Posted by
Hemos
on from the to-complete-the-set dept.
matth writes: "CNN has got an
article
which speaks of NASA thinking about sending a space craft out to Pluto,
which happens to be the only planet we have not yet been visited by an
Earth-sent space craft. Is it worth it? Should we?"
We need to visit Pluto NOW!!!
by
Skipio
·
· Score: 4
If there is any place in the solar system we should explore in the next few
years, it is Pluto. Why, you may ask?
The reason is quite simple, after 2020 or so, Pluto's atmosphere will freeze
solid. And it will be frozen for many decades. It is either now or after a very
long time that we have the possibility to do any serious research on Pluto,
the most exotic place in our Solar system. And exotic it is; for example, because
of the gravitational forces of its moon Charon, we might find volcanos there,
but not the usual ones, but rather volcanos pouring molten water, ammonia and
nitrogen. A truly alien world, if you ask me.
We can go to Mars any time but visiting Pluto is a once in a lifetime opportunity.
Re:We need to visit Pluto NOW!!!
by
imipak
·
· Score: 4
On the contrary -- Pluto, although probably interesting in it's own right (what with having an enormous moon (relative to it's own size), is really just a nice bit of PR chrome. Pluto is really just a big asteroid that happened to be in roughly the right place when Clyde Tombaugh went looking for the ninth planet. (AFAIK the body causing the perturbations of the orbit of Uranus that lead him to look have still not been located - Pluto wasn't it.)
The real point of getting out there is carrying on to the Kuiper Belt.If memory serves, the Pluto mission NASA cancelled earlier this year was called the Kuiper Express.
Kuiper Belt objects would be really interesting because they're a huge cloud of proto-comets left over from the collapse of the gas cloud which eventually formed the solar system 5 billion years ago. They'd consist of virgin, primordial material the proto-stellar disk coalesced from. Although there are a couple of sample return missions to comets in the works ('Stardust' mission) they're not going out to the source.
It would be really interesting to look for complex amino acids in such material, and get another data point on the Wickramasinghe/Hoyle panspermia theory.
Once we've done the Kuiper Belt, there's only the Oort cloud between us and interstellar space. Pluto isn't going to look that different from the moons of Jupiter and Saturn, both of which will by then have been thoroughly checked out by Galileo and Cassini. --
If the good lord had meant me to live in Los Angeles
Re:Obsolete by the time it gets there.
by
Kevin+T.
·
· Score: 3
Instead of sending a high tech piece of machinery across the system which will be obsolete by the time it gets there, why not send high tech equipment (or even food) half way around the world to real people who can use it before its expiry date comes of age.
This is a pretty common argument against NASA. It seems to assume two things:
1) A economy can and should gear toward one particular goal or product sector, like "guns" or "butter."
2) A NASA probe launched in 2004 will be obsolete by the time it reaches its distant destination, presumeably because your Gateway Yourware lease has been renewed three times in that time.
These are both, of course, false. No economy is able to efficiently produce only one product, and no society is able to satisfactorily move toward one goal. To think of it in the simplest possible terms, imagine you have 1000 people with advanced degrees at your disposal. Some are lawyers, some are medical doctors, some are engineers -- the distribution of degrees is not under your control. You're always going to end up with a number of them who are entirely unqualified to meaningfully work on a world hunger project. Fortunately, you can solve the problems of world hunger with only 1% of your GDP. So why not put the astrophysicists and computer scientists on your team onto a project other than world hunger?
In other words, we're talking about 500 million, here. My _county_ has a larger budget than that.
Also, I'd like to point out that a large number of the engineers and scientists who work for NASA and the defense contracters (who would probably bid on the PKE probe) make good enough salaries that they, as private individuals, send money or equipment halfway across the world to real people, usually their families.
As for your perception of obsolescence, you're either buying the Dell/Gateway/Compaq FUD that you need to upgrade a machine every five years, or you're simply employing Zeno's paradox:
"Can we send it now, sir?"
"No, we've got a better camera in development."
"How about now, sir?"
"No, this new engine will do it better."
"Now?"
"Wait on the improved energy source. This is going to be one _rocking_ probe!"
"Uh, sir?"
"The bastards gave our funding to a 'faith-based' endowment to promote space exploration. Bleeding Scientologists...."
Re:Better question is, why shouldn't we?
by
gorilla
·
· Score: 3
Why are you assuming that finding life is the objective?
There are plenty of scientific goals which can be accomplished without ever expecting to find life. The current mars surveyer mission is giving a more detailed map of mars than we've ever had before and because of this we are learning about the planet, for example indications that it may be still volcanically active.
we need a moon base. in the words of hienlein (I think), "once you are on the moon, you are halfway to anywhere"
I was born in 1967, by the time I was in kindergarten, we had been to the moon several times. by the time I was 10, we had driven dune buggies on the moon. now, 23 years later, we have sat around with our thumbs you know where, and we think Skylab++ is an amazing achievement, while we underfund or dont even try to fund the cool stuff which could lead to a truly spacefaring humanity.
look at the launchers that have been cancelled or delayed just in the last 5 years:
delta clipper (dc-x) (cancelled)
x-33 (delayed)
rotary rocket (died for lack of funding)
kistler k-1 (delayed - please don't kill it)
Beal BA-2 (killed by a concerted effort by 2 governments and enviro-weenies)
blackhorse (rocketplane) (lack of funding)
kellyspace (lack of funding)
most of these programs required no more than $100M to survive, but couldn't get even that, at a time when our gov't spends that much studying the effects of cow farts on the ozone layer every year.
are you pissed yet? you should be living on the moon by now, not in some crappy condo in cambridge.
[/RANT]
-- The difference between Theory and Practice is greater in Practice than in Theory.
That's what they want you to think!
by
Trinition
·
· Score: 3
Sure, Pluto is the ninth and last planet (at least for this week, anyways). Sure, its cold and smaller than some moons. SOunds insignificant, right?
Well, if you were a reclusive alien species trying to keep from being found, just which of our nine planets would you choose to hide out on? Hmmm?
Re:Pluto, Mars, The Moon...
by
Kotetsu
·
· Score: 4
There are a number of good reasons we should send a mission to Pluto.
First, Pluto is currently believed to be the largest member of the Kuiper Belt objects. We know very little about these bodies, mostly because they are very small and at great distance. They have similarities to both comets and asteroids, and study of them should tell us a great deal about the formation of our Solar System.
Pluto is unique among the planets. Studies of the other planets don't tell us much about Pluto. As such, it is a better target for research than, say, Uranus or Neptune, both of which resemble Jupiter and Saturn, planets we are studying in detail.
Prior to 1979, it was generally believed that Pluto was larger than Mercury. Since we couldn't measure the actual size directly, the size had been derived based on assumptions that it was similar to the Moon or Mercury - basically a dark, rocky surface. In 1979 there was a series of eclipses of Pluto by Charon, and it was determined that the planet is significantly smaller than previously thought. The significance of this is that the surface of Pluto is probably ices, not rock. Other than (maybe) some of the moons of the outer planets, this means that Pluto is a better target than most objects in the Solar System for study to learn the basics about icy bodies. Unfortunately, it is nearly impossible to study well without sending a spacecraft.
As far as life, it is so cold there that any life would probably not resemble anything we would ordinarily recognize as life. In any event, searching for life would require a landing, and nobody is planning anything like that.
The moon landings had far more significance than "because it's there." In science, it's necessary to verify theories by actual observation. At some point we had to actually have rock samples, and direct, close up observations of the surface. People were sent mostly because it was politically easier to get money to send astronauts than unmanned probes. Unfortunately, the same fools who think using encryption should increase the penalties for crime are the ones who decide the budgets for NASA.
It certainly beats waiting around 248 years before the planet becomes warm enough to thaw its atmosphere out again. Although we could send a probe out later, it would be nice to have data collected on this planet before the freeze, during the freeze, and hopefully after the freeze.
Speaking about freezes, I hope this doesn't turn into a stupid, "Well, we gave you the Pluto thingy, and now you want another probe to Europa? No - we in government think that we've been more than generous." conversation.
It's coming up to the next century, and we don't have a permament presence in space yet? A space station does not constitute a permament presence - having children in a colony away from the Earth, growing up, and having their own children would do so. I expect China would pull it off before the Americans do so - they seem to have the gumption to just go for broke.
But, kudos for NASA for getting out to Pluto, but I feel it'll be at the expense of other missions from a government perspective. Fools.
-- I donate all spillover Karma to the charity of my choice...
Ada was still a babe despite what people may say...
If only in the spirit of Mallory and Shakleton. Pluto is about as far as we can reasonable go, at least in the forseable future. I cant imagine that there is any great scientific point in going, but we should, the human race is fairly starved of suitable 'reasons for life' at this moment in history, so why not just embrace the natural urge to explore.
The article did state that the probe would also
look at Charon, Pluto's moon, as well as the
Kuiper Belt. The belt may contain clues about
how the solar system formed. These clues could
be anything, my favorite would becarbon asteroids
(there is a scientific name, but I don't remember
it).
Slashdot Mirror
http://spaceflightnow.com/news/n0012/21pluto/
If there is any place in the solar system we should explore in the next few years, it is Pluto. Why, you may ask?
The reason is quite simple, after 2020 or so, Pluto's atmosphere will freeze solid. And it will be frozen for many decades. It is either now or after a very long time that we have the possibility to do any serious research on Pluto, the most exotic place in our Solar system. And exotic it is; for example, because of the gravitational forces of its moon Charon, we might find volcanos there, but not the usual ones, but rather volcanos pouring molten water, ammonia and nitrogen. A truly alien world, if you ask me.
We can go to Mars any time but visiting Pluto is a once in a lifetime opportunity.
Instead of sending a high tech piece of machinery across the system which will be obsolete by the time it gets there, why not send high tech equipment (or even food) half way around the world to real people who can use it before its expiry date comes of age.
This is a pretty common argument against NASA. It seems to assume two things:
1) A economy can and should gear toward one particular goal or product sector, like "guns" or "butter."
2) A NASA probe launched in 2004 will be obsolete by the time it reaches its distant destination, presumeably because your Gateway Yourware lease has been renewed three times in that time.
These are both, of course, false. No economy is able to efficiently produce only one product, and no society is able to satisfactorily move toward one goal. To think of it in the simplest possible terms, imagine you have 1000 people with advanced degrees at your disposal. Some are lawyers, some are medical doctors, some are engineers -- the distribution of degrees is not under your control. You're always going to end up with a number of them who are entirely unqualified to meaningfully work on a world hunger project. Fortunately, you can solve the problems of world hunger with only 1% of your GDP. So why not put the astrophysicists and computer scientists on your team onto a project other than world hunger?
In other words, we're talking about 500 million, here. My _county_ has a larger budget than that.
Also, I'd like to point out that a large number of the engineers and scientists who work for NASA and the defense contracters (who would probably bid on the PKE probe) make good enough salaries that they, as private individuals, send money or equipment halfway across the world to real people, usually their families.
As for your perception of obsolescence, you're either buying the Dell/Gateway/Compaq FUD that you need to upgrade a machine every five years, or you're simply employing Zeno's paradox:
"Can we send it now, sir?"
"No, we've got a better camera in development."
"How about now, sir?"
"No, this new engine will do it better."
"Now?"
"Wait on the improved energy source. This is going to be one _rocking_ probe!"
"Uh, sir?"
"The bastards gave our funding to a 'faith-based' endowment to promote space exploration. Bleeding Scientologists...."
There are plenty of scientific goals which can be accomplished without ever expecting to find life. The current mars surveyer mission is giving a more detailed map of mars than we've ever had before and because of this we are learning about the planet, for example indications that it may be still volcanically active.
damnit.
[RANT]
we need a moon base. in the words of hienlein (I think), "once you are on the moon, you are halfway to anywhere"
I was born in 1967, by the time I was in kindergarten, we had been to the moon several times. by the time I was 10, we had driven dune buggies on the moon. now, 23 years later, we have sat around with our thumbs you know where, and we think Skylab++ is an amazing achievement, while we underfund or dont even try to fund the cool stuff which could lead to a truly spacefaring humanity.
look at the launchers that have been cancelled or delayed just in the last 5 years:
delta clipper (dc-x) (cancelled)
x-33 (delayed)
rotary rocket (died for lack of funding)
kistler k-1 (delayed - please don't kill it)
Beal BA-2 (killed by a concerted effort by 2 governments and enviro-weenies)
blackhorse (rocketplane) (lack of funding)
kellyspace (lack of funding)
most of these programs required no more than $100M to survive, but couldn't get even that, at a time when our gov't spends that much studying the effects of cow farts on the ozone layer every year.
are you pissed yet? you should be living on the moon by now, not in some crappy condo in cambridge.
[/RANT]
The difference between Theory and Practice is greater in Practice than in Theory.
Well, if you were a reclusive alien species trying to keep from being found, just which of our nine planets would you choose to hide out on? Hmmm?
There are a number of good reasons we should send a mission to Pluto.
First, Pluto is currently believed to be the largest member of the Kuiper Belt objects. We know very little about these bodies, mostly because they are very small and at great distance. They have similarities to both comets and asteroids, and study of them should tell us a great deal about the formation of our Solar System.
Pluto is unique among the planets. Studies of the other planets don't tell us much about Pluto. As such, it is a better target for research than, say, Uranus or Neptune, both of which resemble Jupiter and Saturn, planets we are studying in detail.
Prior to 1979, it was generally believed that Pluto was larger than Mercury. Since we couldn't measure the actual size directly, the size had been derived based on assumptions that it was similar to the Moon or Mercury - basically a dark, rocky surface. In 1979 there was a series of eclipses of Pluto by Charon, and it was determined that the planet is significantly smaller than previously thought. The significance of this is that the surface of Pluto is probably ices, not rock. Other than (maybe) some of the moons of the outer planets, this means that Pluto is a better target than most objects in the Solar System for study to learn the basics about icy bodies. Unfortunately, it is nearly impossible to study well without sending a spacecraft.
As far as life, it is so cold there that any life would probably not resemble anything we would ordinarily recognize as life. In any event, searching for life would require a landing, and nobody is planning anything like that.
The moon landings had far more significance than "because it's there." In science, it's necessary to verify theories by actual observation. At some point we had to actually have rock samples, and direct, close up observations of the surface. People were sent mostly because it was politically easier to get money to send astronauts than unmanned probes. Unfortunately, the same fools who think using encryption should increase the penalties for crime are the ones who decide the budgets for NASA.
"Bite me, it's fun!" - Crowe T. Robot
Maybe there is ICE 9 on PLANET 9! The astronauts will bring Ice 9 back with them and it will be the end of humanity!
Keeping
It certainly beats waiting around 248 years before the planet becomes warm enough to thaw its atmosphere out again. Although we could send a probe out later, it would be nice to have data collected on this planet before the freeze, during the freeze, and hopefully after the freeze.
Speaking about freezes, I hope this doesn't turn into a stupid, "Well, we gave you the Pluto thingy, and now you want another probe to Europa? No - we in government think that we've been more than generous." conversation.
It's coming up to the next century, and we don't have a permament presence in space yet? A space station does not constitute a permament presence - having children in a colony away from the Earth, growing up, and having their own children would do so. I expect China would pull it off before the Americans do so - they seem to have the gumption to just go for broke.
But, kudos for NASA for getting out to Pluto, but I feel it'll be at the expense of other missions from a government perspective. Fools.
I donate all spillover Karma to the charity of my choice... Ada was still a babe despite what people may say...
If only in the spirit of Mallory and Shakleton. Pluto is about as far as we can reasonable go, at least in the forseable future. I cant imagine that there is any great scientific point in going, but we should, the human race is fairly starved of suitable 'reasons for life' at this moment in history, so why not just embrace the natural urge to explore.
Plus the photo's might be pretty......
The article did state that the probe would also
look at Charon, Pluto's moon, as well as the
Kuiper Belt. The belt may contain clues about
how the solar system formed. These clues could
be anything, my favorite would becarbon asteroids
(there is a scientific name, but I don't remember
it).
Eric Gearman
--
Atomic batteries to power! Turbines to speed!