Going To Mars Thanks To SpaceX

Live stream of Musk talking about going to Mars

Thoughts?

As a lifelong science, rocketry, and Sci-fi fan this is only 40 years too late.

Anyone else sorta feel depressed when it dawns on them that;

When we finally do go to mars, you'll probably be too old to get an erection, let alone go into space?

Thanks for the hopes and dreams scifi.

W/ CGI these days you'll never know it's a hollywood studio

I've been to Mars too many tourists...

Actually, I believe we are 20 years too early.

I do hope we go to Mars and make sure there is a one way ticket for Elon Musk. After he builds his Mars colony I'll be sure to visit.

I'm not really hip in regards to space science, but I recently learnt about cosmic radiation and how NASA can't shield against it, and how we're starting to see how it affected the older astronauts, and I'm curious how that will work into the mission to Mars.

Tinfoil hats are the solution(finally!)

There is cosmic radiation and solar radiation a.k.a Solar wind.
The super fun science fiction answer is a magnetic field (yes similar to earths) which isnt even all that hard to do... but it requires constant power supply and that can be tough on long voyages where efficiency is key.
The cheapest and most efficient method of blocking the radiation is to use water. Surround the capsule where the astronauts are with water and the radiation will be absorbed. Yes its all a tad more complicated than I just said but essentially that is how they will get around normal solar radiation.

Lack of gravity is also a major concern as no gravity = our bodies decide we dont need bones. A spinning room with centrifugal force would help with that (see the Martian or any other space movie lately and they all have that) but its not the same thing as gravity so we'll see how that goes.

Now if a gamma ray burst happens to fly through... no one will get to mars then (or remain on earth for that matter). Should check out Gamma Ray Bursts... really interesting stuff AND they have their own Afterglows. :)

small problem tho.

After vonBraun died NASA, with malice aforethought, dismantled the team that got us to the moon. (The wonders of a turf protecting bureaucracy never fail to amaze and disgust.)

Only in this decade have we been able to build a lifter more powerful than the Saturn V.

You might check on what percentage of our GDP went to NASA and space then vs. now. Admittedly there is a fair bit of black budget in both eras.