In the book Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams described a grossly-overpopulated planet dealing with its problem by radical means. The plan involved building two spaceships to fly the population to a better world.
They built the first one, and loaded up all of the – er, let’s say “less essential” populations; I forget Adams’ list, but today it could be reality TV stars, TMZ-bait, Youtube sensations, Taylor Swift’s exes, and millions of society’s other useless mouths, and shot it into space. They were told that the rest of the people would be coming.
Soon.
As soon as they finished the next spaceship.
Honest.
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A Dutch company is taking applications for a one-way mission to Mars, to start a Mars colony.
And they‘re getting a slew of applications:
“These numbers put us right on track for our goal of half a million applicants,” said the founder of Mars One, Bas Lansdorp. “Mars One is a mission representing all humanity and its true spirit will be justified only if people from the entire world are represented. I’m proud that this is exactly what we see happening.”
Here’s the part I found…intrigueing? Well, deja vu at any rate:
According to the company’s chief medical officer, Norbert Kraft, Mars One is eschewing the usual astronaut candidates – scientists and pilots – in favour of YouTube fanatics and internet people, “because what we are looking for is not restricted to a particular background.”
All applicants have to do is pay the application fee, which ranges from $5 to $75 – in the US, it is $38 – and then submit a video in which they answer three questions.
Huh.
I’m going to run over to Google Translate to see if “Bas Lansdorp” is Dutch for “Slartibartfast”.
Just a hunch.
I was going to say that Bas Lansdorp sounds just like a name Adams would have used, but it’s not Slartibartfast.
I think the Obama (not a name invented by DA) administration has a few whistleblowers they’d like to put on that first expedition.
Agreed, NW. Especially since, without a major improvement in shielding technology, any Mars expedition would be lethal to anyone unlucky enough to go on it.
For that reason, I’m guessing that the applicants are heavy on liberal arts majors.
I think I could offer the same ‘service’ for less than $38.
Perhaps we can chip in for a ticket for Harry Reid.
I wonder if these people still have $38 after they sent all their money to the Nigerian prince.
Meanwhile the Malthusians are scoffing and harrumphing: 500K is about 1/10000th of what we’d like to see leave this planet.
Here’s a liberal notion; instead of incarcerating 1% of our population we could just enact legislation permitting an additional sentencing option for social miscreants called “an order of transportation” which would establish a modern day First Fleet. This would go a long way toward solving our crime and recidivism problems, in addition it would enhance our raw materials pipeline from the asteroids and regional planets. How could it go wrong?
Prisons are not the firstplace I’d go looking for volunteers, kel.
Kel, it could go wrong in this way: Since minorities are so vastly overrepresented as a portion of our incarcerated population, you can bet your ass that Jesse and Al will throw the race card as “trying to get minorities off the planet all together” or somesuch nonsense like that. And of course, once the race card is thrown, everything else comes to a screeching halt.
Bill C, Swiftee,
Think England circa 1767-1820 – Botany Bay, Canada, New Zealand, etc, convicts were deported rather than hanged in order to colonize the New World and provide a little Island on the North Sea with the natural resources / raw materials necessary to dominate the world for another century or so.
I’m fine with the idea of only shipping out only non-people of color. It’ll take the race baiters 100 years to figure out that the wealth and natural resources that this planet will want, with increasing desperation, were all handed over to non-people of color.