Tags:  Joe Carroll, Joe's Theses on Starship, Tourism and Human Futures Beyond Earth, Bezos compared to Musk, Joe's change in focus, tethers in space, understanding our future in space, spinning space stations, Venus for humans, demo for gravity prescription, demo for a gravity prescription test, NASA budget based on Apollo success, near term goals, long term gals, explanation behind Joe's Starship is a LEO vehicle, the value of the rocket payload, Falcon 9 capability, space settlement, main focus is how much gravity is enough, Falcon Heavy potential, Starship flight frequency, Joe discusses the Commons, space tourism, space development program budget, no existing space exploration budget, Joe wants younger people to take the lead but hard to find them, Mary Roach, U.S. Land Grant Act, breaking through the cost barrier, Joe's suggested books to read, commercial space in the midst of the Ukrainian war

Guest:  Joe Carroll;  Topics:  Multiple topics based on Joe's PDF document on the blog for this show covering Starship, Tourism and Commercial Space Travel and Human Futures Beyond Earth.

Please direct all comments and questions regarding specific Space Show programs & guest(s) to the Space Show blog which is part of archived program on our website, www.thespaceshow.com.  Comments and questions should be relevant to the specific Space Show program. Written Transcripts of Space Show programs are a violation of our copyright and are not permitted without prior written consent, even if for your own use. We do not permit the commercial use of Space Show programs or any part thereof, nor do we permit editing, YouTube clips, or clips placed on other private channels & websites. Space Show programs can be quoted, but the quote must be cited or referenced using the proper citation format. Contact The Space Show for further information. In addition, please remember that your Amazon purchases can help support The Space Show/OGLF. See www.onegiantleapfoundation.org/amazon.htm.

We welcomed Joe Carroll back to the program for a 1 hour 53 minute discussion based the PDF Joe uploaded to our blog titled "Theses on Starship, Tourism, and Human Futures Beyond Earth" dated Feb. 7,. 2022 and authored by Joe.  I recommend you have this document available while listening to the show as Joe followed it during our discussion.  In addition, I suggest you use the above tags as a guide to the discussion commentary for this program.  To make following the discussion easier, I am repeating the tags below.

Tags:  "Joe Carroll, Joe's Theses on Starship, Tourism and Human Futures Beyond Earth, Bezos compared to Musk, Joe's change in focus, tethers in space, understanding our future in space, spinning space stations, Venus for humans, demo for gravity prescription, demo for a gravity prescription test, NASA budget based on Apollo success, near term goals, long term gals, explanation behind Joe's Starship is a LEO vehicle, the value of the rocket payload, Falcon 9 capability, space settlement, main focus is how much gravity is enough, Falcon Heavy potential, Starship flight frequency, Joe discusses the Commons, space tourism, space development program budget, no existing space exploration budget, Joe wants younger people to take the lead but hard to find them, Mary Roach, U.S. Land Grant Act, breaking through the cost barrier, Joe's suggested books to read, commercial space in the midst of the Ukrainian war."

As I have done with previous programs, I would like to focus on some of the highlights of our discussion.  To begin with, I detected lots of uncertainty or deep thinking/questioning in Joe's voice and demeanor.  Clearly and as he said, he is engaged in a deep though process about his past and present focus on space and what that focus should be for the upcoming future.  A good portion of the early show was spent in this "deep reflection" mode which I hope caused some deep thinking about these topics with listeners to this show.  Furthermore, I believe what Joe brought to us to be important so how about posting your own thoughts and reflections along the lines of what Joe shared with by sharing them with the audience on our blog.  I suspect that many of us, myself included, have gone through or are going through a similar examination process like Joe has been doing.  Plus working out how best to make our potential future in space count.  Listen to what Joe said was his initial space interest and then what he said about his interests and focus today.  Remember, we want to hear from you on this important discussion. 

Another part of the program that got my attention was Joe's 1 g gravity discussion.  This was a detailed discussion covering many topics from places in the solar system with various gravity conditions, how they appear grouped together in the solar systems, places where humans might be able to go, and of course spinning space stations to have 1 g.  We talked extensively why we have never done the experiments to determine the human gravity prescription and how such experiments could be demonstrated.  Of course the listen input focused on planetary settlements or orbiting one g space stations as the definition of a settlement with the assumption to have a settlement means you need to have children.  That specific issue was not debated on this show but we all agreed that it was essential to determine human minimum safety gravity needs for space.  Many of us, myself included, asked Joe why NASA has never done this work and why is it not a commercial priority today.  Joe shared his opinion with us regarding these questions so let us know what you think by posting on our blog. 

Starship was a big part of our discussion.  I asked Joe to clarify his previous comments on why he thought Starship would evolve to a LEO vehicle.  Joe did this, he clarified what he has said about this on previous shows and there was lots of discussion about his Starship ideas, Starship flight frequency, destinations, purpose, and more.  Joe brought up other rockets and how they could play a roll so no need to just focus on Starship.  He talked about Falcon 9 and when listener Ajay called, our caller focused on the capabilities of Falcon Heavy.

As the discussion was focusing on lunar settlements and going to Mars and our great space development and settlement plans, I stepped in saying I was about to be a jerk to both Joe and Ajay and said it was really surreal to be talking about all these lofty space plans when our world was on fire, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the distrust, sometimes even hatred of one side of folks in the U.S against the other side.  Well, this sparked quite the discussion with Joe and Ajay that went on for 15-20 minutes, maybe even longer.  Ajay had much to say about continuing to do what we always do and not change our lives because of the turmoil.  Joe offered some very deep thoughts about the war and related topics.  Please pay attention to this what I thought would be a digression but then when Joe, near the end of this part of the discussion, said it was not a digression and it was needed, I guess I hit a type of discussion home run which I thought would be risky and possibly derail the entire program.  Again, rather than my trying to summarize this part of the discussion, please do listen to all of it.  I believe this was another important part of this program so do comment about it on the blog.  Let us know what you think of the topic and what the three of us had to say.

Later I asked Joe about space tourism facilitating humans beyond earth.  Joe said we need a spinning facility in LEO and talked with John about it.  Then as I recall, Jack sent in a note asking for Joe's plan of action or was he just talking theory.  Joe said he wanted to inspire younger people to pick up the ball and run with it as he was unable to do that.  It was interesting hearing Joe talk about getting younger people to move to action.  I mentioned to Joe that there were plenty of young inspired entrepreneurs and wondered why he said it was hard to find the younger people.  Jumping forward a few minutes, Tim from Huntsville sent in a last minute note saying finding younger people was not the problem, the money needed to move forward was the issue so he asked Joe does one find the money.  Joe brought up well known author Mary Roach and her work.  I told Joe Mary was due back on the show in a few weeks with her latest book,  "Packing For Mars For Kids."  Listen to what Joe said about Mary.  I look forward to his call when she is on the program on Friday, April 1.  Before ending our program, Joe mentioned the commons book he talked about earlier, "Governing The Commons by Dr. Elinor Ostrom.  This is a recommended book for us all.

Please post your comments/questions for Joe on our blog for this show.  You can reach Joe through The Space Show.