There Is No Place Like Earth w/ Neil Comins #8

Everyone. This is David Goldsmith, and welcome to the Project Moon Hut podcast series, The Age of Infinite. We're looking to learn from individuals from around the world as we help to establish sustainable life on the moon through the accelerated development of an Earth and space based ecosystem to change how we live on Earth for all species. We have on the get on the line today Neil Cummins. How are you, Neil? I'm well. Thank you, David.

Neil is a professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Maine. He has, one tidbit of information reading his bio and it's online for you is that he worked 4 summers in the 19 eighties at the NASA Ames Research Center. And that's where our that's where we started Project Moon Hut. He's also brought online because he had written a book called What if the Moon Did Not Exist? Then, we've known each other for about 4 years. He gave a fantastic presentation on the topic.

And I knew he would be a great guest on the program today. So his title the the title that we're working with today is there is no place in space where people do not live their lives as they do on earth. So Neil, let's start off with the bullet points, the outline that we're gonna be following today. Okay. Here are 3 bullet points to consider. The first is the senses in space.

Okay. The second is other differences that people will encounter in space, And the third is adapting to the different places in space that we will be going in the near future. Okay. So let's start with the first one. Senses and space. What do you mean? Where where are we going with this? Okay. Well, in everyday life, you know, we we humans, under normal circumstances, have we we say we have 5 senses. And, in fact, we have many more than that.

Something like twice as many depending on I'm glad I'm I'm so glad you said that because I was about to say there are a lot more than that. Don't you know that, Neil? So good. And, and so I thought I would just touch on these first because living in space is a sensory experience, and Okay. If people are gonna go in into space, they should know and understand how those experiences there will be different for their senses among many other things, but that's what we're starting with.

So I I thought I would, just sort of, list some of the senses, but let let me begin by defining a sense as I'm using the term. A sense is any input from the external world that the human body is able to detect and respond to. Okay. And in the in the normal scheme of things is touch, sight, sound, smell, taste. And, you know, that's that's usually where we stop, but but it isn't. And and and so let me throw in some others. We are sensitive.

We can detect the existence of ultraviolet radiation without Oh, really? Okay. Without anything different. And the way we do that, of course, is our our bodies, especially light colored folks, respond by tanning, by darkening. So our bodies Ah, okay. Yeah. That's an inter I I never put those 2 together. That is our that is a sense for ultraviolet radiation. Oh, wow. That's cool. Okay. Go ahead. Another one is, heat. We are sensitive to heat.

Now if you go back to the normal 5, it's not on that list, but I don't don't try this at home. But if you touch touch or get near something that's very hot, your body will tell you that you've done that. So heat is another thing, infrared radiation if you'd like, is another thing that we have a sense for. Another one, is rotation. You're spinning around, you know it.

Our bodies have built into our inner ears a structure that has little hairs, and and resting on those hairs is this little tiny thing called an otolith, this little ball. And, and when you accelerate, that that that little ball moves and the hairs can detect the motion, tells us that we are rotating. Another related sense is acceleration. We know when you're sitting in a car and you floor it and you feel yourself being pressed against the back, and you're accelerating.

Likewise, when you jump out of something and and are falling, you know that you are accelerating. And finally, for for our purposes here, we also know which way is down. If you if you close your eyes and just, you know, don't even think about it, you will point down correctly every single time because our bodies likewise have sensors built in based on on the balance and and and the pressure we feel, and or when we're standing, the the motion we go through to determine which way is down.

So we have a lot of senses, and all of them are going to be affected by living in space. Okay. I get it. Yeah. It's and my mind is already racing to the astronauts that have been in space, and the disorientation they might experience or the, well, variety of, senses that I hadn't thought about in that way. Interesting. Okay. Right. So I thought I'd talk about some of the effects that you're going to encounter Okay.

In in these things, and and and please feel entirely free to stop me if I go too far. No. No. No. These are these are great. These are great because I hadn't I hadn't thought when we had talked about the title that you were going to hit this, and I love when there's surprises. So this is good. Okay. Alright. So let me, talk about one that that virtually all astronauts and cosmonauts encounter, and that is the the the sense of balance that we have on Earth.

When you're weightless, you have no orientation to which way is down. Even when they paint on this on on on the spacecraft down is in that direction, which they do sometimes. Really? Okay. And, so our our bodies are not designed for weightlessness And therefore, virtually all people who go into space and are there for more than a matter of minutes, tend to become space sick, which is very uncomfortable feeling and get nauseous and and and and you feel disoriented and and and it's just terrible.

But it tends to go away in a relatively short period of time, matter of hours or tens of hours at worst. Is it different is it different than ocean sickness? It's not dissimilar. They're they're they are related, but, the the ocean sicknesses or seasickness is often or is due to the the Oh, a different type of it's yeah. Okay. And and and and and the motion motion sickness that you feel in, you know, on the sea, is different than the weightlessness that you feel in space.

Okay. So yes and no is the answer to your question. But the good news is that, it happens once and then it's over, and you can get on with your life. So that's that's a short term adaptation for space that people should be need to be aware of if they're going to make the most of the experience. Staying with the the inner ear, the force of gravity on earth is different than the force of gravity that people will experience on any other world.

Of course, in the International Space Station or elsewhere, it's weightless and that is fun. But it's it's also very different and that's the theme here is is it it's not the same. So learning to make the most of a weightless environment is is absolutely fine. There are lots of things you lots of fun things to do, and and and and and people really enjoy that experience. On any of the worlds, the the weight is is something very different.

So let me just talk a little bit about, for example, going to the moon. The force of gravity on the moon is about 1 sixth the force of gravity we feel on on earth. So if you weighed a £150 on earth, you'd weigh £25 on the moon. And that sounds pretty good in the sense of, you know, you'd be able to jump higher, run faster, things like that. And that that that is to in some extent true, but you also, of course, have to wear a space suit at all times, and they tend to be a little bit bulky.

So it's not as as simple as all that. Furthermore, your sense of balance at 1 sixth gravity is not going to be as good as it is otherwise, and it is much more likely that you'll fall until you start getting used to it. So astronauts are were trained on how to get back up when they fell. Which has also been a conspiracy theory big point is that one picture where he gets off his knees. One of the astronauts gets off his knees.

Mhmm. And people have looked at that and said that can't happen that way. So the that balance I can understand is you have to really learn a different way of moving your body to adapt to that type of weightlessness or, minimal weight. Right. Lower weight. Absolutely. So yes. On on Mars, the force of gravity is about 2 fifths of what we weigh on earth. So if you weighed a £150, you'd weigh about £60 on Mars.

And, you know, again, that's something to get used to, but it is something that in all likelihood, we humans would be able to adapt to. So it's just something to be aware of, I would say at this point. Staying with the moon for for just a second, let me go to another sense which is kind of very interesting, and I think is gonna be extremely important to deal with, and that is the sense of smell. This the sense of smell, it really changes when you get into space. And, it is much less sensitive.

The, the astronaut, Don Bennett said that the International Space Station, for example, smells like the combination of a machine shop, which if you ever been in 1, you know, and an engine room in a ship or other place, and a laboratory all at once. So that is a a combination of of of senses impacting on your your brain which you have to get used to. Do do you know why it are those I would the question comes to mind is that it might smell that way because it is a metal building.

It has all sorts of laboratory experiments in it. So that would be somewhat assumptive. Is there something different that's happening in space because of the lack less molecules? Is there is there something different that makes this less sensitive? Good question.

The short answer is no. That is to say that there are a variety of activities that the space station itself is going through is doing that would generate a variety of smells, and it cannot clean up the smells as effectively as just a large volume of air can, you know, disperse smells. So they tend to be more concentrated for longer there than elsewhere. But the short answer is So they so they kind of hang in the air Yes. If you wanna say.

It doesn't it doesn't disperse as it would on earth because it fills the vacuum. And in space, you're going to see those same molecules of concentration exist for a lingering time. Yes. Keep in mind that they do filter it, and they do a very good job. But there's a lot going on that puts stuff back into the air, and it's a question of, you know, who wins the battle, the filters or or the the the noses. So to some degree, the sense of smell might not change that much.

It's just the environment and how we how we receive that smell That is what's changed. You know what I'm saying? I'm getting at a different angle? No. Absolutely. And and and there is something to that. However, as I'm sure you know, the sense of smell is part of our sense of taste in the sense of if if our nose is clogged and we eat a variety of foods, we can't taste them as well or can't enjoy the taste as well as when we can smell them while we're eating them.

Okay. It turns out that as far as I know without exception, when people go into space to the space station, the sense of taste gets, gets very reduced. You lose a lot of the enjoyment of eating. And as a result and and and, you know, there are people working with NASA and ESA and elsewhere to who deal with these kinds of issues a lot.

And and and to deal with the the decrease in the sense of taste, which isn't includes a decrease in the sense of smell, this the foods there are much spicier to make them more enjoyable. So that's a a Yeah. My mind is racing to the trying to figure this out because if our taste buds are the same, what is making limited gravity change the taste? So my first inclination is to say, okay, they're not gonna have a barbecue up there.

And much of the food that's brought up there might not be designed to be tasty, but to be efficient. What what's changed? That's an We know. Excellent question, and I'm not qualified to answer it. I don't know the answer. In other words, I don't know the physiological aspect that changes when we are in a low gravity environment. Yeah. They they've they've act I've heard people say that wine or liquor change tastes different on the International Space Station.

So therefore, we'll have a different is it the molecular biology is it the molecules within the wine or the liquor? No. Or is it our taste sense our our sense? Our sense. And and that is the case because virtually all, foods of all kinds become less enjoyable. Okay. Okay. So that's the space station. Let's talk about the moon since that's a major theme of of of your work. The smell of the moon is something that that humans are going to have to face upfront and big time.

Jack Smith says that the the moon smells like burnt gunpowder. For those of you, your listeners who have ever smelled burnt gunpowder, I can tell you, it smells terrible. Buzz Aldrin said that it smells like if you had charcoal or hot ashes like in a fire, and then you poured water on them. Mhmm. Which is a rather acrid smell also. And, and that is just intrinsic to the powdered I don't wanna say soil, but it technically is called a regolith. The powder powdered surface of of of a world.

So the regolith of the moon has this very strong and distasteful smell. And and so dealing with that is going to be really important. And it gets more complicated because the surface of the moon, because the moon has so little atmosphere, virtually none, the surface of the moon is is being struck by radiation from the sun, which our atmosphere prevents from reaching the earth.

And the radiation that strikes the the moon's surface from the sun, separates the electrons from the the atoms that they normally are are around. And, the way that we know this in everyday life is static cling. Yeah. I have walked into classrooms with, you know, cleaning, you know, downy thing or whatever on my my trousers. That's so you're that you're that professor. Yeah. I'm the one. I'm the one. Okay. Static clang is a huge problem on the moon.

And and because of this the fact that that the, surface is being struck all the time by the radiation from the sun.

And therefore, when you go out for a walk, I'm getting back to the smell part now, when you go out for a walk on the moon, which I understand is a fun thing to do, then within minutes within minutes, your space suit is going to be very dark no matter assuming it was white, a huge amount of the regolith is gonna stick to your space suit because of the static electricity, the static cling. And it doesn't come off easily. It is very difficult.

So when you go back into your habitat, the hut, that debris on your spacesuit is gonna go with you. And it's Which I've heard I've heard is very dangerous. It's dangerous. In what sense? Because it's very sharp. It's a it's not like soil. You've got this more of a, a more more like a it's not a lava rock, but it's a little bit it's a sharper type compound or material, and it's it's been dangerous because it can get into the joints of suits, which is one challenge.

But the other is breathing it in. I've been told at NASA at Ames, actually, they have a little pit called the regolith. They've tried to mimic this. That breathing it in would be very bad for your the human body. I couldn't agree more. And that is sort of the punch line of this aspect of of living on the moon is dealing with the the the regolith, the the both the smells. And we don't know. We really don't know what the long term impact of breathing that material in is.

It is certainly true that, for the most part, the because the moon's surface has been struck for literally 1000000000 of years by the radiation and particles in space, the the powdery, substance of the regolith, it is a very fine powder. And and as you said, when it gets into the joints of things, it's very, very hard to get it out, and it it makes motion difficult.

And the mechanical things like, if you had a motor, if if you get the regolith into it, it very quickly will degrade the quality of of that motor. So if when when you go out for a walk on the moon, you come back, your space suit is going to be sticky and and and making a Teflon space suit is probably gonna be a really big deal to to minimize this effect. But the point is that once you get out of that space suit, you're gonna be breathing the regolith that's on the space suit.

And and so you've got to avoid or minimize that as well. So it's gonna require probably several rooms where you take off the spacesuit, you put it in a place where they can hopefully process it and clean it, then you have to, you know, you know, get probably showered or or, you know, your air your lungs cleaned out and so on, before you

There's a there's a company, and I don't know the name of the company, but there's a a company that's working on technology that will polarize the suit in a way that when you're wearing it and you walk, it will the regolith would not sit on it. Kind of like I don't know what the best example is, but it would like, the RainX that you use for your car. Anybody doesn't know what RainX is? RainX is a, fluid that you would put in your windshield wiper, for example.

And water doesn't stick to it, so the windshield wiper doesn't have to work the same way. Well, this would repel any regolith. So you'd be your suit would be charged in a way that counterbalances the regolith. So I know they're working on those type of technologies. So it kind of begs to question with what you just to question you and what you've just said. Motors burn up. Suits have challenges. How did the first how did they survive while they were on the moon the first few times?

The answer is for a very very short time. So that they, the astronauts who went to the moon, were not apparently not there long enough for any of these things we're talking about to have had a lifelong effect. Okay. So they were breathing the air for no more than several days, and, and that was it. And and it is not unusual for, you know, many kinds of hazardous things, to take longer than that to to have, you know, a really bad effect on people.

So we really don't know how long people can survive breathing in atmosphere that is not extremely well cleaned of the gases and the dust, on the moon. Okay. That that's an open question. Yes. They brought back some samples, but, and maybe they've they've experimented with animals. I honestly don't know. But it it that it's a real big deal. Okay. Interestingly, as one last example, going to Mars, Should we talk about Mars? Yeah. We can add Mars in there.

It's, if it helps us to understand what living in space would be like because I I think the comment you made when we were designing this program was that Earth is special. So let's let's cover Mars so people will understand the differences. Sure. Again, as a issue of sensory things, the, surface, the regolith of Mars is very rich in iron oxides, which we call rust.

And so what it is going to smell like is a very interesting question, which to the best of my knowledge, since nobody's been there, we really don't have a good idea. But it is going to have some of the properties, of the regolith of the moon in the sense of, you know, things are gonna have to be cleaned because they get staticky. And that happens to some of our spacecraft there too, by the way.

And, so we are going to have to understand that environment, to be able to breathe it and to to walk around in it, and and and live in it. So that's another example of how the senses are are affected by going into space. And and as I say, Mars is even bigger question mark than the moon since, you know, we have not had that kind of feedback from from humans who have been there yet.

I wonder with the technology that individuals are looking to create, the the habitat environments are how hard they're working on eliminating the smell component so that it reminds humans of earth or allows the human to be able to maintain their sanity in a place where the smell could be overwhelming or the lack of taste or the sense of balance and to try to give some earth like functionality to the habitat.

What you're describing is really the heart and soul of making life in space habitable, or acceptable, or or enjoyable, because it's so different that, that we've got to take each and every bit and piece of of of the human experience, the senses, for example. And and make sure that we can craft the environments to to to fit our our needs. And so Well, that's where Scott Kelly, I think he was up in space for about 340 some more days.

And when he came back, there's a book I have not read it, so I'm kind of talking without any knowledge. He said it was very difficult. It was not what people anticipated. It was rough at times to have that live in that different type of environment. So I think we have to anticipate that this will not be as smooth as some people profess to be. Well, I wanna go to space. Yeah. Well, it's not gonna be that easy. So okay. So let's get on to the next.

Is this, the other differences people will encounter? Well, I'll give you another one and and and again, feel free to move me on if I get to Sure. No. No. Go ahead. Another one is the the radiation that people are are going to encounter and do encounter in space. Our atmosphere protects us from a large quantity of radiation that the sun emits and other stars emit, as well as very high speed particles in space. They're called cosmic rays, but they're not rays at all. They're particles.

They're hydrogen nuclei or the nuclei of a variety of of of atoms. And in the normal scheme of things, that radiation, the x rays, gamma rays, most of the ultraviolet that are permeating space, do not get to Earth because our atmosphere stops them, likewise with the cosmic rays. And that and that is a really good thing because all of those radiations and the cosmic rays I'll give you an example of of the cosmic ray in just a second. All of those radiations, are dangerous to human life.

Enough exposure to any of them, and you will die. It's just a question of how quickly depending on the dosage. The cosmic ray particles, the most powerful cosmic rays are iron nuclei. And they are they come from not in our solar system. They come from other stars, regions of of our galaxy. And and and the most dangerous ones, are traveling close to the speed of light. And when they go through and they can go through a lot, like in through the space station.

When they go through if they if if if they don't if something doesn't stop them before they hit you, the most powerful, cosmic rays, single atom, has as much punch as a baseball thrown at 50 miles an hour. So we gotta be, aware of these kinds of things. Often the the lower energy ones, will will go through spacesuits, for example, and and and astronauts will will say they see stars. And and and that's when when particles or radiation strike their optic nerve.

And Oh, so they they, in the International Space Station, they're being bombarded by these low energy rays. And they're feeling it all the time or is this infrequently? Is this I mean, how often do you feel this? It it first of all, it varies. And, I've read that, you know, people will feel it in the space station daily or something like that. I'm not I I have not seen the, you know, the the most concrete information. It's all been quote, unquote secondhand.

So I guess the the challenge for most people to get their mind around, which I had to switch my thinking, is that in the molecular in molecular studies, you have to believe that within a structure there is space between those structures on a molecular level so that a cosmic ray can go through what we would consider a piece of metal. Actually to that, it's just molecules. And there's enough space for that cosmic ray to either punch its way through or to move its way through without being stopped.

Is that a good way to say it? Did I say that right? It is. And and and to be sure, most of them are stopped by just physical structures. But, in, you know, in in some cases, apparently not. And when people go to the moon or Mars, likewise, the atmosphere, especially on the moon, of course, is so thin that there is no protection from radiation by the atmosphere. And, so the the the habitats are going to have to be built to protect people from the radiation.

And not only protect people from the radiation, but it it's also even worth noting in in in, a related vein that even during the daytime, the sunlight is is bombarding a surface, any surface on the moon for, about 14 days, 2 weeks roughly, continuously. No night. And so that radiation from the sun is going to heat up whatever habitat is there.

And it that has to be dealt with because it gets extremely it can get extremely hot due to the continuous radiation from the sun, which again is not blocked at all by the atmosphere. So all of the energy that strikes the habitat or that could strike the habitat is going to because there's no air to stop it. So you have 2 weeks of continuous heating and it gets really hot on the on the surface. It gets up to 250 degrees Fahrenheit, on the surface of the moon, during the day. And okay.

So you figured, well, we'll we'll put in refrigerants, coolants, and that that will be necessary. However, then you have after 14 days of continuous sunlight, yeah, 14 days roughly of continuous darkness. And during that time the temperature gets to about minus 400 degrees Fahrenheit. So the plumbing in habitats, on the moon, are going to have to be really resilient to temperature and radiation both, changes.

And so that that is another big issue with how that world is gonna be very different than than living on earth. Again, due to our senses, I mean, we the technology is gonna have to protect the people living there from a a change in temperature of 650 degrees, which is considerable. And to to give a reference point, it's, plus a little bit over, let's say, it's 100 degrees, Celsius and it's minus 150 degrees Celsius. It's to give a reference.

It's not exactly, but those would give the type of swings we're talking about. Actually, if if I may, I I in Sir. I may have gotten it wrong, but when I did the calculation, I got 120 degrees Celsius down to minus 240. Oh, okay. That's the first time I've heard that. Yeah. So I'm going to I'll look that up again. If that's the calculation, that's even better because I've been given a little bit different numbers. And it varies. So what's your take on lava tubes?

And for those who don't know, a lava tube is well, why don't you describe what a lava tube is? I'm assuming you know. Sure. What's your take on living in something like a lava tube to be able to I think it's a great idea. Let me just say what they are very briefly. When when the moon first formed, it's it was a liquid molten rock. And then the first part of the Moon that that that solidified was the surface because it was exposed to space and there was no air to keep the heat in.

So the the rock on the the surface of the moon solidified, and as the inside of the moon cooled down, more of the interior solidified. However, shortly after the the surface started solidifying, not far underneath it, there was a lot of molten rock, magma, liquid rock, that was there from when it first formed and and had not cooled. And what happened is that, the molten rock just below the surface, a matter of meters or yards maybe, we don't know for sure, was flowing like rivers.

You you see this, in Hawaii today, for example, and l and elsewhere. And as that molten rock under the solid surface flowed, eventually, it cooled enough to solidify. But with the exception of water, virtually everything that solidifies shrinks when it goes from the liquid state to a solid state. So when the the flowing lava or magma, solidified, then it didn't have to take up as much space as it did when it was liquid.

So we have a liquid tube of lava flowing under the surface, meandering like a river, but under the surface. And then it solidified, and when it solidified that tube of lava shrank and it left a space on the top of the lava tube. And that is is is a cave. Those are caves. Now in some cases, the the the solid surface eventually became powdery regolith because of the the particles striking it for 1000000000 of years.

And in some cases, some of those lava tubes, those empty caves, if you will, collapsed. And we actually see those collapsed lava tubes on the Moon's surface today. They're called rilles. And, one of the astronauts actually drove a moon buggy down, one of them. But there may be others. It is likely that there are other caves not far below the surface, that have not collapsed, just as we have caves here on Earth.

And those would be desirable habitats for for for living because the rock above them would shield the people living there, from a considerable amount of the radiation and cosmic rays that otherwise would, have an easier time getting to them. And, one of the the dimensions so that, that you've been able to find and research how the size of these caves, I've heard are enormous. Yes. The short answer is yes.

We haven't been in any of them yet, but if the rilles are any indication, then they're tens of yards or tens of meters across, maybe even a 100 yards across or a 100 meters across. So they they may provide a very suitable habitat for for living on the moon. But, again, it would be an environment that they would have to the people living there would have to be well protected from the the rock, the the the potentially hazardous materials that the cave itself would have in it normally.

And, so it's it's just engineering but it can be done. But but the good thing is there won't be any bears. How right you are. Okay. What else in terms of the other differences people will encounter? Okay. Let's see. Let's knock a few more off because I wanna get to your adapting in space. So let's, one one or 2 more if you have or we can move to the next topic. Yeah. Sure. One of the biggest other problems or challenges that people will have in space is, related to our biological clocks.

And, you know, as you probably know, we have, inside us biological clocks which resynchronize with the beginning of the day usually. And those clocks are set roughly speaking to a 24 hour cycle. No surprise. That's where we live. Turns out that in in a world where the day night cycle is not within an hour or so of 24 hours, the human body doesn't handle that well at all. The biological clocks can't resync when they're supposed to and things well, it's not good.

So in in the space station, they or, on Mars, the interesting thing about Mars is that Mars' day is is just slightly longer than 24 hours. 24 hours and 37 minutes. And and so living on Mars, as far as the the circadian rhythms, no problem. But living on the moon, it would have to be completely, synchronized to a a day night cycle artificially Because the 24 hour I I said it wrong. The 24 day of sunlight and the 24 days of darkness, the human body can't handle.

So that's, another aspect of of the sense. I'm gonna I'm gonna make a prediction out of this. Even the 2437 over time will be extremely taxing on the human body Because you're constantly being slightly off. It's like having, you know you hurt yourself and you've got this little pain and it's not a big pain but it's a little pain. And it's always a little pain. And after a while it becomes a real pain that it's a little pain.

Well, I think if you're constantly being taken off a little bit, you'll come your body will start to react maybe negatively as to this is not normal. Something's wrong here. We've got an extra few minutes in every day. That's not out of the question. It has been studied, for a lot of environments. For example, submariners, need an artificial cycle. People who work in caves need an artificial cycle. People on the International Space Station.

And and so they have tried to find out how far you can go and not have those little things build up. And and I strongly suspect that even if the average person could adapt to the 2437, you're probably right that some fraction of the people would just really not be able to handle it, and it's a concern. Well, that's why the moon allows people to come back to Earth as of today. Okay. So in terms let's jump all over to adapting in space just for the few minutes that we've got now.

When you say adapting in space, how are we going to make this work? How do we adapt to all of this? Okay. I think adapting can be used in in many ways. Of course, the human body is going to be changing, and in that sense, adapting. And in somewhat and in some environments, if you're there for a long time, for example, you're going to lose bone mass and you're going to have your muscles are going to change. And, from from the fast, twitch to the slow twitch, different kinds of muscles.

And and and so the body is going to adapt to living in space as well as it possibly can. And if if we're, lucky and careful and really smart about it, then those adaptations can be made, effectively. And and and so It doesn't it's it's it makes it challenging for me to it's really a technological change that has to occur to make everything happen. And I think we touched on this a little bit in our original dialogue is that our bodies are not designed to not move.

So if we don't have gravity and we don't develop bone mass or we don't do something technologically internally, maybe a shot of nanites or so, our body will degrade. Our muscles will atrophy. Our eyes will become rounded in the sockets and have trouble seeing, that we're we're kind of creating a slow death. Or do you believe that won't happen, that we will adapt into a new form of human that can survive in these environments?

I would say that the short answer is I don't expect that to happen soon, which is to say I don't expect us to be able to our our bodies to change enough that we can live there comfortably and for a long time. When when bone structures change or muscle structure, then our bodies can't function as well as they need to. And and and and and bones will break or muscles will be pulled and and so on, much more easily than they can be on earth than they are on earth.

And and so I don't think that in that sense, you know, a human will undergo a sufficient transformation that he or she will be able to function in space as effectively as we can function on Earth in the physiological sense that you just described, which actually raises another interesting question because then if people go into space and then want to have children, and that's a that's an issue because, female eggs have to be at least as far as as has been determined.

They have to be protected incredibly well in space travel. Because the radiation we were talking about before is so dangerous can get through through the the shells of spacecraft and so on. That, it is unlikely that that that eggs in in a woman's body in space would, not be damaged. In in other words, things likely would. So it's almost as if we'd have to develop and I and I I'm going to say this, and please everybody take this nicely, kind of a chastity belt.

A a a a belt that goes around a woman that would protect the eggs all the time. It would be, I I I I don't think we're gonna do that. I have another idea which is not mine. Okay. But I'd love to hear it. I'm sorry? I'd love to hear it.

Okay. And that is for a woman to remove have the eggs, in her body, which are in the as I understand in the normal scheme of things, all of the eggs that she's going to have, removed and put into an extremely well protected hardened, quote, unquote, vault that is super protected from radiation, much more so than the normal spacecraft. It would require a lot of mass and that's a problem in in space travel. The more mass you have, the bigger the rockets have to be.

But if you could make these vaults to keep the woman's eggs safe from the radiation and from the cosmic rays, then when she gets to a world, let's say Mars, or the moon, for that matter, and wants to have children there, then in principle, the egg and egg could be fertilized, put back into her body, and, she could, grow the the the fetus there. In that process, however, she would have to also be very well protected from radiation as the fetus is Right.

Through the whole through the whole process. Absolutely. Absolutely. And your suggestion earlier about, living underground, is almost certainly gonna be the the very best way, the cheapest way, and perhaps the most efficient way, of keeping women, safe when when they are pregnant, from the that radiation. So it's going to be complicated.

And and and sort of the punch line is, that conceivably, no pun intended, the, one of the the the children, the infants that are born in space, perhaps due to some radiation that got through on some at some time, might be mutated. And it may be mutated in a positive way whereas many mutations are not. So the process of evolution would continue Yes. Through being in space. So we might see out of every x thousands of individuals born, if we had that many, then we'd have 10 or 3 that would survive.

But that next generation would then be unsustainable or, protected. From the more resistant, maybe a better way to say it, resistant to the next evolutional change. So that that's a possibility. So what else? Is there any any other last adapting to space that you think, new technology, something interesting that you feel we should know about? Yep. Or I should learn about? Look, can I put in one punch line for Sure? Anything.

If if there are if there is evolution, in space, so that there's a new generation that is better adapted for living in space, they may not be able to visit Earth. They may not be able to function in our gravity with our air density and so on and so forth. So that's something else that, you know, we'll have to think about eventually is that it may well be a new, you know, race.

If you've been born on 16th gravity, you cannot come back to earth because your heart might not pump and the bones might break. Right on all counts. So that's a that's one of the challenges. And I think there are individuals who would like to see the human species evolve. That doesn't include the dolphins, the whales, the birds, the fish, the the reptiles, and all the other creatures on earth. It's human evolution, I think, is the way to look at it. Right.

Our our our the topic came up, you know, when we both started talking about moving in this direction. And you had said that there's no place like earth. That no matter where we go, we're gonna have to change how we technologically live and do. What's the real message that you wanna get out? Or what the real message if you were going to tell me, David, this is why I say that. Is there an underlying honest answer to that?

Why do you say that in the what even why do you even move me in that direction? That's an incredibly important question. And the reason is that it the idea of a, going into space, and b, living in space, are are on the surface, they're incredibly appealing to millions of people. It's a different place. It's something that very few people have done. There are experiences there that you won't have here.

And and and and it it would feel like you're, you know, moving the human race, out to the stars essentially. And and and and I absolutely understand that. And I'm and I'm fine with it. But the reality is that going into space is going to require a huge amount of adaptation both physical adaptation, emotional adaptation, and and other kinds, that people need to be I think, people need to be aware of.

Or else, when they get there and these things start to happen like the smells, then it the whole experience could go south pretty quickly. And I would really like to help prevent that from happening. As I I think you know, I'm not a space fanatic. I do not look up at the stars. And I don't say that in a negative sense. I just say that's who I am so I to give a an understanding of David the person. And I often get when I mention the project we're working on, oh, I'd love to go to the moon.

I'd love to go into space. And I stop. And I say, really? So you understand that you might have your granddaughter or your family or you've just been married or someone's going to have a graduate from a university and you're gonna slap on a suit and you're not sure if you're gonna survive And you're going to shoot yourself up into space. It's not as simple as that. There's a lot more that goes into taking that journey into space.

And part of Project Moon Hut's initiative is that there's going to be 10,000,000,000 people or more on this planet. And we also have to be worried at the same time, not worried, I would say, we have to make sure that the species on earth continues to maintain itself. So, the technological challenges and feats were tempting. I'm not it's a big question. You have to understand. So for you, would you want to go to space? I don't know. How old are you, Neil?

And I don't know if mind if you is it okay I ask you that? It it is okay. I'm 66. And, would I want to go into space? I might enjoy a a trip up to the space station and to sit in the in the they have a a room on the bottom where you can look at the earth. And that as an experience I'm told by all the people I know who have been there or similar places in space, is is a mind changing experience.

And and and I really wouldn't mind seeing the the whole world as an as a unit from space because then we would look at it I would look at it so differently than the day to day problems that we have in the local environment or in a country or in a state. It the whole world as as one big beautiful unit is something that we really should cherish. And I would love to have the experience that the astronauts do who have seen it from that point of view.

I had just recently, I looked this up and I don't know why. Being the International Space Station is at a certain is in low Earth orbit. Mhmm. You see only, I believe, 1 tenth or 1 sixteenth of the Earth as you go around the Earth. There's only been 24 individuals who've been far enough away from the Earth, I think that's the number, to see half of the Earth, which I never thought about. Absolutely true.

However, the astronauts, the people I have talked to who have been to the space station and who have only seen a relatively small fraction, it's still a huge amount. Oh, I I'm not trust me. I I'm not I'm not downplaying. It's a very big feat. Yeah. Yeah. But it it it's also big enough to have the impact that I was describing. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. I just I just found this the other day. I just 2 days ago, 3 days ago, I had questions something and said let me let me step over the threshold.

Let me take a look at this. And I thought it was interesting because I'd never thought about it in that context. Mhmm. Very good. So any last words, that you'd like to add? Well, I I I think that the process of going into space, is going to take off from the physical things that we've been talking about. And it's also going to move into other realms, which I'm sure you have other people talking about, such as the social, the political, and so on.

And and those are also incredibly important, I think, to deal with so that when you get into space, you're not in a social environment that is unacceptable to you. And and because the numbers of people in space that you're going to encounter when you go there are gonna be relatively small, dozens maybe at most. Being able to adapt to that ensemble of people and and and and enjoy your interacting with them. I think that's gonna be also incredibly important, to make it work.

Well, Neil, I'd like to thank you for the time today. Very much appreciated. You've opened my mind to a series of new thoughts. So thank you. My pleasure. Thank you. For those of you who are interested, you could check us out at projectmoonhot.org and sign up for our future space related database project. So that's something that you can do if you're listening to the audio right now. You can participate by liking us at facebookforward/projectmoonhot as one way to keep connected with us.

Or you can connect with us on Twitter at projectmoonhot. So everybody, I'm David Goldsmith and thank you for listening. Everyone. This is David Goldsmith, and welcome to the Project Moon Hut podcast series, The Age of Infinite. We're looking to learn from individuals from around the world as we help to establish sustainable life on the moon through the accelerated development of an Earth and space based ecosystem to change how we live on Earth for all species.

We have on the get on the line today Neil Cummins. How are you, Neil? I'm well. Thank you, David. Neil is a professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Maine. He has, one tidbit of information reading his bio and it's online for you is that he worked 4 summers in the 19 eighties at the NASA Ames Research Center. And that's where our that's where we started Project Moon Hut. He's also brought online because he had written a book called What if the Moon Did Not Exist?

Then, we've known each other for about 4 years. He gave a fantastic presentation on the topic. And I knew he would be a great guest on the program today. So his title the the title that we're working with today is there is no place in space where people do not live their lives as they do on earth. So Neil, let's start off with the bullet points, the outline that we're gonna be following today. Okay. Here are 3 bullet points to consider. The first is the senses in space.

Okay. The second is other differences that people will encounter in space, And the third is adapting to the different places in space that we will be going in the near future. Okay. So let's start with the first one. Senses and space. What do you mean? Where where are we going with this? Okay. Well, in everyday life, you know, we we humans, under normal circumstances, have we we say we have 5 senses. And, in fact, we have many more than that.

Something like twice as many depending on I'm glad I'm I'm so glad you said that because I was about to say there are a lot more than that. Don't you know that, Neil? So good. And, and so I thought I would just touch on these first because living in space is a sensory experience, and Okay. If people are gonna go in into space, they should know and understand how those experiences there will be different for their senses among many other things, but that's what we're starting with.

So I I thought I would, just sort of, list some of the senses, but let let me begin by defining a sense as I'm using the term. A sense is any input from the external world that the human body is able to detect and respond to. Okay. And in the in the normal scheme of things is touch, sight, sound, smell, taste. And, you know, that's that's usually where we stop, but but it isn't. And and and so let me throw in some others. We are sensitive.

We can detect the existence of ultraviolet radiation without Oh, really? Okay. Without anything different. And the way we do that, of course, is our our bodies, especially light colored folks, respond by tanning, by darkening. So our bodies Ah, okay. Yeah. That's an inter I I never put those 2 together. That is our that is a sense for ultraviolet radiation. Oh, wow. That's cool. Okay. Go ahead. Another one is, heat. We are sensitive to heat.

Now if you go back to the normal 5, it's not on that list, but I don't don't try this at home. But if you touch touch or get near something that's very hot, your body will tell you that you've done that. So heat is another thing, infrared radiation if you'd like, is another thing that we have a sense for. Another one, is rotation. You're spinning around, you know it.

Our bodies have built into our inner ears a structure that has little hairs, and and resting on those hairs is this little tiny thing called an otolith, this little ball. And, and when you accelerate, that that that little ball moves and the hairs can detect the motion, tells us that we are rotating. Another related sense is acceleration. We know when you're sitting in a car and you floor it and you feel yourself being pressed against the back, and you're accelerating.

Likewise, when you jump out of something and and are falling, you know that you are accelerating. And finally, for for our purposes here, we also know which way is down. If you if you close your eyes and just, you know, don't even think about it, you will point down correctly every single time because our bodies likewise have sensors built in based on on the balance and and and the pressure we feel, and or when we're standing, the the motion we go through to determine which way is down.

So we have a lot of senses, and all of them are going to be affected by living in space. Okay. I get it. Yeah. It's and my mind is already racing to the astronauts that have been in space, and the disorientation they might experience or the, well, variety of, senses that I hadn't thought about in that way. Interesting. Okay. Right. So I thought I'd talk about some of the effects that you're going to encounter Okay.

In in these things, and and and please feel entirely free to stop me if I go too far. No. No. No. These are these are great. These are great because I hadn't I hadn't thought when we had talked about the title that you were going to hit this, and I love when there's surprises. So this is good. Okay. Alright. So let me, talk about one that that virtually all astronauts and cosmonauts encounter, and that is the the the sense of balance that we have on Earth.

When you're weightless, you have no orientation to which way is down. Even when they paint on this on on on the spacecraft down is in that direction, which they do sometimes. Really? Okay. And, so our our bodies are not designed for weightlessness And therefore, virtually all people who go into space and are there for more than a matter of minutes, tend to become space sick, which is very uncomfortable feeling and get nauseous and and and and you feel disoriented and and and it's just terrible.

But it tends to go away in a relatively short period of time, matter of hours or tens of hours at worst. Is it different is it different than ocean sickness? It's not dissimilar. They're they're they are related, but, the the ocean sicknesses or seasickness is often or is due to the the Oh, a different type of it's yeah. Okay. And and and and and the motion motion sickness that you feel in, you know, on the sea, is different than the weightlessness that you feel in space.

Okay. So yes and no is the answer to your question. But the good news is that, it happens once and then it's over, and you can get on with your life. So that's that's a short term adaptation for space that people should be need to be aware of if they're going to make the most of the experience. Staying with the the inner ear, the force of gravity on earth is different than the force of gravity that people will experience on any other world.

Of course, in the International Space Station or elsewhere, it's weightless and that is fun. But it's it's also very different and that's the theme here is is it it's not the same. So learning to make the most of a weightless environment is is absolutely fine. There are lots of things you lots of fun things to do, and and and and and people really enjoy that experience. On any of the worlds, the the weight is is something very different.

So let me just talk a little bit about, for example, going to the moon. The force of gravity on the moon is about 1 sixth the force of gravity we feel on on earth. So if you weighed a £150 on earth, you'd weigh £25 on the moon. And that sounds pretty good in the sense of, you know, you'd be able to jump higher, run faster, things like that. And that that that is to in some extent true, but you also, of course, have to wear a space suit at all times, and they tend to be a little bit bulky.

So it's not as as simple as all that. Furthermore, your sense of balance at 1 sixth gravity is not going to be as good as it is otherwise, and it is much more likely that you'll fall until you start getting used to it. So astronauts are were trained on how to get back up when they fell. Which has also been a conspiracy theory big point is that one picture where he gets off his knees. One of the astronauts gets off his knees.

Mhmm. And people have looked at that and said that can't happen that way. So the that balance I can understand is you have to really learn a different way of moving your body to adapt to that type of weightlessness or, minimal weight. Right. Lower weight. Absolutely. So yes. On on Mars, the force of gravity is about 2 fifths of what we weigh on earth. So if you weighed a £150, you'd weigh about £60 on Mars.

And, you know, again, that's something to get used to, but it is something that in all likelihood, we humans would be able to adapt to. So it's just something to be aware of, I would say at this point. Staying with the moon for for just a second, let me go to another sense which is kind of very interesting, and I think is gonna be extremely important to deal with, and that is the sense of smell. This the sense of smell, it really changes when you get into space. And, it is much less sensitive.

The, the astronaut, Don Bennett said that the International Space Station, for example, smells like the combination of a machine shop, which if you ever been in 1, you know, and an engine room in a ship or other place, and a laboratory all at once. So that is a a combination of of of senses impacting on your your brain which you have to get used to. Do do you know why it are those I would the question comes to mind is that it might smell that way because it is a metal building.

It has all sorts of laboratory experiments in it. So that would be somewhat assumptive. Is there something different that's happening in space because of the lack less molecules? Is there is there something different that makes this less sensitive? Good question.

The short answer is no. That is to say that there are a variety of activities that the space station itself is going through is doing that would generate a variety of smells, and it cannot clean up the smells as effectively as just a large volume of air can, you know, disperse smells. So they tend to be more concentrated for longer there than elsewhere. But the short answer is So they so they kind of hang in the air Yes. If you wanna say.

It doesn't it doesn't disperse as it would on earth because it fills the vacuum. And in space, you're going to see those same molecules of concentration exist for a lingering time. Yes. Keep in mind that they do filter it, and they do a very good job. But there's a lot going on that puts stuff back into the air, and it's a question of, you know, who wins the battle, the filters or or the the the noses. So to some degree, the sense of smell might not change that much.

It's just the environment and how we how we receive that smell That is what's changed. You know what I'm saying? I'm getting at a different angle? No. Absolutely. And and and there is something to that. However, as I'm sure you know, the sense of smell is part of our sense of taste in the sense of if if our nose is clogged and we eat a variety of foods, we can't taste them as well or can't enjoy the taste as well as when we can smell them while we're eating them.

Okay. It turns out that as far as I know without exception, when people go into space to the space station, the sense of taste gets, gets very reduced. You lose a lot of the enjoyment of eating. And as a result and and and, you know, there are people working with NASA and ESA and elsewhere to who deal with these kinds of issues a lot.

And and and to deal with the the decrease in the sense of taste, which isn't includes a decrease in the sense of smell, this the foods there are much spicier to make them more enjoyable. So that's a a Yeah. My mind is racing to the trying to figure this out because if our taste buds are the same, what is making limited gravity change the taste? So my first inclination is to say, okay, they're not gonna have a barbecue up there.

And much of the food that's brought up there might not be designed to be tasty, but to be efficient. What what's changed? That's an We know. Excellent question, and I'm not qualified to answer it. I don't know the answer. In other words, I don't know the physiological aspect that changes when we are in a low gravity environment. Yeah. They they've they've act I've heard people say that wine or liquor change tastes different on the International Space Station.

So therefore, we'll have a different is it the molecular biology is it the molecules within the wine or the liquor? No. Or is it our taste sense our our sense? Our sense. And and that is the case because virtually all, foods of all kinds become less enjoyable. Okay. Okay. So that's the space station. Let's talk about the moon since that's a major theme of of of your work. The smell of the moon is something that that humans are going to have to face upfront and big time.

Jack Smith says that the the moon smells like burnt gunpowder. For those of you, your listeners who have ever smelled burnt gunpowder, I can tell you, it smells terrible. Buzz Aldrin said that it smells like if you had charcoal or hot ashes like in a fire, and then you poured water on them. Mhmm. Which is a rather acrid smell also. And, and that is just intrinsic to the powdered I don't wanna say soil, but it technically is called a regolith. The powder powdered surface of of of a world.

So the regolith of the moon has this very strong and distasteful smell. And and so dealing with that is going to be really important. And it gets more complicated because the surface of the moon, because the moon has so little atmosphere, virtually none, the surface of the moon is is being struck by radiation from the sun, which our atmosphere prevents from reaching the earth.

And the radiation that strikes the the moon's surface from the sun, separates the electrons from the the atoms that they normally are are around. And, the way that we know this in everyday life is static cling. Yeah. I have walked into classrooms with, you know, cleaning, you know, downy thing or whatever on my my trousers. That's so you're that you're that professor. Yeah. I'm the one. I'm the one. Okay. Static clang is a huge problem on the moon.

And and because of this the fact that that the, surface is being struck all the time by the radiation from the sun.

And therefore, when you go out for a walk, I'm getting back to the smell part now, when you go out for a walk on the moon, which I understand is a fun thing to do, then within minutes within minutes, your space suit is going to be very dark no matter assuming it was white, a huge amount of the regolith is gonna stick to your space suit because of the static electricity, the static cling. And it doesn't come off easily. It is very difficult.

So when you go back into your habitat, the hut, that debris on your spacesuit is gonna go with you. And it's Which I've heard I've heard is very dangerous. It's dangerous. In what sense? Because it's very sharp. It's a it's not like soil. You've got this more of a, a more more like a it's not a lava rock, but it's a little bit it's a sharper type compound or material, and it's it's been dangerous because it can get into the joints of suits, which is one challenge.

But the other is breathing it in. I've been told at NASA at Ames, actually, they have a little pit called the regolith. They've tried to mimic this. That breathing it in would be very bad for your the human body. I couldn't agree more. And that is sort of the punch line of this aspect of of living on the moon is dealing with the the the regolith, the the both the smells. And we don't know. We really don't know what the long term impact of breathing that material in is.

It is certainly true that, for the most part, the because the moon's surface has been struck for literally 1000000000 of years by the radiation and particles in space, the the powdery, substance of the regolith, it is a very fine powder. And and as you said, when it gets into the joints of things, it's very, very hard to get it out, and it it makes motion difficult.

And the mechanical things like, if you had a motor, if if you get the regolith into it, it very quickly will degrade the quality of of that motor. So if when when you go out for a walk on the moon, you come back, your space suit is going to be sticky and and and making a Teflon space suit is probably gonna be a really big deal to to minimize this effect. But the point is that once you get out of that space suit, you're gonna be breathing the regolith that's on the space suit.

And and so you've got to avoid or minimize that as well. So it's gonna require probably several rooms where you take off the spacesuit, you put it in a place where they can hopefully process it and clean it, then you have to, you know, you know, get probably showered or or, you know, your air your lungs cleaned out and so on, before you

There's a there's a company, and I don't know the name of the company, but there's a a company that's working on technology that will polarize the suit in a way that when you're wearing it and you walk, it will the regolith would not sit on it. Kind of like I don't know what the best example is, but it would like, the RainX that you use for your car. Anybody doesn't know what RainX is? RainX is a, fluid that you would put in your windshield wiper, for example.

And water doesn't stick to it, so the windshield wiper doesn't have to work the same way. Well, this would repel any regolith. So you'd be your suit would be charged in a way that counterbalances the regolith. So I know they're working on those type of technologies. So it kind of begs to question with what you just to question you and what you've just said. Motors burn up. Suits have challenges. How did the first how did they survive while they were on the moon the first few times?

The answer is for a very very short time. So that they, the astronauts who went to the moon, were not apparently not there long enough for any of these things we're talking about to have had a lifelong effect. Okay. So they were breathing the air for no more than several days, and, and that was it. And and it is not unusual for, you know, many kinds of hazardous things, to take longer than that to to have, you know, a really bad effect on people.

So we really don't know how long people can survive breathing in atmosphere that is not extremely well cleaned of the gases and the dust, on the moon. Okay. That that's an open question. Yes. They brought back some samples, but, and maybe they've they've experimented with animals. I honestly don't know. But it it that it's a real big deal. Okay. Interestingly, as one last example, going to Mars, Should we talk about Mars? Yeah. We can add Mars in there.

It's, if it helps us to understand what living in space would be like because I I think the comment you made when we were designing this program was that Earth is special. So let's let's cover Mars so people will understand the differences. Sure. Again, as a issue of sensory things, the, surface, the regolith of Mars is very rich in iron oxides, which we call rust.

And so what it is going to smell like is a very interesting question, which to the best of my knowledge, since nobody's been there, we really don't have a good idea. But it is going to have some of the properties, of the regolith of the moon in the sense of, you know, things are gonna have to be cleaned because they get staticky. And that happens to some of our spacecraft there too, by the way.

And, so we are going to have to understand that environment, to be able to breathe it and to to walk around in it, and and and live in it. So that's another example of how the senses are are affected by going into space. And and as I say, Mars is even bigger question mark than the moon since, you know, we have not had that kind of feedback from from humans who have been there yet.

I wonder with the technology that individuals are looking to create, the the habitat environments are how hard they're working on eliminating the smell component so that it reminds humans of earth or allows the human to be able to maintain their sanity in a place where the smell could be overwhelming or the lack of taste or the sense of balance and to try to give some earth like functionality to the habitat.

What you're describing is really the heart and soul of making life in space habitable, or acceptable, or or enjoyable, because it's so different that, that we've got to take each and every bit and piece of of of the human experience, the senses, for example. And and make sure that we can craft the environments to to to fit our our needs. And so Well, that's where Scott Kelly, I think he was up in space for about 340 some more days.

And when he came back, there's a book I have not read it, so I'm kind of talking without any knowledge. He said it was very difficult. It was not what people anticipated. It was rough at times to have that live in that different type of environment. So I think we have to anticipate that this will not be as smooth as some people profess to be. Well, I wanna go to space. Yeah. Well, it's not gonna be that easy. So okay. So let's get on to the next.

Is this, the other differences people will encounter? Well, I'll give you another one and and and again, feel free to move me on if I get to Sure. No. No. Go ahead. Another one is the the radiation that people are are going to encounter and do encounter in space. Our atmosphere protects us from a large quantity of radiation that the sun emits and other stars emit, as well as very high speed particles in space. They're called cosmic rays, but they're not rays at all. They're particles.

They're hydrogen nuclei or the nuclei of a variety of of of atoms. And in the normal scheme of things, that radiation, the x rays, gamma rays, most of the ultraviolet that are permeating space, do not get to Earth because our atmosphere stops them, likewise with the cosmic rays. And that and that is a really good thing because all of those radiations and the cosmic rays I'll give you an example of of the cosmic ray in just a second. All of those radiations, are dangerous to human life.

Enough exposure to any of them, and you will die. It's just a question of how quickly depending on the dosage. The cosmic ray particles, the most powerful cosmic rays are iron nuclei. And they are they come from not in our solar system. They come from other stars, regions of of our galaxy. And and and the most dangerous ones, are traveling close to the speed of light. And when they go through and they can go through a lot, like in through the space station.

When they go through if they if if if they don't if something doesn't stop them before they hit you, the most powerful, cosmic rays, single atom, has as much punch as a baseball thrown at 50 miles an hour. So we gotta be, aware of these kinds of things. Often the the lower energy ones, will will go through spacesuits, for example, and and and astronauts will will say they see stars. And and and that's when when particles or radiation strike their optic nerve.

And Oh, so they they, in the International Space Station, they're being bombarded by these low energy rays. And they're feeling it all the time or is this infrequently? Is this I mean, how often do you feel this? It it first of all, it varies. And, I've read that, you know, people will feel it in the space station daily or something like that. I'm not I I have not seen the, you know, the the most concrete information. It's all been quote, unquote secondhand.

So I guess the the challenge for most people to get their mind around, which I had to switch my thinking, is that in the molecular in molecular studies, you have to believe that within a structure there is space between those structures on a molecular level so that a cosmic ray can go through what we would consider a piece of metal. Actually to that, it's just molecules. And there's enough space for that cosmic ray to either punch its way through or to move its way through without being stopped.

Is that a good way to say it? Did I say that right? It is. And and and to be sure, most of them are stopped by just physical structures. But, in, you know, in in some cases, apparently not. And when people go to the moon or Mars, likewise, the atmosphere, especially on the moon, of course, is so thin that there is no protection from radiation by the atmosphere. And, so the the the habitats are going to have to be built to protect people from the radiation.

And not only protect people from the radiation, but it it's also even worth noting in in in, a related vein that even during the daytime, the sunlight is is bombarding a surface, any surface on the moon for, about 14 days, 2 weeks roughly, continuously. No night. And so that radiation from the sun is going to heat up whatever habitat is there.

And it that has to be dealt with because it gets extremely it can get extremely hot due to the continuous radiation from the sun, which again is not blocked at all by the atmosphere. So all of the energy that strikes the habitat or that could strike the habitat is going to because there's no air to stop it. So you have 2 weeks of continuous heating and it gets really hot on the on the surface. It gets up to 250 degrees Fahrenheit, on the surface of the moon, during the day. And okay.

So you figured, well, we'll we'll put in refrigerants, coolants, and that that will be necessary. However, then you have after 14 days of continuous sunlight, yeah, 14 days roughly of continuous darkness. And during that time the temperature gets to about minus 400 degrees Fahrenheit. So the plumbing in habitats, on the moon, are going to have to be really resilient to temperature and radiation both, changes.

And so that that is another big issue with how that world is gonna be very different than than living on earth. Again, due to our senses, I mean, we the technology is gonna have to protect the people living there from a a change in temperature of 650 degrees, which is considerable. And to to give a reference point, it's, plus a little bit over, let's say, it's 100 degrees, Celsius and it's minus 150 degrees Celsius. It's to give a reference.

It's not exactly, but those would give the type of swings we're talking about. Actually, if if I may, I I in Sir. I may have gotten it wrong, but when I did the calculation, I got 120 degrees Celsius down to minus 240. Oh, okay. That's the first time I've heard that. Yeah. So I'm going to I'll look that up again. If that's the calculation, that's even better because I've been given a little bit different numbers. And it varies. So what's your take on lava tubes?

And for those who don't know, a lava tube is well, why don't you describe what a lava tube is? I'm assuming you know. Sure. What's your take on living in something like a lava tube to be able to I think it's a great idea. Let me just say what they are very briefly. When when the moon first formed, it's it was a liquid molten rock. And then the first part of the Moon that that that solidified was the surface because it was exposed to space and there was no air to keep the heat in.

So the the rock on the the surface of the moon solidified, and as the inside of the moon cooled down, more of the interior solidified. However, shortly after the the surface started solidifying, not far underneath it, there was a lot of molten rock, magma, liquid rock, that was there from when it first formed and and had not cooled. And what happened is that, the molten rock just below the surface, a matter of meters or yards maybe, we don't know for sure, was flowing like rivers.

You you see this, in Hawaii today, for example, and l and elsewhere. And as that molten rock under the solid surface flowed, eventually, it cooled enough to solidify. But with the exception of water, virtually everything that solidifies shrinks when it goes from the liquid state to a solid state. So when the the flowing lava or magma, solidified, then it didn't have to take up as much space as it did when it was liquid.

So we have a liquid tube of lava flowing under the surface, meandering like a river, but under the surface. And then it solidified, and when it solidified that tube of lava shrank and it left a space on the top of the lava tube. And that is is is a cave. Those are caves. Now in some cases, the the the solid surface eventually became powdery regolith because of the the particles striking it for 1000000000 of years.

And in some cases, some of those lava tubes, those empty caves, if you will, collapsed. And we actually see those collapsed lava tubes on the Moon's surface today. They're called rilles. And, one of the astronauts actually drove a moon buggy down, one of them. But there may be others. It is likely that there are other caves not far below the surface, that have not collapsed, just as we have caves here on Earth.

And those would be desirable habitats for for for living because the rock above them would shield the people living there, from a considerable amount of the radiation and cosmic rays that otherwise would, have an easier time getting to them. And, one of the the dimensions so that, that you've been able to find and research how the size of these caves, I've heard are enormous. Yes. The short answer is yes.

We haven't been in any of them yet, but if the rilles are any indication, then they're tens of yards or tens of meters across, maybe even a 100 yards across or a 100 meters across. So they they may provide a very suitable habitat for for living on the moon. But, again, it would be an environment that they would have to the people living there would have to be well protected from the the rock, the the the potentially hazardous materials that the cave itself would have in it normally.

And, so it's it's just engineering but it can be done. But but the good thing is there won't be any bears. How right you are. Okay. What else in terms of the other differences people will encounter? Okay. Let's see. Let's knock a few more off because I wanna get to your adapting in space. So let's, one one or 2 more if you have or we can move to the next topic. Yeah. Sure. One of the biggest other problems or challenges that people will have in space is, related to our biological clocks.

And, you know, as you probably know, we have, inside us biological clocks which resynchronize with the beginning of the day usually. And those clocks are set roughly speaking to a 24 hour cycle. No surprise. That's where we live. Turns out that in in a world where the day night cycle is not within an hour or so of 24 hours, the human body doesn't handle that well at all. The biological clocks can't resync when they're supposed to and things well, it's not good.

So in in the space station, they or, on Mars, the interesting thing about Mars is that Mars' day is is just slightly longer than 24 hours. 24 hours and 37 minutes. And and so living on Mars, as far as the the circadian rhythms, no problem. But living on the moon, it would have to be completely, synchronized to a a day night cycle artificially Because the 24 hour I I said it wrong. The 24 day of sunlight and the 24 days of darkness, the human body can't handle.

So that's, another aspect of of the sense. I'm gonna I'm gonna make a prediction out of this. Even the 2437 over time will be extremely taxing on the human body Because you're constantly being slightly off. It's like having, you know you hurt yourself and you've got this little pain and it's not a big pain but it's a little pain. And it's always a little pain. And after a while it becomes a real pain that it's a little pain.

Well, I think if you're constantly being taken off a little bit, you'll come your body will start to react maybe negatively as to this is not normal. Something's wrong here. We've got an extra few minutes in every day. That's not out of the question. It has been studied, for a lot of environments. For example, submariners, need an artificial cycle. People who work in caves need an artificial cycle. People on the International Space Station.

And and so they have tried to find out how far you can go and not have those little things build up. And and I strongly suspect that even if the average person could adapt to the 2437, you're probably right that some fraction of the people would just really not be able to handle it, and it's a concern. Well, that's why the moon allows people to come back to Earth as of today. Okay. So in terms let's jump all over to adapting in space just for the few minutes that we've got now.

When you say adapting in space, how are we going to make this work? How do we adapt to all of this? Okay. I think adapting can be used in in many ways. Of course, the human body is going to be changing, and in that sense, adapting. And in somewhat and in some environments, if you're there for a long time, for example, you're going to lose bone mass and you're going to have your muscles are going to change. And, from from the fast, twitch to the slow twitch, different kinds of muscles.

And and and so the body is going to adapt to living in space as well as it possibly can. And if if we're, lucky and careful and really smart about it, then those adaptations can be made, effectively. And and and so It doesn't it's it's it makes it challenging for me to it's really a technological change that has to occur to make everything happen. And I think we touched on this a little bit in our original dialogue is that our bodies are not designed to not move.

So if we don't have gravity and we don't develop bone mass or we don't do something technologically internally, maybe a shot of nanites or so, our body will degrade. Our muscles will atrophy. Our eyes will become rounded in the sockets and have trouble seeing, that we're we're kind of creating a slow death. Or do you believe that won't happen, that we will adapt into a new form of human that can survive in these environments?

I would say that the short answer is I don't expect that to happen soon, which is to say I don't expect us to be able to our our bodies to change enough that we can live there comfortably and for a long time. When when bone structures change or muscle structure, then our bodies can't function as well as they need to. And and and and and bones will break or muscles will be pulled and and so on, much more easily than they can be on earth than they are on earth.

And and so I don't think that in that sense, you know, a human will undergo a sufficient transformation that he or she will be able to function in space as effectively as we can function on Earth in the physiological sense that you just described, which actually raises another interesting question because then if people go into space and then want to have children, and that's a that's an issue because, female eggs have to be at least as far as as has been determined.

They have to be protected incredibly well in space travel. Because the radiation we were talking about before is so dangerous can get through through the the shells of spacecraft and so on. That, it is unlikely that that that eggs in in a woman's body in space would, not be damaged. In in other words, things likely would. So it's almost as if we'd have to develop and I and I I'm going to say this, and please everybody take this nicely, kind of a chastity belt.

A a a a belt that goes around a woman that would protect the eggs all the time. It would be, I I I I don't think we're gonna do that. I have another idea which is not mine. Okay. But I'd love to hear it. I'm sorry? I'd love to hear it.

Okay. And that is for a woman to remove have the eggs, in her body, which are in the as I understand in the normal scheme of things, all of the eggs that she's going to have, removed and put into an extremely well protected hardened, quote, unquote, vault that is super protected from radiation, much more so than the normal spacecraft. It would require a lot of mass and that's a problem in in space travel. The more mass you have, the bigger the rockets have to be.

But if you could make these vaults to keep the woman's eggs safe from the radiation and from the cosmic rays, then when she gets to a world, let's say Mars, or the moon, for that matter, and wants to have children there, then in principle, the egg and egg could be fertilized, put back into her body, and, she could, grow the the the fetus there. In that process, however, she would have to also be very well protected from radiation as the fetus is Right.

Through the whole through the whole process. Absolutely. Absolutely. And your suggestion earlier about, living underground, is almost certainly gonna be the the very best way, the cheapest way, and perhaps the most efficient way, of keeping women, safe when when they are pregnant, from the that radiation. So it's going to be complicated.

And and and sort of the punch line is, that conceivably, no pun intended, the, one of the the the children, the infants that are born in space, perhaps due to some radiation that got through on some at some time, might be mutated. And it may be mutated in a positive way whereas many mutations are not. So the process of evolution would continue Yes. Through being in space. So we might see out of every x thousands of individuals born, if we had that many, then we'd have 10 or 3 that would survive.

But that next generation would then be unsustainable or, protected. From the more resistant, maybe a better way to say it, resistant to the next evolutional change. So that that's a possibility. So what else? Is there any any other last adapting to space that you think, new technology, something interesting that you feel we should know about? Yep. Or I should learn about? Look, can I put in one punch line for Sure? Anything.

If if there are if there is evolution, in space, so that there's a new generation that is better adapted for living in space, they may not be able to visit Earth. They may not be able to function in our gravity with our air density and so on and so forth. So that's something else that, you know, we'll have to think about eventually is that it may well be a new, you know, race.

If you've been born on 16th gravity, you cannot come back to earth because your heart might not pump and the bones might break. Right on all counts. So that's a that's one of the challenges. And I think there are individuals who would like to see the human species evolve. That doesn't include the dolphins, the whales, the birds, the fish, the the reptiles, and all the other creatures on earth. It's human evolution, I think, is the way to look at it. Right.

Our our our the topic came up, you know, when we both started talking about moving in this direction. And you had said that there's no place like earth. That no matter where we go, we're gonna have to change how we technologically live and do. What's the real message that you wanna get out? Or what the real message if you were going to tell me, David, this is why I say that. Is there an underlying honest answer to that?

Why do you say that in the what even why do you even move me in that direction? That's an incredibly important question. And the reason is that it the idea of a, going into space, and b, living in space, are are on the surface, they're incredibly appealing to millions of people. It's a different place. It's something that very few people have done. There are experiences there that you won't have here.

And and and and it it would feel like you're, you know, moving the human race, out to the stars essentially. And and and and I absolutely understand that. And I'm and I'm fine with it. But the reality is that going into space is going to require a huge amount of adaptation both physical adaptation, emotional adaptation, and and other kinds, that people need to be I think, people need to be aware of.

Or else, when they get there and these things start to happen like the smells, then it the whole experience could go south pretty quickly. And I would really like to help prevent that from happening. As I I think you know, I'm not a space fanatic. I do not look up at the stars. And I don't say that in a negative sense. I just say that's who I am so I to give a an understanding of David the person. And I often get when I mention the project we're working on, oh, I'd love to go to the moon.

I'd love to go into space. And I stop. And I say, really? So you understand that you might have your granddaughter or your family or you've just been married or someone's going to have a graduate from a university and you're gonna slap on a suit and you're not sure if you're gonna survive And you're going to shoot yourself up into space. It's not as simple as that. There's a lot more that goes into taking that journey into space.

And part of Project Moon Hut's initiative is that there's going to be 10,000,000,000 people or more on this planet. And we also have to be worried at the same time, not worried, I would say, we have to make sure that the species on earth continues to maintain itself. So, the technological challenges and feats were tempting. I'm not it's a big question. You have to understand. So for you, would you want to go to space? I don't know. How old are you, Neil?

And I don't know if mind if you is it okay I ask you that? It it is okay. I'm 66. And, would I want to go into space? I might enjoy a a trip up to the space station and to sit in the in the they have a a room on the bottom where you can look at the earth. And that as an experience I'm told by all the people I know who have been there or similar places in space, is is a mind changing experience.

And and and I really wouldn't mind seeing the the whole world as an as a unit from space because then we would look at it I would look at it so differently than the day to day problems that we have in the local environment or in a country or in a state. It the whole world as as one big beautiful unit is something that we really should cherish. And I would love to have the experience that the astronauts do who have seen it from that point of view.

I had just recently, I looked this up and I don't know why. Being the International Space Station is at a certain is in low Earth orbit. Mhmm. You see only, I believe, 1 tenth or 1 sixteenth of the Earth as you go around the Earth. There's only been 24 individuals who've been far enough away from the Earth, I think that's the number, to see half of the Earth, which I never thought about. Absolutely true.

However, the astronauts, the people I have talked to who have been to the space station and who have only seen a relatively small fraction, it's still a huge amount. Oh, I I'm not trust me. I I'm not I'm not downplaying. It's a very big feat. Yeah. Yeah. But it it it's also big enough to have the impact that I was describing. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. I just I just found this the other day. I just 2 days ago, 3 days ago, I had questions something and said let me let me step over the threshold.

Let me take a look at this. And I thought it was interesting because I'd never thought about it in that context. Mhmm. Very good. So any last words, that you'd like to add? Well, I I I think that the process of going into space, is going to take off from the physical things that we've been talking about. And it's also going to move into other realms, which I'm sure you have other people talking about, such as the social, the political, and so on.

And and those are also incredibly important, I think, to deal with so that when you get into space, you're not in a social environment that is unacceptable to you. And and because the numbers of people in space that you're going to encounter when you go there are gonna be relatively small, dozens maybe at most. Being able to adapt to that ensemble of people and and and and enjoy your interacting with them. I think that's gonna be also incredibly important, to make it work.

Well, Neil, I'd like to thank you for the time today. Very much appreciated. You've opened my mind to a series of new thoughts. So thank you. My pleasure. Thank you. For those of you who are interested, you could check us out at projectmoonhot.org and sign up for our future space related database project. So that's something that you can do if you're listening to the audio right now. You can participate by liking us at facebookforward/projectmoonhot as one way to keep connected with us.

Or you can connect with us on Twitter at projectmoonhot. So everybody, I'm David Goldsmith and thank you for listening.