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Top 10 Reasons for a Space Program
Its_My_Hair writes "Space.com has an article on the top ten reasons for a space program. Most of the reasons seem to say that our space programs are here for our safety." The only necessary reason is "because it's there".
its there, and somebody has to explore it right? So who better than NASA. And if NASA want to do it via space programs...
The space program really does need some very visable goals. How about a manned Mars mission by 2015?
How can a space program be there for our safety?
Maybe GWB thinks it's full of Weapons of Mass Destruction? (the little pixies told him so...)
None of the reasons given imply that we need a human presence in space. As long as we have to use huge, contained explosions to move things off of the planet there is little reason to put humans in space.
They also forgot the 11th reason. NASA is a government agency, and government agencies must find reasons to exist and grow their budgets.
This list definately appears to be tailored for people adverse to a space program. So keep that in mind before you take offense to it not including scientific / exploratory reasons and instead has things like "Protection against catastrophic planetary accidents" that aren't very likely at this point.
Karma: Not Particularly Funny.
Well if we are going to colonize anything and for all we know maybe meet other species someday far in the future, we have to become a more mature species ourselves. Currently we are still primitive - led by fear and superstition, dominated by hunger and war. Will benifits of space and hopefully increased maturity help out the human race, or does the human race have to be helped to mature first before we all set our sights on higher goals? What comes first?
SecondPageMedia - Wha
I've always wondered that if there were some crew memember aboard the ISS and something catastrophic happened to Earth how long could they survive? I know people on Mir survieve for over a year but I have no idea how often Mir was restocked.
However generally I agree that if we do want to survive long term (and we don't destory ourselves) then we will outgrow this planet or strip it bare forcing a move.
Rus
Cheap UK and US VPS
So who better than NASA. ;)
The ESA?
I don't think many people think that near space and upper atmosphere research is a waste, nor the observation of distant stars and galaxies for their obvious scientific use in comparing our environment with others, and understanding our origins. NASA is an important precursor to a lot of the work, and defence technology often spaws useful commercial tech - satellite TV, GPS, international telecoms, weather stations...
If you made this a top ten of reasons to send men into space, you'd have a harder time justifying it, but the debate would be more interesting. Especially since current Reuters news asks that very question today, with mixed conclusions. An allusion in general to space left us with this interesting quote, which ties in with what I said about military tech:
Conversion Rate Optimisation French / English consultant
...the only necessary reason is "because it's there".
or the more correct reason... because it's not there. Space is a vacuum.
I have another reason. becuase human survival depends on it. The sun will eventually die and we gotta bust outta here
Two Towers-Two Worlds.One seeks triumphs and freedom for man.The other deems man unworthy and wrecks them.
of course, by then, the machines will have taken over, so the issue of human survival will become moot.
These terrorists must be stopped before they can launch their attack against the free world and I for one welcome our president's plan to nuke the moon. I sure as hell won't miss it.
Manned missions are great PR, and in the future we must have them, but I fail to see why we need them now, with the current state of space propulsion technology (i.e., large rockets to propel a small payload into orbit). Other than congressional pork-barrel spending, why should we continue to use the Shuttle, a technology that is now well past its prime? Why not start with a fresh sheet of paper and exploit what we have learned in the decades since the Shuttle was conceived?
In fact, when we retire the Shuttle, why do we need to rush into a new manned-space transportation system? Why not wait a few decades for a much more revolutionary system, such as a space elevator? What critical missions in the next few decades will really require humans in space?
Discussing Space programs, Jonathan's Space Report is a valuable source of info.
In the mean time, arguably the most important Remote Sensing satellite, NASA/USGS has announced last week that Landsat 7 will never get normal data anymore. After the Shuttle earlier this year... this is not good news for the space industry.
Animoog.org
it is possibly a quicker way to get to India to bring back spices.
I want to see tentacles and laser blasters and willowy arms and ear probes and time travel and leaders named Glork. I want some bang for my tax buck and I want NASA's brainiacs to go looking or die trying. That's my personal reason 11. As a matter of fact, I think NASA should just rename the entire space program "Reason 11" because if we don't discover "intelligent" life somewhere, or it doesn't find us, this really has been a poor life I've led. Screw the grandkids and their inherited debt. Bring me some critters!
Im guessing that when the Chinese land on the moon America might take a new interest in space exploration. But until then they seem to be happier spending money on blowing things up.
Is it likely that if an impending catastrophic meteor collision were to be discovered, the general public would even be made aware?
I've heard people say the US government would not let its people know they were going to die. But I imagine that if an astronomer discovered something like this, they would request verification from astronomers around the world who would then be in the know. And I doubt the word wouldn't leak out somehow.
Does anyone know what the government's policy towards this might be, and whether or not they could adequately silence such information?
NASA/ESA are just no longer the right guys to take manned space exploration forward. The Shuttle fiasco proves just how bad NASA is at delivering affordable spce travel. Generate incentives (X-Prize style) and let entreprenuers build the re-usable ships that could fly large numbers of people into space..
"You lied to me! There is a Swansea!"
"We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard"
Cynical old bastard though I am, my throat closes up and my eyes water every time I hear or read those words. Everything that defines us as human has come about because our reach has always exceeded our grasp. If we forget that now, then we might as well just go back to hooting, grunting and flinging our faeces at each other.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
OK, I admit it - I like the coolness of NASA. I disagree with the article - most of those "top 10" are not in NASA's mission - but maybe it's just because NASA is a good service provider to those who do have strong, even noble missions.
I do believe that there is a good need to fund the science and engineering of areospace technologies - and the people at NASA are certainly the right people to do it.
And I'm certainly not totally against the manned space program. And being American, I think the US should invest heavily into the technology and trade where it still has clear leadership (because we all here see where industries like manufacturing and IT have/are going).
But alas, NASA needs to do more to both commercialize the business aspects of space, and to invest towards useful goals - too often I think that the billions in contracts could be better invested.
---
If we only did things that were "obviously" useful at the time of their discovery, we'd have dumped lasers, RADAR, the gas laws, astronomy, electricity, gunpowder and genetics.
If we only pursued zero-risk technologies, we'd have no refrigeration (the discoverer died from over-exposure to the cold), no cars (early experimentors frequently crashed, and the death toll from early racing was often double or triple digits), and no medicine (even today, the risks in trials is extremely high).
So space is risky and we can't see any obvious immediate benefit. So what? If we'd prefer to stagnate, then why not just end the world now? All life is genetically designed to move forward, and if we deny this fundamental core of biology, in the name of being cheapskates, the consequence is inevitable.
"Because it's there" is not a statement - it is a fundamental law of biology.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
1. National defense and strategic security.
...
2. Protection against catastrophic planetary accidents.
3.
4. PROFIT!!!!
Don't mod me, bro'!!!!
I think we have enough problems we could solve on earth with all the money that goes into space travel. Shrinking the budget by 90% and using that money to get food, medicines, clothing and housing to all people in the world in need is, IMHO, a far better idea than discussing why we need to go in space and doiing it anyways.
The other 10% should get us some interesting results in a few decades, by that time we might have more control over our own kinds well being.
is a Columbia post. (Or would that be a Challenger post ?)
.. but I don't think we should be reaching to the stars until we've got ourselves sorted out here. Maybe when we've done something about our problems here on earth we can take to space. But a race as messed up as ours taking to the stars to spread to other planets doesn't strike me as something we should encourage yet.
Most of the economically advanced countries such as Japan, Canada, Australia and Europe, not to mention China, India and Russia, use their space programs....
Australia has a space programme?
The government "investing" my money into IT and manufacturing, when parts or in the case of manufacturing, the complete process, can be done better and more cheaply is like tying a noose and jumping off the ladder. This would only hurt the consumer and other businesses for the benefit of a select few. For each job "saved" in IT or manufacturing, many more would be lost in other sectors. No amount of money thrown at a paradigm shift is going to change reality. Instead, one should try to adapt to changing situations.
Slashdot: Playing Favorites Since 1997
...is that, chances are, these technologies will be developed anyway, and they will be developed to solve the problem directly at hand, thus making the research effort cheaper and the results better.
I mean, so space exploration is going to solve the education problems in the third world? Are farmer boys from africa going to sit at a videoconference lecture held by a professor from Harvard? Give me a break.
I have no problems with space exploration, but why is it that when it comes to space, there is always a lot of blind dreaming going on?
Just because space is more entertaining than say, cancer research, it doesn't make it more important.
And by the way, we have plenty of time for space exploration before the odd meteor hits or the sun explodes..
Will code a sig generator for food
I hate to say it againg but it is money, not goals. I just don't understand why the goverment doesn't spend more on space exporation. Every dollar pays off 10-20 times on economic growth.
If every branch of the goverment paid of like that, we wouldn't have any problems.
-Richard
Come the revolution, the Bourgeois, Capitalistic, "A PARKING STICKER HOLDERS", will be first against the wall!
The most desperately dumb sentence in the article is "The only way to provide global education and health care services in coming decades at reasonable cost and broad coverage is via space-based communication systems". You get the feeling these guys have a deep knowledge of how to provide primary education and healthcare.
But the real reason to go into space is because we, as a species, must. It's what we do. We find something we don't understand and we go figure it out. We find uninhabited places and we go live there. It's a major part of being human.
Revisionists may take great joy in dismantling his mythology, but John Kennedy and the generation he led understood this. Raised on the notion that we can do anything, we did the impossible and roared to the moon - and the fact that we were spurred on by fear of the Soviet boogieman was only secondary. Kennedy had a vision for what space meant to the U.S. and to man as a species.
Today, we're all practicality and logic and bottom-lines, and that sucks our soul away. We go into space because we must, because we're called there, and if we don't answer the call, we've lost something vitally important within ourselves.
C'mon, baby, kiss The King.
Pssh...that was an ice cream factory, he said so himself.
wannabit you mean
--- How to use Slashdot
So we think we know a little about space eh? Well answer me this Eisenstein... The astrologers in their ivory towers tell us that space is a vacuum, no air right? So how in the name of Mike does the Sun keep burning? How? HOW??
We need to land manned spaceships on the surface of the sun to answer this question, and maybe take that self-satisfied smirk off the faces of the astromonkeys!
http://www.davetansley.com - you proba
"Prevention of environmental disaster"
More like monitoring of onngoing environmental disasters. The money would be better spent on preventing them on the ground rather than just watching them from space.
"Creating a global network for modern communications, entertainment and networking"
I thought that was what M$ was trying to do. So our great space program is about being a slave to the telecoms... Why don't we just put a giant Verizon logo on all the rockets from now on?
"Global education and health services"
Give me a break. What, are we going to try to broadcast PBS to the entire world? The only people who will benefit the satalites and all the other space based comunications are the people who can afford the devices to tap into those communications. Last time I checked the poor in Africa want food, not TV's. The only people that will be able to afford these devices are the people that don't need these services.
"Cheap and environmentally friendly energy"
Let me guess: widespread use of potatoes to power clocks. They have gone a long way to create operational systems but they still need to develope them and they haven't been put into practice? In other words you have a coupel of ideas but you have done jack shit asbout them.
"Transportation safety"
This is part of the the satalite argument. As for the rest, space travel will always be inherently unsafe. The only recourse is to deal with it. When your shuttle explodes, be a man! Face the pain! I didn't hear any of the apollo astronauts whining about safety. They flew with what they had and if that wasn't good enough, tough!
"Emergency warning and recovery systems"
More satalites.
"National defense and strategic security"
And more satalite systems.
"Protection against catastrophic planetary accidents"
Not too useful since it doesn't seem we are seriously developing any of the tech necessary to prevent a strike if one was imminent(sic). And knowing NASA, the mission to save earth will eb pushed back and eventually scraped due to budget cuts. We have to put saving the world on the back burner cause our president wants to go to war with someone else to boost his poll ratings. Plus, unless the asteroid is in low earth orbit, how is NASA ever going to get to it? Satalites again...
"Creation of new jobs and Industries -- a new vision for the 21st century and a mandate to explore truly new frontiers"
This is the best and possibly the sole reason to have a space program. This alone makes it worth it. But lets face it: they haven't done anything in this theater since apollo (with the exception of a few probes). NASA and the shuttles is like an old man and his model T. He is constantly fixing the car just so he can go down to the local convience mart. Chuck the jollipe and get a hot rod.
There's a growing sense that even if The Future comes,
most of us won't be able to afford it.
-- Lemmy
4. PROFIT!!!! Profit will be what truely expands our development of space explarationa and space tech. When companies can make a profit, it will explode. the X-Prize is an excllent example. "win $10millin to do this..." and who's the leader in that? The guy from ID Software, (IE QUAKE III). He's approching it from a prgrammers view point, saving $ and make quick progress. That's where the future of space lies. Private companies that are in it for the $. It may not be the answer everyone wants, bt it's the truth. Just look at computers, they didn't start improving on an exponetial level until the PC market hit and grew. i.e. PROFIT.
Life is pain. Anyone who says differently is selling something.
Lady Liberty is up to her neck, and you've got to find a way off this blasted rock... get yer hands offa me, you damn dirty ape!
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
I thought the number one reason was that we have to acquire alien technology to defend ourselves against the Goa'uld, who are capable of reaching earth in their ships, even if we bury the gate?
sic transit gloria mundi
...this Top Ten list will be on Letterman tonight ;-)
-psy
For most intents and purposes, the numeric properties of NASA funding is equivalent to the zero: 10% of 'not enough to do anything interesting' is still 'not enough to do anything interesting'. Considering how they're running now, I don't see how you can possibly stuff "cut their budget tenfold" and "interesting results" into one sentence.
Also, I don't see how things are going get any better in the next few decades barring some huge changes. Even if there were a mystical solution to some of (I'm not going to spoil my point by assuming you meant all of the world's problems, I'll assume you're realistic too) the problems down here, they would by necessity be complex sociopolitical solutions, which a few billion dollars gathered from the scrapped space program is not going to make or break.
--- What
We need more reasons besides "because its there" to justify spending billions of taxpayer dollars. Its amazing what geeks want to do with OTHER people's money.
Fortunately there ARE other reasons aside from "because its there". Now we just have to inform the public of them.
Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.
Satelittes.
This article conflates the notions of "space exploration" and "manned space exploration." The first of the final points to ponder should be split in two; either half is more significant than the rest put together.
Why explore space and why send humans into space?
While I don't have a firm opinion about whether or not sending humans into space is the most effective approach to space exploration, I wish to point out that human payloads are expensive. The risk to human life is a tiny (and insignificant, IMO) part of the cost of manned space travel. Could the engineering effort and payload weight of life-support, return-to-earth, and contingency systems be used more effectively?
I can't prove this, this belief might be the result of decades of science fiction reading and a biased reading of the history of the Middle Kingdom, but cultures that interact with forces that don't care about their beliefs seem preferable to me to ones that believe they have it all figured-out and have all they need right there. Space, although its manned exploration will inevitably be a social affair, is not the sort of place that will forgive strong deviations from knowing where you are and what things are like. The feedback loop works better with some connection to a non--socially-constructed reality.
In the other direction, that of societies that are too interesting, I'm afraid that a society without an actual Outside will find its replacement in internal divisions, that without a Grand Project we'll end up in petty bickering (think of the value of unsuccessful escape plans to the P.O.W.s who are kept busy by them, and believe that they're putting one over on their jailers). As long as we can honestly say, "If we can put a Man on the Moon, why can't we....?" we'll have broader horizons than if the immediate retort is, "No we can't."
Of course, maybe I just want all the he-men and strong-chinned monosyllabically-named inventor-heroes to clear off for months at a time (and die in larger numbers) so that more {Robert Crumb}-like men like me can have their women.
Finally, here's some "Lear" on the subject of the importance of non-necessities, at least as a bitter, spoilt, old, men sees it:
We have to go in space so we can find the giant sphere that makes your dreams come true /ashamed that I watched that lame movie last night
...or something bigger than us, to simultaneously keep us grounded in something like reality and to enbiggen our spirits.
I can't prove this, this belief might be the result of decades of science fiction reading and a biased reading of the history of the Middle Kingdom, but cultures that interact with forces that don't care about their beliefs seem preferable to me to ones that believe they have it all figured-out and have all they need right there. Space, although its manned exploration will inevitably be a social affair, is not the sort of place that will forgive strong deviations from knowing where you are and what things are like. The feedback loop works better with some connection to a non--socially-constructed reality.
In the other direction, that of societies that are too interesting, I'm afraid that a society without an actual Outside will find its replacement in internal divisions, that without a Grand Project we'll end up in petty bickering (think of the value of unsuccessful escape plans to the P.O.W.s who are kept busy by them, and believe that they're putting one over on their jailers). As long as we can honestly say, "If we can put a Man on the Moon, why can't we....?" we'll have broader horizons than if the immediate retort is, "No we can't."
Of course, maybe I just want all the he-men and strong-chinned monosyllabically-named inventor-heroes to clear off for months at a time (and die in larger numbers) so that more {Robert Crumb}-like men like me can have their women.
Finally, here's some "Lear" on the subject of the importance of non-necessities, at least as a bitter, spoilt, old, men sees it:
O, reason not the need: our basest beggars
Are in the poorest thing superfluous:
Allow not nature more than nature needs,
Man's life's as cheap as beast's: thou art a lady;
If only to go warm were gorgeous,
Why, nature needs not what thou gorgeous wear'st,
Which scarcely keeps thee warm.
What do you see when you look up at the stars at night?
Anyway, how about a more concrete reason for humans to go to space? Here's one: Because there are humans who are willing to go. There are people who are perfectly willing to risk there lives for the future of mankind (not to mention to have the most thrilling ride imaginable). I cannot speak for other humans but in my experiences through life, I know that I am not meant to be caged. I cannot help but feel that we, as a species, are not meant to "be caged" on this planet.
Perhaps these people who are willing to go right now only serve as guinea pigs (giving us important information on how the human body reacts in such an environment), but I'm sure they don't mind (and if any of them do, I am more than willing to take their place...).
Or, how about this for a reason: Robots, remotely operated vehicles, and computers lack the physical and mental ability to deal with equipment problems in space. Here's an example: the Hubble telescope. Without humans, we would have a peice of junk floating around with a bad mirror.
Unmanned vehicles lack two very important things that will allow them to deal with emergencies and keep themselves functioning when things go wrong: imagination and a will to survive. Put those two things together, and you have the kind of stuff that brought Apollo 13 home. Take those things away and you have probes that crash themselves uselessly into Mars.
In my opinion, humans are eventually meant to be in space. Maybe some will be afraid to leave the cage when the door is eventually opened for all to pass through if they choose, but others are anxious to get out and move on to the next stage of human existance. And there is no time like the present to start taking the necessary baby steps to do it.
Sorry for the rant, but views like these are all the reason I personally need.
Those pictures were taken by the astronauts on the final mission of the Space Shuttle Columbia, STS-107. I can do nothing now but salute and honor those heros who have died while chasing their dreams and the dreams of many of us, just as I can do nothing but salute and honor those heros who are still up there realizing the dream and those who have all returned safely.
Anyway, my apologies for any flamebait that may be in this post, but it kind of bothers me whenever anyone suggests that humans should not be in space.
"Empathise with stupidity, and you're halfway to thinking like an idiot." - Iain M. Banks
Obviously Ethiopia needs hospitals and schools...
But what can really make those hospitals and schools effective, and multiply the value of each one of them many times, is satellites. An isolated hospital or school out in the rough really amounts to a few dedicated workers trying push the world uphill. Give them a satellite link, and the rest of the world can easily give them help and make them more effective. (Open Source style)
"If only I knew more about surgery, I could save this man's/woman's leg instead of amputating." How about remote assistance that can give that local doctor a shot at saving the leg?
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
It looks like they missed one of the most important reasons: energy.
ppl should check out www.hubbertpeak.com
Energy is a BIG problem and the population presently doesn't really grap the issues. Already we have had the 2nd oil war. If anyone doubts this then perhaps a correlation between reserves per captita in Britain and the USA should be done against the reserves in the middle east. Doing same might explain some things.
In my mind - there is zero doubt we need to go nuclear and we need to start now. Yet the biggest nuclear plant in the solar system is the sun and the best way to harness it is from space. So, IMHO space exploration and technology can be used to offset the need for nuclear plants on earth.
Yup - we need nuclear but I prefer to have the plant about 93 million miles from my house and that IMHO is a pretty good reason for a space program.
There is a really good book written by T.A. Heppenheimer that explains this (Colonies in Space). Perhaps with the Chinese planning on a station on the moon the western world will wake up and stop spending their time "administering" and "managing" and start spending more time "doing".
I like the idea in general but "enbiggen", I enjoy new word created in English as it is a growing language but to broaden, enrich, enhance, enbolden, merged into a word like enbiggen. Sorry is just made me read everything you wrote with a healthy dose of scepticism. I can't spell my grammar is horrible and I don't really care but "enbiggen".
Or maybe there was some sarcasm in the whole thing I missed, was it the vague sci-fi references and world war II film plots mentioned as if they were indeed anthro-sociological fact that was meant to throw up the sarcasm alert.
So please restate what you meant to say with some meta emotive tags so I can figure out if I should be laughing, interested or just passing by this post.
I was thinking of the immortal words of Socrates, who said: "I drank what?" - Chris Knight (Val Kilmer)- Real Genius
Since nobody has brought it up this time around....
Space is yet another area to explore, but what about the depths of the ocean? There's ongoing research, but much of it lacks the funding and technology. Sound familiar? The majority of the planet's surface is covered with water, but little of it has been explored in-depth. Sure, we might not have a base on the moon, but we don't have one on the ocean floor either.
Reason 11: maintain the value of the space.com domain
Let's use that money to fix some of our real problems like the millions of homeless in America, underfunded schools and predatory health care system. Space will always be there for us to pollute and exploit; what's the rush?
I think this is my new favorite quote. In my experience as a biologist, this is quite true. Life is always pushing the limits and trying to spread to wherever it can. Though harsh conditions may kill the first pioneers who venture into a new realm, over time, life finds a way to get there for no other reason that because it is there.
In time, we will be no different. We will move on and broaden our scope, or we will stagnate and die off.
Thank you, jd, for an incredibly enlightening statement (and for the new .sig ;) )
"Empathise with stupidity, and you're halfway to thinking like an idiot." - Iain M. Banks
Parent is insightful!
This is the same group of people which applaud China's attempt for manned space missions. Then, the same people criticize the US and NASA for doing it.
A little bit hypocritical? I'd say so!
We need to find out if ants can sort tiny screws in space!!
How about as a research station free from the interence of all of Earth's stuff. How about as a refuelling station for a trip througout the solar system. How about large telescopes free from the dust of the Earth, which are bigger with a crew there to repair fixes. Shit, how about a hotel? Hey at least the Moon HAS gravity, space stations do not, which would be an interesting environment for research and space tourism.
Just a guy with an opinion
...is to fly to Omicron Persei Eight and watch the Final Season of Single Female Lawyer !
indeed, i believe someone once said that same thing about ARPAnet way back when "if we can get these computers talking to each other, why not all of em" Space travel is expensive yes, but because companies still profit from it (the supplies of the rockets, fuels, etc) they don't want to change because they would loose $, unless the supply runs out (we'll run out of rocket parts (metal) long before we run out of LOx and LHx. But, by the same token, we'll run out of Fossil fuels very shortly, and OPEC et. al. are doing SQUAT, those engineers working on Fuel cells for the common man should be commended, after the tech is perfected, and the cost becomes reasonable, bye-bye internal combustion for transportation. Nuclear power's only obstruction is those damned tree-hugging idiots who apparently would rather see us burn up all the hydrocarbons on the planet than risk localized irradiation (the risk in itself is extremly low compared to the pollution that coal and oil put out). Have someone replace half the coal plants in the US with nuclear facilities and watch power bills drop like a stone on jupiter. when the fuel's used up, seal it in big drums, and sink it in the mariannas trench in the pacific or shoot it into orbit. these guys are concerned about nothing.
Logistical Chaos Officer http://www.slagg.org - LAN Gaming in Sarasota FL,USA
... would be that it's a great way for a big country to wave its dick around without having to bomb anyone.
___
Cogito cogito, ergo cogito sum.
There is far more money totally wasted on administration and managment by usless paper pushers than NASA ever had a chance to spend.
Perhaps some of the drones in the civil service could better spend their collective time on social problems. While there is a great deal of good work done by the government it is also true (IMHO) that a huge amount of what the government spends on its payrole would better be classified as welfare.
Among those 10 reasons, you left out yet one more, one that had great currency in the sixties, and seems to have been ignored by the self-proclaimed moralists of the Right: the Space Program, along with the Peace Corps, and then VISTA (dunno if Americorps is the current incarnation of that), were spoken of as the moral equivalent of war.
For those too young to be familiar with the phrase and its meaning, it refers to something that was a great adventure, that had risks, where *real* heroism (not well-paid ball-playing) and service to others could be offered...with gains for *all*, and shall we say, malice towards none?
But such ideas are too old fashioned, traditional values for the GOP - they'd rather worship Mammon.
mark
So I can realize my childhood dream?
I'm glad space.com has latched on to the government-by-fear tactic of trying to get money by trying scaring the crap out of us more than the other people who are trying to scare the crap out of us. Way to raise the bar with the whole "future of the species thing". that's real progressive guys. I support space research becuase it's cool and in the end not very expensive. Yes, it SEEMS expensive, with 100 million dollar missions and what not, but then you need to remember the econmics of scale...Before the internet became popular Americans spent over 1 Billion (B BILLION not M MILLION) dollars on phone sex every year. Ok, I don't have the source for that info, I'll admit it, but it illistrates my point even if the number is incorrect.
I don't recall a moratorium by any government on private space exploration / commercialization. Where are you getting your data from?
+++ATH0
How does NASA ban private industry in space? By refusing to subsidize it?
Geez, I thought if private industry were so efficient, they could deploy much better worldwide tracking facilities and deep space communications capabilities than NASA.
This is my sig.
The reasons for space have to be imperial and greed based, or no one will go. You have to look at how the old west was settled and use that as analog for space.
1. Because the earth sucks for some people and they would rather go live some place else. By living on XYZ base, you get away from all the women and stupid rules.
2. Because you can get rich. If you can get your ship to XYZ planet, the United States will give you the legal right to claim the 100 mile square you landed on.
This is my sig.
The Singular? Why singular? Why is space a program? Presumably you mean it's a government program. What makes you think a bunch of expensive bureaucrats are ever going to do anything useful for you in space? Why does an organisation doing something for 'the good of a country' not equal a form of communism or atleast socialism? Now personally, I'm not against socialism, if it benefits people directly (for example in the UK a health service really does help out the population fairly uniformly- it makes some kind of sense for a tax to cover that)- but in the case of space, specifically NASA, who is benefiting here? A few astronauts mostly, chosen by a bunch of bureaucrats to best spout the party line about how great everything is in NASA, which in turn benefits the bureaucrats. It isn't that great; at best it is OK, and in many cases it is giving terrible value for money.
Space is a place not a program. Space launch needs to be run like along business lines, with some competition, otherwise it ends up getting run like the USSR before the wall came down; and that's pretty much what NASA is- a centralised command economy. These things are not good.
Mind you, it's not that businesses are higher moral entities either; but right now a modicum of competition would help. As an example, how is it that the Space Shuttle, which is more expensive per kg of payload, how is it that it replaced Saturn V? If you had a company that did something dumb like that in a marketplace, they would be dead; their competition would kill them off. No, NASA only survives because they are a monopoly, and a taxation funded one at that.
-WolfWithoutAClause
"Gravity is only a theory, not a fact!"Nine of these are really good arguments for a national space program. Item #2 (Creating a global network for modern communications, entertainment and networking) isn't. Private enterprise, not NASA, does this. I don't think NASA could even begin to compete with private enterprise in entertainment and communication industries; it is just a compeltely different world.
That leaves the "top ten list" with only nine good items. I suggest a good addition to make it an even ten again would be "Because it's there".
How about because we gain something from it?
Like the cell batteries today are probably the result of the batteries put on the first voyager?
Or like finding new resources and materials to sustain us?
Nah. All of this is too practical. Since space research and exploration is run by the goverment the only hope we have is that our governemtn can do things for our safety. That's the common mantra these days from the goverment. Its for your safety. (Just like the on going argument that programers should be licensed--for your safety) Space research and exploration is not an exception.
Bah Hum Bug!
I'm not sure that's possible.
[ducks and runs :-)]
I keep seeing quotes like these. Admittedly, there are some negative points about current rockets (which I intend to fix!), but the underlying approach is not really that bad.
Modern, well designed rockets can achieve 90% efficient conversion of chemical energy into kinetic energy. (Please see http://yarchive.net/space/rocket/efficiency.html.
Now, that is not currently achieved by the Space Shuttle SRBs, for example, but an example of a bad design does not make a good design impossible.
The safety issuses can also be addressed. Remember the report on parrafin wax burning as rocket propellant? Ever seen a candle explode?
Just some thoughts!
while (sig==sig) sig=!sig;
Unless there's some viable commercial or military reason to be in space, those dollars should be spent somewhere else.
If there's a commercial reason, then let industry do it. Lord knows NASA sucks at it. The downside is a possible higher risk of mission failure, due to the higher risk profile that will presumably used by private industry. OTOH, because commercial carriers are actually liable for their failures, risks may decrease.
And as far as anyone can tell, there's no military reason to expand our space presence.
NASA is basically a bunch of space truckers...and a government monopoly. It would be better to turn them into something more akin to the FAA, and let real organizations do the real work.
While not the best reason, this is still A reason for the space program (whether folks want to believe it or not)...
...because NASA is doing the kinds of research that makes this a first world nation.
We're a first world nation because our government puts monetary resources into research intiatives. Without the ability to 'expand our horizons' (in NASA's case literally), we stagnate as a nation and rely on random research, with questionable methods, and no verification ability, to lead progress in the future. Imagine if the government didn't subsidize medical research facilities, or physics research, or bio-engeering work? Where would your cancer treatments come from? Who would want to pay for that kind of research with potentially no pay-off? The costs of the types of research that NASA and other DOD/DOE agencies fund provide real world results. Unfortunately, and more often than not, research doesn't pay off in the form of 'another moon landing', or a 'critical cure for AIDS'... but at the very least the nay-sayer's have to admit that we're still moving forward instead of applying leaches to our bodies to ward off evil spirits, or hooking up horse-n-buggy to get from point A to point B.
Remember it's easy to take pot shots at the big guys, but harder to really understand why money is spent where it is...
Let's see. 10 reasons, right?
Prevention of environmental disaster - what we have already is more than enough. It's not like there is a shortage of LEO satellites and if we want more, our present technology is good and cheap enough.
Creating a global network for modern communications, entertainment and networking - fibre-optics are much better, unless you are talking about Internet in the middle of the ocean. Still, as long as we are moslty an urban society, fibre is the way to go.
Global education and health services - satellites might be a useful temporarily solution (to provide Internet access in remote regions), but ultimately fibre is again the way to go. It's cheap and has more than enough capacity.
Cheap and environmentally friendly energy - fusion is much more feasible than any space based projects.
Transportation safety - GPS is useful, but it's not like it needs any addtional stimuli. There will also be a competing European system soon (Galileo?) and there is a Russian one already (Glonas?).
Emergency warning and recovery systems - mostly hogwash. The capacity for taking pretty pictures from space already exists. What we need are scientific advances in applied sciences (geology, climatology, etc.) to analyse these pictures.
National defense and strategic security - it's not like the ability to kill more people is such a compelling reason. Not for me, certainly.
Protection against catastrophic planetary accidents - it's not urgent. It would be a smarter decision to invest more money in nanotech and AI and then get into space in a couple of years with these new capabilities.
Creation of new jobs and industries - we don't need new jobs, we need to eliminate existing ones. That's why nanotech and AI are important. And if you still want jobs, just open some widget-making factories.
A new vision for the 21st century and a mandate to explore truly new frontiers - a completely outdated vision from 20th century. Flying into space will not change anything. Mars is beyond our reach, unless we get really important advanced technologies - nanotech and AI. To truly open new frontiers for us, we need to oncentrate on these, not on useless space launches.
Future Wiki -- If you don't think about the future, you cannot have one.
If you reason thus, then you cannot reason at all.
NASA's risk averseness just about gaurantees that space exploration will go nowhere. And its a vicious cycle -- the more risks NASA tries to reduce, the more expensive things get, the more expensive things get, the more they want to reduce risk. NASA's strategy seems to be about creating an ever more expensive basket to keep its ever dwindling set of eggs in.
Read about the history of exploration. In the 16th-18th centuries, did European governments halt all expeditions every time a ship sunk? No. Even though hundreds of lives could be lost on a single disaster, the governments and explorers kept on exploring. People back then went on far more dangerous ventures with far less support, planning, and likelihood of return.
I'm sure that there are people today that would gladly risk their lives to go into space and return humanity to a Golden Era of Exploration. It's too bad that our overly-regulated, overly-safe society of today won't let them.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
Eventually, a really big rock will fall on our heads.
One look at the surface of the Moon should be proof of the inevitability of this fact. It may not happen as soon as 2014, but there is a slight chance that it will happen before then. The odds of it happening increase a little bit every single day, and eventually, there will undoubtedly be "an Earth-shattering KA-BOOM!"
What we don't know is there, can hurt us. What we do know is there, also can. We might be able to protect ourselves against what we know, but doing so in a panicked hurry is never the best way to do things. And there will always be a chance that it will be a surprise.
If we are all still here on Earth, when that big rock comes, our being here will end, and it will not matter that we were ever here at all. With the exception of a few chunks of metal we were brave and curious enough to throw out of our solar system, there will be nothing left of us. How sad, that we should eventually be reduced to the gold records and plaques attached to the Voyager probes.
This is home, and we must protect it. This is also our crib, and it's time we grew the hell up and moved out of our parents basement.
The REAL jabber has the user id: 13196
What you do today will cost you a day of your life
"It's not like there is a shortage of LEO satellites and if we want more, our present technology is good and cheap enough." -- Good and cheap, and without NASA non-existant. Thank you NASA for providing the research that put the satalites in orbit and moved the Space Program away from Government Space access ONLY by funding multinational organizations and space intiatives.
"fibre-optics are much better, unless you are talking about Internet in the middle of the ocean" -- Thank you NASA, Engineers and Physics institutions for getting funding that did the initial research on fibre technology 30 years ago instead of not doing the research (in which case we wouldn't have these technologies).
"ultimately fibre is again the way to go" -- Conformity is the hobgoblin of little minds... What comes after fibre-optics? Have you thought that one out yet? or is fibre the end of advancement?
"fusion is much more feasible than any space based projects." -- fusion?? fusion?? You need a couple Phyisics 101 courses before making a statement like that.
"GPS is useful, but it's not like it needs any addtional stimuli. There will also be a competing European system soon (Galileo?) and there is a Russian one already (Glonas?)." -- And while we're at it, we don't need to invest in research or be a first world nation... we can sit back on our laurels and be self-congratulatory about how wonderful our accomplishments are, while we watch the rest of the world leave us behind. The keyword in your statement was "soon"... soon is not NOW, NOW is NOW... Soon means nothing...
"What we need are scientific advances in applied sciences (geology, climatology, etc.) to analyse these pictures." -- Thank you NASA for funding NUMEROUS University Earth Science programs for the purpose of generating 'advances in applied sciences...'
"it's not like the ability to kill more people is such a compelling reason. Not for me, certainly." -- Thank you NASA for continuing research into technologies that work from space to prevent warheads from killing Americans who disagree with your work with National Defense and Strategic Security.
"It would be a smarter decision to invest more money in nanotech and AI and then get into space in a couple of years with these new capabilities." -- Thank you NASA for funding one of the most advanced AI labs and nanotech research in Universities so we have the tools available for use WHEN we get into space, and not waiting to develop the technologies when the time comes.
"we don't need new jobs, we need to eliminate existing ones. That's why nanotech and AI are important. And if you still want jobs, just open some widget-making factories." -- I welcome my AI masters rule, and taking away the need for me to think on my own. (Do you work for Microsoft by any chance?)
"a completely outdated vision from 20th century. Flying into space will not change anything. Mars is beyond our reach, unless we get really important advanced technologies - nanotech and AI. To truly open new frontiers for us, we need to oncentrate on these, not on useless space launches." -- Thank you NASA for continuing research in all areas related to future thinking people with the vision to see beyond the 2 year limitations and think about long term goals. Thank you for not shying away from people who have nothing but criticism for the valuable research you do, and the professional way you do it. Thank you for not giving up despite the cost of many lives, and many setbacks to the invaluable programs at NASA. Thank you for the progress that most times is not seen or ever receives a single accolade that still adds to the value of this nation. In short... Thank you NASA for making this a First World Nation, and not shrinking from the responsibility of the difficult and hard to explain work that you do!
For reading, writing and arithmetic.
Finding more efficient ways to educate people only serves to concentrate wealth into the hands of the people who can out-compete the local educators. That's not about education, or quality of life anymore, it's about foreign companies making big bucks.
If that's the objective of U.S. foreign aid, it shoudn't be called "foreign aid" it should be called investing.
The objective should be on self-sufficiency and raising unnecessarily low quality of life. However, I don't think regional variations in quality of life can be prevented. Just softened.
After every disaster (with the possible exception of Apollo 13), the fiascos are seen to be avoidable, not because of technical achievement but because memoranda and whistle-blowers' warnings are found buried in the stacks.
Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced.
The space program is responsible for tech spin-offs that have shaped our world. From the very first micro-electronics (where most of us make our living) to cell phones and microwave ovens. Creating a technically difficult goal that will require new tools and then reaching for it drives innovation and pushes us forward. The payback to our economy is many times greater than anything else the government does, except, possibly, education spending. Beats burning a billion a month in the middle east.
we might as well find cool chicks up there!
They need vaccinations, help with ordinary diseases, cholera, broken bones, babies who are sick, all that small stuff. Satellites will only help for consultations for major problems, heart surgery and so on. They don't need consultations, they need vaccines and bandages and needles.
Infuriate left and right
There are phenomenal resources in space. Some carbon-rich asteriods contain organic compounds and lots of ice. A manned mission to one of these would be inexpensive, as the asteroid could supply fuel, oxygen and water, and there would be only a minor gravity well. Its the ideal base for a space station. Mining missions could be launched to mineral-rich asteroids, also with gravity being neglible. One this is started, the system would be self-funding from the mineral resources obtained.
This would only work as a manned mission - you don't want to end up controlling prospecting and mining robots from earth.
...couldn't that "because it's there" argument be applied equally well to devoting money to exploring the goatse guy? Because in that case, I definitely DO NOT want to boldly go where god only knows what has gone before.
spelling like a turd today...
Not at all. The Chinese are attempting manned space missions with the ultimate goal of landing on the moon. The United States are attempting manned space missions with the ultimate goal of. . . what? More manned space missions? There is no driving vision behind American manned space flight--we go just to say that we are there. People don't applaud the action without a context--they applaud the vision, and the audacity required to realize it.
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
2015 seems rather soon. They haven't solved the problem of radiation bursts from solar flares. Someone with more knowledge on this topic might care to elaborate, but here's what I gather: while the likelihood of a burst strong enough to harm or kill astronauts during the short (about two days?) period between Earth and its moon in which they are not protected by Earth's magnetic field is low, that period is extended to several months when the destination is Mars. The result is a dramatically increased safety risk, with no solution that I know of.
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
Privitasation is all well and good, but structure (read: metaphor) have always receded humans ventures into any new realm. Without metaphor, we have no basis to understand the new experience.
The exploration of space does involve every person, even those who think it doesn't need to be explored or developed, since it involves the understanding of a new area of the human experience.
If nothing else, modern government should/will be inherently edgy of simply letting corporatons run free into space development. Many of the freedoms and social enlightenment that we've come to know in the last 300 year is fairly recent - to let private corporations run free in space would be akin to 'going backward' because historical precedence would give corps. sovereign control over what they stake claim to (under salvage and high seas 'laws'). Not exactly a step forward.
Cultural Property laws will take the lead here - once we develop them further! Those who want to move humans into space will have to be more broad-sighted than these posts let on.
-shpoffo
A science writer who is unaware of science. Nobody ever blamed the death of the dinosaurs on iridium from the asteroid. The iridium was merely used as a marker, as the concentration in the asteroid was much higher than Earth's. Iridium compounds may be toxic, but there was not enough to poison an entire planet, just enough to label the ejecta blankets from the impact. The real problems were numerous: tsunamis, spontaneous combustion near secondary impacts, acid rain, release of CO2 and sulfuric acid from vaporized carbonates and evaporites, and light-blocking dust.
"I'm so moist I'm sticking to the leather." -Kermit the Frog on The Late Late Show
It's the anthropomorphic something or other theory. The emphasis is on the here because most people seem to be unaware of where they are. Here is the planet Earth. Planet Earth is a rock spinning in orbit around a yellow star called Sol. Sol is in the same spiral arm as Orion. The Orion arm rotates around the center of the Galaxy, trailing Perseus and followed by Carina. If the galaxy was a clock and Orion was the seconds hand, no time would have elasped since humans first appeared on this rock.
I like this rock, it's a good rock, but if some of us don't get off this rock, our future will depend entirely on this rock. Doomsday scenarios are a dime a dozen. Just look at the plot lines for a typical season of Star Trek. Some people on this rock believe it is inevitable. However, if we spread to other planets or moons, make it to the asteroid belt and all it's resources and learn to live in space, then we will be masters of our own fate.
I would love to think that some day when the light goes out on Sol that some humans will be popping some champagne and singing 'Auld lang syne'.
Did you take into account how much energy moving the energy to the space elevator climbers costs?
Using microwave the climber gets about 0.5% (that's HALF a percent) of what you beam up from the ground.
Using laser, you get a whopping 2%. So effectively 2% of the energy you buy goes into lifting, and a measly 98% of it goes into bringing the former 2 to where it is needed.
At least, until we invent superconductors.
Then again, same problem with the fuel: You need more fuel to lift the fuel itself.
OTOH, An energy calculation is almost irrelevant to price calculations (it factors in, but is far from being the determining factor). X jouls in rocket fuel could cost Y dollars, whereas same X jouls in electricity from your local power company would cost a measly fraction of Y.
-
All ten of the reasons give suggest a need only for programs which never leave low-earth orbit.
"Going to mars will not reveal exciting new facts about space to the general public."
This is patently false. Going to Mars will teach us untold amounts of information about how planets are formed and the possibilities of extraterrestrial life formation.
Establishing a permanent base on the Moon will allow a tremendous amount of important astronomy to be done, not to mention the potential for mining there (and collecting the vast amount of Helium-III available on the Moon's surface).
+++ATH0
There are no Native Martians, Native Europans, Native Asteroid Beltians, or any other native life that we know of to exploit or offend in our solar system. Certainly no sentient/sapient life. Anything we find life-wise will be of such tremendous scientific importance that no one would ever think of damaging it.
So what's your point?
+++ATH0
"'Cause it's next. 'Cause we came out of the cave and we looked over the hill and we saw fire. And we crossed the ocean and we pioneered the West and we took to the sky. The history of man is hung on a timeline of exploration and this is what's next." -- Sam Seaborn, _The West Wing_
In 10 years, after 2 years of being unmanned, due to lack of funds to get people up there, because of spiraling deficits, and most likely, financial default by the US Government, we'll be chatting on slashdot as they de-orbit the ISS. We'll be like; "WTF?!".
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
1 - For the artistic beauty of the achievement. What greater artistry has the human race ever accomplished than landing human beings on the moon?
2 - To create a long term focus to technological research and development efforts, without which most R&D would be driven by quarterly profit margins.
3 - We cannot know in advance what extraordinary benefits basic research in outer space may bring, but benefits will surely come and they may be enormous indeed.
4 - The economic benefit to the human race of satellite technology is incalculable and would never have been achieved were it not for aggressive investment in early exploratory missions. Who knows what other economic fallout will accrue from other explorations?
5 - Who controls the high ground, controls all. Shall we believe that no hostile power would ever invest in space? If we would have peace, those who want peace must hold the high ground.
6 - There is going to be a LOT of money to be made in space. Once the gold rush starts, it's going to make terrestrial investments look awfully, well, terrestrial.
7 - The one thing 'every' space traveler brings back to earth is the greater awareness of our sharing one planet, a small place where we must all flourish or perish together.
8 - To get some of our eggs out of our single basket. The dinosaurs were wiped out, it's happened many times, it WILL happen again.
9 - To rid ourselves of limits to our growth. It is raining soup out there. We can either drown in our own waste or turn Terra into a garden. Up and out is the only way to grow.
10 - For the vision of hope it inspires in our youth, without which many would neither believe in the future nor strive to achieve a better future.
Peter
On a long enough time scale, the survival rate for everyone goes to zero. The universe will almost surely end one day in a big crunch or as a thin cold dead space. Ultimately, there will be no survivors. The best reason to explore space is simply because it's there, and that's what humans like to do, explore.
" And while we are at it, thank you NASA for inventing fire, the wheel, alphabet, pottery and everything else." -- Is that the best you've got? Because you don't like that I made valid points, you belittle the idea?
"not really hard if you get billions of dollars in funding" -- Not true, billions go into research that goes nowhere all the time.
"Anyway, the point that I wanted to make was that space should not be our top priority. You didn't disprove it." -- Actually I did by pointing out the research introduced into the economy and technologies is invaluable. To belittle the accomplishments by saying "NASA has R&D capacity and it developed some useful things" is simply stupid. Any space agency has to have the research and technology development capability to push new 'frontiers', not to focus solely on advancing technology, especially since most technology finds it's own way into the economy anyway, while NASA trudges on.
Now onto your less important points:
1) your 'rough estimates' fail to take into account the cost of infrastructure, the personnel to maintain, the cost of installation, dealing with contracting, dealing with hardware changes, and even if you got a fibre only nation, how long before the next big thing came along and someone was saying "why not just re'install the lastest technology across the nation?"... On top of that, your estimates only take into account the cost of not only communications within the US but around the world. Think global, not local; then start moving onto thinking Universal, and not just global.
2) Energy from fusion is nonsense... and is NOT feasible. Fusion is what physicists looking for grant money use to get politicians excited about free energy. Every couple years a theoretical nuclear and particle physicist comes out with a paper on the subject. Let me make this clear to you -- it's crap.
3) The last time you checked our defense plan was still in place and the world knew we continue to improve our defense capabilities. That's why you don't have warheads falling on your head. An arms race for the sake of an arms race would be stupid, but logical deterance through proactive and known defense intiatives work.
Some of us will not give up until Lance Bass is ejected into space. The dream will never die!
Zero-gravity porn flicks.
I can think of at least one reason that people *don't* belong in space.
Explosive decompression.
All kidding aside, I went through school to be an aerospace engineer, and let me tell you that space does not give me hope. What gives me hope is the Bible, nothing more or less. Space is just one more area for us to screw up, one more place for tyranny, one more level for evil people to put their foot on the weak, or stand afar off, while they destroy the lives of people they can't even see.
Quite honestly, if we don't get our act together, I hope we don't get into space. I have enough confidence in other lifeforms forming in other star systems, that I'd rather see space colonized by a species that was good to each other (may that be us).
Which is why it comes back down to the Bible as my source of hope.
Now, here are *my* top ten reasons to go into space:
(1) To come down again.
(2) To see what it looks like.
(3) To conduct the Tree Falling and Nobody Around to Hear it experiment. (Note: this can be a very small tree.)
(4) To see what stars look like.
(5) To keep us Safe From Terrorism
(6) For our kids to bring dinosaur-killer asteroids back to earth as souveniers.
(7) To attract Ferengi traders to help boost our economy.
(8) To justify a budget for NASA
(9) To spend NASA's budget
(10) To justify higher taxes: See #8-9.
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
.. X--Prize.
You are saying that NASA blocks people from launching rockets. I am asking: HOW.
You're making a claim without anything to back you up.
What stops ME from launching a rocket myself? The FAA maybe, but not NASA.
This is my sig.
in a capitalist society.
People are worth more than money!
Seems some people at NASA are still having trouble with that one.
This isn't Civ2. We don't have a nice tech tree. Back in the 60's people didn't know that space research would yield communication satellites. Although the technology is indispensible, the idea was then unknown. That's how a lot of research works.
-- Political fascism requires a Fuhrer.
Yeah it's been tried before. The International Space Station. Except other countries don't seem to hit their deadlines or have enough money...
What makes us different from other animals is that we are capable of second-order desires - striving to be more than what we are.
+++ATH0
#1 Satellites (weather)
#2 Satellites (communications)
#3 Satellites (communications)
#4 Satellites (solar power)
#5 Satellites (communications/weather)
#6 Satellites (communications/GPS)
#7 Satellites (military)
#8 Big rocks are scary and coming to get us!
#9 Space is cool, damn it!
#10 ??? - no, seriously, they said top ten reasons but they didn't give a numbered list and only highlighted nine things.
This Space Intentionally Left Blank
Am I the only person reading this who thinks that anyone who argues for a space program on the basis of its ability to detect (and presumbaly prevent) large rocks about to hit the earth, and who also thinks that the biggest danger posed by these rocks is their "dangerous iridium compounds" is an idiot.
I would have thought the giant tsunami and 100 metre high land-waves are a whole lots scarier than a small amount of iridium.
If this guy actually thought about it, he might have worked out that a once in 65 million year event is not our biggest concern right now.
I disagree. We'd get more bang for the buck in an area that has never had an Apollo style program. I think that the next such program should be in the area of medicine -- eliminating the common cold and the flu for example. This would have tremendous spinoffs in basic biology as well as biotechnology.
However, there should be continued development of space for commercial and scientific purposes.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
..who wrote: "The Earth is too fragile a basket for humanity to store all it's eggs in."
"Talk minus action equals nothing" - Joey Shithead, D.O.A.
"Talk minus action equals
It seems to me that most of the reasons given pertain pretty specifically to launching satellites. I wasn't aware that too many people were against launching satellites...?
Downmodding is the refuge of the weak. Don't downmod, make a better argument!
An average car travelling down the freeway has about 9e5 J of kinetic energy (1500 kg car at 130 kph, approx. 3000 lbs. at 80 mph). The energy in 35 cars travelling on the freeway is enough to put 1 kg (2.2 lbs.) into orbit.
Your point about maturity is well taken, it looks quite likely that we'll either kill each other or poison our environment before space travel can become reality.
Unlimited growth == Cancer.
As if there is any other reason...duh!
All other reasons are baloney smoke-screens to keep you from understanding the real reason.
As a former NASA engineer, I just have to say while these are 10
reason that space is important they are also 10 reasons NOT to need
NASA.
Prevention of environmental disaster: This is bogus, and doesn't
require a government agency other than the EPA which should be doing
this anyway.
Creating a global network for modern communications, entertainment and
networking: Agreed but NASA has absoultely nothing to do with this.
Global education and health services: This is the same as the previous
one.
Cheap and environmentally friendly energy: What? There is no truth to
this. It's pure fantasy.
Transportation safety: This is the one I have the biggest problem
with. I'm currently working to try to get the FAA and the airlines to
use GPS more. So they don't currently relay on GPS. Also, GPS has
nothing to do with NASA.
Emergency warning and recovery systems: Yes, but these programs are
under the DoD and NOAA, not NASA.
National defense and strategic security: Again, DoD business, not NASAs.
Protection against catastrophic planetary accidents: NASA doesn't do
this either. This would be an astronomer at a University.
Creation of new jobs and Industries -- a new vision for the 21st
century and a mandate to explore truly new frontiers: It is a classic
socialist argument for big government. Again, can be done without
NASA.
----------
Here's a few reason to have NASA:
* To fund and develop scientific satellites for Astronomy and Earth science.
* To fund and develop advanced aircraft and aeronatical research.
* To fill any other holes that need research funding, but have no
immediate monetary return for commercial investors.
I guess my point is the Government should fund programs that wouldn't
get funded otherwise.
1) Wealth - a single Near Earth asteroid of the right type includes 10-20 trillion dollars worth of precious metals, way more tons of building metals and materials than we could ever afford to blast out of our gravity well, tons of combustibles useful for propulsion systems and for little things like air and water.
2) Materials - There are not enough raw materials on earth to bring everyone up to a reasonable standard of living. Not going to space is condemning a large number of human beings to perpetual poverty - not relative poverty but real sub-subsistence level poverty.
3) Ease population pressures - terraforming Mars, inhabiting large asteroids (inside most likely), space colonies and so on are possible ways to not overcrowd this one planet.
National defense and strategic attack: Space has been called the high frontier. NATION ATTACK AND CONQUEST SYSTEMS are increasingly based on smart technologies and instruments that operate in outer space. Ever since Operation Desert Storm, military operations are based heavily on space systems and future systems will be even more so.
THE REST IS BEING ALREADY DONE OR JUST PIE-IN-THE-SKY WET DREAMS FOR TECHNOPHILIACS and a cover for the real agenda.
Creation of new jobs and Industries -- a new vision for the 21st century and a mandate to explore truly new frontiers: Most of the economically advanced countries such as Japan, Canada, Australia and Europe, not to mention China, India and Russia, use their space programs to stimulate their economy....
Since when was Europe a "country"?
Is "terrorism" the new buzzword that every report has to include in it as a method of persuasion? It's mentioned in three of the ten reasons for the space program. This "terrorism" fad is really getting old...
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
I can't wait to see the evictions!
- How to live in low-G without your body turning into jello
- Is there any value to having a space factory? Anything that's hard to do on Earth, but would work better on Mars or in zero-G?
That said, I must concede two things:1) Space did seem to have more urgency when we were trying to "beat the Soviets".
2) Practicality be damned, I'm on that first colony ship to Mars, even if they have to duct-tape me to the hood. By God I'll hold my breath till we get there.
Nonono, you miss my point. I am -not- an advocate of dumping money into lost industries (like steel!).
But I am encouraging appropriate investment in up-and-coming industries where the start-up cost is so high that only a government can pull it off.
I think aerospace is one of those industries. Investing in a viable industry is good, for both capitalistic and socialistic reasons. Investing in a forever-lost industry is just the opposite.
Interesting! I wasn't aware that the internet has already been declared useless in that regard.
I object to that article, and to the next reply.
cy83rpunk2002@netscape.net wrote; :)
:) Linux Space Open Source Development ..
visit the space.com link? No comments.. no public feedback.. (bad)
Nasa has options for alternate propulsion systems, people and nasa wont push them forward.
*anti mater drives protypes publicly exist
*Nuke derived thrusters GE 60's been there done that
*Not so known simulation of stellar gas in San Diego could become a kind of grav drive (I know I have an idea very much like it)
*Higher power Nuke driven ION drives or partical drives.
The ufo's we have or do not have in area 51
Some damn reason we think Hydrogyne based rockets are the only deal.. What about more back to the roots approach ! Oh yea I heard of Methyl rockets from the X plane teams,, looked around and found out the damn things are from the past..??!? Way back.. But wait.. The model T almost ran on corn too! ?? WTF
Yes Corn, it could put you into space, power your house and makes a good tacco holder..
Basically we need guts and brains, we need to take the cost cap out of building a spaceship..
If I had say 5 million for a 5 year project I would build 10 space craft and have a production line for doing it.. Seriously..
Machine tools fabrication combined with outsourcing and opensourcing the plans..
Composite bodies, Mythil based to start and probably grav drives after the first wave..
Basically Linux in space.
How about LSOSD
Public, funded and audited..
Dear Jebus no! Then there will be endless arguments about which kernel version it should run, whether it should run KDE or Gnome, vi or Emacs... the damn thing'll never get off the ground!!
Trilobites.
They're regarded as "primitive" because they're found fossilised in the lowest layers, but they have an enormous range and several advanced features not possessed by their peers. If we replaced our current crop of bottom-dwelling scum-suckers with trilobites, I reckon we'd be way ahead of the game. (-:
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
I find it hard to take this article seriously. It blatantly neglects the space program's contribution to improving our capacity as a planet to resist attacks from bloodthirsty crab-shaped alien invaders and their galactic super-fleets, which also are shaped like crabs. I think it's time we take our own welfare seriously, lest our blindness be the cause our ultimate doom.
Full text here.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
Feasible, even economical, but nobody wants to put up the gazillions of spondoolies needed to kick it off.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
...some meathead will invent a truly effective bioweapon, or discover a way to fuse nitrogen in quantity, or start a serious tsunami, or...
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
Genesis 2:19
And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.
this idea is Blatantly Stolen from David Brin's novel "Earth." but in a religious sense God's first positive order to Adam (not eating of the Tree was a NEGATIVE order) was to name the animals in creation. which is what we STILL do when we find something new.. we name it, categorise it, identify it. therefore it is a religious IMPERATIVE for us to travel forth to the stars so that we may continue with the first job God gave us. that of finding and naming everything in creation
Suchetha
*note, i am a non theist, but this is as good a reason to go to space as any
learn from yesterday, plan for tomorrow, party tonight
or one out of three ain't bad
We know powersats can be built (solar cells work well in vacuum, we know how to build microwave energy transfer systems, the rest is detail), which is something we do *NOT* know about hydrogen fusion power plants.
Alternative and renewable energy sources and conservation at best stretch out the time we've got to find a better solution than fossil fuels.
Tech Public Policy stuff
Telecommunications has already made a big difference to Third World lifestyles. Video-based (television, etc.) lessons in sanitation, farming techniques, first aid, etc. result in healthier, better fed people who need less medical care.
In an area with few doctors and medical facilities, paramedics with telecommunications-based access to superior medical expertise can make a very large difference to people's health. A solution where the US can provide satellite-based communications and the Ethiopians only have to pay for low-cost terminal uplinks that can be put in remote areas is something the Ethiopians might be able to afford.
There have been several articles posted in slashdot where people posting from the Third World tell us about the things people can do who have access to telecommunications that have made the lives of peasants better. In the face of smug, superior people who think they can tell the poor what they really need.
One other thing. If you want to know why a lot of the poor all over the world hate the USA. . . look in the mirror.
Tech Public Policy stuff
That is what Orion promises. Don't let inefficiency of rockets fool you.
Gentlemen, you can't fight in here, this is the War Room!
Parent of the parent is a repost of a comment that's modded insightful further up.
:-)
Yep, not only do we have to contend with dupes in the stories, now we have to do it in the comments, too...
Julesh (posting as AC 'cause I've moderated in here)