As this article goes into detail, http://gizmodo.com/5904081/new-asteroid-mining-company-will-add-trillions-of-dollars-to-worlds-economy?tag=space is going to make plans to mine asteroids passing near earth. Allegedly this will add trillions of dollars to the economy. Though in my mind that's a lesser effect. The really important aspect of this is it might kick start a new wave of space based exploration. Either for money, or scientific discovery. Point being we need to get out there. It may be years until they actually see the fruits of their labor, but the fact that this is happening is amazing.

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Mentok! I almost forgot about the whole space company owning space in the future thing since everyone else is apparently going to give up. This is the first step towards that. So I'm not entirely happy about this.

Wonder when someone accidentally forgets to carry a 2 or convert to metric and causes an asteroid to hit earth or the moon to explode.

Had to happen eventually.

In all seriousness I doubt they intend to send the entire asteroid here. It would just create clutter in our already cluttered orbit with tons of junk. This is a problem they'll have to solve, and I hope they do.

Oh, [censored] they've got James [censored] Cameroon involved in it! It's in the bag already. He's already got space ships and robots that'll protect the miners....or will they try to kill everyone? Either way, he's still got space ships and has the whole interplanetary travel thing down.

If the money is there, someone will go get it.

Its still cool though.

All is fine and good until they uncover an exogorth and unleash it on the Earth.

It would be pretty interesting to get resources from near earth Asteroids, but I can't help but feel its a Farce, we barely send folks into space as is and now

We don't send anyone out into space because we get nothing out of it, therefore we don't send anyone into space. Naturally your not going to get anything out of space if you don't actually go there. When someone asks why they don't do x in space its because they don't get anything out of it. Circular logic, it's a common thing people fall into. Not sure if that is where you stand or not. It just reminded me of it. At the end of the day some brave and bold adventurers are going to have to do it.

So the point of retiring the last space shuttle and effectively ending the space program was?

No idea. Apparently to let other people tell you to sit down so they can do your job better. At least from the looks of it. Though only time will see if this turns out to be correct.

So that it wouldn't blow up on the launchpad, or -as history will note; once after 93 seconds and once while flying over Texas..

Ever ridden the cross town bus, and noted instantly that you're riding one of the oldies?

All the shuttles were oldies in that regard.

Space Shuttle Discovery and the space program was NASA, funded by the US government.

This looks to be a private venture by a myriad of rich investors. If that's the case, and they're the ones forking over the enormous expenditure to fund this kind of thing, I don't see why not.

Pssh. Everybody is getting excited about some film director. Forget James Cameron.

Larry Page and Eric Schmidt are some of the few people on earth who would be able to finance this sort of thing. They're worth 25.6 billion dollars. That's way bigger than James Cameron!

It's only a matter of time before we discover an ancient alien artifact on mars, use it to discover more artifacts and, in doing so, piss off an alien race who proceeds to go to war with us. Then, about a hundred years down the line, things will start to not make sense. Whose fault will it be? Ours.

You've been warned.

My mentok senses are tingling. I'm getting something. Nope, not going to happen. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7gEZcK_9VY

Don't come crying to me when they discover a Necron tomb.

Obviously NASA is looking to enter the lucrative themed resort/casino business

But, he's already got space ships, robots that already have a proven military record in killing [censored] and crazy ass weapons. Larry Page and Eric Schmidt may be rich but Cameron has robots, space ships and crazy weapons. He wins.

If this works, they could open up a whole new economy. Rare earth minerals could allow computers and electronics to go from hundreds of dollars to tens.
Rare metals could allow catalytic chemistry to hit a breakthrough point, letting hydrogen or other advanced fuel economies become cheap enough to build up.

This could be ridiculous.

If they do it.

If it works.

Doubtful in your lifetime or mine. To recoup from the huge initial costs of such an enterprise, costs will stay high for some time. Heck, the only reason it is practical at our current level is because of a seen increase in demand for certain things they hope to be able to mine. It'll act as a price stabilizer, but not a driver for lower prices any time soon.

Yes i have, and in one case there was a loud bang and the trip stopped right there. Not something i'd want to happen in anything that flies.

Unsurprising that private companies will be the ones leading new space programs, it's a rare day when i don't hear the government cutting back on something, and space exploration doesn't really do that much quick, practical good.

First step would be the relatively easy transfer between Earth and the thermosphere with perhaps as mentioned in another post the idea of a space elevator with possibly the use of nanotubes that maybe be within reason soon rather then later I think (all of this is still very hypothetical however). What with the sheer cost of getting a pound of goods yet alone mining equipment being rather shall we say enormously expense before we can think of doing such a endeavor. All and all though if national governments can't do this made clear by the recent [in]action of NASA compared to the space race period when we had competition then the role goes to I'm afraid private corporations for such ambitions if they can get past the idea of no short term capital gains if you really wanted to go on such grandiose projects. Unless something like the EU or UN decide to really get into that kind of thing it seems like space for the moment may go to the private sector.

A http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUOBLX55h4s&feature=relmfu on the matter.

It's nice seeing some private investment, but it's definitely not something we should come to expect overall at this rate. I think our best bet at a reignited space race lies in a Chinese initiative.

There's already a C'tan on Mars, I don't see how a necron tomb could be worse than that.

Anyway, I guess we should all come back after a number of years and see if they've successfully intercepted an asteroid.

We've intercepted asteroids in the near past, that isn't the challenge here. Mining them is.