FORUM

This is (sadly) my prediction. Sure, there will be a lot of initial hype when this becomes a reality during the actual mission itself. Parades and medals will occur afterwards. And everyone will get back to their lives, because we have no reason to have mass colonization, little economic benefit, and likely no life changing discoveries.

Even if we find life (my primary interest in this mission), most people will change their lives or beliefs not at all. The theological groundwork has already been laid in many religions for the possible existence of life on other planets. The life will not be intelligent, and we won't have regular starship visits for people to go see it. If we are lucky, we'll find a way to bring some examples back to earth for observation and possible captive reproductions.

And that will be it. How many people talk about the researchers on Antarctica in hushed in reverent tones? Exactly.

Bryan, I think you are incorrect with most if not all of your assumptions. First, I fully agree with Cosmobio, so I will not restate what they have already said.

Second, you say "because we have no reason to have mass colonization, little economic benefit", this is terribly incorrect. As far as colonization, we may not want to colonize Europa specifically, as asteroids are a much better alternative, but the technology developed for a mission to Europa would be the same type of technology used to get to other distant locations. Furthermore, with our global population dramatically increasing year after year, getting closer and closer to the breaking point, we will have no choice but to colonize off-earth.

When it comes to economic benefit, once again, Europa itself may not have resources worth harvesting, but the technology developed for a mission to Europa would enable objects, like asteroids, to be harvested for resources. Also, just like all our other ventures into space, technology developed for the Europa mission can be adapted to be used for every day life. For example: Health/medical products, industrial/chemical productivity, computer technology, environmental/agricultural technologies, etc.

mguerrein, I agree with all the asteroid work, and I think that is where the focus will be. I think at the end, we Europa dreamers will piggyback off the technology that was used to mine and exploit the asteroids. Perhaps that is where our energy should be: promoting asteroid mining, let the corporations figure out the technical aspects, then upgrade what we need to get a little farther to Jupiter.