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Back to the Moon?
An anonymous reader writes "This BBC story discusses the prospects of probes returning to the moon. The article first mentions the ESA's SMART-1 probe, which will overfly the Apollo landing sites during 2003, and then talks with US scientists about why NASA should send probes back."
It amazes me that so many allegedly "educated" people have fallen so quickly and so hard for a fraudulent fabrication of such laughable proportions. The very idea that a gigantic ball of rock happens to orbit our planet, showing itself in neat, four-week cycles -- with the same side facing us all the time -- is ludicrous. Furthermore, it is an insult to common sense and a damnable affront to intellectual honesty and integrity. That people actually believe it is evidence that the liberals have wrested the last vestiges of control of our public school system from decent, God-fearing Americans (as if any further evidence was needed! Daddy's Roommate? God Almighty!)
.. the next time you're out in the backyard exercising your Second Amendment rights, the liberals will see it! These satellites are sensitive enough to tell the difference between a Colt .45 and a .38 Special! And when they detect you with a firearm, their computers cross-reference the address to figure out your name, and then an enormous database housed at Berkeley is updated with information about you.
Documentaries such as Enemy of the State have accurately portrayed the elaborate, byzantine network of surveillance satellites that the liberals have sent into space to spy on law-abiding Americans. Equipped with technology developed by Handgun Control, Inc., these satellites have the ability to detect firearms from hundreds of kilometers up. That's right, neighbors
Of course, this all works fine during the day, but what about at night? Even the liberals can't control the rotation of the Earth to prevent nightfall from setting in (only Joshua was able to ask for that particular favor!) That's where the "moon" comes in. Powered by nuclear reactors, the "moon" is nothing more than an enormous balloon, emitting trillions of candlepower of gun-revealing light. Piloted by key members of the liberal community, the "moon" is strategically moved across the country, pointing out those who dare to make use of their God-given rights at night!
Yes, I know this probably sounds paranoid and preposterous, but consider this. Despite what the revisionist historians tell you, there is no mention of the "moon" anywhere in literature or historical documents -- anywhere -- before 1950. That is when it was initially launched. When President Josef Kennedy, at the State of the Union address, proclaimed "We choose to go to the moon", he may as well have said "We choose to go to the weather balloon." The subsequent faking of a "moon" landing on national TV was the first step in a long history of the erosion of our constitutional rights by leftists in this country. No longer can we hide from our government when the sun goes down.
why not fly me to the moon instead!
I'll be happy if they send the rest of N*Sync into space. Maybe send them to the dark side of the moon and, er, mission aborted.
oops
siri
Just so we can have headlines like "TO THE MOON ALICE!"
[cue Dr. Evil laugh]
Muwahahahahaha...hahahaha...hahahah!!! Muwahahahahaha...hahahaha...hahahah!!! Muwa.......haha?
[/cue Dr. Evil laugh]
I don't know why this is such a big deal!
that the moon landing was bogus? Wasn't the whole thing staged?
Better yet let's probe natalie portman's anus! Who is with me?
I've very happy to see a renewed interest in space by our governments (and hopefully people). It's crazy to think that we've expanded across this planet so quickly yet when it comes to rocketing into one of the last uncolonized frontiers no-one has any interest. You'd think we almost needed another cold war to get the super powers competing against each other for a goal like that.
Though we probably should solve more of earth's own problems before seriously reaching from the stars, but that could take a long time and I've only got another 70 years or so to buy a vacation trip to mars!
-Matt
--- Need web hosting?
What he said.
I've always wondered about this, did we ever really land on the moon? Now I know we supposedly did, but its hard for me to believe that one trip was sufficient to discover everything that the moon has on it to explore. The other thing is that during this time it was a race against the Russians but moreover a race against Communism and what better way to show American superiority than to fabricate a lie saying we were the first to reach the moon? I've seen those pictures that show the flag waving like theres wind but it's not those that concern me, it's the fact that we never sent a second mission to the moon.
Making fun of revisionists is always ok with me :-)
And the only question on all of our minds: WILL THE PROBE RUN LINUX?!
What is the last thing a child sees before it dies?
The anime collection at the Slashdot Compound!
After I saw the documentary claiming it was all a hoax I'm convinced. I think the Russians should send some probes and try to provide "independent" evidence whether the US was there or not. I truly believe it was a hoax.
Unbelieveable that they'd pull something like that...
Why are so many people so damn ignorant that they actually believe we never went to the moon?
This is a good site, even if they are conspiracy theorists about other coverups and such:
http://www.lunaranomalies.com/fake-moon.htm
Morphing Software
So now we get to prove the apollo moon landings wer e a big hoax.
I am convinced that atleast the first Apollo missions where a hoax. Maybe they went eventually but there is alot of convincing evidence..
I think they staged it to meet the dead line but came through in the end. In time we will know for sure.
The best reason for going back to the moon is to replentish our supply of cheese.
Do you know how long that thing has been festering in the sun?
"I have opinions of my own, strong opinions, but I don't always agree with them." -- George H. W. Bush
IMAGINE A BEOWULF CLUSTER OF THOSE THINGS!
Mining the moon for use on Earth is never going to be a winning proposition. Re-entry into earth's atmosphere is just too expensive.
However, we should to move our space fabrication facilities to the moon. That's the way to lower our launch costs, in the long run. It is a lower G environment, it provides an additional slingshot for launches into the rest of the solar system, and, given a sufficient initial capital investment, energy on the moon will be cheaper than energy on the surface of the earth.
Before that's practical, we need a thorough, ground based, resource survey of the whole sattelite. In order to do that, we need a permanent base with facilities to fuel, service and repair all of the robots doing the lunar surveys.
We have the technology. We should stop dinking around, pony up the cash, and do it.
The good and new comes from no quarter where it is looked for, and is always something different from what is expected.
Not mentioned in the above brief, there is a CNN article here.
CNN seems to be under the impression that SMART-1 mission's priority is to determine the future site for a lunar base. While I wish that this were the case, I cannot help but think how neccesarily a long way off we are from this commendable goal.
Really, if one thinks about it, we are not really much closer to this goal than the last apollo mission, and NASA has made it clear that it has no plans for a lunar base, let alone further lunar missions. As well, there interest in manned mars missions falls far behind other items *cough* ISS, pluto probe *cough*.
Is it time to have a new space agency that will pursue more "commercial" goals in space? Can the ESA or China fulfill this role? I am encouraged by what we have already seen from Russia, but am not sure wheather the can move beyond simple space tourism to the ISS...
This poor guy has been waiting for 30 years for us to go back and get him.
In response to another Anonymus Coward's post that the Moon landings were fabrications of an ultra-liberal government, I have a few things I wish to point out.
First: Liberals aren't evil; radicals are, and there are radicals in both parties, so get it right, Rush.
Second: Ever read the Bible? It was written before 1950 and DOES mention the Moon. Read in Genesis where God does this thing called Creation, and makes the Sun and the Moon and the Stars all on the same day. As a republican, I would expect you to know that before I, a crazy lying Liberal, would. Other recommended readings (in case such a holy book burns you with its goodness) include Copernicus, Shakespeare, and other ancient texts such as Mayan astronomical charts. They all mention the Moon; and don't claim mistranslation - Shakespeare spoke English.
Third: Is it so hard for you to imagine an entire universe full of planets, moons, suns, stars, and other celestial bodies? I like thinking humanity is not alone.
Live long and prosper, you undereducateed fool.
"you and your third dimension"
"what about it?"
"oh nothing, its cute. we have five. thousand"
I think you're right on the money.
It seems ludicrous to me that no one has returned to the moon for 30 years! The "giant leap for mankind" now seems to have been a giant leap backwards.
This is the first moderator who has made me laugh.
"I have opinions of my own, strong opinions, but I don't always agree with them." -- George H. W. Bush
NASA does not like to publicize the extent to which even short space flights negatively effect an astronaut's health. We evolved in gravity and our bodies depend on it to function properly ... and no amount of research is likely to change this fact. However, low gravity environments (like the moon) are thought to be ok.
The moon is not that hard to get to, and once there its much easier to get into a zero-g environment, if thats what you want (for research, manufacturing, etc). If the goal is to have long term habitiation off Earth, then going back to the moon is a very good idea.
Look at http://nmp.jpl.nasa.gov/ds1/tech/sep.html
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
The moon rotates as it orbits the earth, so the "light" side of the moon seen by the USians is the "dark" side of the moon see by the Russians. and vice versa. So maybe the Russians know about the Illumunati moon base and just never told us..
cpeterso
People are always looking for ways for the private sector to get involved in space. IMO, A profitable one may be in going to the moon and back. It may seem silly, but moon rock is some of the most valuable stuff on earth. The value now is in the millions for relatively large chunks, and in the hundreds of thousands for small ones.
While I realize that having more of the rare stuff will reduce its value, could you imagine selling small moon particles (100ths or even 1000ths of a gram) to private citizens/collectors? 1/100 of a gram * $500 * 10kg * 1000g/kg = 1,000,000*500 or $500,000,000 with 10kg and only 100,000 customers.
500,000,000 may not be enough for a small robot mission to the moon (with the intent of returning) but it is getting close.
-Sean
And here I thought the giant weather baloon we normally call the "Moon" was for people to go looking for renegade androids and robots.
I'll be this means there aren't androids and robots amoung us either, doesn't it. And I thought sure I'd run into some, too.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
#2 on the new planetary exploration priority list from the National Research Council is a sample return mission from the South Pole basin of the Moon. So if NASA doesn't have plans right now, they're going to be thinking about it real hard real soon.
Energy: time to change the picture.
Closer = Easier To Hit
hell, we've *been* there, and that was with 60's-era technology. Lets go back...for good.
Go to the moon, leave the lamers from the slashdot crowd and mac users their, then leave, world peace has been found.
WRONG, the Moon is always facing the same side towards Earth, whenever it happens to be visible.
According to top level sources broadcasting out of Pahrump, Nevada (ie Art Bell), we've yet to make the trip. It will be embarrassing when some new lunar probe confirms this ;)
- SMART-1 from ESA (the only one this BBC article mentions)
- LUNAR-A from ISAS/NASDA (Japan).
- SELENE also from ISAS.
- TrailBlazer and Electra from TransOrbital Inc.
- Lunar Retriever from AppliedSpace Resources
- IceBreaker from Lunacorp
- Lunar Service from Celestis (you have to be dead...)
- Lunar Architecture is a subject of study for HJ Rombaut, including a recent Lunar Base design workshop
- Bill Mook's lunar tours
- The Artemis Project
Many of these have received approval - some of the commercial missions seem to have had a bit of trouble finding funding or overcoming regulations and have announced delays of a year or so, but then the government missions have been delayed too.What's missing on this list? Where's NASA you say? Interestingly NASA has spent over 50 times as much on Mars missions as on missions to the Moon since Apollo 17 left in Dec 1972. But that may change now that the NRC has put a lunar return among the highest priority missions.
Want to be involved? Check out the National Space Society and the Moon Society and you may help make some of these things happen!
Energy: time to change the picture.
Not as funny as the other moderation for the guy scratching his head at the liberal myth post... but still very very weird!
If so, good. If not, then no.
except for Apollo 13, which suffered a meteor collision enroute
WTF are you talking about? An oxygen tank ignited, most likely due to damage that was known about while the craft was still in testing weeks before the mission. It was an oversight of replaning a below-spec component that almost killed the crew.
I have no idea where this meteor theory came from.
Do not fold, spindle or mutilate.
So now we can really go there for the first time.
Oooh. Whups. All you Americans better get angry.
No, ANGRY!
That's better.
Curious how you guys have never been back isn't it.
Right, right, there's no reason. OK. I heard the first time.
Invoicing, Time Tracking, Reporting
The ESA is not the first to return to the moon
we went only 4 years ago http://lunar.arc.nasa.gov/
Anyone remember Lunar Prospector?
First lets get rid of myths that very lame stupid pasters here wil use for this story:
Lame Myths about Moon:
1. Landing was staged..wrong rock my friend and wrong fiction as well..try Red One with OJ Simpson early 1970s movie about fake landing on Mars
2. There is no chees on the Moon..However there is religion that bases their worship on the moon in fanatical portions they even put the lunar cresent on all their flags..not to mention they worship a rock that they claim came from the moon..
3. No un manned probes went to the Moon...Russia has expertise at crashing un manned probes on the moon...Nasa are you ready for lessons?
Truths:
1. Nasa is looking for new funding sources to feed its monopolistic behavior and is looking at putting Bill Gates on the moon..no word as to whether this is with Oxygen supply or lacking an oxygen supply
Don't Tread on OpenSource
Lunar generated solar power has the potential to replace every fossil fuel power plant on Earth. And who cares about gravity? We export the electricity by beaming it down via microwaves to collectors on the Earth's surface.
Solving the energy crisis could be the Great Reason we need to get back into space, and could turn the Moon into a moneymaker instead of a sinkhole. This is one of the few reasons I believe returning to the Moon is more important than colonizing Mars at this point. Off-earth manufacturing, energy, tourism, and science all show incredible promise. It's time we went back. I want to visit the Luna Hilton before I die.
He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
low gravity environments (like the moon) are thought to be ok
Unfortunately we don't yet have any evidence whether or not this might be true and it is starting to rank as the most important question of the new (half?) century in determining our destiny.
If, and it remains a significant "if", humans can operate (in suitably protected structures) on the lunar surface long term without seriously adverse health consequences, then the course that makes the most sense is to establish a serious lunar industrial complex before we worry too much about sending anything more than ever smarter robotic probes to explore other parts of the solar system.
For quite a while yet, there are going to remain very serious constraints on what unattended robots can achieve. On the moon we can push that boundary to reach the point of confidence in sending off the robots that will be needed to prepare on Mars (and/or its satelites) sufficient supplies for the first arrival of human vistors/colonists.
Not only will it be much easier to do this if humans can stay healthy for years rather than months on the moon, but that will also open the way to much greater development on the moon when we start to see the energy and environmental trade offs from a lunar perspective.
-- Our systemic servants do not good masters make.
I think Mars is the real prize here. From the point of species survival we would probably be alot better off not putting all our eggs on one planet (hey is that a double pun?)
Since it was posted anonymously, how do you know it was plagiarized? Its quite possible the person who wrote it is the same person who posted it.
/. troll HOWTO", which curiously enough says, "Because you're posting as an AC..."
The url you cite just happens to host "The
All that is beside the point, because there are plenty of people who don't give a shit about getting (or giving) "credit". If you wrote it, fine, bitch all you want.. otherwise go preach your IP ideology elsewhere.
Never!
Not once!
You're a complete idiot if you believe for one friggin second we went to the moon.
We didn't have an "accident" on lucky #13.
We didn't bring back any dusty rocks.
We didn't boot around in an electric buggy.
We didn't slowly bounce up and down like Britney Spears on Qualuudes.
We didn't make any "small steps for man."
We didn;t drive golf balls "miles and miles"
I AM CANADIAN! We didn't go to the moon!
Bunch of Americans did though...
If you don't want to repeat the past, stop living in it.
I watched Space Station for the first time the other day.
I sat there either with my mouth hanging wide open or with a huge grin and thinking "oh, maaaannnn..".
The only thing cooler than that would be an IMAX film taken from lunar orbit possibly with a low-level fly down as they did on Apollo 10.
Next we send an IMAX camera to Mars.
Hell, people don't need to go anywhere as long as you have IMAX.
(And yes I know all about the technical limitations of IMAX having watched them since the very first in Toronto in 1971.)
If you don't want to repeat the past, stop living in it.
The number of posts here from people who give credence to the lunar-landing-as-hoax nonosense is scary. Is this embarrassing, often willful, ignorance, representative of the
Slashdot audience?
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
Seriously though, when will NASA be destroyed like the incompetent group of overpaid buffoons they are? Real progress is put on hold because of ego and power grubbing, while these bozo's waste more and more tax payer dollars. The collateral damage is a reduction in support and interest of vital space based research. Please someone pull the plug on that group of monkeys and let real innovators do what they do best.
"Primitive computers" ... hmmm 1969, no opportunities for deriding MS here, too bad.
I read articles like that one on BBC News, and thus know that space programs are always in serious jeopardy from misdirection and emotional decisions.
The word "manufacturing" wasn't used even once in the article, and only the main-picture caption had the word "industry". The main picture doesn't even show any equipment that can be identified as for manufacturing -- it just looks like a mission base.
Manufacturing -- the activity of a real economy -- must be the main point of sustainable space development. Anything else is the masturbatory fantasy of the academic class. The academics (as unwitting dupes of the aerospace contractors) are clearly unfit for directing space programs, given their propensity for spending billions to get some kilograms of rock and megabytes of data back. As far as a space program is concerned, academics should be used as skilled labor, not managers.
Well, what will these non-academic managers aim for? The Moon is an ideal site for space manufacturing. There's enough gravity to hold things down and keep Human bones from decaying too much -- while also being light enough to make it 22 times easier to deliver a load of material to LEO (low Earth orbit) than from Earth. There's plenty of solar power -- for heat and electricity -- due to no clouds, and no weather either to disrupt activity. The regolith is a fine powder that itself is a very useful ore, being oxygen, silicon, aluminum, magnesium, calcium, iron and then other trace elements. Scoop it up into foundries; melt it with your free solar energy; then use whatever extraction techniques are required to obtain materials. The vacuum even at the surface of the Moon (note that within ~30 feet of the surface, there is a dim but measurable "atmosphere" of sorts involving dust influenced by static charges) is finer than usually obtained on Earth in labs. Imports from Earth will be the qualitative counterpart (people, parts, volatiles) to the quantitative exports (aluminum, oxygen, steel) from the Moon. (Note the exports are for building Earth's orbital facilities.)
The only things making the Moon a real problem for manufacturing are the hostilities of vacuum and radiation toward lifeforms. There is basically an inverted paradigm, where on Earth you live freely but undergo constraints in work environments, but the Moon requires constrained living methods while the work environment is everywhere. If only Earth-based manufacturing problems were so simple.
Do we really want to throw more billions of dollars at socially-inept types to spend, to get JUST some rock and data in return? Why not spend the billions making an industry that returns products and investment margin, and then those academic types can charter themselves flights, housing and equipment. They can go out and do all the science they want while a real economy churns away at their backs, making it sustainably possible for them to do it in the first place. Necessities before luxuries, folks.
[also misbehaves on Kuro5hin as Peahippo]
yes, we definately need a moon base, but only for mining purposes.
...)
1) space fabrication will benefit much more from microgravity: build them in orbit, then use centrifugal forces for whatever gravity you wish.
2) solar-power-satellites can be built with much less resources (and less fuss) in microgravity: build them in orbit.
3) the moon AFAIK is mainly made of Si, O, N and some C (not in that order) what is really missing is Hydrogen, which you can provide by bringing small asteroids/comets back to near-earth orbit. (landing them on the moon in one piece is much harder
so, to summarize: yes, the human race very much needs a moon base, but not as a standalone project, but as part of a larger free-space colonizaiton and industrialization effort.
Working for necessity's mother.
BAR
BAZ
GARPLY
ZAP
ZOP
Just got done reading Chronoliths (Slashdot review Here)
Thought it was an odd coincidence this was mentioned just after I read it, as the book.. written from the perspective of 20-40 years in the future.. mentions in passing the second wave of moon expiditions.
The irony being that the book is all about coincidences, time travel, and how the two don't play well together.
Maybe it's nothing. Maybe it's just late and my mind needs sleep. Maybe.. it's.. just... a coincidence..
Ok, so maybe you had to read the book?
WALDO
WHERE'S WALDO?
Wait! Ask yourself this:
"How do you know that Americans actually exist?"
You only believe that Americans exist because of the inflow of Data.
Now! What if that Data is FALSE?
That's right - if that Data is FALSE; Americans may not actually exist!
And, if Americans do not actually exist then they can't have gone to the Moon!
If fact, your whole knowledge of the Universe may be based on FALSE Data!
And if you think on this some, you may come to the conclusion that I may not even exist?!
Now, a FINAL question: how do YOU know that YOU actually exist?
.
(David Bowman, EVA near HUGE Monolithic Win-PC in orbit around Jupiter) "My God - its full of Malware!"
Yes yes its all another big space race to see who can claim the moon as theirs. America might have got their people there first (or not) but unless they get some guns and defense systems up there quick, those evil Chinese might take it, or, even worse the Europeans!! This is exactly the reason why America wanted to nuke the moon - to make it uninhabitable. Unless NASA gets up there fast, someone is going to claim it and start digging for rocks or all the incredible technology technology thats lying all over it.
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
Face it we're all a bunch of loonies. But seriously, I am so hoping that somebody starts to build a base on the moon soon, otherwise Im just going to be too old to try that zero-g karma-sutra I bought.
What's the hurry? We've got 'till 2019 to get there before the asteroid smashes into the earth.
Chip H.