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China to attempt manned space mission next month
buxley writes "BBC News is reporting that China may celebrate the upcoming Year of the Dragon by launching a man into space next month. Western experts have been quoted in the past as saying they didn't expect a manned mission from China for a few years yet. Surprise!"
Once China gets to the moon, do they plan to put some meaning behind the phrase "The Red Planet"?
One of the primary motivating factors of the beginning of the American and Soviet space programs was competition between the two programs and the boost to national pride each sucessful mission started. Now, with China potentially entering the ranks of countries with a manned space we could potentially enter a new space race.
The Chinese government isn't exactly the greatest in the world, in fact, I rank it among the worst, but China could pull this off. From seeing firsthand the industrial prowess the Chinese have it is very possible they could pull this off. However, I'm not so sure that having a Chinese space presence is a good thing. Really, any Chinese space shot is just an extension of ballistic missle technology, just rather than lofting a nuke into suborbit you add some thrust and orbit a spacecraft. Personally, I think we have enough unstable countries with ICBM technology as it is thank you very much.
The only silver lining I can see is that if China starts a manned program, it invigorates others with more peaceful intentions to do the same. If China can expand their space technology to a point where the US feels threatened enough to start seriously looking at space again then that's a good thing. If it takes the Chinese to get us to seriously see what an asset manned space exploration can be for us, then that's what we need. As long as the Chinese are only lobbing men into space rather than nuclear/chemical/biological weapons, then let's see where they take the technology of spaceflight.
I'd have actually been impressed if China used their own design, but since it just an old proven Russian design, tweaked by chinese scientists (maybe the computers don't use vacume tubes.. :-) Nasa's been screwing up and lying[1], Russia does less.. so maybe this is good news. But of course.. the only reason so far for politions to be behind these is for prestige (ie US catching up), or drooling over what war power it could bring. The latter is more plausable for the main reason behind China's aggressiveness.
[1] Nasa scientists did not get th conversion wrong, but rather to save costs the navigation system was coded, but not tested. A small error brought it off course, which the scientists saw and asked for permission to fix. As the navigation system said things were ok, it was denied. Of course, by the time the truth came out, people weren't interested anymore
"Open Source?" - Press any key to continue
The scientific payoff from sending up a copycat version of the Soyuz is minimal, and the propaganda benefits aren't all that great either (some research into undetectable sporting performance-enhancing drugs would achieve a similar propaganda result at a much lower cost), and the military benefits non-existent. So, what's the point - even from the view of the Chinese leadership?
Unless this was the first step in some kind of long-term plan (Mars anyone?)
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
this will send china-phobia in the US into a national spotlight. I wonder if this issue will come up in presidential campaigns. Some of the canidates really like to trash China(G.Bush). This really could lead to campaign promises that could benefit NASA. It could also result in anti-China sentiment from the uneducated masses. Did anyone out there who went to school in the US learn a single thing about China? Americans are severely under-educated about the people's republic. This will chnge in the next ten years as the US goes searching for enemies (and probably finding a good one).
Why did the USSR channel so much energy into its space program instead of trying to stabalize the command economy?
(Half rhetorical, half asking and knowing I sound stupid asking that question)
--
The shareholder is always right.
What racism? Criticising China's government has nothing to do with race.
The real question, of course, is the Chinese government's motives behind this. Presumably, national prestige is a major factor -- if they were doing this for economic reasons, they'd go the route of India, and echew manned operations for potentially profitable satellite launch services. In which case you have to wonder, will this spur the U.S. or other spacefaring governments to increase funding for manned spaceflight, or to just sit back and say, "good for them," unconcerned?
Quantum mechanics: the dreams that stuff is made of.
The primary motivating factor at the beginning of the space race was not competition! It was fear. Unless you lived through the time, you have no idea how terrifying it was to the national consciousness that Sputnik was going "beep, beep, beep". The American propaganda machine, if anything, was at least as effective as the Soviet one in getting America scared enough to support keeping space out of the hands of those damn Communists. The primary motivating factor was not any sort of competition pride, but rather it was making sure that Soviet Russia did not control space and use it as a weapon against us.
We have no need to compete to China, and the only possible NASA benefit is if the US government can get the people scared enough of a Chinese Red threat to put more money in. I don't see that happening, since space has sort of become this peaceful no-man's land, kind of like Antarctica only colder. Right now, the Chinese are more scared of use than we are of them, and thus, we have no reason to 'compete' against them. If China does threaten us from space, you can bet that it's going to be more of a diplomatic war than a space race.
But, it does sort of make Arthur C. Clarke's 2010 story about the Chinese landing on Europa a bit more realistic, eh?
I alluded to this in another post, but it bears mentioning here. Arthur C. Clarke used a Chinese space program in 2010 and the race to the Discovery. They landed on Europa to get water from the surface (a risky move) and ended up getting destroyed by life beneath the crust.
Who knows, ten years from now, maybe we'll see some sort of similar scenario involving the Chinese. Heck, they're surprising us now, aren't they?
The point is that this is a "status" achievement. China has a lot of national pride (and rightfully so), but it has a lot of problems, like you said. It feels like it should be one of the world's superpowers, but, at the moment, just doesn't have the economic power / political structure / whatever to do it.
So, what's an impotent-feeling leadership to do? Status projects! This is why there are projects like sending people in to space and (eek) the Three Gorges Dam. Neither one's really going to improve the country or the lot of the people in it. In the case of the Three Gorges Dam, millions of people have had to be resettled (read: have their livelihoods destroyed) because of it.
This point about performance-enhancing drugs is a good one, but it wouldn't qualify as a status project. Sure, China would win a lot of events at the Olympics, but could the leadership (and the people -- I'm not sure how much the people care) take pride in saying "we sent a man into space entirely on our own, something that only Russia (or USSR, or both, actually) and the US have succeeded in doing!", and then feel like a real superpower about it. One big project successfully completed is worth a lot to them, but lots of small projects? "Well, anybody could have done those." It's not propaganda or national benefit -- just pride.
Once again, I'd love to have somebody who knows let me know how much this matters to the people -- I don't know whether the people I work with don't care very much or just don't talk about it.
Blame it on NASA and the shuttle pilots. They were complaining about lack of Chinese food delivery for the planned space station
China will make some accomplishment, like building a small Moon base, and the US will suddenly wake up. America will put its money into Mars, and as a result, save the US from stagnation.
Then the US will look back and remember that it was China that poked America on the shoulder just before it dozed off during the final exam, and suddenly decide to be helpful to China.
Hey, I can hope
--
The shareholder is always right.
It'll probably be the leader of the Falun Gong, and instead of a space craft, they'll just launch his screaming body from a really, really big cannon.
China: Advancing the Space Race by Crushing Religious Freedom!
Cheers,
ZicoKnows@hotmail.com
For, as Robert Heinlein put it, "There may not be intelligent life on mars, but I can assure you that there is intelligent life in Beijing".
-- Slashdot sucks.
Get your facts right...
From NASA: (http://www.ksc.nasa.gov/ history/mercury/flight-summary.txt)
That's the 60's not the 40's. Back in the 40's the little green men had all of space to them self.
Ost99
---- Sig. gone.
I see lots of post talking about how this could start a space race, and how that is good. And, an compitetion is good. It keeps everyone honest (ok not totally, not ever, but still). It also provides motivation to keep people invovled.
/. as well.
It's been said that "we see the world in out own image and there are as many views of the waorld as there are people" This only proves the point. The more space exploration there is, and the more people invovled, then that only means that more viewpoints are brought to the discussion and in the end, it is a tremendous addition to the sum of human knowledge.
And to those making all those cute little "red" jokes, consider one thing. We in the States have always had an "adventurous" (conquering) streak in us. And, since (as stated above) we see the world in our own image, then we in the States have always seen space in that light. Its a place to be conquered. Now the Chinese have, for a long time (since at least the mid 1800's), had a more guarded (protective) nature. Perhaps the will see their exploration of space in that light and better recognize some of the inherant dangers in space. Perhaps they will see something else. Or, perhaps they will see it exactly as we do.
The point is, this is a win-win situation.
This talk of competition also caries over to other debates/forums on
"I mean, All you can definately say about a fellow who thinks he's a poached egg, is; He's in the minority." James Burke
-Vercingetorix
"Necessitas non habet legem." -St. Augustine
A famous quote is that the reason the US lead the space race for so long, was that their Nazis were better than the Russian's Nazis.
dave "Godwin's what?"
Stop right now and go read "Titan" by Stephen Baxter.
dave
And if this is what the Chinese govt. want to spend their money on, instead of more tanks. Good for them!
[humor]
We'll see if you don't change your tune when the commie bastards rain death upon the children of America from their orbiting laser death stations!
[/humor]
No, but seriously, China is going to be a major power in the next century. Possibly more major than the US. It's important that we maintain good relations, lest we end up in another cold war. Perhaps joint space exploration projects could be just the thing we need? It could also be just the thing we need to get space exploration back in high-gear -- it's been on the decline since Apollo.
Well, perhaps things won't be quite that easy. But even given the differences the US and China have, I'm having trouble figuring out how anyone could think this was a bad thing.
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This space unintentionally left unblank.
-- Slashdot sucks.
China wants to be seen as a major world power. The only other choice to achieve that goal is to start a massive military buildup, which would be more expensive and provoke adverse reactions in neighbors.
Nuclear weapons? Britain, France, India, Israel, South Africa, and Pakistan have all done it. Big public works? Even Egypt has the Aswan Dam. Winning lots of sports events? Even a splinter country under foreign occupation like East Germany did that.
Manned spaceflight, however, is an exclusive, prestigious club. The only other nations to achieve it were superpowers. It's the ultimate prestige project.
Steven E. Ehrbar
This just might scare the US out of space-complacency. The thought of China being more advanced than anticpated might just do it.
Won't be a problem. Some how, china reaching the technology level of the US in the 1950's dosn't seem like somthing that will rise much ire in the US...
Amber Yuan (--ell7)
"and dear god does this website suck now." -- CmdrTaco
Cue giant catapult.
I hate to burst anyones bubble but if you really examine the issue of space travel or more problemmatic, the escaping from the gravitational pull of the earth, it doesn't take a genius to figure out that space travel at least from planet earth is a very expensive proposition.
It is interesting to note that we basically take for granted the fact that we can hop on a jetliner and be almost anywhere in a matter of a few hours. Of course in this case we are not trying to completely break the bonds that gravity has on us, we are just merely changing the elevation temporarily.
The immense amount of energy it takes for a spacecraft to blast off from earth and enter interplanetary space is overwhelming. With current technology it is almost unthinkable of sending up a spacecraft every 15 minutes. You probably think I'm nuts by now but hear me out...
For space to be a truly viable enterprise for the world and for mankind as a whole it must become accessible to the masses, much like mass transit via powered aircraft has become in the 20th century. What I am trying to say is that without the technology to send mankind into orbit cheaply and reliably we are merely just playing with a scientific curiousity.
I am hopeful that one day someone will discover this technology and make space travel truly viable but until that time I will that we are wasting a large amount of are precious resources and money on projects that really have no bearing on our existence here on earth.
I mean what good does it do us to send a explorer to Mars, unless one day we have the means and the intentions to terra-form the Red Planet. Trust me I am interested in space travel as much as the next techie, but sometimes I have a hard time justifying the money that our government spends on such projects, especially when they seem to do it half heartedly. I mean if we're going to explore Mars lets hunker down and do it right... Send a couple of Astronauts to the Red Planet and really explore it for all its worth
Sometimes this is what frustrates me with NASA the most... the lack of any real ambitious goals or intents. Its like they like to toy with a few ideas but never really put their back behind it. If we had continued on with the momentum we had back in the 60's we would be visiting Jupiter's moons by now. Think about it.
Just some food for thought.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
NPS Internet Solutions, LLC
www.npsis.com
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
www.haidacarver.com
If you are anti-China, that's fine. YOu have the freedom to get yourself an enemy anytime anywhere.
If you are a racist, that's ok. You just believe in something that is not popular even in the US and that's nobody else's business.
However, if you hate China because you hate communism, I have to tell you, my friend, you are wrong. Communism in China today is absolutely not the Communism in your mind.
Five years ago, my professor(a political science professor) visited Beijing and I was his interpreter. He asked me several times, why does China call itself a communist country? In his eyes, it was not communist at all. He was right, he just could not understand the way Chinese use political terms.
In China, we call the current system "socialism with chinese characteristics". It is a compromise between the hard-liners and the reformers. The hard-liners see the "socialism" and the reformers see the "chinese characteristics". The hard-liners are losing their power every day and still strong enough to defend the term. The reformers are in power since 1980's but are still afraid of being attacked by hard-liners on ideological issues.
Just think about the Political Correctness in America. That is the case in China with ideology! So when you say you are not a racist publicly, you don't have to mean it--you just have to be politically correct, even in a free country like America!
While putting a man in space may not be technically challenging (heck the west expects to have suborbital tourist flights in a decade or so), it does provide tangible symbols of a country's prowess. Sure it might bankrupt the rest of the country (Reagan came close with his Cold War buildup) but if it provides a focus (or more precisely a distraction if you don't have any Royal scandals handy) for a PR-challenged country, then it may revive confidence in the leadership (which I suspect is sorely needed). One can only look back in the past to see religious motifs, royal emblems, national monuments, etc to respect the power of imagery and associated national pride. Given that the all the grand poo-bahs have technological leadership as exemplified by gee-whiz space-craft and real-time CNN-friendly fire-and-forget missiles, how can China not participate in trying to be in the same tier? Given also the Year of the Dragon (remember the imperial symbol for China is the 5-clawed dragon) plus the start of the new millenium (the so-called Pacific century before the Asian crisis hit) and the rather negative recent political custard pies (Tibet lama escaping, etc) and you can probably see the incentives for the government to make a big splash (hopefully not with the returning capsule).
This is not to say it is a smart move, history is full of stupidities, whether east or west. Establishing a casino town in the middle of nowhere has got to be either the smartest (not letting people escape) or dumbest (how are they to get there in the first place) moves of all times. As one of the few missile producing countries in the world, there are few commercial outlets for such technology outside satellite launching and they'd probably want to get a leg up on the Koreans and Japanese in getting a man up, if only for bragging rights. As a serious threat, I suspect 40 year old technology is more likely to explode in their faces than to make their competitors shake in their boots. However, if it is for a purely symbolic role of beating the drum and waving the flag, there are worse ways of burning a few million dollars (wonder how much was spent on fireworks displays for the new millenium). Hopefully other countries like India or Europe won't take it seriously and restart their own space race as there is a lot more poverty in the world to be fixed first.
May you live in interesting times (old Chinese curse).
LL
What financial burden are you talking about? Compare the current space exploration budget with the "Agencies (let's not trigger Eshelon)" budget for christ's sake.
... to NASA (who in btw handled some of the underwater research in the old days as well).
I understand that the days of Kennedy and Chrushov are long gone. I understand that those space projects were riducolously overfunded in order to get ICBM technology and military applications a good polishing along with good PR.
It happened not only to space but to ocean exploration as well. It was funded almost with a comparable amount of money. And now what? The ocean bottom is mapped, all magnetic anomalies are mapped as well. Sumbarines are no longer as invisible as they were. The psychological aspects of human behaviour in hostile environment (read space) have been researched. So nobody cares any longer. Anyone heard of Alvin missions lately? What happened to the US manned underwater stations? What happened to the French ones? Custo had a city under water in the Red Sea at one point?
Overall, especially compared to budgets some "Agencies" the funds for space exploration and ocean exploration are simply riduculous. So do not talk about funding as above please. Better bug your congressman to transfer budget from
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
One need only look at the statements made by members of the Chinese government vis a vis the situation of Taiwan to immediate consider a parallel situation with the upcoming Chinese space launch. (For those who haven't been paying attention, on several occasions, officials have stated that if the US dares to intervene on behalf of Taiwan, that Honolulu or Los Angeles are reachable targets by Chinese missles. Our anti-missle technology development is at something of a standstill, since much of it was linked to Reagan's "Star Wars" program, and that has been enough for research to be dropped (ah, politics).)
Whether or not the threats could be carried out today, other analyses have suggested that China will have copious technology to do it by about 2003 (no doubt thanks to our lax security at our national laboratories).
Meanwhile, the US has floundered on its own programs for 20 years (basically since Apollo 17). Aside from some bright spots (IUE was insanely overproductive, the Voyager program's record speaks for itself), many large-scale project has either suffered incredible delays getting off the ground (the shuttle program was supposed to start in 1979, Galileo sat in storage for several years, and had been crippled from a non-working antenna since launch) or has had problems (Mars Observer, the secondary mirror of HST, etc.). Worse, several low-cost (i.e., good bang-for-the-buck) programs never got off of the ground (so to speak): one of the last things developed as part of SDI was a low-cost launch capsule that could carry a payload pretty much anywhere in the solar system and was re-usable. I think the cost was somethng like 0.1% of a shuttle launch. Oops.
The saddest part is, if we wanted to go back to the Moon again tomorrow, we woud have to start over, and it would probably take longer to get there (from the announcement of the program) than it did before.
Finally, the comments about a space program being wasted because people are starving. There is and has always been room for doing both. The cost of the Apollo program was something like 50 cents per American per year, and the R&D involved brought us useful things like Teflon, microwave ovens, many advances in solid state physics, and of course, Tang! :-) Increasing our understanding of what's around us, and meeting technical challenges is always beneficial to the general public. Somehow we lost that in the last 30 years, and now we're plunging into a very anti-science/anti-education society. I really don't see how that will help anyone.
Yes, Wernher von Braun being the canonical example. The Russian moon programme was plagued with rocket trouble while the USA had its lovely new hydrogen-fuelled Saturn V.
The reason that the USSR was ahead in the earlier stages of the space race was that they had a head start. Russia has a long history of interest in space travel and rocketry, going all the way back to Konstantin Tsiolovsky's science fiction in the 19th century. In the 20s and 30s the government supported rocket research (although the purges were something of a setback).
The USA, OTOH, didn't take much of an interest in space or rockets until they perceived a threat from the USSR, and even then the funding was slow in coming. Although the USA had the pick of the German scientists at the end of WW2, the USSR had a lot more experience to start off with.
Bread and circuses, baby. Bread and circuses. The wonder of modern American life is that the corporacracy has figured out how to make the American public pay out of its own pocket for the bread and circuses that keep it tranquilized and sedate!
-E
Send mail here if you want to reach me.
"Mr. President, sir! The Chinese have painted the moon red."
"Well don't just stand there. Send someone up with some white paint and put up the Coca-Cola logo."
Further evidence of the evils of nationalism....
......
/.ers.
Racism, and bigotry have nothing to to do with nationalism (except in times of war).
In the US especially, which is a country made from many other cultures, there is no tolerance for racism.
In fact the ACLU has had to stand up for the "right" of racist groups to spout their propaganda because most of the rest of us don't want to have to hear it.
I love my country, and I do believe that it's the best country on the planet. However so do many Canadians, and French, and Swedish, and
We're all right.
Back to the point that three or four ACs posting racist drivel don't represent the majority of
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Communism != Race
Clinton claims to be a Baptist.
Just so you know, John Kennedy was the only Catholic president that the US has had. Apparantly neither he nor Clinton are the most devout examples of followers of their religions.
Perhaps not everyone in China is a communist, but enough of them are to keep the communists in control.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
But like black ink in a glass of clear water, it only takes a few to turn the whole thing grey. Most of the 'racist' comments are just childish button-pushing on the part of the posters. Such is life.
**>>BELCH
Will they shoot him down upon re-entry?
Yes, along with his family, pets and everyone on his Internet mailing list. Next question please.
**>>BELCH
History is made by folks willing to risk their balls. Sometimes people who risk their balls lose them. When they ask for volunteers, you don't need to raise your hand. Someone else always will, for their own reasons, which will always be senseless and inscrutable to you.
Life does NOT come with a chin-strap.
**>>BELCH
Good. Maybe they'll make better use of it than we have.
**>>BELCH
Reinforcements will arrive soon. Renew your subscription to SOF and await further contact.
**>>BELCH
;) Or as an AC put it so well:
----
All the technological advances of mankind are simply steps on the road
to completely replace women. This is because of the deep rage that has
long existed in the male collective unconscious, over the fact that so
many women won't put out.
Soon will come the day when, when a woman pouts that "I have a
headache", the male response will be "Who cares?". Because we won't
need them anymore. Automated cleaning, realistic sex dolls/robots, and
mindless female clones to produce eggs to reproduce the race along
with artifical wombs... the female will no longer be needed. No, this
isn't advocating rounding them up or anything -- they can do whatever
they want. It's just soon -- perhaps within our lifetimes, my
brothers! -- we'll be able to do what WE want as well, without
pandering to some woman's whim.
Ah, the days of glory will soon be upon us...
----
Hehe. But I guess that isn't what you ment.
(Don't take it too hard, ladies. It is a joke.)
This sig is false.
He's referring to the actual story, not the movie. In the book, a US/Russian join expedition heads to the Discovery, and without warning, a Chinese expedition shows up with the same intentions. It ends up being a race to get there.
For a while, anyway. And unless it was in direct sunlight of course.
Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
Thought exists only as an abstraction
And "Voyage" (also by Stephen Baxter) while you're at it.
Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
Thought exists only as an abstraction
That's true, but you're tilting at windmills. The original point made was not that the Shuttle and Soyuz are the same, but that they are representative of similar 1970's technologies. In his own words:
<blockquote>...the two craft were developed using similar technology. mid-70s technology. This technological level lets you do one of two things: build an advanced expendable spacecraft or build a crappy "reusable" one. </blockquote>
Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
Thought exists only as an abstraction
Next question?