WEBVTT - What Is Terraforming? 0:00:06.920 --> 0:00:09.040 Okay, Daniel, how many times in your life do you 0:00:09.080 --> 0:00:13.160 think you've moved, like from one house to another so 0:00:13.200 --> 0:00:16.680 many times. There was one period when we actually moved 0:00:16.760 --> 0:00:19.239 back and forth across the Atlantic. I think it was 0:00:19.320 --> 0:00:24.160 seven times in four years. That's wild. Yeah, from California 0:00:24.200 --> 0:00:26.760 to Geneva and back. It was insane. Well, the hard 0:00:26.760 --> 0:00:28.800 part is when you need to do renovations right, Like 0:00:28.840 --> 0:00:31.280 if you're the home that you're moving into is not 0:00:31.640 --> 0:00:34.000 quite habitable, that's right. You want to get it just 0:00:34.080 --> 0:00:36.000 as you like it. You wanted to be nice and cozy, 0:00:36.040 --> 0:00:38.199 you wanted to be comfortable place to live. You want 0:00:38.240 --> 0:00:41.320 all those things right. And that's hard enough when the 0:00:41.360 --> 0:00:44.519 other place you're living is across town or across the country, 0:00:44.640 --> 0:00:46.800 or even somewhere else on the planet. Yeah, but now 0:00:46.880 --> 0:00:50.600 imagine if you had to move to a whole another planet. 0:00:50.840 --> 0:00:52.560 I'm not sure I can get my wife on board 0:00:52.600 --> 0:00:54.920 for taking the kids to Mars or to the moon 0:00:55.080 --> 0:00:58.160 or did you better it's a little further than Geneva. 0:00:58.360 --> 0:01:01.040 It's a time of it for the traveling in Switzerland, 0:01:01.400 --> 0:01:03.920 and I'm not sure how we'd find a contractor to 0:01:03.920 --> 0:01:06.240 do that work, Like, who's going to do the renovations 0:01:06.240 --> 0:01:10.560 of my lunar base Elon Musk. He's probably got a 0:01:10.600 --> 0:01:13.440 company already for it. So you five different kinds of flooring. 0:01:13.640 --> 0:01:20.200 It's called house X the flooring company. The flooring company. 0:01:20.280 --> 0:01:39.760 Oh perfect. Hi, I'm h and I'm Daniel. Welcome to 0:01:39.760 --> 0:01:43.560 our podcast, Daniel and Jorge Explain the Universe. I'm a 0:01:43.600 --> 0:01:46.119 particle physicist, but I like thinking and talking about all 0:01:46.120 --> 0:01:49.200 sorts of crazy things in science, and I make cartoonists 0:01:49.200 --> 0:01:55.240 and mostly I'm just crazy. I got nothing to say 0:01:55.240 --> 0:02:01.080 to that. You're totally a sane, a normal person, and yeah, 0:02:01.120 --> 0:02:03.880 I'm so not saying that. Um. And this is our 0:02:03.960 --> 0:02:06.200 podcast in which we take things in the universe and 0:02:06.200 --> 0:02:08.679 try to explain them to you, make them understandable. We 0:02:08.720 --> 0:02:10.960 don't want you to be intimidated by the fancy words 0:02:10.960 --> 0:02:12.760 and science. Who wants you to understand them so you 0:02:12.800 --> 0:02:15.040 can impress people of cocktail parties when they ask you 0:02:15.480 --> 0:02:19.079 what is the Higgs boson or how does something actually work? Yeah, 0:02:19.200 --> 0:02:21.960 we want you to imagine what it's like to travel 0:02:22.000 --> 0:02:25.200 the universe and to see all these amazing things out there. Today, 0:02:25.200 --> 0:02:33.880 we're gonna talk about living on other worlds, terraforming, terraforming. 0:02:34.000 --> 0:02:37.280 Is that like the ceramic thing that you make statues 0:02:37.320 --> 0:02:40.240 out of. I think if you want to make a 0:02:40.320 --> 0:02:44.799 really big planet size statue, then you could call that terraforming. Yeah. Wait, 0:02:45.080 --> 0:02:48.560 I think I'm thinking about terra cotta. That's different. Terra cotta. 0:02:48.600 --> 0:02:51.680 That's right. Can you build a planet out of terra cotta? Right? 0:02:52.080 --> 0:02:54.400 That would be the largest pottery wheel in the in 0:02:54.440 --> 0:02:56.680 the history of the universe. Yeah. So that's a big 0:02:56.760 --> 0:03:01.040 question is can we be an InterPlaNet hairy species? Can 0:03:01.080 --> 0:03:04.880 we can humanity live in multiple planets? That's right? And 0:03:04.919 --> 0:03:07.360 this this is a really important question because if we 0:03:07.400 --> 0:03:10.400 want to survive for thousands or millions of years, we 0:03:10.440 --> 0:03:13.600 can't keep all of our eggs in just one planetary basket. 0:03:13.919 --> 0:03:15.919 You know, one comet comes and slams in the Earth 0:03:15.919 --> 0:03:18.800 and kills everything on Earth. Poof, we're dead. But if 0:03:18.840 --> 0:03:21.240 we have people living on Mars and the Moon and 0:03:21.320 --> 0:03:23.799 you know, and somewhere else, then we could survive such 0:03:23.880 --> 0:03:26.880 cataclysm as a species. You mean as a species, not 0:03:26.919 --> 0:03:29.160 me or you individually. Like I'm not going to jump 0:03:29.240 --> 0:03:31.040 up there and catch the commet and save the planet 0:03:31.080 --> 0:03:33.079 or anything like that. But from the point of view 0:03:33.080 --> 0:03:35.640 of humanity. It seems like a really important project to 0:03:35.720 --> 0:03:38.840 get off this rock, get living somewhere else. Yeah, Or 0:03:38.920 --> 0:03:42.720 like if we ruling this planet, right, Like, if we 0:03:43.120 --> 0:03:45.800 mess it up somehow and Earth is no longer happenable, 0:03:46.120 --> 0:03:48.040 what's going to happen to humanity? We have to go 0:03:48.080 --> 0:03:49.800 somewhere else. And you make us sound like we're a 0:03:49.800 --> 0:03:51.480 bunch of kids making a mess in the living room 0:03:51.560 --> 0:03:53.120 or something like you don't have faith that we're gonna 0:03:53.120 --> 0:03:54.440 be able to take care of this planet. You think 0:03:54.440 --> 0:03:57.160 we're on a on the trajectory to climate doomsday, where 0:03:57.200 --> 0:04:00.240 more like little kids burning tires inside of the house, 0:04:02.160 --> 0:04:04.680 you know what I mean? Like that's an officially recommendation people, 0:04:04.760 --> 0:04:07.760 Jorge says, do not burn tires inside your house. Just 0:04:07.800 --> 0:04:11.680 do it in the backyard. Right, Generally that's a bad idea. Yeah, 0:04:12.400 --> 0:04:14.640 is that how you start your cozy family evenings? Let's 0:04:14.640 --> 0:04:18.039 go burn some tires outside? Um. Yeah, But this is 0:04:18.040 --> 0:04:19.960 even bigger than that. This is bigger than can we 0:04:20.040 --> 0:04:22.159 go to another planet? Can we establish a base on 0:04:22.160 --> 0:04:25.560 another planet? This is can we make another planet habitable? 0:04:25.600 --> 0:04:28.200 So you can live outside, you can breathe the air, 0:04:28.279 --> 0:04:31.000 you can run around, you can grow crops. So you 0:04:31.200 --> 0:04:33.719 meaning we can go to another planet and live there, 0:04:33.839 --> 0:04:36.359 but we would be in space suits and inside of 0:04:36.680 --> 0:04:38.800 some kind of base the whole time. That wouldn't be 0:04:38.839 --> 0:04:40.440 a lot of fun. That would not be a lot 0:04:40.480 --> 0:04:42.000 of fun. I mean, I think if you went to 0:04:42.080 --> 0:04:44.440 Mars and just build a colony, like you know, out 0:04:44.440 --> 0:04:47.000 of ships and domes and stuff like that, you'd basically 0:04:47.000 --> 0:04:49.560 be living on Antarctica, you know, be cold and dry 0:04:49.600 --> 0:04:51.360 and unpleasant, and you have to pee in a space 0:04:51.360 --> 0:04:53.359 suit all the time, and it would not be like 0:04:53.440 --> 0:04:56.120 living on Earth and be very hard to imagine millions 0:04:56.200 --> 0:04:58.560 or billions of people living that way on Mars right 0:04:58.640 --> 0:05:01.200 or anywhere else. So if you want to really want 0:05:01.200 --> 0:05:04.960 to establish non Earth population centers, you have to figure 0:05:04.960 --> 0:05:08.120 out a way to make the planet itself habitable without 0:05:08.240 --> 0:05:11.440 space suit. Yeah. So that's where the term terraforming comes from. 0:05:11.560 --> 0:05:13.520 And so we were curious to know how many people 0:05:13.520 --> 0:05:17.640 out there, including you, maybe knew this term. Yeah. So 0:05:17.680 --> 0:05:19.080 I went out in the street and I asked people, 0:05:19.120 --> 0:05:21.320 have you heard of terraforming? Do you know what it is? 0:05:21.400 --> 0:05:23.720 What does it mean? Is it possible? Here's what people 0:05:23.720 --> 0:05:26.480 had to say, I've heard the word before, but I 0:05:26.520 --> 0:05:29.880 don't actually know anything about it. Okay, I used the 0:05:29.960 --> 0:05:33.240 form like how the Earth got formed? Okay, No, I 0:05:33.279 --> 0:05:37.000 haven't heard terraform before. No, No, I have no terraform. 0:05:37.000 --> 0:05:40.720 I've heard of it, I don't know the meaning of it. Okay, 0:05:40.800 --> 0:05:45.479 um on another planet forming the environment or something like that, 0:05:45.560 --> 0:05:48.080 something along those lines. A right, is that like when 0:05:48.160 --> 0:05:50.440 you dig up the planet. I've heard of the term, 0:05:50.480 --> 0:05:52.720 but not the definition. What's your best guess what it 0:05:52.839 --> 0:05:56.080 might be? How the Earth forms or how any planet 0:05:56.120 --> 0:05:59.680 forms or good. Yeah, I have heard of terraforming. Terraforming 0:05:59.720 --> 0:06:01.520 is whole fully something when we can be a step 0:06:01.560 --> 0:06:04.920 three civilization. I forget the correct connotation. But you'll maybe 0:06:05.279 --> 0:06:06.919 get a lot of energy from the Sun and be 0:06:06.960 --> 0:06:09.239 able to use that to go and colonize another planet 0:06:09.240 --> 0:06:12.840 and make the human race become a multiplanetary species. Do 0:06:12.839 --> 0:06:15.040 you think that's realistic? No? I think we have way 0:06:15.080 --> 0:06:16.760 too much on Earth that we need to take care 0:06:16.800 --> 0:06:19.240 of still, and that it's a sexy idea, but I 0:06:19.279 --> 0:06:22.359 think that it's not gonna happen for some long amount 0:06:22.400 --> 0:06:26.160 of time. All right, So a lot of nose. Maybe 0:06:26.200 --> 0:06:28.200 I was asking the wrong question. I was asking people 0:06:28.200 --> 0:06:31.279 have they heard of terraforming, and most of the people, 0:06:31.320 --> 0:06:33.560 except for one very smart gentleman I had a lot 0:06:33.560 --> 0:06:35.240 of a lot to say about it, had never even 0:06:35.279 --> 0:06:37.840 heard of the word. Right. They're like, just not even 0:06:37.920 --> 0:06:40.520 part of something they think about or or talk about 0:06:40.600 --> 0:06:42.680 or wonder about. Right, So that's good. We can we 0:06:42.680 --> 0:06:44.680 can explain people what the word means. Nobody thought it 0:06:44.720 --> 0:06:47.920 was terra cotta. Nobody except for you things that has 0:06:48.000 --> 0:06:52.000 to do with pottery, That's right, very Chinese soldiers. Except 0:06:52.040 --> 0:06:53.840 for now. Somebody now is going to be listening to 0:06:53.880 --> 0:06:55.760 this podcasts. They're gonna come away with it that that's 0:06:55.760 --> 0:06:58.640 their takeaway, right, that terraforming is making an earth out 0:06:58.640 --> 0:07:01.320 of terra cotta. But maybe a more interesting question to 0:07:01.360 --> 0:07:03.200 have asked would have been like, do you think it's 0:07:03.279 --> 0:07:07.240 possible to turn Mars into a habitable planet? Right? That's 0:07:07.600 --> 0:07:09.920 I'm curious what people would have thought about that. But anyway, 0:07:09.960 --> 0:07:13.360 in another universe and another multiverse, I asked that different question. 0:07:13.960 --> 0:07:15.960 Do you think people would have known or thought it 0:07:16.000 --> 0:07:18.000 was possible or not? I don't know, but I'm always 0:07:18.000 --> 0:07:19.840 surprised to hear what people think. I would have would 0:07:19.840 --> 0:07:22.760 like to know what people think is possible if that's 0:07:22.800 --> 0:07:25.240 sort of a feasible project the humanity could pull off. 0:07:25.280 --> 0:07:28.400 I mean, man, massive planetary engineering, as you'll hear in 0:07:28.440 --> 0:07:31.680 today's podcast, folks, it's not a small project to undertake. 0:07:31.840 --> 0:07:35.680 That's a word, planetary engineering. The idea that you can 0:07:36.120 --> 0:07:39.960 change an entire planet. That's amazing, right, Yeah, And you 0:07:40.000 --> 0:07:42.320 know it's something people thinking about for Earth. Right. Geo 0:07:42.400 --> 0:07:44.880 Engineering is the study of, like, can we solve our 0:07:44.920 --> 0:07:48.840 climate climate problems by doing some crazy engineering, you know, 0:07:48.880 --> 0:07:52.280 like deflecting the Sun's rays or or you know, injecting 0:07:52.280 --> 0:07:54.680 things into the atmosphere or pulling CEO two out of 0:07:54.680 --> 0:07:58.600 the atmosphere, like these massive engineering projects as desperate measures 0:07:58.600 --> 0:08:02.040 to reverse climate change. It's gonna become center stage more 0:08:02.080 --> 0:08:03.560 and more, and then in the next few years, I 0:08:03.600 --> 0:08:06.560 think be cool to we get that as a degree, 0:08:06.720 --> 0:08:11.240 you know, in your diploma planetary engineer. Yeah. Well, you know, 0:08:11.320 --> 0:08:13.600 the more people burned tires outside or in their living room, 0:08:13.680 --> 0:08:15.200 the more we're gonna have to worry about this stuff 0:08:15.200 --> 0:08:17.520 and counteract it. So somebody's got to think about it. 0:08:17.560 --> 0:08:19.920 There's a lot of really fun papers about geo engineering. 0:08:20.280 --> 0:08:22.880 People have crazy schemes to try to cool off the 0:08:22.920 --> 0:08:24.920 Earth or I mean a lot of it sounds really 0:08:25.000 --> 0:08:26.920 risky to me. It's not like we really understand the 0:08:26.920 --> 0:08:29.240 way the atmosphere works. So trying to tweet it and 0:08:29.320 --> 0:08:32.240 twiddle with it, like dialing the knobs on the atmosphere, 0:08:32.280 --> 0:08:35.720 that scares me. Seems tricky. If you don't have a 0:08:35.720 --> 0:08:40.120 lot of faith in engineers, generally, I feel, well, you know, 0:08:40.240 --> 0:08:42.160 sometimes you have to put your faith in the engineers 0:08:42.160 --> 0:08:45.360 because you have a desperate problem. Right, But when it's 0:08:45.360 --> 0:08:47.840 a when it's a system that you know they don't understand, 0:08:47.880 --> 0:08:50.440 Like we can't predict the weather very well, right, so 0:08:50.880 --> 0:08:53.720 how can you predict what happens when you seed clouds 0:08:53.800 --> 0:08:56.600 or when you put huge mirrors in space? Like And 0:08:56.640 --> 0:08:58.880 that's a fine thing to do on another planet where 0:08:58.880 --> 0:09:00.480 you know you have a million year is to figure 0:09:00.480 --> 0:09:02.640 it out, or a thousand years to figure it out. Um, 0:09:02.679 --> 0:09:04.760 an infinite budget. But when it comes to Earth, our 0:09:04.840 --> 0:09:08.480 home less open to this kind of crazy experimentation. I 0:09:08.480 --> 0:09:10.760 would be very concous. We only have one planet and 0:09:10.800 --> 0:09:13.120 so you know we if we miss it up tinkering, 0:09:13.800 --> 0:09:16.560 it could be bad news. Yeah, exactly, Um, would you 0:09:16.600 --> 0:09:19.840 put the whole climate into the hands of engineers and say, hey, 0:09:19.920 --> 0:09:24.240 tinker away, see what happens. I think it'd be cool 0:09:24.320 --> 0:09:26.280 just to be be called the P you know, like 0:09:26.679 --> 0:09:28.800 Planet arr engineer. You just want the title, you don't 0:09:28.800 --> 0:09:33.240 want the responsibility. Ye say it part of com planetary 0:09:33.320 --> 0:09:42.840 Engineer pH D and P. Yeah. So let's get into it. 0:09:43.160 --> 0:09:45.679 So what is terraforming? What is what is the concept 0:09:45.720 --> 0:09:49.520 of terraforming? Yes, so, just from the word terror meaning 0:09:49.559 --> 0:09:52.839 earth and right informing meaning forming, it means take another 0:09:52.880 --> 0:09:55.760 planet like Mars or another planet and make it like 0:09:55.960 --> 0:09:59.600 the Earth, make it to be able to sustain human life, right, 0:10:00.040 --> 0:10:02.520 make it habitable, yeah, make it habitable, make it a 0:10:02.520 --> 0:10:05.280 place that you might want to go, right, right, But 0:10:05.440 --> 0:10:07.640 is it? So it's basically the concept of making it 0:10:07.720 --> 0:10:10.040 so that you can step outside without a space food, 0:10:10.200 --> 0:10:12.960 take a deep breath and enjoy the sun and the 0:10:13.000 --> 0:10:15.920 air on Mars, yeah, or any other planet. I mean, 0:10:15.960 --> 0:10:17.680 And that's exactly the kind of thing that happens in 0:10:17.679 --> 0:10:20.000 science fiction stories all the time. Right, they land on 0:10:20.040 --> 0:10:22.880 some planet, they set down, they open the door, they 0:10:22.880 --> 0:10:25.960 take a deep breath, and they go ah, yeah, yeah, 0:10:26.080 --> 0:10:29.560 smells pretty sweet on planet x y Z. But there's 0:10:29.640 --> 0:10:34.120 nothing toxic or dangerous when I breathe this air, right, Yeah, 0:10:34.160 --> 0:10:37.280 exactly exactly, And that's that strikes me as very unlikely. 0:10:37.400 --> 0:10:38.880 I mean, that would be wonderful if it happened, but 0:10:38.920 --> 0:10:40.880 it strikes me as very unlikely. But that's the point, 0:10:40.960 --> 0:10:43.440 is being able to step outside without a space, food 0:10:43.600 --> 0:10:46.079 and breathe and live. But is that the only motivation 0:10:46.160 --> 0:10:49.120 kind of to enjoy the outdoors in another planet or 0:10:49.280 --> 0:10:52.479 is there something more that you know, we can't physically 0:10:52.960 --> 0:10:56.240 live that many people inside of a base or inside 0:10:56.240 --> 0:10:59.440 of a constrained environment. Yeah, I think if you want 0:10:59.440 --> 0:11:01.320 to if you want to really spread across the planet, 0:11:01.320 --> 0:11:02.840 you've got to make the whole thing habitable. I mean, 0:11:02.840 --> 0:11:06.640 if you're gonna build domes and live inside domes, that's 0:11:06.920 --> 0:11:11.600 that's not nearly as fun, right, and it's it's constrained exactly. So, um, 0:11:11.640 --> 0:11:14.560 if you want to have agriculture that supports a large population, 0:11:14.679 --> 0:11:17.319 you can need to have plants growing, and so either 0:11:17.679 --> 0:11:19.400 you have to build a dome the size of the 0:11:19.400 --> 0:11:22.280 planet or just make the planet into a dome, right, 0:11:22.320 --> 0:11:26.199 eventually having domes impractical? Interesting? Okay, So let's get into 0:11:26.280 --> 0:11:29.199 the details and what does it mean to be habitable. 0:11:29.280 --> 0:11:31.200 For a planet to be habitable, like, what do we 0:11:31.280 --> 0:11:33.719 need to change in other planets to make it more 0:11:33.800 --> 0:11:37.520 like ours? Yeah? So you need an atmosphere. You need 0:11:37.960 --> 0:11:41.240 non toxic atmosphere with oxygen in it. You need to 0:11:41.280 --> 0:11:44.640 have enough water, right. Um, you need the temperature to 0:11:44.679 --> 0:11:47.880 be reasonable. Right. You can't be a frozen instantly or 0:11:47.920 --> 0:11:50.719 boiled to a crisp as soon as you step outside. Um. 0:11:51.000 --> 0:11:53.559 You also, and that's not even enough, right. You might think, well, 0:11:53.600 --> 0:11:56.080 that's a tall order, and it is, but even that's 0:11:56.120 --> 0:11:59.160 not enough. You need things like shielding from cosmic rays. Right. 0:11:59.559 --> 0:12:01.720 If you're a place where the radiation is much higher 0:12:01.720 --> 0:12:03.920 than it is on Earth, then you need to be protected. 0:12:04.040 --> 0:12:05.960 Having an atmosphere will do some of that for you, 0:12:06.160 --> 0:12:09.240 but it might not be enough. Um. So I'd say 0:12:09.240 --> 0:12:13.200 those are the basics. Water, temperature, atmosphere, um, and shielding 0:12:13.240 --> 0:12:16.040 from cosmic rays. Those are the four elements. It's a 0:12:16.080 --> 0:12:18.520 lot of things to get right, you know already. I mean, 0:12:18.600 --> 0:12:21.080 so it just seems like four things. But that's that's 0:12:20.720 --> 0:12:23.720 a big list of requests for your for the flooring 0:12:23.800 --> 0:12:26.400 company or whatever it is we're gonna hire to to 0:12:26.960 --> 0:12:29.360 renovate the Moon for us, Well, it's just four things, 0:12:29.360 --> 0:12:32.839 but it's four things the size of an entire planet, right, 0:12:32.880 --> 0:12:35.640 Like you, it's not about like changing in a little dome. 0:12:35.760 --> 0:12:39.640 It's it's an entire gigantic space that you need to 0:12:39.960 --> 0:12:43.319 have these, right, Yeah, exactly. And we have that situation 0:12:43.320 --> 0:12:45.440 on Earth, which is wonderful, but it's not like that 0:12:45.480 --> 0:12:47.920 happened overnight. You know, this is a billions of years 0:12:48.040 --> 0:12:50.560 process to get to where we are today, and now 0:12:50.600 --> 0:12:53.319 we're talking about engineering it and doing it in hopefully 0:12:53.400 --> 0:12:55.680 less than a billion years, right, So it's gonna be 0:12:55.760 --> 0:12:58.440 harder to do on another planet, or it didn't happen 0:12:58.480 --> 0:13:01.040 by itself in a shorter amout of time. Yeah, it 0:13:01.080 --> 0:13:03.920 kind of makes you think how precious it is the 0:13:03.960 --> 0:13:07.680 conditions that we have here. Yeah, exactly. Maybe we should review, 0:13:07.760 --> 0:13:09.839 like roughly how that happened on Earth, how we got 0:13:09.880 --> 0:13:12.720 to habitable planet on Earth. Earth was formed big ball 0:13:12.720 --> 0:13:15.120 of hot lavats that it's cooled down a little bit, 0:13:15.280 --> 0:13:17.360 but then it was dry and so as we talked 0:13:17.360 --> 0:13:20.240 about a podcast episode a while ago, um, we got 0:13:20.280 --> 0:13:23.120 water by having comets smashed into the Earth's surface. And 0:13:23.120 --> 0:13:26.640 comets are basically huge snowballs in space, and so we 0:13:26.800 --> 0:13:29.800 brought water in from outer space. We ordered it right 0:13:29.840 --> 0:13:32.520 on door dash or something. Can you deliver like a 0:13:32.559 --> 0:13:36.480 thousand commets tomorrow, Hey arrowhead, we need a couple of 0:13:36.480 --> 0:13:40.559 trillion gallons please, yeah, exactly. So that's where we got 0:13:40.559 --> 0:13:44.800 the water right from space comets um. And then life started, right, 0:13:45.240 --> 0:13:49.000 and life and produced some carbon dioxides. This is very 0:13:49.120 --> 0:13:51.840 very early life like microbes that could eat things like 0:13:52.000 --> 0:13:54.720 metals and rock and all sorts of stuff that existed 0:13:54.760 --> 0:13:57.560 on the planet Um and produced some carbon dioxide. And 0:13:57.600 --> 0:14:00.680 we also got some carbon dioxide by venting from volcanoes. 0:14:00.880 --> 0:14:03.520 So that's how we got our atmosphere from microbes and 0:14:03.559 --> 0:14:05.839 from volcanoes. That gives us an atmosphere that has a 0:14:05.880 --> 0:14:08.240 lot of carbon dioxide in it, right, But then we 0:14:08.240 --> 0:14:12.319 need the oxygen, and the oxygen came when microbes, actually 0:14:12.360 --> 0:14:16.120 cyanobacteria in particular, and then later algae and plants figured 0:14:16.160 --> 0:14:19.960 out how to photosynthesize. For the instance, this essentially is 0:14:20.120 --> 0:14:24.520 breaking down C O two into oxygen and carbon, right, 0:14:24.920 --> 0:14:27.400 and so some of that oxygen is released in the atmosphere. 0:14:27.840 --> 0:14:30.600 And see, you have huge amounts of microbes and algae 0:14:30.600 --> 0:14:32.800 and plank in the ocean doing this all the time, 0:14:32.840 --> 0:14:35.880 and the trees now doing this produced enough oxygen to 0:14:35.920 --> 0:14:39.400 give us an atmosphere that was breathable for animals. Right, 0:14:39.720 --> 0:14:41.760 So that's how we got water, we got pressure, we 0:14:41.880 --> 0:14:45.480 got oxygen. Yeah, And it's all sort of tied together, right. 0:14:45.480 --> 0:14:49.000 The living things are tied together with the things in 0:14:49.000 --> 0:14:51.400 the rocks and the things that came from out of space, 0:14:51.480 --> 0:14:54.080 and it all sort of mixed together too, and that's 0:14:54.080 --> 0:14:57.479 where we evolve. Right. It's not like these are the 0:14:57.520 --> 0:15:00.480 ideal conditions for any life. It's just that these are 0:15:00.480 --> 0:15:02.920 the conditions in which we grew up in and so 0:15:02.960 --> 0:15:05.760 that's what we need, right. That's right, And you're right there, 0:15:05.760 --> 0:15:07.880 all tied together. It's hard to get one without the other. 0:15:08.240 --> 0:15:11.320 You know. Having enough water helps you with all these cycles, 0:15:11.400 --> 0:15:13.960 and having the right pressure in the atmosphere helps keep 0:15:13.960 --> 0:15:16.920 the water on the planet, and caps keep the temperature right. 0:15:17.200 --> 0:15:20.160 And so it's a very complicated, delicate system, and it's 0:15:20.240 --> 0:15:22.360 very easy to throw out a balance. I'm amazed, frankly 0:15:22.360 --> 0:15:24.200 that we haven't screwed it up already. You know that 0:15:24.640 --> 0:15:27.440 it's lasted this long where we're well on our way. 0:15:27.480 --> 0:15:33.800 I think expectations are are not low enough. That's right. 0:15:33.840 --> 0:15:39.720 Too many people are burning tires inside. Yeah. Um, okay, 0:15:39.760 --> 0:15:41.360 so let's get into the then how you would do 0:15:41.360 --> 0:15:43.600 it and another planet. Let's get into the details of 0:15:43.600 --> 0:15:49.760 of peeing, not peeing, but peeing planetary engineering a whole 0:15:49.760 --> 0:15:53.040 other planet to be just like our cozy Earth. But 0:15:53.160 --> 0:16:09.040 first let's take a quick break. Al Right, So, how 0:16:09.040 --> 0:16:11.920 do we set up a livable situation on Mars so 0:16:12.000 --> 0:16:14.520 that we can do cartwheels in the grass and enjoy 0:16:14.560 --> 0:16:17.600 and take deep breaths and drink from rivers and raise 0:16:17.640 --> 0:16:20.120 our children care free? Right, that's the goal? Yeah, how 0:16:20.120 --> 0:16:21.920 do we change the planet in which we would die 0:16:22.040 --> 0:16:25.120 if we stepped outside, to one in which it would 0:16:25.120 --> 0:16:26.840 be nice to go out and take a walk. Right, 0:16:26.840 --> 0:16:30.240 We basically want to turn Antarctica into southern California. Right. 0:16:30.280 --> 0:16:32.720 That seems how hard could that be? Right? Well, we're 0:16:32.760 --> 0:16:36.600 well on our way for that too. Antarc global warming 0:16:37.160 --> 0:16:40.160 is the new Southern California. Yeah, so we're going to 0:16:40.240 --> 0:16:43.000 start with Mars because that's the nearest planet. Right, that's 0:16:43.040 --> 0:16:46.320 kind of the best candidate we have for maybe moving 0:16:46.760 --> 0:16:49.080 the entire species to Right, that's right, this is a 0:16:49.160 --> 0:16:54.360 ridiculous project, possibly potentially impossible, costing zillions of dollars and 0:16:54.360 --> 0:16:59.520 maybe taking zillions of years. But of the impossible destinations, 0:16:59.560 --> 0:17:02.920 we mightsidder, Mars is sort of the least impossible. So yeah, 0:17:02.920 --> 0:17:05.679 that's the one people people talk about a lot, the 0:17:05.760 --> 0:17:10.359 least impossible. Okay, so there's a sliver of a chance 0:17:10.400 --> 0:17:13.000 that we might be able to pull this off, yeah, exactly. 0:17:13.000 --> 0:17:15.240 And so to figure out whether this was possible, I 0:17:15.240 --> 0:17:18.280 actually made a call to an expert, professor Jim Castings 0:17:18.320 --> 0:17:20.160 at Penn State University. He was he knows a lot 0:17:20.200 --> 0:17:23.000 about terraforming and Mars. He's thought about this. And when 0:17:23.000 --> 0:17:24.960 I first called him up and I asked him, I said, 0:17:25.119 --> 0:17:28.240 is terraforming Mars possible? He said, just flatly no, I 0:17:28.320 --> 0:17:31.000 can't be done. I was like, well, that was a 0:17:31.040 --> 0:17:33.159 short phone call, right, it was gonna be a this 0:17:33.240 --> 0:17:36.480 will be a short podcast. Yeah, But then I said possible, 0:17:36.560 --> 0:17:41.000 no next time, thanks for tuning in. So he said no. 0:17:41.080 --> 0:17:43.360 He said he's an expert, he's worked with NASA. He's 0:17:43.440 --> 0:17:45.520 like no, yeah, he's thought about like you said no. 0:17:45.560 --> 0:17:46.879 But then I said, okay, what if I give you 0:17:46.920 --> 0:17:51.359 an infinite amount of money. He was like, okay, mab Yeah. 0:17:51.359 --> 0:17:53.600 So then he considered it as an infinite number of 0:17:53.640 --> 0:17:56.439 years and he said, okay, infinite amount of time and 0:17:56.560 --> 0:17:59.720 infinite amount of resources, then we can do it. Wow. 0:18:00.040 --> 0:18:02.840 So there's it's about the resources. When you say it's impossible, 0:18:02.880 --> 0:18:06.200 it's not um like it violates any laws of physics. 0:18:06.320 --> 0:18:10.320 Is just that we he didn't foresee how we would 0:18:10.320 --> 0:18:12.960 pull this off with the resources that we have. Yeah. Well, 0:18:13.000 --> 0:18:14.760 as you'll hear when we talk about this, it's going 0:18:14.800 --> 0:18:18.240 to be expensive. Right. So the first problem is Mars 0:18:18.320 --> 0:18:21.120 has hardly in the atmosphere, and the atmosphere is mostly 0:18:21.160 --> 0:18:25.080 carbon dioxide. Right, There's almost no oxygen on Mars. So 0:18:25.320 --> 0:18:28.520 problem number one is you need an atmosphere on Mars. Right, 0:18:29.119 --> 0:18:31.760 But an atmosphere you mean like a layer of gas 0:18:31.800 --> 0:18:35.040 surrounding the planet, because currently it doesn't have much of that. 0:18:35.040 --> 0:18:37.159 That's right, So that when you step outside you take 0:18:37.160 --> 0:18:39.640 a deep breath, you get a breath instead of like 0:18:39.840 --> 0:18:43.560 your lungs boiling um, which seems less comfortable. Right. I 0:18:43.560 --> 0:18:46.159 don't want to we adds for the resort that we're 0:18:46.200 --> 0:18:48.400 going to start on Mars. We don't want um, images 0:18:48.440 --> 0:18:50.720 of our guests having their lungs going inside out and 0:18:50.760 --> 0:18:53.880 their blood boiling into space. Right, yeah, like Arnold trash 0:18:53.960 --> 0:18:59.240 Negger in total recall. Yeah that was a documentary exactly. Yeah. Yeah, 0:18:59.280 --> 0:19:01.200 well he could when he goes outside of Mars and 0:19:01.480 --> 0:19:05.640 like his eyes bug out and yeah exactly. Um. And 0:19:05.680 --> 0:19:08.359 so that's one problem is the atmosphere. And connected to 0:19:08.400 --> 0:19:10.919 that is the temperature currently on Mars. I checked the 0:19:10.920 --> 0:19:14.399 web this morning. It's negative sixty three degrees celsius on 0:19:14.440 --> 0:19:18.520 the surface of Mars. Right, Chili chili definitely not Southern 0:19:18.520 --> 0:19:22.280 California standards. Right. And those two things are connected. Is 0:19:22.280 --> 0:19:26.200 it connected to the the fact that there is no atmosphere, 0:19:26.320 --> 0:19:30.880 you know, like vacuum is by definition kind of cold. Right, Well, 0:19:30.880 --> 0:19:33.399 there's that, I mean, but also there's nothing to store 0:19:33.440 --> 0:19:36.840 the Sun's energy. Right. The Sun hits Mars and and 0:19:36.840 --> 0:19:39.320 warms it up, but then the energy just floats off 0:19:39.359 --> 0:19:42.199 into space, right, It just radiates back onto space. But 0:19:42.280 --> 0:19:44.679 an atmosphere acts like a blanket, right, and so it 0:19:44.800 --> 0:19:47.480 keeps the Sun's energy on the planet. That's one of 0:19:47.480 --> 0:19:49.600 the reasons why we have global warming here on Earth 0:19:49.680 --> 0:19:52.159 is that we're thickening the blanket we have of carbon 0:19:52.160 --> 0:19:54.439 dioxide is keeping more and more of the Sun's energy. 0:19:54.880 --> 0:19:57.280 So Mars has almost greenhouse, right, Yeah, it acts like 0:19:57.280 --> 0:20:00.360 a greenhouse. Mars has almost no atmosphere, and so most 0:20:00.359 --> 0:20:02.960 of the energies bounces right back into space. So the 0:20:02.960 --> 0:20:05.080 fact that you don't have an atmosphere and you don't 0:20:05.080 --> 0:20:08.280 and you and you're too cold are connected, right, which 0:20:08.320 --> 0:20:11.639 is bad. Had an atmosphere, it could warm up, Yes, exactly. 0:20:11.720 --> 0:20:14.639 So one strategy for warming up the planet is to 0:20:14.720 --> 0:20:18.119 give it an atmosphere. Right. So for example, um, I 0:20:18.800 --> 0:20:20.640 asked the professor, I said, you know what if we 0:20:21.160 --> 0:20:23.840 um use the carbon dioxide that is on Mars. Because 0:20:23.880 --> 0:20:25.919 Mars has a bunch of carbon dioxide, It has a 0:20:25.920 --> 0:20:29.680 bunch of water, but it's mostly frozen in the ice caps, right, 0:20:29.680 --> 0:20:32.800