On the difficulties involved in selecting crew for space missions

[VetLegion]

I just saw a movie about a ship on a mission to save the earth by flying straight towards the sun and detonating a big nuclear bomb once there.

To not spoil the movie I'm just going to say that one or more crew members go crazy. Which got me thinking. How exactly do you pick a crew for such a mission? What psychological characteristics do astronauts have to have? The way I see it, a space traveller has to be:

- willing to travel to a cold, lifeless and vast space in a small ship which can malfunction in a variety of ways
- ready to leave family and friends behind
- ready to sacrifice own life to save the mission
- willing to sacrifice someone else's life to save the mission

If someone satisfies those criteria, can he be sane at the same time? Discuss

[SlowwHand]

No need for lengthy discussion. They're nuts.

[VetLegion]

But say you need to pick a crew for the mission I described (or some similar mission). How do you do it? How do you make sure your insane people act sane for the purposes of the mission?

[SlowwHand]

They need to be goal driven, for one thing.

[VetLegion]

Yep. Also, you need people who are not likely to get excited. Pensioners.

[Bkeela]

That film was the biggest load of garbage. As if a single crew member would orchestrate such a vital maneuver without consulting his crew mates first! All of the crew should have been working on it - and if they still had contact with Earth - an entire room full of NASA nerds would had to have authorised it first.

Danny Boyle is a moron.

[VetLegion]

I don't know who Danny Boyle is, but yes, the movie is not something I recommend.


BTW I found some good candidates for the job!

glumbert - High Power Job

[Bkeela]

Danny Boyle is the ****** director of Sunshine.

I'd feel safe with the fate of the World in those men's hands.

[Blake]

To take it a bit seriously...

Kim Stanley Robinson, in his book Red Mars, touched on this topic.

The actual conclusion (from the psychologist character), was that ALL people who were selected (to go to Mars to found a colony, a non-suicide mission) were insane, but good at hiding it . That insanity is a basic requisite of wanting to do such a thing, yet that they must be capable of functioning at a high level.

The crew in other words, are crazy people who are nevertheless capable of functioning.

It helps that experts in fields usually ARE insane, by any commoner definition of sane. These aren't people who value things like family, material possessions, sometimes even glory. They're on some strange personal mission of discovery.


Now, if the people selected to go to Mars and NOT necessarily die have to be insane, then those selected for a suicidal mission to the sun must really be insane .

One of the challenges of gaining people for such missions is that you can't motivate them with money, they can't be paid! The money has to go to their family or something. That means they are either disinterested in wealth, unusually altruistic or obsessed with some kind of perceived glory. That does indicate the kind of people who end up on the mission.

Bearing in mind, that anyone who wouldn't sacrifice their life to save the earth is pretty weak :P. The tricky part, is finding people who are stupid enough to fall for some story like "We need to fly a manned spaceship into the sun and detonate a nuclear bomb!", anyone with half a brain would know that wouldn't do anything.

[Blake]

To take it a bit seriously...

Kim Stanley Robinson, in his book Red Mars, touched on this topic.

The actual conclusion (from the psychologist character), was that ALL people who were selected (to go to Mars to found a colony, a non-suicide mission) were insane, but good at hiding it . That insanity is a basic requisite of wanting to do such a thing, yet that they must be capable of functioning at a high level.

The crew in other words, are crazy people who are nevertheless capable of functioning.

It helps that experts in fields usually ARE insane, by any commoner definition of sane. These aren't people who value things like family, material possessions, sometimes even glory. They're on some strange personal mission of discovery.


Now, if the people selected to go to Mars and NOT necessarily die have to be insane, then those selected for a suicidal mission to the sun must really be insane .

One of the challenges of gaining people for such missions is that you can't motivate them with money, they can't be paid! The money has to go to their family or something. That means they are either disinterested in wealth, unusually altruistic or obsessed with some kind of perceived glory. That does indicate the kind of people who end up on the mission.

Bearing in mind, that anyone who wouldn't sacrifice their life to save the earth is pretty weak :P. The tricky part, is finding people who are stupid enough to fall for some story like "We need to fly a manned spaceship into the sun and detonate a nuclear bomb!", anyone with half a brain would know that wouldn't do anything.

[FrostyBoy]

That sounds like me Blake.


I hate that movie, I loved the music, but the movie is crap. The director is an idiot, I hate his other movies as well.

[b etor]

they also cannot be short.

[realpolitic]

Those criteria aren't any different from those who enlist in the military. Getting a dozen sane people a year from a nation of 300 million for space doesn't seem as hard as getting a few hundred thousand a year to sign up for the armed forces.

[Zkribbler]

Originally posted by b etor
they also cannot be short.

I vote we send short people. They breathe less oxygen, take up less room, and eat less.

[Winston]

Just making sure they're not predisposed to driving across the country wearing diapers, attempting to kill love rivals would be an important first step.