Can Humans Get to Mars Without Going Insane? 

Humans can’t even get to Earth without going insane.

The obvious solution is to bring plenty of cats.

The Hawaiian "Mars mission" should've continued after the loss of the two members. Two "deaths" on that kind of scenario is extremely likely. There could be more to learn, especially if only one member continued for the last year.

I was reading about the Soviet/Russian missions to Antarctica and apparently at their most isolated “Vostok” base, two scientists had an argument over a game of chess which escalated to one assaulting the other with an ice-axe… and now chess is banned at Russian Antarctic bases. So to everyone suggesting sending games on long missions, I imagine selecting which games might be important

For every tragic story of a "heroic" explorer killed in a mutiny by his mad crew is a story of a tyrannical narcissist who would sacrifice anyone for his own glory who needed to be put down to save the crew's lives

“Can humans go to Mars without going insane-“ Hells no. We’re plenty insane as a species.

Maybe we are looking at this from the wrong angle. The obvious choice is to look for the "most social" humans. And sure, they will sing and cook together for 2 weeks but then they are burned out. What if insted you pick the biggest introverts and make sure everyone has a personal space to retreat to. Fill it with a Playstation, an E-Reader or whatever the person is into and I'm sure there are plenty people who could be stuck like that for months.

The real question should be can humans continue to co-exist on this planet without going insane....

every time i think of crazy things that could happen on a space trip, i think of of that time when NASA almost sent an astronaut 100 tampons for her week long trip 😂

At 9:45. The perfect trigger for an entire breakdown of order. That's what happens when you have someone playing a ukulele in a closed system.

PBS just aired that episode _"Space: The Longest Goodbye"_ and it was really well done. Definitely a must watch if you're into this sort of thing.

Going to Mars is like the rest of your life in a supermax, but without the yard hour🤗

The parallels of wintering in Antarctica seem to get overlooked by these stories.

“The good news is we landed on Mars; the bad news is the crew is holding the captain hostage & has a list of demands.” - NASA

Submariners: "hold my bug juice..."

Maybe one day VR-like technology will help us with dealing with these kinds of issues. Imagine if it was super realistic, allowing each crew member to escape when they need time to themselves.

Reminds me of Robert A. Heinlein’s book “Stranger in a Strange Land”. The crew is 4 married couples. The captain gets another wife pregnant. The wife dies giving birth, her husband is the surgeon. The surgeon immediately kills the captain with the bloody scalpel. We don’t find out what happens to the rest of the crew. The baby is raised by native Martians.

Yeah let's just erase the fact that Hudson wanted to continue what had already proven to be a dangerous journey after being trapped for months by ice. Like dude would have survived if he'd been able to swallow his ego and concede to returning to England.

I thought the ways that celebrating holidays, inventing traditions, and playing games helped keep crews healthy and cohesive is really interesting. As you said: people can’t just “tough it out”, they have to have their needs met to continue functioning well. So we need a good understanding of what those needs are, and openness to the idea that just because not everyone enjoys these things doesn’t mean we don’t need them.

Where are you going to find sane humans?

NASA needs to start screening entire teams, not just individuals. Theres no point in sending the 5 best people if they cant get along.

Because our current society is so competetive and individualistic. We have the technology, but not the philosophy.

"Since they're going to go crazy anyway why not just send insane people in the first place and save them the trouble"-Red Mars

"Electrocution" means when someone dies from an electric shock. If it is not immediately fatal, then the correct term is that they received an electric shock.

What do u think solitary confinement does to ppl.

On my third run with the Blue Crew of an SSBN in 1974 in the North Atlantic, we had a psychiatrist on board. Around the halfway mark of that 78-day run, he had begun to eat with the Enlisted. A fellow Machinist Mate and I were having dinner with him, and he launched into a tirade about how we were all insane. When he paused for breath my friend said, "You are just as crazy as we are." I will never forget the look of shock on his face. He quit eating with us. The next patrol cycle was 100 days: 30 days of refit, and a run of 70 continuous underwater extending submerged time by 10 days.

Why not load up a future Mars mission with video games so that they can break up the monotony in and mentally disappear for hours every day. Video games have been shown to help with mental acuity. Games also make gamers forget they've been confined to their rooms all day and to eat out drink.

History is an important guide. Those that dismiss history as irrelevant are ignorant of its importance. Humans will adapt just fine to long journey's. The explorers who set off in sailing ships for years into the unknown managed to cope with the circumstances. They lived in conditions that modern people would find appalling and still managed to complete their journeys without going insane. They had no idea what they would find and were completely cut off from the rest of humanity for months or even years sometimes. Mars explorers will be much better equipped and have much better knowledge of where they are going and the hazards. As well as the ability to communicate with delays of only minutes at most.

Just give each astronaut an SD Card with plenty of Games, Anime, Movies, etc. and a Steam Deck. I could be set for YEARS lol

Mars is *TOO RADIOACTIVE* to be inhabited for any serious length of time or by any large number of people. Crushed a lot of personal dreams when I learned that.

Never mind getting to Mars, staying there, isolated from humanity, will undoubtedly lead to insanity and social breakdown.

I get wildly concerned about sanity especially when thinking about the ray bradberry martian chronicles

I hope that the findings from these experiments will compell us to end solitary confinement in our prisons. The U.S. still routinely practices this inhuman treatment of prisoners (a population of which is the largest per capita in the world). Funny how we so easily separate these kinds of challenges in our minds. One is a heroic challenge, full of talk of bravery and promise; the other shameful, full of excuses and denial.

One of the first things that would have to be fine for the screening process of people going on this mission would be to find those that are ambivert in personality social skills. An ambivert is just as fine being alone as a introvert but has the want to be around others. This tendency will allow for the extreme isolation that the crew members will have to deal with but the fact that there is a crew will keep them socially active. If you were to send a pure introvert they wouldn't want to work in a team if you sent an extrovert they'd be so lonely they die. This is why you need to find the best of both worlds someone who can deal with isolation and be perfectly fine but wants to work in a team and is capable of doing so.

1 - mars is almost pure hype

Being isolated and watching anime 24/7 with doing the odd chore here and there? That's literally what I already do, and I'm not insane.

"Do you know the symptoms of pandorum?"

If only there were some organisations that already existed where crews were routinely sent on months long deployments with no real time comms... Seriously, just select submariners and up the crew size a little to improve the fifa competition

there are plenty of people who enjoy solitude but also delight in overcoming challenging collaborations and appreciate the mantle of being an extragalactic paragon for eons to come there are dozens of us!🎉😊

Even the ISS scientists get to go home, and that still messes with their psychology and physiology. Colonizing Mars is a fool's errand, as our focus should be within, before it starts looking without. Wherever WE go, there WE are.

I believe there is a solution: Send convicts to Mars. In the case of Australia, it worked ;)

I'd also point out a few non-NASA experiments done - I think there was one called BioSphere2 (I may have the name wrong). Many efforts were made to create a habitat that did NOT interact with the outside world, completely self sufficient in terms of power, food, water. I don't recall right now if there was much in the way of "mission control" but I think maybe not. Within weeks, the ten people locked in there were at each other's throats, what had started out as a fairly reasonable and structured crew had split into two very, very angry factions, and it was just bad. I don't THINK anybody died but I remember reading that no one who participated considered the experiment a success in ANY sense of the word.

I think that in order for someone to be willing to go to Mars they'd have to be a little bit unwell, surely? It sounds like the most terrifying thing I could imagine, if someone is volunteering for that then I think they have some "interesting" reasoning behind it.

me, a gamer who hasn't gone outside for a month: sounds like skill issue

Yeah, we conquered the Northwest Passage by warming the planet until it existed lol.

As an experiment, I propose we send Musk, Gates, Thiel, Bezos, and Trump into space.

I worked on fishing boats in Alaska and it was a good display of how these breakdowns began to happen.

Hey PBS terra, Joe here

Good to Mars is a pipe dream!

I dont know why anyone would want to go to Mars in the first place...no one wants to colonize the Sahara desert, and it has air, food, a livable temperature, a magnetosphere, etc., but sure lets go live on Mars lol

7:22 Electrocution is death-specific. If you survive it, you were just shocked.

Not only are they going to be alone on that long journey but they're also going to be alone in their preparation for the journey so that will require being alone for 2 to 3 times as long

PBS Terra is fast becoming morbid.. and I AM HERE FOR IT. Bahahaha Although.. I am also becoming fastly convinced I should be prepping for something 😅😆🤔

Hey, licensed electrician here. When you use the word electrocuted here that means that the person died from the electric shock. From what I can tell Givin the context the person who didn't got shocked didn't didn't die, so the proper wording should have been, the person recieved an electric shock.

Hey Guy! I recognize your voice Mr. narrator you’re from my favorite Science Channel on RU-vid. I’m glad you’re doing PBS now as well! ❤❤❤❤

Between the psychological issues, the severe mission limitations, and complete lack of redundancy, a crewed mars mission shouldn't be attempted unless both a) reusable rockets can be employed extensively and cheaply and b) nuclear thermal rockets can be used to both reduce transit times to one month and allow for the possiblity of rescue in a timely manner. A traditional disposable rocket and small capsule approach would not only be horrifically expensive but also destroy public support for crewed space exploration. Any failure would be broadcast to the entire world.

What about prisons?

Find former Navy submarine sailors, to fly to Mars.. They are good at isolation, in a tight space.

You know... seeing this actually makes me think about jails and how cruel and psychologically damaging it is, specially solitary confinement. And we call it "resocialization".

Honestly, it sounds like a pretty tranquil journey. Not to mention, you'll most likely be busy a lot of the time preparing for when you land

Reminiscent of The Terror.

Just send with them a good game master for a TTRPG

Being in a small spaceship for 6 months is gonna be a wild experience. Separated from humanity by millions of miles knowing if something goes wrong it’s on you and your crew to fix it. That’s scary as hell in my opinion 💀

Going to Mars by definition is insane.

What can I do to help or where can I go to volunteer in any way for these experiments and missions? I want to see humans reach Mars and be a part of it in some way.

The first human on Mars will be running around with their underpants on their head yelling "Shut up about your Funko Pop collection!"

I've wondered about the weird research about how lack of doorways affects the human brain and how that would apply to the mars missions.

They’ll have to be insane to go in the first place

Look towards submariners for inspiration and candidates. There have been documented instances of crews going on patrol for 200+ days. Stuck inside a tube and in an environment as deadly as space.

How to know if someone will get along with someone else? Two examples how: 1. Let all candidates spend couple of months together in confinement, and you will find people who formed really nice friendships and would enjoy working alongside that person, but also you will people who would hate and would not ever wanted to work alongside someone particular. 2. Get them all drunk and their personalities will show you their true faces.

This problem will be coupled with the physical problems prolonged weightless will cause. This is going to be a very tough mission in every respect.

Thank you.

People should probably figure out how to stop fucking up earth before they go to Mars, lol.

Isolation sounds great, covid19 was great preparation

So idk why the sentence at timestamp 9:51 was just glazed over, but he said THEY'RE GENETICALLY MODIFYING HUMANS TO MAKE THEM MORE SUITED TO SPACE TRAVEL...

The whole ordeal sounds like a Tuesday for a shut-in.

As of March 2024 the longest deployment of a submarine is 201 days or nearly 7 months. The crew did not go mad and they did not become violent to one another. Perhaps there is something to be learned about long duration space travel from the worlds Navy's who have already had to solve a very similar problem.

These types of difficulties make me go: sign me up immediately.

Colony One Mars (one of six) is a great read on the subject/psychology & the audio books should still be available here on tube

man this series is really good!

Fermi paradoxe solved.

"...the kind of monotony that few people have ever known" is true for the rest of the world. In America, oh, theres lots of people who've known it via solitary confinement thanks to America's Prison Industrial Complex. Maybe send those people to Mars as they are most qualified to endure the isolation. Ask them how to survive this supposedly "deadly" journey. After all, "it's our humanest" that justifies the punishment.

I can see why it'd be so tough out there. My average interaction with most other human beings is a psychological onslaught against me. I think me doing the Mars mission alone could make things easier

2:12 Well that lady's dead, I can see her hair sticking out of her helmet. No seal, leaking oxygen ... probably breathing in Martian dust which is no bueno.

The problem with this subject is that it makes so many unchallenged assumptions, beginning with whether or not it is even worthwhile to conduct manned exploration of space, given the laws of Physics. Sadly, a lot of people without a solid foundational education in Physics assume that technology will simply continue to get "better", because our past experiences of technology have created a steady progression. But, we are approaching the point with our understanding of the universe that we know to a very fine degree how little there is left to know about the universe that we can meaningfully affect, due to the simply nature of the amount of energy it requires to do anything at an interplanetary scale. There is no "magic" energy source and there isn't ever going to be a "hyperdrive" or "warp drive" that enables travel at a significant fraction of the speed of light, let alone faster than light travel. And even if it were possible to create distortions in spacetime, we already understand that the energy levels which would be required for that to happen are not attainable by human tools, probably not even if you have deluded yourself into thinking humans will ever be able to build a sustainable fusion reactor, let alone one small enough to outfit a spacecraft. Many of the psychological problems that this type of research is attempting to solve arise out of the simple fact that the only people who are ever going to be considered for manned space missions are themselves elites with huge egos and towering senses of entitlement engendered by their supposed merit. Such people are inevitably going to create conflict between each other. These are people who are inherently competitive and combative, and putting them into a pressure cooker is guaranteed to cause an explosion, at some point. Yes, literally a pressure cooker, because that's really what a spacecraft is, in the first place-a pressurized, heated containment vessel. There are millions, billions of people here on Earth who every single day are facing the very same psychological, technical, and resources challenges that manned exploration of space entails; however, we as a society are spending billions of dollars on novel technologies in an attempt to alleviate these challenges for a minuscule, elite cohort, instead of investing in the proven, non-technological solutions we know would alleviate these conditions for billions of people on Earth. Comparing 17th Century exploration to 21st Century exploration is comparing apples to oranges. For one thing, we have radios, now, which would make communications possible even between Mars and Earth in less than 1 hour, something Henry Hudson couldn't have enjoyed beyond a few miles' radius, at best, in his time. And yet, even though we figured out how to communicate with a spacecraft outside the Solar System some 45 years ago, we still struggle to provide reliable communications to the people of Earth, still today-not because we don't know how, but because we don't believe everyone deserves it. It's not a technological problem, it's a political problem, caused by psychological problems in the hearts and minds of those who wield social, cultural, political, and economic power right here on Earth.

Id love to see human feet touch down on Mars. At the same time, let's focus on Earth. Ya know, the only habitable planet in our solar system. Let's work on preserving it.

Well, you'd have to be a little crazy to get on the first ship tomorrow, so given that you might not have too far to go once you get there

There are several things that can make a positive outcome more likely, starting with the careful selection of the crew in the first place. Chances are good that those selected will go through a six-month confinement in similar facilities in the arctic for observation first. Each person can be given a private space each day for a period of time where they can be alone and listen to music, watch videos, etc. Virtual reality headsets can transport the crew anywhere that the software choses, allowing them to escape the feelings of confinement for a while on a daily basis. A bigger concern might be the risk of dying from radiation from a solar flare or being dangerously weak unless some sort of artificial gravity (such as a rotating space craft) is not provided to keep muscles toned.

The answer is so simple. Mars is a pointless deathtrap... send boston dynamics robots, and never colonize Mars.

There should be two general steps. 1: deliver the supplies, primarily base construction equipment & non-perishable materials, including fuel for the welders, or whatever. 2: deliver the crew & perishable supplies, especially seeds to grow food & fertilized eggs to raise livestock. Note: these things, these steps doesn’t need to happen all at once. Instead, when there is enough equipment to start construction, then construction crews could go next, maybe with enough seeds to plant crops, followed by another ship to deliver the fertilized eggs, & more crew if need be.

Aren’t submariners go on tours lasting 6 months underwater confined in tight space facing instant death at any moment?

It’s not good to be together it’s even worse to be alone

None of the habitats used in the isolation experiments seems to resemble what a real spaceship would be like. That would be the real test.

It's not like humans haven't done very, very similar challenges before.

I would start by stating that going to Mars is the insane thing.

This just reminded me of a great Sci-Fi narration that got me into the whole story side of YT called "The First Murder On Mars" Its definetly worth a read/listen!

"Never send people to do a robot's job" -a wise man. Seriously, for Mars exploration, for many decades to come, invent better robots. Then send these better robots.

Can Humans stay on Earth without going insane?

Fascinating.

For that research group in Antarctica. It wasn’t the antagonist who was spoiled the book endings that caused the stabbing. It was the isolation that caused the fight.