Moon added to list of threatened cultural sites for first time
Moon added to list of threatened cultural sites for first time
Potential looting and commercial trips pose risk to artefacts left by lunar landings, says World Monuments Fund
Summary
The moon has been added to the World Monuments Fund's (WMF) list of threatened heritage sites for the first time due to risks from commercial and governmental lunar activities.
The WMF highlights concerns about looting and damage to artefacts from Apollo missions, such as Neil Armstrong’s footprints and objects left on the moon.
WMF calls for international protocols to protect lunar heritage as private space tourism and missions increase.
The 2024 list also includes sites in conflict zones and areas endangered by climate change or unsustainable tourism.
I PISSED ON THE MOON! HOW DO YOU LIKE THAT OBAMA?!?!
Whatever. Fuck the Moon. Even the guy who went there hates it.
Unfortunately, it seems he hates all of us. Aldrin’s endorsement of Trump was like a gut punch when I read about it last year.
Hey Buzz doesn’t hate the moon, he just demands it know its place.
As a Nazi puncher, he has excellent taste. Maybe I should yell at the moon?
Commercial and mining activities on the moon are infinitely better than anywhere on Earth.
There's no life on the Moon, there's no environments to be destroyed, species to be displaced, no atmosphere or oceans to pollute, etc.
If we're going to insist on continued industrialization it would be best to put it somewhere it's not poisoning the environment, like the moon.The headline is misleading, it doesn't appear that they want to "protect" the whole entire Moon. They're just concerned about sites of particular historical importance like the Apollo moon landings, and the artifacts at those locations.
Until we've mined so much that the ratio of mass between the Earth and the Moon causes tidal changes and eventually the Earth pulls the Moon into the Earth and all life is destroyed. How quickly do you think we can speedrun that?
The industrial revolution was about 150-200 years ago and our planet is dying because of it. Can we beat that record?
Edit: also, who gets dibs on the moon? Something tells me the vast majority of the population won't get a say and mysteriously, somehow, it'll be American mega-corps doing the mining
Uh, that's not how orbital mechanics work
And also, let's say we have to remove 10% of the moon's mass to noticeably affect the tides (and it's not enough to just mine it, you'd also need to remove it from the moon's gravity well which is... A whole thing by itself, so let's ignore that for funsies), which is about 7*10^21 kg. I can't find statistics for total mining activity, but we mine about 2.6 * 10^12 kg iron each year. Let's just take the 10x value of that to be safe, 2.6*10^13 "stuff" mined each year
In order to mine 10% of the moon's mass, it'd take roughly 10^8 years, or written out, 100 000 000 years
And, as mentioned, this is while ignoring that you'd need to actually remove the moon's mass from its gravitational well, which simply won't be done at this scale
Worrying about this problem is so ridiculously out of scope that it's laughable
I'll take "Hyperbolic & Catastrophic Exaggerations" for $400, Alex.
I'm pretty sure you're reply is tongue-in-cheek, but that did get me thinking how long it would take to actually destroy the Moon by mining.Let's say we used mass drivers to launch 1000kg of material from the Moon to the Earth every second, non stop, until the Moon was completely dismantled. The moon has a mass somewhere around 7.35×1022 kilograms. Dividing the Moon's mass by the rate of removal, we get Time=7.35×1019seconds. Divide that by 35,536,000 seconds in a year, and it would take us about 2.33 trillion years to dismantle the moon.
Considering how the Earth only has, maybe, a billion years until the Sun's natural life cycle makes life on Earth impossible, I'd wager that we're good. Drill baby, drill.
Hmm, that's an awful lot of material to move the one way. I'd actually expect a lot of what's built on the moon will get shipped further outward.
Right now, it's moving a couple of centimeters away from Earth every year, so a bit of that would actually be a good thing. And depending on how they're getting it off the surface, the effect on the orbit might be something very different.
Wouldn’t the orbit of the moon not change in height if it decreased in mass? Since it should theoretically continue to orbit at the same speed?
I bet I could destroy all life with only half an A-press.
The WMF highlights concerns about looting and damage to artefacts from Apollo missions, such as Neil Armstrong’s footprints and objects left on the moon.
This specifically is a valid concern.
so safe...
Save time and just list Humanity as a threat to everything.
While I agree, isn't this somewhat outside the scope of their agency?
The WMF highlights concerns about looting and damage to artefacts from Apollo missions, such as Neil Armstrong’s footprints and objects left on the moon.
The British Museum be like 😍
That's nice can we get some protection for anything here on earth? Don't give a fuck about some moon shit there's no one there. Call me when they find dudes living on the moon, then I'll fuckin care
The list being added to already covered Earthbound locations.
In principle I agree with this. The moon has been up there, relatively unchanged for the history of our species. It's a meaningful connection to our deep past. It may even have helped life evolve on the planet. Romantically, it's the only thing that we all can look up at and see so it's a common shared experience for everyone. I think this is an important piece of our heritage and does need to be looked after. Also, I don't really understand how morally one person has a right to do things on the moon but I don't. - who gives them the ownership?
I'm not anti-science, or anti-progress, but some things are more important than, money or individual egos.
You can do anything to Mars, or the asteroids, they're not culturally important, but the moon is, at least the side facing us.
Is this a real problem? Who's looting stuff at the moon? And so what if somebody take some of the stuff we left there? Like does the frequency of landings at the moon merit this?
Who is this worried about something we can barely visit? This is the dumbest thing.
It's pretty easy to declare it a protected site, so why not do it before it's a problem? China and India have already launched robotic moon missions. The Apollo landing site is a significant monument for humanity
It's preparation.
Now that human craft have finally made it back to the moon for the first time in decades, human beings and development are set to follow.
Reminds me of this classic from Mr Show
technically its not a world monument if its not on this world...
Depends on your definition of world.
It's a wonder that you can see from your backyard.
I can't see any other wonders from my backyard.