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piTehT_tsuJ t1_j1x46f0 wrote

It should be, as it would most likely remove the need for mining cobalt here on earth. Cobalt being mined with hammers and chisels in the Congo. And with our reliance on recharggable batteries and the things operated by them and the fact its only going to increase dramatically as the world goes wireless.

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[deleted] t1_j1xb5lq wrote

[removed]

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_OriamRiniDadelos_ t1_j1xv12y wrote

I hope it’s not a cotton gin situation. Where getting rid of one horrific job didn’t exactly help the victims not be in other horrific jobs

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EscapeVelocity83 t1_j21e8t8 wrote

Well if we weren't all clamoring to be rich, being rich is what slavery creates. People need to think of creating wealth by their own work not the work of others.. we have AI robots to replace slaves now common folk can have it to instead of just super abled geniuses

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volantredx t1_j1x7rhu wrote

I mean the idea that we're not leaving behind pristine environments seems to miss the fact that asteroids aren't exactly all that valuable for preservation. They're vast empty deserts of rocks. It's not really the same as Yellowstone. There's also an inconceivably large number of them in space so it's not like humans would run out of preserved giant rocks with no life or interesting features.

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ShiftSandShot t1_j1yxq2h wrote

Not to mention that they smack into eachother...not frequently, but it's estimated to be a yearly event.

So they're destroying themselves on top of it.

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Padhome t1_j1zhdhp wrote

Plus there are moons around Jupiter that have several times the water of earth..

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EscapeVelocity83 t1_j21enab wrote

We are leaving to create a diversity of pristine environments. We can make historical environments and entirely synthetic ones that never existed. All separated by millions of miles

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damnedspot t1_j1xh3el wrote

Yes. Robotic mining is the way forward, whether it's earthbound or otherwise. The first company to make asteroid mining commercially viable will rewrite the planet's economies.

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Aggromemnon t1_j1xk6x2 wrote

A profitable mining operation would encourage growth in near-Earth space. This in turn opens pathways to move many environmentally costly industrial processes off earth to the moon and orbital stations. Low and 0 gravity fabrication will allow for new industrial processes and spur growth in automation.

Then orbiting space debris will get completely out of hand and collapse the whole thing because the second and third generation of CEO's cut corners trying to grow profits without actually doing any work. The whole planet will be thrust into chaos as supplies of tech devices dry up and they suddenly have to deal with the real world.

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Kryosite t1_j1yevm9 wrote

Adequate regulation of orbital pollution could solve that, even if it means dumping all our space borne trash into the sun or something

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Aggromemnon t1_j25d6ez wrote

Oh, sure, there are ways to avoid it. I just have little faith in space profiteers to employ solutions that impact their margin until the problem is out of hand.

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hgs25 t1_j1zqkwb wrote

Then they pull a Debeers (diamond industry) and do what we do for oil. Just hoard the material to control the price.

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EscapeVelocity83 t1_j21eu0a wrote

Can they do it now please so I can make 10mil a year by my self thanks I promise to spend it at the space hotel

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damnedspot t1_j21s5th wrote

The DeBeers comment has made me wonder whether an asteroid connection might make the disparity worse rather than better. Hopefully more than one concern accesses any rare material so there’s an impetus to challenge prices and marketplaces. If not, economic dystopia could be much closer than we expect…

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Jsmith0730 t1_j1xhtyg wrote

I’d say it’s imperative. There are asteroids out there with more minerals on them than have existed on earth in its entirety. It’d go a long way to helping the planet.

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anengineerandacat t1_j1xfr5q wrote

Honestly, space is already uninhabitable and I don't envision any breakthrough in that department within the millennia.

Whatever pollution generating activities we can move off-world; the better.

Accidental noxious gas leak? Vent it.

Toxic liquids? Collect, move, ignore & mark, or jettison it.

No life other than the humans and they already are in basically the best hazmat suit money can buy.

The work will be harder, and the costs significantly higher but if the raw material is dense enough and the logistics are solved it's really the best place to mine.

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Kryosite t1_j1yez83 wrote

You can't just jettison everything in Earth orbit, unless you want to get trash rings that make life difficult

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AllGodsRTricksters t1_j209ezk wrote

The sun is the best trash disposal in the system, just have to nudge things in it's direction

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Kryosite t1_j20htl2 wrote

Yeah, but you need to make everyone nudge it, or we're in for a bad time

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grundar t1_j22p3cc wrote

> The sun is the best trash disposal in the system, just have to nudge things in it's direction

No, interestingly.

Anything that hasn't fallen into the sun yet is in a relatively stable orbit around it, meaning pushing it into the sun would require cancelling out most of that orbital velocity, or about 20-30km/s of delta-v.

Getting anything to fall into the sun is actually really hard.

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noideasleft11 t1_j1x7eop wrote

Like anyone rich enough to mine in space gives a shit.

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Mrogoth_bauglir t1_j1zmr2g wrote

No one is rich enough to mine in space. You're talking about initial losses in the trillions.

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moon_then_mars t1_j1ybnbg wrote

Whether enriching yourself is socially acceptable is irrelevant and juvenile to even ask. The only relevant question is whether its economically viable.

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Kryosite t1_j1yf2nd wrote

Social acceptability is important for economic viability, as new laws will need to be made about this

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ToolTime100 t1_j1xioub wrote

mining on a lifeless rock is more responsible than destroying ecosystems on Earth

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PhilosophusFuturum t1_j1x24ab wrote

Obviously yes. Almost not even worth asking the question because it’s so obvious

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Fragmentia t1_j1xg0rv wrote

Clearly, mining in space is the way. Why destroy our planet when there are opportunities that can be found on asteroids floating around our solar system. We just need some Nexus-6 replicants, and then we'll be set a species.

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EscapeVelocity83 t1_j21f29m wrote

I had some complain about polluting asteroids. You can't win em all,some people are just hateful of hominids

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Okay_Splenda_Monkey t1_j1x0imi wrote

I think it depends on the particulars of the externalities of the mining in question. How polluting would it be, and where would that pollution end up? Are there indigenous life forms that might be damaged?

Otherwise, I say yes.

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recoveringleft t1_j1xglbg wrote

Let’s not mentioned if there are intelligent aliens, they will be “manifest destinied” by corporations

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moon_then_mars t1_j1ybbw3 wrote

We won’t find any intelligent aliens in the main asteroid belt of our solar system.

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scrubbless t1_j1z3cb3 wrote

I suspect aliens looking on our world think the same 😅

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No_Weather_7038 t1_j1x1j47 wrote

Exxon has entered the chat

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Okay_Splenda_Monkey t1_j1x9lgl wrote

Continuously operating since 1870, the ExxonMobilTesla family has been increasing shareholder value for our investors throughout the Milky Way and neighboring galaxies for centuries.

Our operations combine exploration, innovation, and profitability with a respect for all forms of life capable of protesting in languages we understand and in a manner that our shareholders care about.

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Lazarus_Steel t1_j1x8afs wrote

As with anything, the only relevant question is it's economic viability.

If it was it would become a side hustle of whatever agency did the work.

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moon_then_mars t1_j1yb3qk wrote

Yea, the question sounds like its coming from a middle school child. “Will doing x make me unpopular?”

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CptSuperlative t1_j1xlrex wrote

The concept of nature or environments being pristine or virginal if they haven't been affected by humanity is extremely dangerous and wrong.

  1. It's based on the assumption that humanity is unnatural, perhaps OVER nature or UNDER nature but definitely not OF nature. This is wrong. We are natural. We can't help but be natural. So is uranium and arsenic and black holes and hamsters that eat their young. Nature isn't always cute and benign.

  2. If we think of ourselves as separate from nature then we will find it hard to think about how we live within and as parts of ecosystems. And thinking about these is necessary for our survival as a species.

  3. The 'pristine' sort of talk is extremely toxic. It's based on negative ideas about sex and sexuality and toxic man v woman archetypes.

Now, if we think asteroid mining is a poor choice because of its ecological effects, that's one thing and it deserves a reasonable conversation. But if we're against asteroid mining because it would sully the virginity of the solar system then No, that's a not a conversation even worth our breath.

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AbbyWasThere t1_j20s8bt wrote

If we're talking about destroying something culturally important, like, seriously defacing the near side of the Moon for example, I get it, but getting sentimental about asteroids is extremely silly. Are we really so morally stupid as to consider "disturbing the pristineness of space" a worse offence than depriving ourselves of the prosperity that could be brought with virtually unlimited resources, all without the terrors that mining on Earth currently brings?

Between a lifeless space rock the size of a mountain we didn't know existed earlier that year, and an actual mountain on Earth, you know which one I would much rather preserve every time.

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Nomore_crazy t1_j1xp21x wrote

Unless there is habitat in those rocks where life exists that we are aware of, then no why would we care?

Remember many of those large rocks can become an earthbound planet killer. There are still many of them in the Kuiper belt that we are not aware of as light is not always reflective off then.

Id say let's worry more about changing the trajectory of them to possibly bite us in the ass later. Develop a safe system to mine, extract, transport and build planetary defense against large projectiles.

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metfan1964nyc t1_j1xqkua wrote

Like that will matter when they mine an asteroid that's worth more than all the gold on earth right now.

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BassoeG t1_j1xwgel wrote

Fact 1: Earth's supply of oil, metals, fissiles and rare earth minerals are finite, rapidly being expended and already insufficient to provide everyone with a first world quality of life.

Fact 2: Without said materials or hypothetical Outside Context technologies we don't possess or even have the slightest clue as to how we might create, a space program is impossible.

Fact 3: In the long run, the extinction of all life on earth is inevitable, on account of the sun going red giant if nothing else.

Fact 4: If humanity doesn't have a breeding population offworld by then, that includes us.

Conclusion 1: If we don't get off earth soon, while we still possess the material richness to do so, we never will, inevitably leading to our extinction.

Conclusion 2: This means that attempting to sabotage attempts at getting off earth can be considered an existential threat against the entirety of humanity, therefore morally justifying anything done to the saboteur/s as self defense.

Much as kin selection demands I hate the trisolarans, I've still got to admit they've got their heads screwed on right about how to appropriately deal with traitors to their species.

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Gari_305 OP t1_j1x0p9w wrote

From the Article

>It was not a foregone conclusion, as there are some potentially negative environmental factors to mining in space. While it might not cause any immediate harm to ecosystems as it does here on Earth, it does destroy "pristine" environments that have arguably been around since the dawn of the solar system, at least in the case of the asteroids. As excellently portrayed in the Mars trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson, there will always be a part of humanity that will want to leave space as it is

Also form the Article

> However, there are some other confounding factors, including, as the authors point out, that both lunar and asteroid mining are, at this point, highly abstract concepts, the real impact of which may be hard to grok for many study participants. But studies such as this have to start somewhere, and waiting until after there is already a fully-fledged mining mission on the moon to see if it has public support might be a little late. For now, at least, those interested in moving forward with this aspect of the economic development of space have the public on their side.

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AftyOfTheUK t1_j1x4z5d wrote

> it does destroy "pristine" environments

I don't get it. What's the benefit of those pristine environments?

What percentage of them should be left pristine, and for how? Like a National Parks type system?

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Words_Are_Hrad t1_j205lzz wrote

>What percentage of them should be left pristine

Ideally? Zero percent. WE NEED MORE MINERALS!

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2KilAMoknbrd t1_j1xoqy5 wrote

I don't know about that, however, recovering the enormous amount of garbage we Earthlings have put in space would be more acceptable.
What do I know ?

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JustYourAvgJester t1_j1xqu4j wrote

Where else are we gonna get the materials to make more pollution and world ending weapons?

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datfixinboy t1_j1xrn80 wrote

Considering the potential mineral wealth on some of those asteroids, we could use that to build an off-world economy

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SuperSpread t1_j1y4xff wrote

Is exploiting workers the Amazon way socially acceptable? Is dumping pollution to save a few cents on the dollar socially acceptable? This is a useless question. There is absolutely no hesitation to do something, if it is by a corporation and there is a profit motive. If you don’t, 99 others will happily do it.

The only question is is it legal or can I get away with it / make money after fines. Nothing else is even given a moment’s thought.

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adelbrahman t1_j1z65ck wrote

  1. Yes.
  2. For the Belt - Beltalowda - "remember the cant"
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enek101 t1_j1znv72 wrote

i think the biggest issue in this is we are going to miss out. While americans, UK and other "first world space nations" debate the "ethics" of mining space rocks the greater space community at large that has sprung up in the recent years ( Saudi arabia, India, China) are just going to do it without care for the ethics. Severely hampering other nations because we will be late to the game because we should mine a rock floating in space.

I get the debate but really if we want to advance as a species this is kinda a big step imo. Larger swaths of Material as the lack of destroying our planet. Less need to worry about wracking the ecosystem with toxic runoff if mining in space or on lifeless planets etc. Honestly i'm not sure why its a debate at times. we can literally save our planet by mining asteroids or lifeless worlds.

I know my rant sounds VERY human ( ie consume consume consume) But that is what we are. there is laws in the universe that dictate this is the order of things. i think we just expect our selves to be better as a race and when you have countries that dont care it will limit the ones power that do.

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Dantheking94 t1_j1zs7gv wrote

I just think the moon should be off limits. Mine everything else. Leave the moon out of it and for that matter once it gets cheap enough, leave Earth out of it too.

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GeauxAllDay t1_j20ayrh wrote

I'm more worried about disputes arising in space and the need to regulate countries and private companies to prevent them from going out and claiming asteroids and/or clusters of them to try to hoard their resources to control the price. We need to come up with Space Law that will prevent entities from doing this, and/or starting wars in space over these resources.

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realbigbob t1_j20g38t wrote

The only real problem I can see with space mining/industry is that, rather than saving earths natural environment, it might provide the capital to industrialize earth even further.

Throughout history it seems like gains in efficiency just lead to exponentially increased production, instead of reductions in our exploitation of existing resources

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FuturologyBot t1_j1x4yov wrote

The following submission statement was provided by /u/Gari_305:

From the Article

>It was not a foregone conclusion, as there are some potentially negative environmental factors to mining in space. While it might not cause any immediate harm to ecosystems as it does here on Earth, it does destroy "pristine" environments that have arguably been around since the dawn of the solar system, at least in the case of the asteroids. As excellently portrayed in the Mars trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson, there will always be a part of humanity that will want to leave space as it is

Also form the Article

> However, there are some other confounding factors, including, as the authors point out, that both lunar and asteroid mining are, at this point, highly abstract concepts, the real impact of which may be hard to grok for many study participants. But studies such as this have to start somewhere, and waiting until after there is already a fully-fledged mining mission on the moon to see if it has public support might be a little late. For now, at least, those interested in moving forward with this aspect of the economic development of space have the public on their side.

Please reply to OP's comment here: https://old.reddit.com/r/Futurology/comments/zwvmq5/is_mining_in_space_socially_acceptable/j1x0p9w/

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thewend t1_j1x8tnt wrote

The richest of the rich are going to do it anyway, with no consequences whatsoever (would it really pollute anything at all?)

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Fantastic_Ask t1_j1xa8tz wrote

It will eliminate slave labour and destroy a few larger companies so no not socially acceptable. But a good thing overall 😅

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perpetualtedium t1_j1xtrc7 wrote

I think it depends on how much borderline slave labor is used.

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Aggravating-Hair7931 t1_j1xvslv wrote

Let's focus on what we could change today. The top 1% should not hoard over 90% of planetary resources.

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Weird-Information-61 t1_j1xwpkb wrote

The problem with space mining is how should one go about it? Take resources from another planet, or asteroids? If asteroids, should we try to land on them and drill, or pull the sci-fi route and just take the whole rock & break it down somewhere else?

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KillerNinja86678 t1_j1y1itg wrote

As long as humans dont do it and robots do it, sure.

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crabcakesandbeer t1_j1y8tsv wrote

Why would space mining be bad for the the earth? What is the thesis for socially acceptable in space?

There aren’t any people or resources to pollute.

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TheIRSEvader t1_j1yd5mr wrote

we do it here on Earth, there’s an entire universe to be explored so I don’t see why not

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DRETIME t1_j1ye3xy wrote

If the process to make this happen wouldn't kill us all, then yes

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syfari t1_j1yl9pb wrote

100% yes, make it a social imperative. If preserving our home means fucking up some barren rocks, there shouldn’t even be an option.

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freemyslobs1337 t1_j1ypqp8 wrote

Current rockets are NOT environmentally friendly. We need fusion powered space shuttles(I think thats the term? Like space planes) or some other way to propel rockets. This will quickly become an issue.

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xXkiljoyXx t1_j1z0ch0 wrote

I imagine that we would be extinct before a lack of "pristine space" became an issue for anyone.

Ffs a black hole eats indiscriminately and we are worried about our impact on the vast nothingness we have no use for.

God forbid a piece of our trash get loose in the galaxy.

The entire earth could explode and the impact on the universe would be business as usual.

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SuperStarPlatinum t1_j1z2kgr wrote

The idealized version done remotely by drones. Yes definitely.

The horrible early version done by human labor because of corporate sadism no.

But hey if we get in trouble for doing it, we've finally made first contact even if its in the form of a fine from galactic NIMBYS.

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scrubbless t1_j1z2tmu wrote

>They could therefore end up in landfills, causing a longer-term environmental problem than if we simply recycled the material we already have in these large deposits of everything that humanity has created. 

All in all I am in favour of mining asteroids, I think the benefits outweigh the negitives, if done properly. The moon i find less preferable (similar to mining on the earth) because it has a direct link to our planets habitat.

The article answered my main concern with the prospect of mining in space, the recent drive in renewables and sustainability I think are really important, if it becomes cheaper to just consume and mine from space then it cod shift the general world mentality away from sustainability.

So something the article didn't answer for me is how will this theoretically be done?

I would assume we will not be firing people into space to mine and then back and forth, because the cost to sent people into space and back constantly will suck for the environment.

I would assume we'd developing a self maintaining robotic fleet that can mine, package and fire the goods back to earth. I don't think we are there yet, but it's an exciting (and a little scary) prospect.

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MisterBilau t1_j1z3ezl wrote

Of course it is. "environmental destruction" is only a significant factor in the way it impacts life. If there's no life, the "environment" is irrelevant. So it's acceptable to mine any space rock as long as there's no life there.

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FenrirHere t1_j1zi3wv wrote

What does that matter? If it's viable I say go for it, but I don't see how you could feasibly do that without continuing to damage the ozone layer further.

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Brutezord t1_j1zq6av wrote

This might be a stupid question and if so, my apologies, but one thing that constantly pops to my mind in this kind of post is: Won't bringing significant amounts of extraterrestrial matter to earth impact a shift in the Earth's trajectory around the Sun?

Of course what could constitute a "significant amount" might be beyond the practicality of human consumption but worth a thought.

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Scotswolf_otaku t1_j1zvdnz wrote

Why shouldn't it be?

  1. The amount of resources on Earth is finite.

  2. There are enough metals and volatiles in the asteroid belt to last for the next 10,000 years, even with the current rate of increase of use. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asteroid_mining

  3. If countries that don't have access to space invest in companies that do, they still get a share of the profits & access to the goods generated.

The more resources we get from space, the less we use from our world, putting less strain on the environment. And the more profits generated, the more we plow back into restoring our environment to it's pre-industrial levels.

This doesn't even take into account the spin offs & advances that'll occur from the research needed to create the equipment and infrastructure to mine the asteroids, just like what happened with the Apollo program.

Sounds pretty much like a win-win situation to me.

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No_Bet_1687 t1_j1zzve3 wrote

Sure as long as long as the conditions for human workers are good and no one is being bred, enslaved or genetically and forced to do it.

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Villad_rock t1_j20g762 wrote

Almost 2000 stars die every minute. We should find ways to save and preserve them.

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spamburg21 t1_j20i3bm wrote

Doesn’t matter. It’s going to happen asap. When you have asteroids made of gold, you don’t think humans are on a race to go exploit foreign bodies? There’s a new space race because are trying to find new worlds because we already raped and pillaged this one to the point that developing (and eventually ruining) space is our only option.

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Chipatamawey t1_j2171o8 wrote

i thought it said miming in space

that would be hilarious tho

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LordHitokiri t1_j26q3yq wrote

I mean taking weight could shift weight and throw a comet into some planet that hasn’t had the opportunity to evolve into a nuclear species with a complex that treats politicians like gods Maybe that’s how the dinosaurs was killed by some other species mining in space I’ll see myself out

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UrmomisKindaGay_ t1_j2f9ish wrote

Oh boo hoo we destroyed the beautiful natural environment of an asteroid that nothing lives on. I don’t care. I value nature on earth more than random asteroids

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zdm_ t1_j1xb484 wrote

I initially read this as bitcoin mining in space then it hit me, why arent we doing that

0

ExternaJudgment t1_j1zz600 wrote

Lol, why care what animals on earth think.

If they don't like it they can fly up in space and come complain if they can.

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okieman73 t1_j20s725 wrote

I guarantee there would be a bunch of people complaining about it for some reason. We have no right...bla blahs. I personally hope I'm alive to be around and slap the crap out of them. Unless we hurl the debris to earth it wouldn't hurt anyone or anything but most likely be a benefit for everyone. I personally have had about enough of what's socially acceptable especially in the US and Europe. We don't hire kids and work them for 16 hrs a day. Other countries do but somehow the countries that are doing the most to mine or drill for resources carefully are bitched about the most.

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Bullet1289 t1_j1xkcf6 wrote

we fucked up the earth enough, time to spread the love to the rest of the solar system

−1

Pair_ofDocks t1_j1xuufd wrote

No, it is not socially acceptable. Those that don't have the means or ability to mine in space could potentially be offended by those who do. Mining also has a problematic history, fraught with child and slave labor and male dominated occupational roles.

−2

MisterBilau t1_j1z3nwt wrote

> Mining also has a problematic history, fraught with child and slave labor and male dominated occupational roles.

Lol, what? We're talking about mining IN SPACE, and you're worried about child and slave labor, and gender issues?

2