The Great Meteor Grab 152
RocketAcademy writes "New regulations by the Federal government define asteroidal material to be an antiquity, like arrowheads and pottery, rather than a mineral — and, therefore, not subject to U.S. mining law or eligible for mining claims. At the moment, these regulations only apply to asteroidal materials that have fallen to Earth as meteorites. However, they create a precedent that could adversely affect the plans of companies such as Planetary Resources, who intend to mine asteroids in space."
Putting the cart before the horse. (Score:5, Insightful)
Talk about worrying about the wrong problems. Why worry about how this is regulated before anyone can even come close to doing it?
First come up with a way to mine an asteroid, then you can worry about the legal semantics.
Re:Putting the cart before the horse. (Score:5, Funny)
I guess the other side of that is, "Why come up with a way to mine an asteroid if the legal semantics won't allow you to mine it anyway?"
I agree that it's probably not a huge issue that can't be ironed* out, though.
* Yeah, I did that. Deal with it.
Re:Putting the cart before the horse. (Score:5, Informative)
Courts have long established that meteorites belong to the owner of the surface estate. Therefore, meteorites found on public lands are part of the BLM’s surface estate, belong to the federal government, and must be managed as natural resources in accordance with the FLPMA of 1976."
In this case, I'm thinking that claiming that these changes will somehow apply to asteroids in space is a very long stretch. Especially since they don't apply to the significant volume of privately owned land in this country, let alone the rest of the world.
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No, but when the US starts planting flags on more heavenly bodies, they may be able to define them as "Federal Land", subject to BLM regulation.
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More likely it will be private enterprise, and will flag it as corporate property. Which is fine. No regulations needed.
Re:Putting the cart before the horse. (Score:4, Informative)
No, but when the US starts planting flags on more heavenly bodies, they may be able to define them as "Federal Land", subject to BLM regulation.
Not likely, the US is a signator to the Outer Space Treaty [wikipedia.org]...
Article II
Outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, is not subject to national appropriation by claim of sovereignty, by means of use or occupation, or by any other means.
Re:Putting the cart before the horse. (Score:5, Insightful)
That will be ignored as soon as the capability to occupy celestial bodies exists.
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That will be ignored as soon as the capability to occupy celestial bodies exists.
In the US, probably not, treaties are the supreme law of the land, as indicated in the constitution. A signed treaty is tantamount to a constitutional amendment, and authorizes the legislature to enforce the treaty, but not to "ignore it"
Even laws passed by congress cannot override the text of a treaty,
Because the courts have a policy of interpreting any law passed by congress in a manner so that it complies with the sign
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That will be ignored as soon as the capability to occupy celestial bodies exists.
In the US, probably not, treaties are the supreme law of the land, as indicated in the constitution.
A signed treaty is tantamount to a constitutional amendment, and authorizes the legislature to enforce the treaty,
but not to "ignore it"
Even laws passed by congress cannot override the text of a treaty,
Because the courts have a policy of interpreting any law passed by congress in a manner so that it complies with the signed treaties,
or declaring the conflicting law null and void.
It would be necessary for the treaty to be officially rescinded first.
you're joking, right? you are aware that the president of USA can override anything and everything he wishes, including making mockery of the constitution, declaring wars which are not wars, re-defining POW status and just carrying out executions without notice.
the outer space treaty is just a feelgood paper.
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you're joking, right? you are aware that the president of USA can override anything and everything he wishes, including making mockery of the constitution, declaring wars which are not wars, re-defining POW status and just carrying out executions without notice.
the outer space treaty is just a feelgood paper.
Technically you are absolutely right. However in the real world, playing global (or space) cowboy has it's repercussions, And since we won't be alone out in space, assuming that the USA has the unfettered ability to act like an ass is parochial, naieve, and dangerously misguided thinking.
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and as such supercedes anything written in the Constitution itself.
False.
Article VI addresses this; it states
Note that Article VI states LAWS shal
Threre, FTFY: (Score:2)
That will be modified as soon as the capability and the superiour firepower to occupy and defend celestial bodies exists.
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Once we uncover the Shadow Battlecrabs buried under the mars surface, Our new "advisors" will see that the superior firepower becomes available.
The Vorlons might have something to say about this however!
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Or if newt gingrich gets elected :p
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There might be a point to "hoarding" specific asteroids that are in more useful locations -- for example, in earth orbit. That's like saying there's no point to hoarding because there's an abundance of them in the Earth's core. Accessibility, composition, and so on will dictate that some claims are more valuable than others, without regard to overall theoretical availability.
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Suddenly, a mighty roar of laughter erupted from hundreds of boardrooms across hundreds of cities.
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Yeah, until it's practical to start doing it...
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Because this ruling has to do with meteorites on US government land not asteroids?
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Re:Putting the cart before the horse. (Score:5, Interesting)
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Because the laws of nations are transient and the laws of physics aren't?
But on the subject of laws I'm not sure what any relevant treaties might say. Seems likely that if somehow this ruling applied to space*, you could find another jurisdiction outside the U.S. to host your asteroid-mining company.
* Legally or not, it makes sense to me that there's a big difference. Meteorites are rare and precious things of immense value to science. If/when we can feasible reach the asteroids readily enough to mine th
Re:Putting the cart before the horse. (Score:4, Funny)
Likewise, if we were up to our fucking necks in "antiquities", there'd probably be a lot less concern about preserving them.
Watch what you say there, Mr. 4 digit UID. You're not getting any younger. You may want to be preserved a bit longer even if there are a lot of us baby boomers flopping around.
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I guess the other side of that is, "Why come up with a way to mine an asteroid if the legal semantics won't allow you to mine it anyway?"
I agree that it's probably not a huge issue that can't be ironed* out, though.
* Yeah, I did that. Deal with it.
Asteroids in space are outside any legal jurisdiction.
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Regulating it in advance would provide a stable legal background for off-world resource exploitation. Currently, besides technological problems, the biggest hurdle the space mining industry is facing is the unclear/poorly defined legal standing of outer space, and even more importantly, the resources extracted, namely whether they inherit the "common domain of mankind" status of outer space, which would make it impossible to turn a profit, since all nations could potentially demand an equal share.
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Why worry about US mining laws when no country has claim on the rocks in space?
Because if you don't have legal title to your property, you can't defend it in court when someone else tries to take it away.
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Exactly, it is Space, the final frontier...
Getting tarred and feathered in a spacesuit is gonna suck.
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No... but if somebody tries to take it away from you, you can try and go and try to take it away from them right back. It doesn't belong to anybody, that's the point.
As long as you can resolve the dispute without resorting to any form of violence against the other party (which would be a violation of human rights, which are assumed to not be subject to national borders), there's no problem.
Or drop ceramic coated rebar on their pointy heads (Score:2)
No... but if somebody tries to take it away from you, you can try and go and try to take it away from them right back. It doesn't belong to anybody, that's the point.
As long as you can resolve the dispute without resorting to any form of violence against the other party (which would be a violation of human rights, which are assumed to not be subject to national borders), there's no problem.
And if they don't like it, they can come up to space themselves and stop you... Oh snap! Forgot! No launch systems capable of reaching space, unless the person dropping the rebar chooses to sell them to you, or you can get close enough to their launch site with your weapons while it's raining rebar. Whose dumb idea was that again?
Maybe the can contact Energia, and not get outbid by a space tourist this time...
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yeah really, and not only that, but they're putting up roadblocks to doing what we absolutely must do at some point if we want to retain our lifestyle. fucking hippies..
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Fuck your lifestyle
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First come up with a way to mine an asteroid, then you can worry about the legal semantics.
It's notoriously difficult to get investors to put billions of dollars into developing something unless you can show you have the legal right to do it.
Look at the history of the Law of the Sea or mining in Antarctica.
Broken cart, dead horse. (Score:2)
Why worry about future problems? Because the current problem (absence of any manned deep space vehicle and absence of any serious plans to create one) seems to be insurmountable.
All the geeky news stories about deep space projects are just a little sad. We love to fantasize about doing fancy things, but we can't face the basic problems that need to be solved before we can do them.
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"Talk about worrying about the wrong problems. Why worry about how this is regulated before anyone can even come close to doing it?"
It's completely pointless anyway. If you're not "over" the United States, their laws do not and cannot apply, by International law. At all. So wait for the Earth to turn for a couple of hours, and mine away.
It's not even "worrying about the wrong problems". It's a non-problem.
Don't worry about it (Score:5, Insightful)
The well-funded asteroid-miners will be able to buy the politicians and get the rules changed before they launch and call it a cost of doing business.
The not as well funded ones... well, it wouldn't be the first time lack of excess capital to pay lawyers or lobbyists stopped a project before it started.
Besides, if only the US has this law, then companies will just launch under other nations' flags and sell the minerals to countries that don't have a problem with mining asteroids.
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As usual there is nothing here beyond an angst-ridden blog post about how some law might someday be (mis) applied. (Next up: Will Shariah Law take over the UN!??? Oops, we already did that one today.)
I am more interested in how this applied in the case of large meteors that leave large deposits of valuable minerals in the earth's crust [cosmosmagazine.com]. These are not little objects you can walk away with,
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This is about meteorites that have fallen to Earth. It has no bearing on space mining despite Soulskill's implication.
Re:Don't worry about it (Score:4, Insightful)
Large scale metal mining and retrieval is likely to use very large, roughly formed, vaguely aerodynamic bodies with cheap re-entry shields. Basically, form the metal into a plane shape, whack a shield on the front and drop it in a desert. Scrap it for the metal in it. Any valuable metals you put in the centre, if the wingtips burn off a bit, so what.
The problem comes when the thing misses your couple of square miles of desert, and the BLM says they now own your multimegabucks worth of rare metals.
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The problem comes when the thing misses your couple of square miles of desert,
Or miss by a couple of hundred miles and rack up a few billion dollars in lawsuits for taking out most of Las Vegas.
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They went there to gamble, they should have known the odds...
Starmetal (Score:2)
Quickly! Grab it all, so that we may form swords and shields out of it!
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True, but who above 12 years old was really surprised when Virgin unicorns all ended up on the endangered species list?
Wait, I'm asking that on Slashdot, where it was probably totally unexpected and a lot of you still don't get it.
Talk about crying wolf (Score:5, Insightful)
The article makes a huge logical leap: that US laws governing items on federal lands somehow apply to items that are not on federal lands (for example, the asteroid belt). This is akin to saying that US antiquity laws would prevent a US citizen from prospecting for fossils in, say, Canada. What a load of baloney. The author is trying to conflate and confuse two issues (mining in space and prospecting on US federal lands) which are utterly unrelated.
Nebulo
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In the future, watch Asian, European, and so on, mining companies mine tons of minerals from outer space, and everyone in the world use it to build stuff, except he U.S. who isn't allowed to due to their law!
laws in space ? (Score:1)
Earth laws don't apply in space and neither does eminent domain.
So earth laws can f'off, I want my Orion spacecraft traveling to Alpha Centauri.
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No one is making any such claim of jurisdiction. You fell for a trollbait story submission. This was about meteorites on Earth not mining asteroids.
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If you're already in LEO, you don't need Orion. You can just use your nuclear material to generate power for electric propulsion with even higher Isp. Where you need Orion is where you can't ever use it - to climb out of the earth's gravity well in the first place - it's a relatively high Isp, extremely high thrust solution, but you can't use it on a populated planet with an atmosphere, because you're setting off thousands of nuclear bombs in an atmosphere.
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Sadly the fact remains Orion can't be built because Nuclear testing in LEO is against stupid laws. IT'S SPACE DAMNIT, keep your retarded backward laws on earth.
Back in the 60's there were a couple of atomic weapons that were exploded in space in if I recall correctly, Project Starfish. They were known to have some wonky effects on the Van Allen Belts which are rather important to life on this planet. At that point, it was deemed prudent not to play around any further.
Damn it all! (Score:2)
I just built an autonomous spaceship and 3 asteroid mining robots. Wish they would give us a heads up every once in a while.
Words have meanings (Score:5, Insightful)
"A meteorite is a natural object originating in outer space that survives impact with the Earth's surface" - Wikipedia - Meteorite [wikipedia.org]
So unless someone plans on mining an asteroid by slamming it into the planet, they probably don't have to deal with laws pertaining to meteorites. There is also the fact that US law does not extend to the Asteroid Belt.
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Unless you plan to use the mined material on the Moon, you are eventually going to take it down on Ea
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No, it wouldn't apply. You're being absurd.
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Unless you plan to use the mined material on the Moon, you are eventually going to take it down on Earth, and maybe inside the US. Then the federal laws would apply and your rocks/metals would fit the definition of "surviving impact with the Earth's surface", wouldn't they?
If people do start asteroid mining the amount of materials available on Earth could increase tremendously providing a massive boost to the economies which permit the import and use of these materials.
If the USA declines to participate then they will be putting themselves into the new third world group of nations as virtually every other nation on earth grows and prospers beyond the dreams of avarice.
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Unless you plan to use the mined material on the Moon, you are eventually going to take it down on Earth, and maybe inside the US. Then the federal laws would apply and your rocks/metals would fit the definition of "surviving impact with the Earth's surface", wouldn't they?
A controlled landing is not an impact. Back to the dictionary for a second round:
"impact - the striking of one thing against another; forceful contact; collision"
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There is also the fact that US law does not extend to the Asteroid Belt.
For now, yes. But who knows where Assange will seek asylum next?
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Unless the materials mined in space magically disappear, will they not have survived their impact with the Earth's surface when their spaceship lands?
And once you try to bring them into the US, US laws apply... think CITES (the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species) i.e., you might be able to legally catch a three pecker wood toad in BoraBora but if its protected under CITES, you face legal consequences if you're caught bringing it into the US. And, I think they'd notice an arriving spaces
Controlled landings are not impacts (Score:2)
Unless the materials mined in space magically disappear, will they not have survived their impact with the Earth's surface when their spaceship lands?
By definition controlled landings are not impacts.
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A "landing" is nothing more than a controlled impact.
You're also not factoring in that the legal/judicial system doesn't always follow normal logic in it's interpretations and decisions. If they wanted the law to include the refined products brought to Earth they probably would just get a court to agree or have Congress add a rider to some essential bill to re
US laws apply to US flagged vessels (Score:2)
Actually, US law shouldn't extend beyond the USA borders :D
US laws apply to US flagged vessels. It will probably work for spacecraft much like it works for boats.
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"US laws apply to US flagged vessels. It will probably work for spacecraft much like it works for boats."
The USA has a Navy to enforce its laws on the sea. There is no space navy to enforce laws in space.
Anyway you could just 'fly the flag' of the Klingon Empire, or The Khanate of Orion or The Centauri Republic
(pick your favorite aliens)
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US law follows all the objects launched into space. We own it all!
well, they can just declare the asteroid belt a part of Cuba and mine it all since laws don't apply.
Total crap -- /. summary is wrong (stunning!) (Score:5, Insightful)
Total fail.
1. "A meteorite is a natural object originating in outer space that survives impact with the Earth's surface." Wiki source [wikipedia.org].
Re:Total crap -- /. summary is wrong (stunning!) (Score:5, Insightful)
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Wait, what?!? Damnit! What kind of legal precedent does that set in regards to my plan to go harvest space fenceposts?
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These regulations are just clarifying that /yes/ meteorites are valuable minerals
On the contrary, the regulations specifically state that meteorites are not minerals but "antiquities." That's the whole point.
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Over large swaths of land, the US government has leased the right to dig up whatever minerals they find there. It doesn't apply to fenceposts, but it does apply to rocks.
The ruling here is that the meteorites aren't included in that. Yes, they're minerals, but for this purpose they're also part of the national heritage. So we're going to treat them in the same category as other heritage items, i.e. ancient artifacts. These aren't artifacts, but they're saying they're going to treat them according to the rul
Follow the Money (Score:2)
So what? (Score:2)
Who was planing to mine an asteroid... in US jurisdiction? Asteroids are sort of outside the US border I would say...
And let's not talk about the fact that we don't even have the ability to send a man to the moon like we did decades ago (or even supersonic commercial flights like we also did decades ago), and TFS is worried about what all those miners we are going to send to the asteroids are going to do???
And I thought we couldn't go lower than another bitcoin post...
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ftfy.
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The US could send someone up in a Falcon 9/Dragon if there were some pressing need to do so. The capsule works, and it's (partly) pressurized. They don't have a launch escape system (yet), but neither did the shuttle.
The problem is there isn't a pressing, or, actually, any need at all, to send people into space. You can get far more done for far less money using robotic probes. Until we can drop the cost per kg to LEO by a factor of at least 20, manned space is a vanity project, nothing more.
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Really? You go and do that then.
Good luck.
Scaremongering for a non-space agenda (Score:2)
This is nothing but some paranoid right-wing fucktard upset that the government is acting in the public interesting regarding land that the public owns. Nothing to see here.
What? Asteroid mining now? (Score:2)
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Lol, you have no idea how much they are worth. I bought a tiny 1in piece by half an inch, shaved from a large specimen, nearly $100. An actual verifiable asteroid meteorite. Like the one found of Vesta, would be alot more.
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US jurisdiction in space (Score:3)
Only as far as it stands to reason that the US can claim jurisdiction in space.
Creates problems because...? (Score:1)
The United States has sovereignty over asteroids now?
WTF (Score:2)
Why is a federal reg which allows for meteorite collection on public land bad for asteroid mining? This favors, in a small way, the exploitation of extraterrestrial resources, and so I would view it as a positive (if very weak) precedent.
Note, BTW, that asteroid are not public land under the Outer Space Treaty.
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This is totally off topic, but under the Outer Space Treaty, mining is not a prohibited activity, but if you read closer, you don't get to escape all jurisdiction by simply going into space. You are still under the jurisdiction of the place where you launched from.
Article VIII
A State Party to the Treaty on whose registry an object launched into outer space is carried shall retain jurisdiction and control over such object, and over any personnel thereof, while in outer space or on a celestial body.
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Yes, I know that, but the US (or anyone else) does not get to claim extraterrestrial bodies, so they are not (US) public land.
Now, I would not be surprised if some future law or Executive Order came about where we would treat asteroids as if they were public lands, but it isn't in place yet. And, I would look for a new treaty move along that time, to clear these matters up.
Also, note that Article 8 talks about "on a celestial body," but is silent about what happens _inside_ a celestial body. If you want to
Like usual, the Gov has logic problems (Score:2)
Hasn't this been settled? (Score:1)
You own what you produce or mine, not the natural resource. That will help reduce speculation that's so rampant in today's real estate market.
I've said it before and I'll say it again (Score:3)
The recent Banking-and-Finance Charlie Foxtrot proves that if you make ENOUGH money The Government will drop their pants to support you no matter what you do (ie no matter how immoral and unethical your actions may have been).
If you WAIT for the legislation first, said laws will have been funded by lobbyists of EXISTING INTERESTS supporting their own outdated business models.
you are kidding? (Score:2)
a US law applying to material in Space. OFFS!
In related news... (Score:2)
Speed limits on public roads are going to set a precedent when we develop teleportation, and may set this technology back decades.
And don't forget about the import tariffs when I start making gold using nucleosynthesis from hydrogen in air that make have drifted over from China!
"New Rules for Meteorite Hunters Unveiled" (Score:1)
That's the title of the actual Space.com post. It details how the US Bureau of Land Management has released a notice of how it will regulate the collection of meteorites on public lands. That's it.
It has nothing to do with asteroid mining. Any inference of how this would map to any asteroid mining is a wild-ass ... inference.
When people are able to mine asteroids, any "governing body" in a planetary gravity well is not going to be able to enforce early 21st century administrative law on entities that can
It may surprise many americans (Score:2)
If you believe this propaganda (Score:2)
Meanwhile, over here in the real world, 14000 people are at risk of fungal meningitis, 186 have been diagnosed, and 14 or m
Post Terran Minerals Corporation (Score:2)
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How is taking meteorites off of US government lands considered "space mining". Since, you know, that's what this ruling was actually about.
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i fail to see how NOT being subject to mining laws would adversely affect space mining.
Because mining law is what protects your claim. That's why it was created in the first place.
Imagine if your house was suddenly declared "not real estate" and anyone could move in, tear it down, make alterations, shelter livestock, etc.