they do need to come back home.
Speaker 2: Not under any pressure to get back, but I think they.
Speaker 3: Want to come home, probably probably.
Speaker 2: Let's now with the Art of the Cosmos.
Speaker 3: The part of the Cosmos was as my most recent book,
Speaker 3: and it was a lot of fun putting this together.
Speaker 3: I've taken a whole bunch of photography from robotic missions
Speaker 3: and human missions, astronauts in Earth orbits or on the Moon,
Speaker 3: and I've looked at these pictures as pieces of art.
Speaker 3: Some of them, like the spectacular swirling clouds of Jupiter
Speaker 3: which are on the cover of the book, almost like
Speaker 3: a Van Goh painting, you know, just these natural patterns
Speaker 3: of such beauty, And some of the landscapes on Mars
Speaker 3: or the Moon that have this just absolute stark, stark
Speaker 3: bleakness to them, and yet a familiarity to us, like,
Speaker 3: you know, I may have gone on a hike in
Speaker 3: that place at one point, you know, and in the
Speaker 3: desert southwest or whatever, you know, and there's a there's
Speaker 3: a great intersection between science and art, between space exploration
Speaker 3: and art. And photography is a visual art after all,
Speaker 3: and once in a while, those of us who who
Speaker 3: do space photography, very rarely we get to think like
Speaker 3: real photographers frame a picture, think about depth of field,
Speaker 3: think about contrasts and focus, you know, those kinds of things,
Speaker 3: and and we do get to create photographic art space
Speaker 3: and sometimes we don't think about it. It just happens naturally.
Speaker 3: You know, beautiful pictures of the Earth rising from the moon,
Speaker 3: or you know the nebula and deep space, the so
Speaker 3: called pillars of creation that are just so incredibly visually spectacular.
Speaker 3: And so I tried to collect a few hundred of
Speaker 3: those with some stories behind them in that book, The
Speaker 3: Art of the Cosmos.
Speaker 2: If you were asked to permanently go to Mars, would
Speaker 2: you go.
Speaker 3: Permanently? You know? Maybe if I had just been diagnosed
Speaker 3: with a terminal disease or something, and you know, I
Speaker 3: know I don't have much time to go, I sure,
Speaker 3: probably why not? But I want to go. I'd love
Speaker 3: to go. George but I want to come back. I
Speaker 3: really want to come back.
Speaker 2: How long do you think I'll stay there?
Speaker 3: You know, I'd go for one of those trips that
Speaker 3: to three to six months to get there, spend a year,
Speaker 3: a year and a half three to six months to
Speaker 3: get back. I would do something like that. You know,
Speaker 3: when people get there, it does look it looks familiar
Speaker 3: and inviting and even warm with those reddish colors right
Speaker 3: the red planet. But it is the harshest environment that
Speaker 3: humans will ever have been in its you know, it
Speaker 3: makes Antarctica look like a tropical wonderland, you know, and
Speaker 3: you have to bring your own oxygen, you have to
Speaker 3: bring water, you have to bring food, bring fertilizer, you
Speaker 3: need to bring your rocket fuel to get back. You know,
Speaker 3: it looks inviting, but it's going to make, you know,
Speaker 3: the settlement of the Wild West look easy in comparison,
Speaker 3: So it's going to be hard. It's going to be
Speaker 3: hard for people who go there, especially people who do
Speaker 3: want to settle there. There will be tragedy, there will
Speaker 3: be loss of life, just as in any hard exploration endeavors.
Speaker 3: But I would love to visit because I've been studying
Speaker 3: and learning about trying to figure that place out through
Speaker 3: the eyes of robots for my entire career. I'd love
Speaker 3: to see those some of those places with my own
Speaker 3: eyes and try to answer some of those questions. Probably
Speaker 3: we're getting it all wrong, who knows, But I do
Speaker 3: want to come back because Earth is my favorite planet.
Speaker 3: I've lived here most of my life. Most of my
Speaker 3: friends are from here.
Speaker 2: Do you ever see the day that there'll be a
Speaker 2: baby born on Mars?
Speaker 3: Yes, I do, and the Moon as well, although I
Speaker 3: wonder and I don't. I'm not a medical doctor, so
Speaker 3: I don't know the details, but I know people are
Speaker 3: thinking about childbirth in space and how important is gravity
Speaker 3: and earth gravity and the shielding from radiation that we
Speaker 3: get here on planet Earth from the ozone layer and
Speaker 3: our magnetic field. You know, these are all important things
Speaker 3: that enable life and conception and gestation on our planet
Speaker 3: in the way that it happens. And so I don't
Speaker 3: know if the medical world right now knows if people
Speaker 3: can have children in space. I would love to find out,
Speaker 3: and you follow the research, but at some point I
Speaker 3: imagine the experiments are going to happen and we will
Speaker 3: find out.
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