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Speaker 1: Welcome to stuff to blow your mind from how stuff

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Speaker 1: weren't dot com? Hey, welcome to stuff to blow your mind.

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Speaker 1: My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick. So Robert, Yes,

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Speaker 1: I wanna put you in a strange scenario. I want

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Speaker 1: you to imagine yourself an astronaut in a near future dystopia,

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Speaker 1: in fact, a truly dystopian scenario. From my perspective, to

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Speaker 1: do this is an exer side I try to employ

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Speaker 1: you know every day. Okay, Now, you might be going

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Speaker 1: to a kind of Orwellian place, like the totalitarian Hell

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Speaker 1: don't go there. Or you might be going to like

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Speaker 1: the oldest Huxley place where we're all just medicated and

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Speaker 1: placated and have an empty, soulless bliss. Not there. I

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Speaker 1: want you to put yourself in the actuarial capitalist bureaucracy

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Speaker 1: of the private insurance market. Okay, okay, so we land

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Speaker 1: in a place that's maybe a little more comfortable, but

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Speaker 1: a little more mundane. So specifically, what you're trying to

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Speaker 1: do is purchase a suite of insurance policies that will

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Speaker 1: protect you and your family if you suffer death, disability,

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Speaker 1: or a serious medical condition in your line of work.

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Speaker 1: So during a brief interview, there's a policy agent who

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Speaker 1: has to ask you if you questions to determine whether

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Speaker 1: they can sell you a policy and what your rate

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Speaker 1: is going to be, so you get the standard ones.

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Speaker 1: Are you a smoker, heavy drinker, ivy drug user? Wait?

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Speaker 1: What this is the future? Right? Yes? Okay? Uh duelist

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Speaker 1: and or gun slinger? Um, this is the future? Yeah, um,

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Speaker 1: I'll say sometimes how about drag race junkie night of

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Speaker 1: the Sacred art of the motor joust? Um? Do you

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Speaker 1: work with high voltage nitroglycerin or flying guillotines? Not currently?

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Speaker 1: And does your church congregation practice snake handling? Not bio snakes?

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Speaker 1: So we're good, right, you only get those uh those

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Speaker 1: safe synthetic snakes. Yeah, yeah, I mean so we get

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Speaker 1: you know, the spirit of the practice is still true.

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Speaker 1: It's not the Middle Ages. Come on the future. Okay.

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Speaker 1: So we're all the way through the interview except for

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Speaker 1: one final question. Are you now or have you ever

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Speaker 1: been on the waiting list for a space colonization project?

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Speaker 1: And there you got me? Yeah, I got you. Sorry,

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Speaker 1: that's the kicker, because Robert, I know that you are

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Speaker 1: in fact, currently an in astronaut training to become one

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Speaker 1: of the members of the first wave of semi permanent

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Speaker 1: Mars colonists. Uh. And depending on circumstances, you might be

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Speaker 1: spending the next six to twelve years and maybe the

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Speaker 1: rest of your natural life in a habitat on the

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Speaker 1: surface of a red, red waste land. And unfortunately you're

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Speaker 1: well aware of this, and well aware of the fact

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Speaker 1: that if you answer yes to this question, your monthly

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Speaker 1: payments are going to be so high as to defeat

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Speaker 1: the entire purpose of the insurance policy, right, because this

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Speaker 1: is a risky venture. This is this is even beyond

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Speaker 1: drag racing and motor jousting and what have you. This

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Speaker 1: is uh, this is this is a risky lifestyle to

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Speaker 1: take on. How true that is? Now, you could do

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Speaker 1: what Neil Armstrong and the rest of the crew of

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Speaker 1: Apollo eleven did. Did Did you ever hear about this story? Now?

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Speaker 1: The whole insurance policies for astronaut is is an area

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Speaker 1: I've I've not explored well. When the crew of the

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Speaker 1: Apollo eleven mission, who were going to be the first

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Speaker 1: people to land on the Moon, realized that life insurance

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Speaker 1: policies would be prohibitively expensive for them. They came up

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Speaker 1: with an interesting idea to to make a policy of

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Speaker 1: their own. So, during the month when they were in

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Speaker 1: quarantine before launch, and this is true, they signed hundreds

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Speaker 1: of autographed covers they were called which were these envelopes

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Speaker 1: postmarked with historically significant dates on them? Uh, And they were.

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Speaker 1: They were autographing these covers, and then they would deliver

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Speaker 1: them all to their families. This way, they knew that

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Speaker 1: if they didn't survive of the mission, the sale of

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Speaker 1: autographed memorabilia would at least be enough to keep their

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Speaker 1: families afloat. So since I'm probably not going to get

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Speaker 1: this insurance policy because of my my my aspirations to

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Speaker 1: to become a Mars colonist, I can at least set

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Speaker 1: up the possibility that my family can make money off

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Speaker 1: the fact that I am Slash was the first man

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Speaker 1: to die on Mars. Yeah, okay, I could see that. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean that the motion pictures that would be made

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Speaker 1: about me, the rights to your life. Who's gonna play

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Speaker 1: you dying on Mars? I I hope everybody. They would

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Speaker 1: be like a Bob Dylan kind of thing, where different

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Speaker 1: actors and actress would would play me at different stages

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Speaker 1: of my demise. Kate Blanchets you gasping on the red Rock.

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Speaker 1: I think that's perfect. That would be pretty cool. But anyway,

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Speaker 1: put yourself back in the scenario. So the insurance agent

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Speaker 1: that that question might actually cause you to have some

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Speaker 1: second thoughts about your plans to go to Mars because

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Speaker 1: of what your body is going to be up against.

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Speaker 1: Now you know a few things, but you might not

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Speaker 1: realize the entire spate of potential challenges to your health

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Speaker 1: and well being while living on Mars, well while bound

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Speaker 1: for Mars, and once you get there, especially since you

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Speaker 1: couldn't wait out the years of preparation it was going

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Speaker 1: to take to be part of the joint NASA Jackson Yes,

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Speaker 1: a mission, and instead you have signed up with a

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Speaker 1: kind of sketchy sounding nonprofit based Mars colonization outfit because

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Speaker 1: they promised lift off within eighteen months and you're in

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Speaker 1: a hurry. Though from what you've seen so far, they

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Speaker 1: might be cutting some corners. Uh. Yeah, I was very

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Speaker 1: skeptical of the the wooden spaceship approach that they were

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Speaker 1: they were looking to employ. Did you ever read that?

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Speaker 1: What was that there? Was a proposition that that the

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Speaker 1: movie Alien three was originally going to be about a

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Speaker 1: wooden planet. Oh yeah, I go, yeah, wooden space station

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Speaker 1: man by monks. That idea. Pretty wish they'd made that. Anyway,

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Speaker 1: back to the story, So this is a good jumping

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Speaker 1: off point to talk about the real thrust of today's episode,

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Speaker 1: which is the question, what are all of the health

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Speaker 1: challenges that our bodies might face over the course of

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Speaker 1: a long term Mars colonization effort, both traveling to Mars

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Speaker 1: and living there for years at a time or maybe

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Speaker 1: for a whole lifetime, And are there anyways we know

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Speaker 1: of to overcome these challenges? Yeah, it's a it's a

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Speaker 1: big question one that uh that NASA and other space

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Speaker 1: exploration authorities continue to look into, because that's kind of

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Speaker 1: the next big phase, right, that's the dream that's our

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Speaker 1: generation's moon, the idea of actually making it to the

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Speaker 1: red planet, of leaving this world that we've evolved to

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Speaker 1: thrive on and to thrive within a very slim portion

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Speaker 1: of the atmosphere and also only in certain regions of

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Speaker 1: the planet, to leave this world, travel through the unforgiving

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Speaker 1: void of space to a rather lifeless world and somehow

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Speaker 1: make a go of it. Yeah, well, we certainly don't

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Speaker 1: want to discourage Mars exploration with this podcast, but I

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Speaker 1: think it's just helpful while encouraging the exploratory and scientific

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Speaker 1: spirit to also realize what a truly horrible place Mars is.

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Speaker 1: So I think we should start with some of the

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Speaker 1: more obvious and more often talked about issues such as

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Speaker 1: radiation and reduced gravity micro gravity or zero gravity as

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Speaker 1: the case may be, and and then move on to

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Speaker 1: some of the more obscure concerns. So, the biggest health concern,

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Speaker 1: quite obviously for Mars travelers is going to be radiation exposure. Indeed,

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Speaker 1: we live in a kind of privileged a situation here

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Speaker 1: on Earth because we're we're largely shielded from some of

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Speaker 1: the the harsher radiation that can reach us in the

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Speaker 1: form of cosmic radiation and in a lot of the

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Speaker 1: solar radiation. Yeah, that's certainly true, And we actually would

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Speaker 1: have to deal with radiation in two different scenarios that

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Speaker 1: both apply to the Mars colonists. So there's gonna be

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Speaker 1: the radiation on the way to Mars and the radiation

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Speaker 1: once you get there. Because it's a sad fact that

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Speaker 1: Mars is not shielded the way Earth is, so both

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Speaker 1: cosmic and solar radiation immediately become a problem once you

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Speaker 1: leave the neighborhood of Earth. Even on Earth's surface, we're

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Speaker 1: actually exposed to a steady ambient level of radiation from

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Speaker 1: the Sun and from the larger universe. That would be

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Speaker 1: solar radiation and cosmic radiation, respectively. But Earth's atmosphere and

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Speaker 1: magneto sphere, so that's the magnetic field generated by the

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Speaker 1: dynamo effect when the Earth's liquid metal outer core rotates

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Speaker 1: around the intercore, an effect that most planets, uh that

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Speaker 1: we know do not feature. Yeah. Uh, that protects us

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Speaker 1: from the danger. So most of the incoming radiation gets

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Speaker 1: deflected or absorbed and we don't really have to worry

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Speaker 1: about it. Even astronauts on the International Space Station, which

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Speaker 1: is on average two nine miles above the surface of Earth,

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Speaker 1: even though they're exposed to more radiation than we get

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Speaker 1: on the surface, there's still shielded by Earth's magnetosphere, which

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Speaker 1: extends thousands of miles out into space. Yeah. When you

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Speaker 1: take that into account, I mean it's it's hostile and unforgiving.

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Speaker 1: As as the orbital environment is, it makes it seem like,

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Speaker 1: you know, like a five year old camping in his

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Speaker 1: parents backyard compared to actually venturing beyond the magnetosphere into

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Speaker 1: this unprotected regional space. Well, it's the equivalent of like

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Speaker 1: wading into three feet of water as opposed to swimming

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Speaker 1: across the ocean. But yeah, so once you're traveling in

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Speaker 1: outer space on the way to Mars, you no longer

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Speaker 1: have these protective barriers. And even once you get to Mars,

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Speaker 1: as we said, things aren't gonna be much better because

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Speaker 1: Mars does not have a strong magnetosphere like Earth, and

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Speaker 1: its atmosphere is absolutely puny. It's puny and thin. It's

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Speaker 1: about one percent the thickness of Earth's atmosphere. So you're

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Speaker 1: just not going to get much protection from radiation on Mars.

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Speaker 1: And there are ways to get around this. So people

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Speaker 1: have been coming up with all kinds of habitat and

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Speaker 1: space ship designs that would try to shield astronauts from

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Speaker 1: the various types of radiation they would encounter. So some

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Speaker 1: ideas are how to how to make shielding around a

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Speaker 1: spaceship that would absorb cosmic rays and try to prevent

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Speaker 1: secondary radiation from shooting off and irradiating you. One interesting

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Speaker 1: idea of read about is surrounding the crew capsule with

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Speaker 1: organic materials and water, so all of the food and

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Speaker 1: human waste and water and things like that would go,

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Speaker 1: would sort of form a weird moist BioShield around you.

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Speaker 1: Oh wow, so in in a sense, you would be

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Speaker 1: sailing to Mars in a protective bubble of your own sewage. Yes, exactly. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's sewage to the future. It will save your life, hopefully,

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Speaker 1: But we need to do more research to determine exactly

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Speaker 1: what the risks are and if we can create a

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Speaker 1: system like this that's economically feasible and we'll keep astronauts safe.

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Speaker 1: Because another problem is, sure, you can build a radiation shield.

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Speaker 1: I mean, we've build stuff like that all the time.

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Speaker 1: We have nuclear power plants, people who work with radiation,

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Speaker 1: and they can do that with relative protection. But it's

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Speaker 1: expensive to ship stuff into space, and the more bulk

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Speaker 1: you're adding to your ship to shield yourself, the more

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Speaker 1: trouble you're making this mission. Yeah, and it's in a

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Speaker 1: continuing theme that we'll we'll keep coming back to here

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Speaker 1: is is so much of this work is still ongoing.

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Speaker 1: We're still trying to find the answers, still trying to

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Speaker 1: figure out the best methods and dealing with a limited

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Speaker 1: ability to experiment on them. UH in real life. Totally true,

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Speaker 1: And unfortunately, it's not even just the standard radiation risks

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Speaker 1: that we're going to be dealing with during the trip

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Speaker 1: to Mars. So a standard trip to Mars might take

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Speaker 1: somewhere around six months. This is an estimate you see

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Speaker 1: thrown out a lot, and during those six months, and

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Speaker 1: once you get get to Mars, it's not just the

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Speaker 1: increased risk of cancer and other standard dangers associated with radiation.

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Speaker 1: Astronauts bound for Mars might face even weird or and

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Speaker 1: more disturbing dangers, for example, brain damage. So there is

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Speaker 1: some evidence that the kinds of cosmic rays that will

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Speaker 1: be cutting through your body on a regular basis while

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Speaker 1: you're on the way to Mars can produce brain damage,

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Speaker 1: leading to symptoms somewhat analogous to neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's UH,

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Speaker 1: and I've read a few articles about this. So medical

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Speaker 1: doctors have noted that some patients who receive radiation to

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Speaker 1: the head in the course of treating brain cancer display

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Speaker 1: side effects like increased confusion and other cognitive impairments, and

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Speaker 1: cosmic rays might do pretty much the same thing to us.

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Speaker 1: So in recent experiments, researchers have subjected mice to simulated

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Speaker 1: cosmic rays, and six weeks after acute exposure to this radiation,

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Speaker 1: the mice exhibited decreased cognitive performance as well as physiological

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Speaker 1: changes to brain tissue. And I just want to read this,

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Speaker 1: uh quote from the abstract of the study. It was

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Speaker 1: reductions in dendritic complexity and spine density along the medial

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Speaker 1: prefrontal cortical neurons known to mediate neurotransmissions specifically interrogated by

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Speaker 1: our behavioral tasks. So so your ability to behave with

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Speaker 1: intelligence could be impaired by the time you arrive at Mars.

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Speaker 1: Showing up at Mars brain damage is not a good idea. Yeah, yeah, right,

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Speaker 1: when a lot of the really heavy work is about

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Speaker 1: to begin. Yeah. And so a couple of notes, these

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Speaker 1: are mice brains, not human brains, and we know there's

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Speaker 1: some difference there. Also, we we should be able to

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Speaker 1: protect against this, like I was saying earlier, if we

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Speaker 1: prepare and invest enough, if we do the research, figure

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Speaker 1: out what the vulnerabilities are, and build the right kind

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Speaker 1: of shielding. But again it's an economics problem. Can we

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Speaker 1: invest enough resources to make sure people are safe from

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Speaker 1: these effects? If you're going on the nonprofit cutting corners

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Speaker 1: get you there fast missions, that might not be the case. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I don't know if the balsa wood shielding is going

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Speaker 1: to work and the outfit that I've been I've been

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Speaker 1: reading the brochure about. But of course it's not just

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Speaker 1: the radiation that will threaten our bodies on the trip

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Speaker 1: to Mars. What about the effects of micro gravity. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: this is a big one. And again I'm sure this

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Speaker 1: is one that that everyone is familiar with on some level. Uh,

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Speaker 1: you know, it often shows well, I was about to

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Speaker 1: say it often shows up in science fiction, but more

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Speaker 1: more often it's ignored in science fiction than the whole

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Speaker 1: issue of of of gravity and the lack of gravity

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Speaker 1: and space flight. Generally, you just throtle in some sort

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Speaker 1: of magical artificial gravity scenario and you don't worry about it.

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Speaker 1: I always respect the science fiction universes that have some

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Speaker 1: kind of rotating device on the ship to generate the

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Speaker 1: force of gravity. Yeah, where it's not just the millennium

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Speaker 1: falcon and you can walk around wherever. Yeah, because the

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Speaker 1: bottom line, of course, is that we evolved on a

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Speaker 1: world with a certain amount of gravitational pull and we're

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Speaker 1: completely adapted to it. Yeah, everything about our form and

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Speaker 1: gravity dictates the form of our muscle groups. Uh. And

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Speaker 1: gravity alone forces a certain level of exercise on you

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Speaker 1: at all times. So even if you're just you know,

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Speaker 1: standing in your apartment otherwise doing nothing, your body is

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Speaker 1: still working with gravity. And on a microscopic level, our

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Speaker 1: skeleton constantly alters its structure to bear the gravitational forces

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Speaker 1: of our planet. Even our organs work with it. With

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Speaker 1: with Earth gravity, I mean our heart beats against gravity

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Speaker 1: when it pushes blood um up to our brains. So

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Speaker 1: I mean we are we are just steeped in it.

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Speaker 1: We often take it for granted. I mean we we

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Speaker 1: almost always take it for granted. But we are creatures

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Speaker 1: that have evolved to live with our gravity, with Earth gravity. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: you don't think about it, but your body is constantly

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Speaker 1: having to compensate for gravity. I mean, the gravity wants

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Speaker 1: to pull you towards the floor. The gravity wants to

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Speaker 1: pull all your blood into your feet. So, like you said,

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Speaker 1: your circulatory says them, Like you mentioned has to pump

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Speaker 1: more blood pressure into the top of your body just

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Speaker 1: to make sure you get an even circulation, all because

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Speaker 1: of gravity. Indeed, so when we when we send astronauts

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Speaker 1: into space, when they go into orbit, um, they experience

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Speaker 1: a certain amount of muscle and skeleptle system deterioration. It's

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Speaker 1: called getting soft. Yeah, and literally that's that's what happens.

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Speaker 1: The muscles, especially the underutilized leg muscles, become flabby, lose

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Speaker 1: tone and mass, Muscular atrophy occurs. Bone becomes weaker because

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Speaker 1: of the loss of the minerals calcium, potassium, and sodium

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Speaker 1: um and the bone degeneration can reduce bone in the

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Speaker 1: lower limbs by so it's essentially a form of osteoporosis

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Speaker 1: known as space flight osteopenia. Yeah, and astronauts have to

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Speaker 1: do tons of exercise just to prevent this from being

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Speaker 1: worse than it is. Yeah, they're a number that there's

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Speaker 1: a lot of exercise. Um. Also, astronauts will generally take

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Speaker 1: various vitamins and even some pharmaceuticals. Particularly will take calcium

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Speaker 1: and vitamin d H. NASA often you know, tends to

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Speaker 1: have their their astronauts take clay to help to supposedly

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Speaker 1: help with calcium retention and then also uh, and it's

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Speaker 1: thought that osteoporosis drugs can be helpful in mitigating this

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Speaker 1: as well. Um, it's interesting the calcium is especially a problem.

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Speaker 1: The calcium loss in the bones of our body is

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Speaker 1: calcium is stored in the skeleton, and when we lose

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Speaker 1: it in low gravity, it enters the bloodstream, where an

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Speaker 1: excess of calcium can cause a host of unpleasantries. You know,

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Speaker 1: that could be as mild as just you know, diarrhea.

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Speaker 1: But you don't need another reason to have diarrhea in space. Yeah, well,

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Speaker 1: I mean you don't need you don't need a reason

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Speaker 1: to have any condition in space. That plays on another

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Speaker 1: problem that's not a medical condition in itself, but just

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Speaker 1: the fact that if you're headed towards Mars, or on Mars,

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Speaker 1: you are so far away from the nearest medical facility. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: you've got to have it all in the back, right,

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Speaker 1: you're ready to go. Yeah, what if you get a

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Speaker 1: kidney stone on Mars? You know? And the other thing

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Speaker 1: about the the exercise, because it easy to imagine, all right,

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Speaker 1: we'd have our our our drug hampers is completely filled

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Speaker 1: up and our our vitamins and our um and our

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Speaker 1: osto process medications. But then and we'll just be hitting

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Speaker 1: the treadmill the whole time. But you know, we've been

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Speaker 1: working with this problem for decades and and uh and

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Speaker 1: and experts still aren't really convinced, you know, what the

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Speaker 1: best method of exercises and if exercise really helps to

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Speaker 1: mitigate this, because you're again you're talking about constant ambient

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Speaker 1: gravitational pressure on the body and that's not something you

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Speaker 1: can you can really replicate with our current systems of

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Speaker 1: you know, treadmills or even some of these, uh, like

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Speaker 1: these force suits that the the Russians experimented within the past,

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Speaker 1: where they would be like this, we're just the act

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Speaker 1: of moving your arm would have a certain amount of

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Speaker 1: of of exercises. Yeah, the resistance suits, those are interesting, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: they're Um is a space musical by the name of

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Speaker 1: the American Astronaut, and there's a character that shows up

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Speaker 1: named body Suit, and he's this, uh, he's been living

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Speaker 1: in deep space for a long time and has has

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Speaker 1: one of these resistant suits on to keep his body strong. Meanwhile,

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Speaker 1: his father is just this stringy creature that's completely lost

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Speaker 1: all of his bone mass and as this enormous swollen head.

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Speaker 1: It's a yeah, um, it's it's a common exploration in

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Speaker 1: sci fi. I guess some of the heavier sci fi,

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Speaker 1: like Dan Simon's Hyperion books, there's a there's like a

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Speaker 1: race of humans that live in wayless environments and very

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Speaker 1: very tall and elongated, creepy. Well. I mean, actually, if

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Speaker 1: you've ever seen live footage of astronauts on the International

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Speaker 1: Space Station, you might have noticed that they look a

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Speaker 1: little weird, like, yeah, what, what exactly is wrong with

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Speaker 1: their bodies? That's an effect of weightlessness, where where body

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Speaker 1: fluids are read distributed up from the legs and into

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Speaker 1: the chest, shoulders, and heads. So if their face looks

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Speaker 1: puffy and they look they've got the kind of bodybuilder shoulders,

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Speaker 1: that's because of the microgravity environment. Yeah, there's so many

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Speaker 1: things we don't even necessarily think about. One that always

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Speaker 1: amazes me is how your bladder fills up in a

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Speaker 1: weightless environment. Yeah, because we've evolved to live in gravity.

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Speaker 1: So as our bladder fills up, that water is subject

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Speaker 1: to gravity, and as it starts getting a little bit,

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Speaker 1: a little bit towards the tipping point, we realize Hey,

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Speaker 1: I need to go to the bathroom. I should go

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Speaker 1: and relieve this. But if you're in a weightless environment,

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Speaker 1: it's not filling from the bottom up, it's just kind

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Speaker 1: of filling all around. So afternots don't often really realize

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Speaker 1: they have to go urinate until they've reached like maximum capacity,

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Speaker 1: like like almost you know, dangerous levels of full bladder.

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Speaker 1: Oh man, Yeah, so it's kind of so it kind

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Speaker 1: of transforms, you know, an ad adventurous adult in to

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Speaker 1: a toddler who suddenly realizes I've got to go to

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Speaker 1: the bathroom and there's nothing I can do to stop it.

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Speaker 1: All right, But that's all just in space flight, when

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Speaker 1: you're in this effectively zero G environment, the micro gravity

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Speaker 1: environment floating around, when you're on the International Space Station

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Speaker 1: for a number of months, you can eventually come back

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Speaker 1: to Earth and retrain. Your body might never be exactly

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Speaker 1: the same as it was before you went up to

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Speaker 1: the I S S, but you can you can regain

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Speaker 1: a lot of lost capacity. One question I have is

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Speaker 1: to what extent is that going to be true once

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Speaker 1: astronauts get out of the ship after six months in

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Speaker 1: weightlessness and then walk around on Mars, Because Mars is

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Speaker 1: not Earth right less gravity there, So you be you're,

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Speaker 1: you're you would certainly leave behind this, uh, this weightless

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Speaker 1: environment of space travel, but you're not. You're certainly not

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Speaker 1: going back to Earth levels of gravity. You're going back

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Speaker 1: to something far lighter. Yeah, and so what is the

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Speaker 1: effect of living in sixty less gravity for years at

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Speaker 1: a time or the rest of your life. I don't

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Speaker 1: think anybody knows the answer to that question yet. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's just not something we've we've dealt with thus far.

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Speaker 1: And and and this is again an area where are

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Speaker 1: our research into ways to mitigate uh space flight osteopenia

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Speaker 1: has to improve. Is we have to figure out better

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Speaker 1: ways to tackle it with improved exercise system improve pharmaceuticals

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Speaker 1: and vitamin regiments. So it's it's hard to say. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: And then there are a whole host of other effects

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Speaker 1: we observe in astronauts and witless environments that are not

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Speaker 1: even related to the decay of muscle and bone density.

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Speaker 1: One example would be vision. We ever read about astronaut

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Speaker 1: vision impairment? Yeah, this is the thing. So on Earth,

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Speaker 1: like we were saying, our circulatory system has adapted to

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Speaker 1: give us even blood circulation despite the effects of gravity

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Speaker 1: yanking our blood towards the ground. So without the gravity,

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Speaker 1: your body overcompensates for gravity that isn't there and puts

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Speaker 1: way too much blood into your head, so you can

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Speaker 1: essentially read out without without the aid of the jet fighter. Well,

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Speaker 1: the it's actually the continuous effects of this increased blood

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Speaker 1: pressure in the head that caused the biggest problem. One

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Speaker 1: common symptom is far sightedness. Another thing is this thing

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Speaker 1: called cotton wool spots in your field of vision, and

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Speaker 1: that's caused by damage to the nerve fibers in the

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Speaker 1: back of the eye. So now we've got a few things.

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Speaker 1: When you get out of the ship, so you've just

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Speaker 1: arrived at Mars, you might have decreased bone and muscle density,

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Speaker 1: possibly brain damage if you didn't take you know, your

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Speaker 1: proper radiation shielding, and impaired vision. That's not a way

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Speaker 1: to build a colony. So I I don't know if

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Speaker 1: the impaired vision effects would carry over onto Mars either

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Speaker 1: or to what extent the Mars gravity would help solve

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Speaker 1: the problem. Again, we don't know about the long term

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Speaker 1: effects of living on reduced gravity. All Right, we're gonna

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Speaker 1: take a quick break and when we come back, we

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Speaker 1: will consider the Martian dusty. Alright, we're back, as we've

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Speaker 1: been discussing. Yeah, we've arrived at Mars and we've we've

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Speaker 1: just been ravaged by a micro gravity radiation and now

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Speaker 1: we're actually on the surface and here comes the Martian dust. Right,

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Speaker 1: So we've dealt with the main threats to health and

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Speaker 1: well being that people bring up, the micro gravity and

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Speaker 1: the radiation. But it turns out there are a bunch

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Speaker 1: of other ones, and and the Martian dust is a

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Speaker 1: particularly interesting one to me. In December of nineteen seventy two,

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Speaker 1: the astronauts Harrison Schmidt and Eugene turn On of Apollo

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Speaker 1: seventeen landed on the Moon and they were carrying out

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Speaker 1: some surface missions and once upon returning from the Taurus

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00:24:59,080 --> 00:25:01,760
Speaker 1: Littro Valley, which is close to the Sea of Serenity

429
00:25:01,800 --> 00:25:05,600
Speaker 1: on the Moon, the two astronauts re entered the lunar

430
00:25:05,680 --> 00:25:12,760
Speaker 1: module and Harrison Schmidt reported respiratory distress from inhaling particles

431
00:25:12,800 --> 00:25:16,040
Speaker 1: of moon dust that they had tracked into the capsule

432
00:25:16,160 --> 00:25:18,760
Speaker 1: with them. Uh and to make it sound cute, he

433
00:25:18,800 --> 00:25:22,159
Speaker 1: called it lunar dust hay fever. That does sound cute,

434
00:25:22,240 --> 00:25:26,600
Speaker 1: but the actual situation isn't so cute. And while working

435
00:25:26,600 --> 00:25:28,680
Speaker 1: on the surface of the Moon, the Apollo astronauts have

436
00:25:28,680 --> 00:25:32,440
Speaker 1: have noticed a consistently annoying and troubling thing about the Moon.

437
00:25:32,880 --> 00:25:37,680
Speaker 1: It's covered in this sticky, abrasive dust that true fact,

438
00:25:37,800 --> 00:25:42,040
Speaker 1: smells like gunpowder, they all report, and it gets all

439
00:25:42,080 --> 00:25:46,840
Speaker 1: over everything. Astronauts found that it's these sharp edged, abrasive

440
00:25:47,000 --> 00:25:51,160
Speaker 1: dust grains, almost almost like a tiny shards of glass,

441
00:25:51,200 --> 00:25:54,159
Speaker 1: and they would embed themselves and surfaces, and it was

442
00:25:54,200 --> 00:25:57,640
Speaker 1: just impossible to prevent astronauts from bringing it with them

443
00:25:57,680 --> 00:26:00,439
Speaker 1: when they returned from outside. And this is proven a

444
00:26:00,440 --> 00:26:03,520
Speaker 1: tough problem for anybody imagining a return trip to the

445
00:26:03,520 --> 00:26:06,880
Speaker 1: Moon or a Moon colony, because if the trip involves

446
00:26:06,920 --> 00:26:10,800
Speaker 1: any extra vehicular activity, moon colonists are going to have

447
00:26:10,880 --> 00:26:13,879
Speaker 1: this dust problem. Yeah, I've read about some of this,

448
00:26:13,960 --> 00:26:16,560
Speaker 1: but before it's it's it's interesting. You just see those

449
00:26:16,560 --> 00:26:19,200
Speaker 1: images of the Moon and you you kind of default

450
00:26:19,240 --> 00:26:21,800
Speaker 1: to imagining it is being covered with you know, just

451
00:26:21,920 --> 00:26:26,480
Speaker 1: sand or maybe maybe like a fine flower, uh consistency,

452
00:26:26,560 --> 00:26:31,040
Speaker 1: but it's it's it's rough stuff and it gets over everything.

453
00:26:31,480 --> 00:26:34,800
Speaker 1: Another aspect is that again it's dark. It's like, uh,

454
00:26:35,080 --> 00:26:39,440
Speaker 1: and it's it's dark gray kind of material, and you're

455
00:26:39,480 --> 00:26:41,640
Speaker 1: on the Moon and it's say, it coats your instruments,

456
00:26:42,000 --> 00:26:44,760
Speaker 1: it coats your equipment, maybe it coats your space suit,

457
00:26:45,200 --> 00:26:47,679
Speaker 1: and it's gonna cause whatever it's coding to start heat up,

458
00:26:47,720 --> 00:26:49,639
Speaker 1: to heat up in the sun because this is the

459
00:26:50,320 --> 00:26:54,200
Speaker 1: dust itself will absorbed the solar radiation. So suddenly it's

460
00:26:54,240 --> 00:26:56,720
Speaker 1: like you're wearing a black coat on a sunny day

461
00:26:57,119 --> 00:26:59,399
Speaker 1: and you're just getting hotter and hotter because of the

462
00:26:59,480 --> 00:27:01,439
Speaker 1: dust on Yeah, and you don't want to sweat like

463
00:27:01,440 --> 00:27:05,040
Speaker 1: a pig on the moon, So you could essentially wind

464
00:27:05,119 --> 00:27:10,960
Speaker 1: up cooked via lunar dust. Scary thought, but that's the Moon.

465
00:27:12,000 --> 00:27:16,360
Speaker 1: Mars might have a similar problem, but basically even more horrible.

466
00:27:17,200 --> 00:27:22,359
Speaker 1: So one problem is fine grains of silicate materials. So

467
00:27:22,440 --> 00:27:26,080
Speaker 1: here on Earth, human miners often suffer from a disease

468
00:27:26,160 --> 00:27:29,119
Speaker 1: called silicosis. If you're working in like a mine or

469
00:27:29,119 --> 00:27:33,080
Speaker 1: a quarry, or if you work in tunneling, drilling, sand blasting,

470
00:27:33,240 --> 00:27:36,400
Speaker 1: glass works, any of these things, your work environment can

471
00:27:36,440 --> 00:27:41,879
Speaker 1: produce extremely fine grain particles of silicon dioxide or silica

472
00:27:42,080 --> 00:27:46,120
Speaker 1: dust in the air and silica is a totally common mineral.

473
00:27:46,240 --> 00:27:48,760
Speaker 1: It's not one of those things to get upset about.

474
00:27:48,840 --> 00:27:53,000
Speaker 1: As a material itself, sand is mostly sica. If ingested

475
00:27:53,040 --> 00:27:56,959
Speaker 1: in reasonable quantities orally, it's non toxic. But if you

476
00:27:57,040 --> 00:28:01,800
Speaker 1: breathe in extremely fine particles silica dust, they can become

477
00:28:01,880 --> 00:28:06,400
Speaker 1: embedded in your lungs and your body can't remove them,

478
00:28:06,520 --> 00:28:09,280
Speaker 1: so depending on the level and length of exposure, this

479
00:28:09,320 --> 00:28:13,560
Speaker 1: can lead to irritation, swelling, and difficulty breathing, and eventually

480
00:28:13,600 --> 00:28:17,639
Speaker 1: to progressive massive fibrosis, which means your lungs are pretty

481
00:28:17,720 --> 00:28:21,679
Speaker 1: much destroyed, and long term exposure to crystalline silica is

482
00:28:21,720 --> 00:28:24,399
Speaker 1: also considered a cancer risk. This is this is a

483
00:28:24,480 --> 00:28:30,280
Speaker 1: bad recipe for long health. Martian soil contains fine grained

484
00:28:30,320 --> 00:28:34,040
Speaker 1: silicate particles that are largely different from the particles of

485
00:28:34,119 --> 00:28:36,879
Speaker 1: quartz silica that we'd risk breathing on Earth, though they

486
00:28:36,920 --> 00:28:40,720
Speaker 1: might produce similar or even worse effects. So years ago,

487
00:28:40,840 --> 00:28:45,560
Speaker 1: researchers at Stony Brook University in New York pulverized samples

488
00:28:45,600 --> 00:28:48,320
Speaker 1: of the most common basaltic minerals you'd find in the

489
00:28:48,320 --> 00:28:53,360
Speaker 1: Martian soil feldspar, pyroxene, and olivine to see what would

490
00:28:53,360 --> 00:28:56,960
Speaker 1: happen when this faux Martian dust reacted with moisture the

491
00:28:57,000 --> 00:28:59,479
Speaker 1: way it would with the moisture in your lungs if

492
00:28:59,520 --> 00:29:02,640
Speaker 1: you breathe in And the results were kind of gross.

493
00:29:03,440 --> 00:29:05,960
Speaker 1: A mixture of five million liters of water with a

494
00:29:05,960 --> 00:29:10,080
Speaker 1: couple hundred milligrams of the synthetic Mars dust reacted to

495
00:29:10,120 --> 00:29:16,000
Speaker 1: create hydrogen peroxide, So fizzy fizzy party times hydroxyl and

496
00:29:16,160 --> 00:29:21,440
Speaker 1: a negatively charged oxygen ion called superoxide. Not not really

497
00:29:21,480 --> 00:29:24,840
Speaker 1: things you want in your lungs. In addition to this,

498
00:29:24,920 --> 00:29:29,320
Speaker 1: scientists believe Martian soil contains perchlorates, which have detrimental effects

499
00:29:29,320 --> 00:29:32,680
Speaker 1: on the thyroid and hormone production in the human body.

500
00:29:33,280 --> 00:29:37,480
Speaker 1: So not only is it likely to cause irritation and

501
00:29:37,880 --> 00:29:41,720
Speaker 1: lung diseases if inhaled chronically over time, it can also

502
00:29:41,840 --> 00:29:45,960
Speaker 1: poison you and he gets worse. On Mars, there are

503
00:29:46,120 --> 00:29:48,880
Speaker 1: dust storms of titanic proportions. You don't really have to

504
00:29:48,920 --> 00:29:51,840
Speaker 1: worry about dust storms on the moon. On Mars, you do.

505
00:29:51,920 --> 00:29:54,480
Speaker 1: The dust storms there can become so bad they can

506
00:29:54,520 --> 00:29:59,320
Speaker 1: become planet wide dust storms engulfing the entire surface. So

507
00:29:59,440 --> 00:30:04,560
Speaker 1: welcome to planet poison storm. Don't breathe in. As far

508
00:30:04,560 --> 00:30:07,080
Speaker 1: as I'm aware, there is no known solution to this

509
00:30:07,120 --> 00:30:10,080
Speaker 1: problem yet except maybe just never going outside. I guess

510
00:30:10,080 --> 00:30:13,520
Speaker 1: if you seal yourself off in an airtight container and

511
00:30:13,760 --> 00:30:15,760
Speaker 1: you know you're never going in or out, then you

512
00:30:15,800 --> 00:30:19,360
Speaker 1: could probably be okay. But then what are you doing right?

513
00:30:19,400 --> 00:30:22,800
Speaker 1: As right? So I read in the past, I think,

514
00:30:22,800 --> 00:30:26,160
Speaker 1: in the context of Moon exploration, about NASA researchers looking

515
00:30:26,160 --> 00:30:30,440
Speaker 1: into designs for things like handheld vacuums and airlocks. And

516
00:30:30,800 --> 00:30:33,280
Speaker 1: I don't know where that research is today, but it

517
00:30:33,320 --> 00:30:35,800
Speaker 1: seems like even that would have trouble completely solving the

518
00:30:35,880 --> 00:30:39,160
Speaker 1: dust problem, because you only, what, are you just going

519
00:30:39,200 --> 00:30:42,280
Speaker 1: to bring an entire ship of vacuums that steadily break

520
00:30:42,320 --> 00:30:46,040
Speaker 1: down from all the particles that are surging through the system. Yeah,

521
00:30:46,040 --> 00:30:47,920
Speaker 1: and then there's the question of how the dust would

522
00:30:47,920 --> 00:30:51,880
Speaker 1: actually affect the equipment in your habitat. So is the

523
00:30:51,960 --> 00:30:55,120
Speaker 1: dust going to be clogging air filters, is it going

524
00:30:55,160 --> 00:30:57,840
Speaker 1: to be getting into instruments that you need to perform

525
00:30:57,880 --> 00:31:02,440
Speaker 1: your scientific work? And so, by and large, the dust

526
00:31:02,560 --> 00:31:05,680
Speaker 1: is going to be a huge problem, and it's something

527
00:31:05,760 --> 00:31:08,080
Speaker 1: we really need to think about if we're actually going

528
00:31:08,120 --> 00:31:10,880
Speaker 1: to be sending people to Mars. And that's assuming that

529
00:31:10,920 --> 00:31:14,040
Speaker 1: the dust doesn't suddenly turn into a giant hand like

530
00:31:14,120 --> 00:31:17,760
Speaker 1: the Stephen King short story Beach World. Right, yeah, because

531
00:31:17,760 --> 00:31:20,200
Speaker 1: then it's a whole set of set of problems in

532
00:31:20,200 --> 00:31:23,200
Speaker 1: addition to just breathing it in or or wait a minute,

533
00:31:23,240 --> 00:31:25,800
Speaker 1: what does the dust do in mission to Mars? Oh?

534
00:31:26,320 --> 00:31:28,560
Speaker 1: You know, I don't think I ever saw mission to Mars. Well,

535
00:31:28,640 --> 00:31:32,920
Speaker 1: you're one of the lucky ones, all right, Well, the

536
00:31:32,960 --> 00:31:35,680
Speaker 1: next thing to think about, you know, on the surface

537
00:31:35,720 --> 00:31:40,120
Speaker 1: seems a little less intensive. Uh, you know, it's not.

538
00:31:40,480 --> 00:31:44,880
Speaker 1: It's not as as crazy as dust that's gradually killing you,

539
00:31:45,080 --> 00:31:48,240
Speaker 1: or or the loss of phone mass, or even the

540
00:31:48,520 --> 00:31:51,640
Speaker 1: harmful effects of radiation. But it is very real, and

541
00:31:51,680 --> 00:31:54,040
Speaker 1: you can think of it as just an additional thing

542
00:31:54,120 --> 00:31:57,320
Speaker 1: you would have to deal with on Mars. And that

543
00:31:57,680 --> 00:32:01,360
Speaker 1: is how life on Mars would affect your circadian rhythm. Um.

544
00:32:01,400 --> 00:32:03,440
Speaker 1: And I have to admit I never really thought about

545
00:32:03,480 --> 00:32:07,479
Speaker 1: this myself, But a Mars day called a soul is

546
00:32:07,520 --> 00:32:10,800
Speaker 1: thirty nine minutes and thirty five seconds longer than an

547
00:32:10,800 --> 00:32:15,800
Speaker 1: Earth day. Oh that that's just close enough that it

548
00:32:15,960 --> 00:32:21,160
Speaker 1: seems maybe even worse than if it were way different. Well,

549
00:32:21,280 --> 00:32:24,120
Speaker 1: you know it, Yeah, and on the surface, it doesn't

550
00:32:24,120 --> 00:32:25,760
Speaker 1: maybe it maybe it doesn't sound like much. You might

551
00:32:25,800 --> 00:32:27,400
Speaker 1: even think, oh, it's a good thing. I can watch

552
00:32:27,560 --> 00:32:31,320
Speaker 1: one extra episode of of my favorite hour long show

553
00:32:31,680 --> 00:32:34,400
Speaker 1: Fans Commercials. Right, it's forty minutes. I can get it in, right,

554
00:32:34,560 --> 00:32:37,560
Speaker 1: maybe forty minutes of extra sleep. But we actually have

555
00:32:37,720 --> 00:32:42,240
Speaker 1: some experience dealing with the problems of an extra forty

556
00:32:42,240 --> 00:32:45,600
Speaker 1: odd minutes in the day. Uh As, every time NASA

557
00:32:45,680 --> 00:32:49,360
Speaker 1: lands are over on Mars operations teams have to adapt

558
00:32:49,440 --> 00:32:52,520
Speaker 1: to the Martians schedule. There's a there's a great article

559
00:32:52,520 --> 00:32:55,000
Speaker 1: that deals with this that appeared in Scientific American by

560
00:32:55,040 --> 00:32:58,040
Speaker 1: Katie It's an article by Katie Worth titled step into

561
00:32:58,040 --> 00:33:00,840
Speaker 1: the Twilight Zone? Can Earthlings adjust to a longer day

562
00:33:00,840 --> 00:33:05,880
Speaker 1: on Mars? And she describes how those extra forty minutes,

563
00:33:06,240 --> 00:33:08,800
Speaker 1: you know, they weren't bad at first, but you have

564
00:33:08,920 --> 00:33:11,120
Speaker 1: the you have this crew and they're dealing with with

565
00:33:11,120 --> 00:33:13,080
Speaker 1: with the Martian day, they're dealing with the Earth day,

566
00:33:13,080 --> 00:33:16,040
Speaker 1: and they're dealing with both across multiple time zones. So

567
00:33:16,120 --> 00:33:19,280
Speaker 1: the forty minutes just begins to add up over time.

568
00:33:19,440 --> 00:33:23,200
Speaker 1: It just ends up causing high levels of exhaustion, so

569
00:33:23,240 --> 00:33:26,120
Speaker 1: they end up trying limiting shifts to four days in

570
00:33:26,120 --> 00:33:29,400
Speaker 1: a row no more. But even this uh causes the

571
00:33:29,400 --> 00:33:33,720
Speaker 1: martian minutes to catch up with you after time. Um. Yeah,

572
00:33:33,720 --> 00:33:36,240
Speaker 1: because you have to imagine it. It's not just that

573
00:33:36,280 --> 00:33:39,320
Speaker 1: you would get an extra long day one day and

574
00:33:39,360 --> 00:33:42,800
Speaker 1: then you get to sleep and reset every day. This

575
00:33:43,000 --> 00:33:46,240
Speaker 1: accumulation of the extra forty minutes is adding on to

576
00:33:46,360 --> 00:33:50,920
Speaker 1: the accumulation of the day before. Now it's like continuous

577
00:33:51,000 --> 00:33:55,240
Speaker 1: jet lag. Now we're in for some good news because

578
00:33:55,680 --> 00:33:57,920
Speaker 1: one of the things is once you actually get to Mars,

579
00:33:58,360 --> 00:34:01,000
Speaker 1: you're at least going to have, you know, cycles of

580
00:34:01,080 --> 00:34:03,320
Speaker 1: day and night to tie in with your circadian rhythm.

581
00:34:03,400 --> 00:34:06,920
Speaker 1: So it's thought that you would probably adjust pretty well

582
00:34:07,000 --> 00:34:10,680
Speaker 1: to this extra forty minutes once you're on the planet. Now,

583
00:34:11,040 --> 00:34:12,960
Speaker 1: of course, one of the problems is that you've, of

584
00:34:13,000 --> 00:34:16,399
Speaker 1: course you've been traveling through space completely cut off from

585
00:34:16,440 --> 00:34:18,239
Speaker 1: cycles of night and day unless there's some sort of

586
00:34:18,280 --> 00:34:22,879
Speaker 1: artificial stimulation of your circadian rhythm and uh, and you're

587
00:34:22,880 --> 00:34:26,279
Speaker 1: still going to have to on some level deal with

588
00:34:26,400 --> 00:34:30,399
Speaker 1: time back come um. And this is where you get

589
00:34:30,400 --> 00:34:32,840
Speaker 1: into questions about, all right, what what's going to be

590
00:34:32,880 --> 00:34:36,960
Speaker 1: the degree of communication with the home world. Uh. I'm guessing,

591
00:34:37,040 --> 00:34:40,200
Speaker 1: especially in an early low budget visit to Mars, is

592
00:34:40,200 --> 00:34:42,720
Speaker 1: gonna be pretty minimal. You're not gonna have any direct

593
00:34:42,719 --> 00:34:46,040
Speaker 1: skype conversations with your family back home. Now, you're just

594
00:34:46,080 --> 00:34:51,080
Speaker 1: gonna be broadcasting your reality television show. Yeah, and with

595
00:34:51,080 --> 00:34:54,200
Speaker 1: with some tape delay, right. But um, but the people

596
00:34:54,200 --> 00:34:57,040
Speaker 1: back home, the people looking after you and uh and

597
00:34:57,040 --> 00:34:59,120
Speaker 1: and seeing how operations are going, they're going to be

598
00:34:59,160 --> 00:35:01,440
Speaker 1: the one suffering from that extra forty minutes is they

599
00:35:01,480 --> 00:35:06,759
Speaker 1: have to simultaneously live into different time zones at once. Um.

600
00:35:06,800 --> 00:35:09,279
Speaker 1: And this this plays into another area that I've thought

601
00:35:09,320 --> 00:35:11,440
Speaker 1: about before too, like how do we end up keeping

602
00:35:11,480 --> 00:35:15,400
Speaker 1: track of time in general when we start looking towards

603
00:35:15,480 --> 00:35:18,560
Speaker 1: an an interplanetary future where you have different lengths of

604
00:35:18,640 --> 00:35:21,759
Speaker 1: days on different worlds, um, And then you have to

605
00:35:21,800 --> 00:35:25,240
Speaker 1: deal with the distance between those worlds, the time delay

606
00:35:25,400 --> 00:35:28,239
Speaker 1: and communication. In some cases, you might even have to

607
00:35:28,280 --> 00:35:32,000
Speaker 1: deal with noticeable time dilation exactly. Yeah, if you're talking

608
00:35:32,000 --> 00:35:35,560
Speaker 1: about like near light speed travel between different I mean,

609
00:35:35,960 --> 00:35:39,360
Speaker 1: the idea of time starts to lose its sense of

610
00:35:39,480 --> 00:35:43,640
Speaker 1: universality when you're talking about an interplanetary species. Yeah, it's

611
00:35:43,640 --> 00:35:47,960
Speaker 1: a great example of taking a very terrestrial concept and

612
00:35:48,000 --> 00:35:50,200
Speaker 1: then trying to make sense of it when we leave

613
00:35:50,239 --> 00:35:52,560
Speaker 1: the planet and I and you know, there we've we've

614
00:35:52,560 --> 00:35:54,680
Speaker 1: touched on religion in that sense, and you know, now

615
00:35:54,680 --> 00:35:57,920
Speaker 1: we're talking about time and the human body there. And

616
00:35:58,200 --> 00:36:00,839
Speaker 1: I can't even imagine how many different additions to that

617
00:36:00,840 --> 00:36:02,560
Speaker 1: there are that we're not even thinking about, all the

618
00:36:02,600 --> 00:36:07,319
Speaker 1: little things that add up to make interplanetary life all

619
00:36:07,400 --> 00:36:11,959
Speaker 1: the stranger totally. I I was trying to think about

620
00:36:11,960 --> 00:36:14,319
Speaker 1: it in the car on the way to work this morning, like,

621
00:36:14,400 --> 00:36:17,520
Speaker 1: how do you synchronize Mars time with Earth time? This

622
00:36:17,600 --> 00:36:20,440
Speaker 1: is only forty minutes difference each day, but what do

623
00:36:20,480 --> 00:36:24,440
Speaker 1: you do? Does does Mars just have thirty nine points

624
00:36:24,480 --> 00:36:27,120
Speaker 1: something extra minutes that go up on the clock and

625
00:36:27,160 --> 00:36:31,000
Speaker 1: then it resets to zero or I'm sure nobody would

626
00:36:31,000 --> 00:36:32,960
Speaker 1: actually try to do this, But for a minute, my

627
00:36:33,040 --> 00:36:34,799
Speaker 1: brain went to the place of would you just make

628
00:36:34,840 --> 00:36:37,560
Speaker 1: your minutes a little bit longer and have twenty four

629
00:36:37,560 --> 00:36:41,480
Speaker 1: hour days? Or yeah, it's very complicated and uh, and

630
00:36:41,520 --> 00:36:43,640
Speaker 1: again we have some experience with this in the way

631
00:36:43,680 --> 00:36:48,160
Speaker 1: that that NASA workers looking after any kind of operations

632
00:36:48,200 --> 00:36:51,680
Speaker 1: on Mars have to add that forty extra minutes into

633
00:36:51,680 --> 00:36:54,120
Speaker 1: their day. Well, I've got another way that we are

634
00:36:54,280 --> 00:36:57,799
Speaker 1: completely and totally adapted to Earth, and I think we

635
00:36:57,920 --> 00:37:02,880
Speaker 1: haven't fully considered the rampant cations of removing our culture

636
00:37:03,400 --> 00:37:08,600
Speaker 1: to a non Earth location, and that is microbiota. Ah,

637
00:37:08,640 --> 00:37:10,640
Speaker 1: and this this is uh, this is what I had

638
00:37:10,680 --> 00:37:13,320
Speaker 1: never thought of either. But even though on the past,

639
00:37:13,320 --> 00:37:15,560
Speaker 1: on the show, we've done a number of episodes dealing

640
00:37:15,560 --> 00:37:20,760
Speaker 1: with microbota and and how essentially we're just this population

641
00:37:21,120 --> 00:37:25,880
Speaker 1: of different bacteria, uh, in different microbiotic organisms that all

642
00:37:25,960 --> 00:37:29,080
Speaker 1: kind of work together as one spaceship. Oh totally. So. Yeah,

643
00:37:29,080 --> 00:37:32,239
Speaker 1: imagine you're a colonist on Mars. Where are you going

644
00:37:32,280 --> 00:37:36,120
Speaker 1: to get your food? I imagine you're gonna be growing it, right, yeah,

645
00:37:36,239 --> 00:37:40,000
Speaker 1: or or you know, getting it from the cube distancer. Yeah.

646
00:37:40,040 --> 00:37:41,880
Speaker 1: I mean, so, if you're an astronaut in the I

647
00:37:42,120 --> 00:37:44,920
Speaker 1: S S. You can live on vacuum packed shrimp cocktail

648
00:37:45,040 --> 00:37:47,239
Speaker 1: for a couple of months and that's not gonna kill you.

649
00:37:47,600 --> 00:37:49,840
Speaker 1: On Mars, you can't take all your food with you

650
00:37:50,000 --> 00:37:52,640
Speaker 1: and you go. You're gonna have to somehow grow crops

651
00:37:52,719 --> 00:37:56,680
Speaker 1: for yourself. Once you're at your semi permanent colony on Mars.

652
00:37:57,040 --> 00:38:00,800
Speaker 1: So maybe you could survive on hydroponics like rooting plants

653
00:38:00,800 --> 00:38:04,359
Speaker 1: in nutrient field water, or maybe even aeroponics like free

654
00:38:04,360 --> 00:38:06,799
Speaker 1: growing roots in the air fed by a nutrient rich

655
00:38:06,960 --> 00:38:11,160
Speaker 1: mist or spray. Makes sense, but there's a crucial question there.

656
00:38:11,160 --> 00:38:14,480
Speaker 1: We might not be taking into consideration what happens when

657
00:38:14,480 --> 00:38:17,480
Speaker 1: you drive a hundred and forty million mile wedge between

658
00:38:17,600 --> 00:38:24,480
Speaker 1: earthlings and earth soil, because Mars is a microbiotic desert.

659
00:38:24,600 --> 00:38:28,160
Speaker 1: And this is a digression, but I had to report

660
00:38:28,520 --> 00:38:34,520
Speaker 1: that Microsoft word wanted to change microbiotic desert to macrobiotic dessert.

661
00:38:34,880 --> 00:38:39,560
Speaker 1: That's how that's how appalled Microsoft is that the idea

662
00:38:39,680 --> 00:38:42,160
Speaker 1: of life on Lars right. So I read a really

663
00:38:42,200 --> 00:38:47,080
Speaker 1: interesting article about this in Slate from called our Guts

664
00:38:47,120 --> 00:38:51,040
Speaker 1: May Hate Mars, and the author, Michael Chorrost, makes the

665
00:38:51,080 --> 00:38:54,319
Speaker 1: interesting point that the soil we live on isn't just

666
00:38:54,480 --> 00:38:57,560
Speaker 1: an inert mass of stuff for plants to sit in.

667
00:38:58,120 --> 00:39:01,400
Speaker 1: It's an ecosystem. It's an ecosystem of its own, like

668
00:39:01,440 --> 00:39:04,560
Speaker 1: a rainforest or a coral reef, and it is teeming

669
00:39:04,600 --> 00:39:10,759
Speaker 1: with life, including bacteria, insects, worms, protozoa, and this ecosystem

670
00:39:10,800 --> 00:39:13,600
Speaker 1: is something that humans have never really tried to live

671
00:39:13,680 --> 00:39:17,800
Speaker 1: without for years at a time. So a few considerations.

672
00:39:18,080 --> 00:39:21,000
Speaker 1: One of them is the bacteria found in earth soil

673
00:39:21,080 --> 00:39:26,239
Speaker 1: is probably important for maintaining your microbiotic profile, because, as

674
00:39:26,480 --> 00:39:28,560
Speaker 1: we were alluding to a minute ago, your body isn't

675
00:39:28,600 --> 00:39:32,719
Speaker 1: just your body. You are a symbiant. You have legions

676
00:39:32,760 --> 00:39:35,880
Speaker 1: of benign microorganisms that live inside you, for example, in

677
00:39:35,920 --> 00:39:39,440
Speaker 1: your digestive system. And without healthy gut flora, humans can

678
00:39:39,440 --> 00:39:43,480
Speaker 1: suffer serious consequences Like what happens to you if you

679
00:39:43,600 --> 00:39:47,439
Speaker 1: don't have healthy gut flora. A lot of bad things

680
00:39:47,520 --> 00:39:51,640
Speaker 1: gonna happen. I mean, at the very least diarrhea in space, yeah,

681
00:39:51,920 --> 00:39:54,279
Speaker 1: which is a bad thing to happen in space. Yeah.

682
00:39:54,320 --> 00:39:56,960
Speaker 1: And you know, this reminds me too of some past

683
00:39:56,960 --> 00:39:59,759
Speaker 1: episodes we've done on the show dealing with the problems

684
00:40:00,000 --> 00:40:02,839
Speaker 1: of creating all these artificial environments that we live in now,

685
00:40:02,960 --> 00:40:05,440
Speaker 1: just talking about our our office spaces, where you have

686
00:40:05,480 --> 00:40:10,480
Speaker 1: an entirely different microbiotic profile that emerges because it is

687
00:40:10,760 --> 00:40:15,520
Speaker 1: separated from the soil, separated from the natural microbiotic environment

688
00:40:15,760 --> 00:40:17,560
Speaker 1: in which we live. And that's just here on Earth.

689
00:40:17,760 --> 00:40:21,040
Speaker 1: That's your workplace. Yeah, and so in this article, Chorist

690
00:40:21,120 --> 00:40:23,759
Speaker 1: points out that scientists say organisms that live in the

691
00:40:23,800 --> 00:40:29,040
Speaker 1: earth soil also provide countless quote ecosystem services that go

692
00:40:29,160 --> 00:40:31,840
Speaker 1: unnoticed but which are really important for keeping the rest

693
00:40:31,880 --> 00:40:35,000
Speaker 1: of life on Earth running smoothly. And these services include

694
00:40:35,000 --> 00:40:39,000
Speaker 1: things like the breakdown of dead organic matter, water filtration,

695
00:40:39,160 --> 00:40:44,120
Speaker 1: carbon dioxide cycling, and he cites Justin L. Sonnenberg, a

696
00:40:44,200 --> 00:40:48,479
Speaker 1: microbiologist and immunologists from the Stanford School of Medicine, who

697
00:40:48,520 --> 00:40:51,040
Speaker 1: also says a couple of really interesting things. One of

698
00:40:51,080 --> 00:40:55,080
Speaker 1: them is that the soil bacteria on Earth might make

699
00:40:55,280 --> 00:40:59,440
Speaker 1: your food better. So when you grow crops in the

700
00:40:59,800 --> 00:41:03,160
Speaker 1: t eaming micro jungle of Earth's soil, the plants have

701
00:41:03,239 --> 00:41:05,839
Speaker 1: to face off against enemies. They have to face off

702
00:41:05,840 --> 00:41:09,600
Speaker 1: against predators parasites of the ecosystem, and this causes the

703
00:41:09,640 --> 00:41:12,400
Speaker 1: plants to you know, be like Rocky when in the

704
00:41:12,440 --> 00:41:16,120
Speaker 1: training montage. It makes the plant strong, and in getting strong,

705
00:41:16,160 --> 00:41:19,920
Speaker 1: they have to synthesize compounds like antioxidants that make the

706
00:41:19,960 --> 00:41:23,759
Speaker 1: plants more nutritious for us when we eat them. So

707
00:41:23,840 --> 00:41:28,200
Speaker 1: without having to fight off the microbiotic onslaught the plants,

708
00:41:28,280 --> 00:41:31,120
Speaker 1: we eat wouldn't do all the same beneficial things for

709
00:41:31,160 --> 00:41:33,799
Speaker 1: our bodies that they do here on Earth. And this

710
00:41:33,880 --> 00:41:36,880
Speaker 1: is just one example of the many ways the complexities

711
00:41:36,920 --> 00:41:39,720
Speaker 1: of earth soil contribute to our well being. The point

712
00:41:39,760 --> 00:41:42,120
Speaker 1: is we don't know all of the ways that earth

713
00:41:42,200 --> 00:41:44,720
Speaker 1: soil contributes to our well being and to what extent

714
00:41:45,360 --> 00:41:47,960
Speaker 1: we might be able to survive without it, and we

715
00:41:48,040 --> 00:41:50,640
Speaker 1: might face health and well being problems that are much

716
00:41:50,680 --> 00:41:52,920
Speaker 1: bigger than we could have expected. So we get to

717
00:41:53,000 --> 00:41:56,600
Speaker 1: Mars and we're flabby and fightless due to our our

718
00:41:56,640 --> 00:41:59,319
Speaker 1: bone and muscle loss, and then we're growing some sort

719
00:41:59,320 --> 00:42:03,480
Speaker 1: of hydropod pumpkin to eat that's equally flapping and fightless

720
00:42:03,480 --> 00:42:05,719
Speaker 1: because it doesn't have to deal with the with the

721
00:42:05,840 --> 00:42:10,040
Speaker 1: with the natural uh predators and microbiota that it has

722
00:42:10,080 --> 00:42:13,719
Speaker 1: to that it has evolved to combat. Yeah, how many

723
00:42:13,760 --> 00:42:17,640
Speaker 1: ways Mars would make us soft? Well. So there's one

724
00:42:17,640 --> 00:42:20,200
Speaker 1: potential solution, right, What if we just shipped a bunch

725
00:42:20,239 --> 00:42:23,560
Speaker 1: of soil with us two Mars. So you just pack

726
00:42:23,680 --> 00:42:26,960
Speaker 1: up dirt from Earth and you take it and you

727
00:42:27,080 --> 00:42:30,239
Speaker 1: protected along the way because you don't want irradiated soil either,

728
00:42:30,840 --> 00:42:33,000
Speaker 1: and then you grow your crops in that would would

729
00:42:33,040 --> 00:42:36,560
Speaker 1: that work. Probably not, and there are a couple of reasons.

730
00:42:36,560 --> 00:42:38,920
Speaker 1: One of the things is that we've alluded to already

731
00:42:39,000 --> 00:42:43,480
Speaker 1: is cost. It's unbelievably expensive to put mass into orbit,

732
00:42:44,120 --> 00:42:46,319
Speaker 1: even more expensive to send it all the way out

733
00:42:46,360 --> 00:42:48,279
Speaker 1: of Earth's gravity well as we would need to do

734
00:42:48,360 --> 00:42:50,880
Speaker 1: to get it to Mars. The old figure that was

735
00:42:50,920 --> 00:42:53,640
Speaker 1: commonly cited was that it cost ten tho dollars per

736
00:42:53,680 --> 00:42:56,879
Speaker 1: pound to put stuff into low Earth orbit. With all

737
00:42:56,880 --> 00:42:59,879
Speaker 1: the private space launch technology that's currently emerging or will

738
00:43:00,000 --> 00:43:02,759
Speaker 1: emerge soon, that number is going to change. Who knows

739
00:43:02,800 --> 00:43:05,239
Speaker 1: what it is today or what it will be, but

740
00:43:05,360 --> 00:43:07,200
Speaker 1: I think it's safe to say it's still going to

741
00:43:07,280 --> 00:43:11,120
Speaker 1: be very, very expensive. And if you're on this corner

742
00:43:11,120 --> 00:43:13,759
Speaker 1: cutting Mars mission, they're not going to pony up for

743
00:43:13,760 --> 00:43:17,200
Speaker 1: the Earth soil. But there's a second point that's made

744
00:43:17,200 --> 00:43:21,320
Speaker 1: by Dr Sonnenberg in this article, and that point is

745
00:43:21,360 --> 00:43:24,360
Speaker 1: that it might not matter because in a closed environment

746
00:43:24,480 --> 00:43:27,200
Speaker 1: separated from the rest of Earth. Sonnenberg says that the

747
00:43:27,239 --> 00:43:31,200
Speaker 1: biodiversity of a soil sample will tend to decrease over

748
00:43:31,280 --> 00:43:35,480
Speaker 1: time until you no longer have the balanced microbiotic jungle

749
00:43:35,560 --> 00:43:38,600
Speaker 1: that you're looking for in this soil, so you end

750
00:43:38,680 --> 00:43:41,760
Speaker 1: up with just this dead soil. Essentially, the soil dies

751
00:43:41,880 --> 00:43:46,720
Speaker 1: like you you will. Yeah, this is interesting. It brings

752
00:43:46,760 --> 00:43:49,920
Speaker 1: mind to two things. First of all, even though it

753
00:43:49,960 --> 00:43:52,320
Speaker 1: would ultimately die, if we just needed to get soil

754
00:43:52,400 --> 00:43:55,960
Speaker 1: into orbit, we could take the Great Escape route, right

755
00:43:56,080 --> 00:43:58,320
Speaker 1: or the no I guess it was. I guess it

756
00:43:58,360 --> 00:44:00,440
Speaker 1: was the Great Escape And maybe it was Shoshank Redemption

757
00:44:00,480 --> 00:44:03,560
Speaker 1: as well, where they you have the problem of right,

758
00:44:03,560 --> 00:44:05,680
Speaker 1: if you're digging a hole to escape from a prison,

759
00:44:05,880 --> 00:44:07,799
Speaker 1: you have to do something with the dirt, so you

760
00:44:07,920 --> 00:44:10,319
Speaker 1: just you you you sneak it out a little bit

761
00:44:10,360 --> 00:44:12,600
Speaker 1: at a time, right, So maybe we just start putting

762
00:44:12,640 --> 00:44:16,320
Speaker 1: like a pocket full of dirt into on on board

763
00:44:16,360 --> 00:44:19,320
Speaker 1: each astronaut as they go up every space launch. Yeah,

764
00:44:19,680 --> 00:44:22,080
Speaker 1: well that's a great idea. Every time an astronaut goes

765
00:44:22,120 --> 00:44:24,399
Speaker 1: to the I S S, they just take some fistfuls

766
00:44:24,400 --> 00:44:26,320
Speaker 1: of soil. Yeah. Of course, again, it doesn't really do

767
00:44:26,440 --> 00:44:29,040
Speaker 1: much good if it's dead. But the other thing that

768
00:44:29,160 --> 00:44:32,200
Speaker 1: kept entering my mind is we consider the possibility of

769
00:44:32,760 --> 00:44:35,319
Speaker 1: organisms bringing their soil with them when they travel to

770
00:44:35,360 --> 00:44:39,799
Speaker 1: a new land in order to to thrive and to live. Is,

771
00:44:39,800 --> 00:44:43,440
Speaker 1: of course Dracula, because when Dracula left his home in

772
00:44:43,480 --> 00:44:47,400
Speaker 1: Transylvania to begin life in uh in London, he brought

773
00:44:47,440 --> 00:44:49,600
Speaker 1: with him a bunch of that that soil from his

774
00:44:49,680 --> 00:44:52,279
Speaker 1: native land, right. Yeah, And you actually see this in

775
00:44:52,440 --> 00:44:56,040
Speaker 1: ancient religious concepts, to like the idea that the God

776
00:44:56,080 --> 00:44:59,400
Speaker 1: I worship is the god of my lands, and if

777
00:44:59,440 --> 00:45:02,080
Speaker 1: I want to work ship my God in a foreign land,

778
00:45:02,360 --> 00:45:05,160
Speaker 1: I might want to take some soil from where I

779
00:45:05,200 --> 00:45:07,960
Speaker 1: came from with me, so I'm still technically on the

780
00:45:08,080 --> 00:45:11,200
Speaker 1: lands of my god when I worship him. Well, there

781
00:45:11,200 --> 00:45:13,320
Speaker 1: you go. There's some Internet that's probably some great food

782
00:45:13,320 --> 00:45:17,040
Speaker 1: for thought when it comes to any asked ancient astronauts scenarios, right,

783
00:45:17,040 --> 00:45:20,200
Speaker 1: because clearly this idea was handed down to us by

784
00:45:20,360 --> 00:45:23,440
Speaker 1: quote unquote gods who from another planet and had to

785
00:45:23,440 --> 00:45:26,200
Speaker 1: bring their own soil because they were aware of the

786
00:45:26,239 --> 00:45:29,399
Speaker 1: problems here of venturing to a new world caught off

787
00:45:29,600 --> 00:45:32,680
Speaker 1: from your your Earth. They were the reason the Colossus

788
00:45:32,680 --> 00:45:38,120
Speaker 1: of Rhodes was anatomically correct. Uh So, So ultimately, what

789
00:45:38,160 --> 00:45:42,040
Speaker 1: will life be like separate from from Earth dirt? We

790
00:45:42,160 --> 00:45:47,120
Speaker 1: just don't know, And the prospects are intriguingly scary. And

791
00:45:47,200 --> 00:45:49,360
Speaker 1: I think this is something that needs to be researched

792
00:45:49,440 --> 00:45:53,440
Speaker 1: very well before somebody makes that leap and says, Okay,

793
00:45:53,480 --> 00:45:57,799
Speaker 1: I'm a Martian now. But there's another risk that you

794
00:45:57,880 --> 00:46:00,160
Speaker 1: might run when you take the leap to say I'm

795
00:46:00,160 --> 00:46:03,759
Speaker 1: a Martian now, which is that you're not going to

796
00:46:03,880 --> 00:46:07,919
Speaker 1: have a lot of room on Mars, and you might

797
00:46:07,920 --> 00:46:12,480
Speaker 1: not necessarily have a lot to do on Mars, and

798
00:46:12,560 --> 00:46:14,640
Speaker 1: you're not going to be able to leave if you

799
00:46:14,680 --> 00:46:18,680
Speaker 1: want to write, and you might be confined in this

800
00:46:18,800 --> 00:46:22,560
Speaker 1: small space with several other people who you don't get

801
00:46:22,600 --> 00:46:26,200
Speaker 1: to get away from if you don't like them. And

802
00:46:26,200 --> 00:46:29,640
Speaker 1: and that's where space madness centers EQUI right, what we

803
00:46:29,640 --> 00:46:31,560
Speaker 1: we would be remiss if we did not talk about

804
00:46:31,560 --> 00:46:35,480
Speaker 1: space madness. So what is the deal with psychological health

805
00:46:35,600 --> 00:46:38,560
Speaker 1: on Mars. Well, you know, we've already touched a little

806
00:46:38,600 --> 00:46:41,719
Speaker 1: bit on how radiation could play into it. But but yeah,

807
00:46:41,760 --> 00:46:45,239
Speaker 1: just when we're dealing with the possibilities of dealing with

808
00:46:45,239 --> 00:46:50,239
Speaker 1: a confined space, not much variety in your environment. Um,

809
00:46:50,239 --> 00:46:52,880
Speaker 1: certainly on the trip there, but even once you get there,

810
00:46:52,920 --> 00:46:55,400
Speaker 1: you know you're you're you're stuck in this little shell.

811
00:46:55,440 --> 00:46:58,319
Speaker 1: Perhaps and then occasionally you get to engage in this

812
00:46:58,600 --> 00:47:04,000
Speaker 1: very stressful john out into the dust ravage landscape. But

813
00:47:04,000 --> 00:47:06,680
Speaker 1: but yeah, you're opening yourself up to the psychological effects

814
00:47:06,760 --> 00:47:12,160
Speaker 1: of of of isolation and seclusion. Uh, social isolation as

815
00:47:12,160 --> 00:47:14,440
Speaker 1: well as just you know, a lack of variety in

816
00:47:14,440 --> 00:47:16,680
Speaker 1: your environment. They've been you know, countless studies that have

817
00:47:16,719 --> 00:47:20,600
Speaker 1: looked at at how um isolation affects the human mind.

818
00:47:21,000 --> 00:47:24,319
Speaker 1: Now when we don't, you know, it comes back to

819
00:47:24,440 --> 00:47:26,759
Speaker 1: what we've evolved to live. And we've evolved to live

820
00:47:26,840 --> 00:47:31,080
Speaker 1: in this rather vibrant world of fixed and movable objects,

821
00:47:31,160 --> 00:47:35,319
Speaker 1: of interacting people and things. And when you leave that,

822
00:47:35,719 --> 00:47:40,120
Speaker 1: your brain kind of starts gnawing on it, creating the

823
00:47:40,120 --> 00:47:42,600
Speaker 1: the varied stimuli that you have come to it, your

824
00:47:42,600 --> 00:47:45,720
Speaker 1: brain has come to expect. Yeah, so we're here on Earth,

825
00:47:45,760 --> 00:47:49,080
Speaker 1: we're the mice on the mouse playground. On Mars, you

826
00:47:49,160 --> 00:47:51,880
Speaker 1: might be the mouse in the tiny cage with nothing

827
00:47:51,880 --> 00:47:55,719
Speaker 1: but a heroine button to push right and uh, and

828
00:47:55,960 --> 00:47:58,839
Speaker 1: you better hope that the heroine button works. And of course, yeah,

829
00:47:58,840 --> 00:48:02,200
Speaker 1: the whole time you're dealing with people, which, of course,

830
00:48:02,320 --> 00:48:05,239
Speaker 1: just in any given environment, can be stressful. And then

831
00:48:05,280 --> 00:48:07,959
Speaker 1: on top of that, you were traveling through space. You're

832
00:48:07,960 --> 00:48:10,480
Speaker 1: going to a disco. You're dealing with all the stress

833
00:48:10,560 --> 00:48:13,440
Speaker 1: of that, which is only going to exasperate into these

834
00:48:13,480 --> 00:48:18,120
Speaker 1: other conditions. Yeah, you're possibly having a lung conditions, serious

835
00:48:18,200 --> 00:48:20,920
Speaker 1: lung conditions. You might be suffering from cancer, you might

836
00:48:20,960 --> 00:48:24,239
Speaker 1: be suffering brain damage, you might be suffering weakness and

837
00:48:24,280 --> 00:48:27,880
Speaker 1: bone density loss, you might be suffering from digestive distress

838
00:48:27,960 --> 00:48:32,239
Speaker 1: from lack of proper microbiome. And then you've got to

839
00:48:32,280 --> 00:48:34,120
Speaker 1: deal with all these jerks and a tin ft by

840
00:48:34,160 --> 00:48:36,879
Speaker 1: tin foot space. Yeah, it's not surely not tin foot

841
00:48:36,920 --> 00:48:39,240
Speaker 1: by tin foot. I just threw that out there. However

842
00:48:39,239 --> 00:48:42,240
Speaker 1: big the space would be. Let's hope it's bigger than that. Yeah,

843
00:48:42,719 --> 00:48:45,000
Speaker 1: it's uh. You know, it's an area that that NASA

844
00:48:45,000 --> 00:48:47,359
Speaker 1: has been looking into for a while, but it's also

845
00:48:47,400 --> 00:48:50,760
Speaker 1: an area that we haven't had an extensive amount of

846
00:48:50,920 --> 00:48:54,279
Speaker 1: research on because for the most part, space flights are

847
00:48:54,320 --> 00:48:58,160
Speaker 1: pretty busy, even when you're dealing with these longer johns

848
00:48:58,239 --> 00:49:01,200
Speaker 1: up to the I s s, because you have a

849
00:49:01,200 --> 00:49:03,040
Speaker 1: lot a lot of that time is taken up by

850
00:49:03,120 --> 00:49:06,320
Speaker 1: you know, just getting acclimatized to the orbital environment, forcing

851
00:49:06,360 --> 00:49:11,040
Speaker 1: down your food making yourself sleep, braving the indignities of

852
00:49:11,120 --> 00:49:14,520
Speaker 1: orbital toilet use, and then of course conducting lots of experiments,

853
00:49:14,520 --> 00:49:17,080
Speaker 1: repairs and all the exercise you have to do. Yeah,

854
00:49:17,160 --> 00:49:21,080
Speaker 1: hitting that that coldbart treadmill up there. Um, there's plenty

855
00:49:21,120 --> 00:49:23,240
Speaker 1: to do. So we're not we're not as yet dealing

856
00:49:23,320 --> 00:49:27,799
Speaker 1: with the long term, uh, solitude issues, of the very

857
00:49:27,880 --> 00:49:31,480
Speaker 1: long term isolation issues, and people don't spend you know,

858
00:49:32,040 --> 00:49:36,200
Speaker 1: six to twelve years of Yeah, but of course NASA

859
00:49:36,239 --> 00:49:39,239
Speaker 1: has been looking into it, and they've studied how work, entertainment,

860
00:49:39,239 --> 00:49:42,800
Speaker 1: and food can conquer the effects of solitude. The agency

861
00:49:42,840 --> 00:49:46,240
Speaker 1: even invested one point seventy four million in a virtual

862
00:49:46,280 --> 00:49:50,240
Speaker 1: space station, a computer program designed to council astronauts about

863
00:49:50,239 --> 00:49:54,120
Speaker 1: the emotional problems, about their emotional problems and insecurities. So

864
00:49:54,320 --> 00:49:59,040
Speaker 1: we're essentially talking about the birth of robots psychologists here, um,

865
00:49:59,040 --> 00:50:03,080
Speaker 1: which which I I believe the movie Moon explored. We

866
00:50:03,160 --> 00:50:06,919
Speaker 1: had to Kevin Spacey voiced psychologist robot the regularly checks

867
00:50:06,920 --> 00:50:09,480
Speaker 1: in with our main character to uh, to see how

868
00:50:09,520 --> 00:50:13,160
Speaker 1: he's coping with this isolation. Yeah, it was fun. It

869
00:50:13,239 --> 00:50:15,959
Speaker 1: had a number of cool science topics, the Helium three

870
00:50:16,120 --> 00:50:19,000
Speaker 1: isolation and a few others. I don't want to spoil,

871
00:50:19,600 --> 00:50:23,120
Speaker 1: but uh, there's also a two thousand eight study that

872
00:50:23,200 --> 00:50:26,560
Speaker 1: was conducted at the NHC Healthcare in Maryland Heights of Missouri,

873
00:50:26,840 --> 00:50:31,080
Speaker 1: and they found that the robotic dog Abbo or abbo

874
00:50:31,200 --> 00:50:35,040
Speaker 1: ibo ibo a I b o that's the one. Yeah

875
00:50:35,280 --> 00:50:38,520
Speaker 1: he uh he that that particular robot he she whatever

876
00:50:38,719 --> 00:50:41,920
Speaker 1: was just as effective at decreasing human loneliness as a living,

877
00:50:42,000 --> 00:50:48,360
Speaker 1: breathing dog. That's kind of weirdly depressing but comforting because

878
00:50:49,200 --> 00:50:51,239
Speaker 1: we probably don't want to send a dog on one

879
00:50:51,239 --> 00:50:53,280
Speaker 1: of these journeys. God knows it's it's gonna be difficult

880
00:50:53,320 --> 00:50:55,200
Speaker 1: enough to send a human. But if you have a

881
00:50:55,280 --> 00:50:58,480
Speaker 1: robot psychologist, a robot friend all wrapped up into one,

882
00:50:58,480 --> 00:51:02,000
Speaker 1: maybe it's a robot dogs I cologist that can help

883
00:51:02,160 --> 00:51:05,440
Speaker 1: mitigate the problems. Um. Yeah, I guess if he took

884
00:51:05,440 --> 00:51:07,680
Speaker 1: a real dog to Mars, you'd have a big problem

885
00:51:07,680 --> 00:51:10,280
Speaker 1: with like taking it out to do its business. Yeah,

886
00:51:10,320 --> 00:51:12,480
Speaker 1: I mean in the dust. I've been watching a lot

887
00:51:12,520 --> 00:51:17,760
Speaker 1: of shows recently that have a robotic humanoids in it. Um,

888
00:51:17,800 --> 00:51:21,080
Speaker 1: the excellent Humans show that's been airing on and you

889
00:51:21,160 --> 00:51:22,880
Speaker 1: can tell me about that. I've got to check it out.

890
00:51:23,080 --> 00:51:26,319
Speaker 1: It's pretty good. Um. It makes me think, like what

891
00:51:26,360 --> 00:51:28,560
Speaker 1: you need to do is you need a robot family

892
00:51:28,719 --> 00:51:32,920
Speaker 1: to send this uh the space uh explorer with right.

893
00:51:33,680 --> 00:51:35,800
Speaker 1: You can't send him with his actual hit him or

894
00:51:35,840 --> 00:51:38,520
Speaker 1: her with her actual family. You know. Another way you

895
00:51:38,520 --> 00:51:40,040
Speaker 1: could go is if you want to go down the

896
00:51:40,080 --> 00:51:43,480
Speaker 1: total recall route, the Quato route, and then you could

897
00:51:43,560 --> 00:51:47,080
Speaker 1: have a friendly companion in your body with you, like

898
00:51:47,400 --> 00:51:51,080
Speaker 1: Quato's Uh, well you have Big Marshall Bell and then

899
00:51:51,080 --> 00:51:54,480
Speaker 1: he has Quato in his stomach. Yeah, okay, well well

900
00:51:54,560 --> 00:51:57,319
Speaker 1: you know, and maybe the the the form that could

901
00:51:57,320 --> 00:52:01,560
Speaker 1: take is that essentially the I on your ship or

902
00:52:01,600 --> 00:52:04,120
Speaker 1: in your suit, like that is your buddy. Like your

903
00:52:04,160 --> 00:52:05,840
Speaker 1: suit is your buddy. You talk to your suit, and

904
00:52:05,880 --> 00:52:09,360
Speaker 1: your suit is analyzing your your your your your levels

905
00:52:09,360 --> 00:52:12,880
Speaker 1: and your your your current state of physical fitness, and

906
00:52:12,880 --> 00:52:15,440
Speaker 1: then also quizzing you about your mental health. So it's

907
00:52:15,440 --> 00:52:20,279
Speaker 1: like David Hasselhoff in his car. What's the car called, um,

908
00:52:20,480 --> 00:52:23,600
Speaker 1: smart car? Smart cars? No, I don't think it's not

909
00:52:23,680 --> 00:52:29,280
Speaker 1: how kit kits the tea, Yeah, because you need somebody

910
00:52:29,320 --> 00:52:32,880
Speaker 1: to talk to, so talk to the computer anyway. It's

911
00:52:32,920 --> 00:52:35,879
Speaker 1: you know, it's not a perfect, perfect answer. Well, but

912
00:52:36,120 --> 00:52:37,879
Speaker 1: but it's the one we've been looking at. Tying back

913
00:52:37,920 --> 00:52:40,560
Speaker 1: into our echo Boorgs podcast. I think we would need

914
00:52:40,600 --> 00:52:43,640
Speaker 1: better chat pots before this would make any sense. Otherwise

915
00:52:43,640 --> 00:52:45,600
Speaker 1: you're just gonna be up there and infuriated that it

916
00:52:45,680 --> 00:52:48,080
Speaker 1: won't stop bringing up fruit trees. Yeah. I mean it

917
00:52:48,120 --> 00:52:51,200
Speaker 1: comes back to the reminding you of the fruits you

918
00:52:51,239 --> 00:52:53,799
Speaker 1: can't get. Yeah. I mean it comes back to the

919
00:52:53,840 --> 00:52:56,839
Speaker 1: idea that there there's certain things that we've evolved as

920
00:52:56,920 --> 00:52:58,640
Speaker 1: part of our lot to deal with as part of

921
00:52:58,640 --> 00:53:04,360
Speaker 1: our lives, and would be dealing with long term um

922
00:53:04,560 --> 00:53:07,960
Speaker 1: extraction from that environment, and so what can we do

923
00:53:08,160 --> 00:53:13,080
Speaker 1: to mitigate the effects of removal from that environment? Uh,

924
00:53:13,120 --> 00:53:18,000
Speaker 1: and or the recreation of that environment on another planet

925
00:53:18,040 --> 00:53:21,480
Speaker 1: and during the voyage to that planet. Yeah, So is

926
00:53:21,520 --> 00:53:25,160
Speaker 1: your solution to try to simulate Earth on Mars or

927
00:53:25,239 --> 00:53:30,160
Speaker 1: to try to recognize that your Mars habitat isn't Earth

928
00:53:30,239 --> 00:53:34,840
Speaker 1: and deal with the problems as they arise. I know

929
00:53:34,920 --> 00:53:36,360
Speaker 1: that's a tough one. I mean, maybe you try and

930
00:53:36,360 --> 00:53:43,000
Speaker 1: find some sort of space between I'm reminded of one

931
00:53:43,000 --> 00:53:45,440
Speaker 1: of the elements from Philip K. Dicks The Streets the

932
00:53:45,440 --> 00:53:49,799
Speaker 1: Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldrick. Um, they're they're they want

933
00:53:49,800 --> 00:53:51,680
Speaker 1: to read it just based on that title. Oh yeah,

934
00:53:51,680 --> 00:53:53,080
Speaker 1: I mean it's a wonderful book. It's one of his

935
00:53:53,160 --> 00:53:56,040
Speaker 1: trippier books and and really one of his best in

936
00:53:56,080 --> 00:53:59,840
Speaker 1: my opinion. But you have these individuals in space and

937
00:54:00,400 --> 00:54:04,160
Speaker 1: they take this drug called can D which allows them

938
00:54:04,280 --> 00:54:08,600
Speaker 1: to share the experiences of these perky pat layouts that

939
00:54:08,680 --> 00:54:11,000
Speaker 1: they play around, which is essentially kind of like Barbie

940
00:54:11,080 --> 00:54:15,000
Speaker 1: play uh houses with little dolls. Um. But it also

941
00:54:15,080 --> 00:54:18,000
Speaker 1: reminds me a lot of the computer game The Sims.

942
00:54:18,800 --> 00:54:20,799
Speaker 1: You know, You're really end up. I haven't played it

943
00:54:20,840 --> 00:54:22,520
Speaker 1: in you know, over a decade, but I remember when

944
00:54:22,560 --> 00:54:24,920
Speaker 1: it came out and I'm playing it, remember how invested

945
00:54:25,320 --> 00:54:28,239
Speaker 1: I felt in these uh these little you know, non

946
00:54:28,280 --> 00:54:33,240
Speaker 1: existing characters and they're little, very you know, one dimensional lives.

947
00:54:33,840 --> 00:54:36,560
Speaker 1: But but it reminded me even then a lot of

948
00:54:36,560 --> 00:54:40,000
Speaker 1: of perky pat and and of course the in this scenario,

949
00:54:40,200 --> 00:54:45,040
Speaker 1: there's a there's a pharmaceutical, uh means of of increasing

950
00:54:45,200 --> 00:54:47,919
Speaker 1: your involvement with perkey Pats. So I don't know, maybe

951
00:54:47,960 --> 00:54:51,480
Speaker 1: it's a situation of giving the the astronaut or robotic

952
00:54:51,560 --> 00:54:55,080
Speaker 1: family that looks after him and analyzes his, uh his

953
00:54:55,080 --> 00:54:58,760
Speaker 1: mental state and then also secretly, you know, pumping ecstasy

954
00:54:58,760 --> 00:55:02,640
Speaker 1: and in the whole trip. Maybe that's the the answer.

955
00:55:02,800 --> 00:55:05,359
Speaker 1: That's what I'm suggesting. We're gonna have to be way

956
00:55:05,440 --> 00:55:08,120
Speaker 1: less prude issue about our methods to keep the astronauts

957
00:55:08,160 --> 00:55:10,200
Speaker 1: truly happy. Yeah, you kind of end up having to

958
00:55:10,480 --> 00:55:14,960
Speaker 1: perhaps take that that lab rat mentality. Right, This is

959
00:55:15,800 --> 00:55:19,480
Speaker 1: maybe less a person in more an experiment. This is

960
00:55:19,480 --> 00:55:22,080
Speaker 1: more about the living cargo, and how do we keep

961
00:55:22,120 --> 00:55:26,200
Speaker 1: the cargo uh in in shape for the duration? Yeah,

962
00:55:26,200 --> 00:55:30,920
Speaker 1: that is an interesting question. How how mercenary do you

963
00:55:30,960 --> 00:55:34,560
Speaker 1: want to be about keeping the astronauts on your Mars

964
00:55:34,600 --> 00:55:38,080
Speaker 1: colony happy? Like if you found that you could just

965
00:55:38,200 --> 00:55:41,759
Speaker 1: give them a drug that would make them, you know,

966
00:55:41,920 --> 00:55:44,680
Speaker 1: sort of placated, and then the oldest Huxley sense to

967
00:55:44,719 --> 00:55:46,719
Speaker 1: go back to that, you know, if you could, if

968
00:55:46,760 --> 00:55:49,440
Speaker 1: you could make a brave new world on Mars, and

969
00:55:49,440 --> 00:55:51,600
Speaker 1: and that was a pretty reliable way to keep the

970
00:55:51,640 --> 00:55:55,719
Speaker 1: astronauts from going crazy, would you do it? Yeah? I mean,

971
00:55:55,760 --> 00:55:59,640
Speaker 1: and it also just drives home that we don't belong there,

972
00:56:00,120 --> 00:56:03,520
Speaker 1: right in a very very basic sense, like this is

973
00:56:03,560 --> 00:56:07,600
Speaker 1: not our world. And it's it's not how it's completely

974
00:56:07,600 --> 00:56:11,759
Speaker 1: inhospitable to the human form. We want to go there.

975
00:56:11,840 --> 00:56:13,960
Speaker 1: We want to go there to two so we can say, hey,

976
00:56:14,000 --> 00:56:17,120
Speaker 1: we have been to Mars, and then in our grander

977
00:56:17,600 --> 00:56:21,720
Speaker 1: visions of the thing, we want to recreate Earth life there.

978
00:56:22,400 --> 00:56:26,200
Speaker 1: But is that is that just kind of a ridiculous

979
00:56:26,239 --> 00:56:29,160
Speaker 1: notion that we eventually have to get past. Yeah? I

980
00:56:29,160 --> 00:56:32,719
Speaker 1: don't know. Is it wishful thinking? I don't want to

981
00:56:32,760 --> 00:56:34,960
Speaker 1: take away from this episode to be let's not go

982
00:56:35,040 --> 00:56:37,839
Speaker 1: to Mars, right, I mean, because I don't feel that way.

983
00:56:37,880 --> 00:56:40,959
Speaker 1: I'm in a lot of ways I support a very

984
00:56:41,000 --> 00:56:46,239
Speaker 1: aggressive program of space exploration and colonization. But I think

985
00:56:46,280 --> 00:56:49,440
Speaker 1: we're just highlighting how difficult this project is if we

986
00:56:49,480 --> 00:56:51,839
Speaker 1: want to do it right, all of the things we

987
00:56:51,880 --> 00:56:53,600
Speaker 1: have to learn and all the things we don't we're

988
00:56:53,640 --> 00:56:56,360
Speaker 1: not even aware that we don't know about the dangers

989
00:56:56,400 --> 00:56:59,399
Speaker 1: of space and Mars and and and colonization of other

990
00:56:59,440 --> 00:57:04,120
Speaker 1: bodies in the Solar System. Indeed, the destination is hostile,

991
00:57:04,360 --> 00:57:08,400
Speaker 1: the trip is dangerous and lonely, and those are realities

992
00:57:08,440 --> 00:57:10,640
Speaker 1: we have to face if we are actually going to

993
00:57:10,680 --> 00:57:13,080
Speaker 1: send humans to Mars. Yeah, but if you're one of

994
00:57:13,120 --> 00:57:16,400
Speaker 1: those people out there who's working on these problems. Right now,

995
00:57:16,520 --> 00:57:18,880
Speaker 1: I salute you and I and I say more people

996
00:57:18,920 --> 00:57:23,440
Speaker 1: should support your efforts. Indeed, yeah, I'm still one behind

997
00:57:24,440 --> 00:57:27,040
Speaker 1: putting up you know, human on Mars. Uh you know,

998
00:57:27,280 --> 00:57:29,240
Speaker 1: just one though, just just one. Yeah, I don't think

999
00:57:29,240 --> 00:57:33,120
Speaker 1: we should go crazy, just just one. Really, it should

1000
00:57:33,160 --> 00:57:36,080
Speaker 1: just be Val Kilmer, just Valkolmer. Or who's going to

1001
00:57:36,120 --> 00:57:39,360
Speaker 1: be in the upcoming film about the I think it's

1002
00:57:39,400 --> 00:57:42,400
Speaker 1: Matt Damon. There's a film. Yeah, I heard about that.

1003
00:57:42,480 --> 00:57:45,760
Speaker 1: I haven't read that book, but I hear good things interesting.

1004
00:57:45,880 --> 00:57:48,800
Speaker 1: So we'll have to we'll have to revisit this topic

1005
00:57:48,800 --> 00:57:51,520
Speaker 1: when that film comes out. I guess okay, So that

1006
00:57:51,600 --> 00:57:54,520
Speaker 1: you have it, your life as a Mars colonists, all

1007
00:57:54,760 --> 00:57:57,240
Speaker 1: important stuff to think about before you sign on the

1008
00:57:57,280 --> 00:58:00,240
Speaker 1: dotted line. Right. Hey, if you want to check more

1009
00:58:00,240 --> 00:58:01,840
Speaker 1: episodes of Stuff to Blow your Mind, you want to

1010
00:58:01,920 --> 00:58:05,200
Speaker 1: check out our vast archive of videos. We want to

1011
00:58:05,240 --> 00:58:07,200
Speaker 1: check out our blog posts, links out to our social

1012
00:58:07,200 --> 00:58:09,640
Speaker 1: media accounts. Head on over to stuff to Blow your

1013
00:58:09,640 --> 00:58:11,800
Speaker 1: Mind dot com. That's the mothership and that's where you

1014
00:58:11,840 --> 00:58:14,440
Speaker 1: will find everything. And if you want to let us

1015
00:58:14,440 --> 00:58:17,720
Speaker 1: know about an interesting solution you've read about or thought

1016
00:58:17,720 --> 00:58:20,400
Speaker 1: of to any of these concerns we brought up today,

1017
00:58:20,600 --> 00:58:23,520
Speaker 1: or a threat that your health might encounter on Mars

1018
00:58:23,560 --> 00:58:26,000
Speaker 1: that we didn't even think to include. You can email

1019
00:58:26,120 --> 00:58:28,360
Speaker 1: us at blow the Mind at how stuff works dot

1020
00:58:28,400 --> 00:58:35,240
Speaker 1: com for more on this and thousands of other topics.

1021
00:58:35,480 --> 00:58:42,800
Speaker 1: Is it how stuff works dot com