Thread by @tragic_conceit

@AntiLeftMemes @elonmusk Quite possibly, but only if Musk abandons the fatal mistake that he's making at the moment.

@AntiLeftMemes @elonmusk Chemical rockets are great for getting off of and onto planetary surfaces, but they're a dangerously bad choice for crossing the distances between planets.

Needlessly bad. Better alternatives exist, but Musk won't listen.

@AntiLeftMemes @elonmusk If he persists in this stubbornness, he's going to lose his first group of colonists to a logistics failure, followed by a race to see whether they die from the cold, starvation or suffocation, first.

@AntiLeftMemes @elonmusk He's expecting that colony to make do without resupply over time stretches of two years, while waiting for the planets to return to their most optimal positions, at which point a seven month trip would follow.

But why do that, when one can cut travel time down to 3-9 days?

@AntiLeftMemes @elonmusk Nine days when the planets are on opposite sides of the sun, meaning that the supply line would never need to break down, at all. Shipping between the worlds could go on, non-stop.

Three days at closest approach.

@AntiLeftMemes @elonmusk The acceleration needed to achieve these far lower travel times is a mere .01 gravities. Musk has made the mistake of confusing the short term drama of a powerful rocket takeoff with a maximization of speed, over the longer haul.

@AntiLeftMemes @elonmusk But a chemical rocket booster, as impressive as it looks, has to stop producing thrust after a few minutes. It quickly runs out of fuel.

After that, it would be in free fall for seven months, en route to Mars.

@AntiLeftMemes @elonmusk A ship that can maintain that .01g acceleration over a period of days will reach far higher speeds than that flashy chemical rocket did in those relatively few minutes of firing.

@AntiLeftMemes @elonmusk At this point, the technology to work on should be a fairly obvious one. Know of any drives that can produce low thrusts for long stretches of time?

@AntiLeftMemes @elonmusk Something that uses a relatively low mass of propellant, but sends it out at a high speed, sacrificing energy efficiency for efficient use of that propellant?

@AntiLeftMemes @elonmusk Give you a hint: solar cells would be used to power it.

@AntiLeftMemes @elonmusk Oh, and before any of the fan boys say "Elon knows what he's doing" - I've been to graduate school and have some actual claim to being an engineer.

Elon hasn't and doesn't.

@AntiLeftMemes @elonmusk Musk didn't found SpaceX or Tesla, he bought them, using money he had not because he was clever, but because his daddy owned a diamond mine and he was born rich.

I'm not going to h a t e him over that, but I'm also not going to worship him.

@AntiLeftMemes @elonmusk He wants to do big things, and that's cool. But if he wants to get them done, he has to be willing to listen to and learn from those who know more than he does, even when they've had to rise above the challenges of growing up in a middle class home.

@AntiLeftMemes @elonmusk Without having any yachts or diamonds around, out on the mean-ish streets of Suburbia. Or something like that.

@AntiLeftMemes @elonmusk People might bend to his will, but the Universe won't. One works with it on one's own terms, or it will kill one without mercy, hesitation or remorse.

I really hope Elon understands that, before the first launch, because suffocation is a brutal way to go, and it is preventable.