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The Case for the Moon
apsmith writes "Continuing the flurry of recent hearings on the future of humans in space, a Senate committee on Thursday heard testimony in favor of a return to the Moon. Former senator and moon-walker Harrison Schmitt and physicist David Criswell see the lunar surface as an immense energy resource, just waiting to be tapped. Astronomer Roger Angel sees the lunar south pole as the ideal astronomical observatory, with locations for telescopes 100 times better than anything we've done so far. And geologist Paul Spudis sees a lot of unfinished business on the Moon, to develop it as the "feedstock of an industrial space infrastructure." TransOrbital also sent written testimony."
I'm not a space nut, but why did NASA stop going to the moon in the first place? Its been a couple decades since our last moon landing, no?
I'll Moon you.
Each in due time. Start with the Moon and Mars. Eventually we'll (personally) explore the whole galaxy...
Fuck Iraq, the Moon is the Future. . .
This persecution of the moon must stop.
Even the combined historical damage of tides, werewolves and lunacy cannot justify our behaviour towards our misunderstood neighbor.
Let us hear its case.
lysergically yours
...the end of the moon?
Or was that bluetooth? Er...
Should be to wipe the smirk off that guy's face, I hate looking up and seeing that sarcastic asshole looking down on us with that superior grin on his face, we'll show him!
Are you secure enough in your masculinity to run 'man touch'?
Sure, no problem. Just run a power line from there to here.
The Spongmonkeys also make a case for the moon. They apparently like it because it is close to us.
I meant "Moon" not "Mood".
There are large quantity of mineral and oxygen chemically stored in the crust of the moon. In another word, one nice place to do mining operation.
In US, you can easily buy enough major firearms to wipe out your neighbourhood but a few little fireworks are banned.
...folowing by USSR was bad new for US space science.
Send a chinese in space, and all of a sudden, space is interesting.
Can americans be rulled without an official enemy ?
Hate to break it to you, but there is gravity on the moon.
This doesn't have anything to do with China's manned space mission, does it? I mean, now that China's got a man up in space (albeit temporarily), the USA wants its domination of space back?
Condemnant quod non intellegunt.
I'm packing my case right now! When do we leave?
Stick Men
I feel that most of the advantages mentioned for another moon project would also apply to a large expanse of oceanfront property I've had my eye on near Cancun, given a sufficient level of government support. I even have a white paper detailing the implementation, at a far reduced cost. Oh, and the command center would be *so* sweet...
(A libertarian with karma to burn... whaddya expect...?)
~ Whence do you come, slayer of men, or where are you going, conqueror of space?
Would a space elevator make local trips that bit more reasonable? Yeah it might be possible to build that 100x telescope, but how the heck to get it up there?
Couple that with cheap(er) commercial space traffic and these projects become more likely. I see no reason why we can't be fiscally savvy and explore space at the same time.
What is music when you despise all sound?
The moon is just itching for a theme park.
Karma: Chevy Kavalierma.
The moon is the next logical step for humanity. Why? Because its close, mainly. A permanant base on the moon will allow us to reach the rest of the solar system easier. There are tons of resoures that can be tapped on the moon, helium-3, for instance. Once we are on the moon, Mars, Jupiter's moons, and the asteroid belt would seem like reasonable destinations for humanity. We are so rapidly using up our resources here on earth, that is no alternatives are found, we will be doomed. Sure the costs and teh risks are astronomical (no pun intended), but the rewards should surely outweigh any such cost. The trick will be finding someone to foot the bill in order to get started.
in-sig-nificant
Probably one of my favorite Astronomy Professors at the University of Arizona. He's never satisfied with the status quo. I know of other projects he's spearheaded, and he is always pushing the envelope of Astronomical Engineering.
Ideas like "faster" mirrors for sky surveys (and asteroid watching) - where the limitation is that the mirror would gather so much information at once, its too fast for modern computers to process, and modern busses to transport.
This is just one more example of ideas he's been dotting over.
*Carlos: Exit Stage Right*
"Geeks, Where would you be without them?"
"Got Linux?"
At first I thought this was an article about the moon ejecting huge LUNAR FLARES at Earth. Whew.
C'mon man - the cheese. What about the cheese. Geez.
__ Someday, but not this morning, I'll finally learn to use the preview button.
We really went to the moon the first time?
Well, considering there's nothing on the moon that people can eat and it would all have to be imported, it's a pretty good bet that every tourist trip to the moon would add to its mass. So no, it doesn't make one think.
Don't blame me; I'm never given mod points.
Beaming power all the way from the moon is one of the most stupid ideas I've heard. If you want solar energy that badly, you can mine the moon for materials but the most logical place for the solar collectors is Earth orbit. You'd get an order of magnitude better efficiency by not transmitting power over such an enormous distance.
But the article is facetious from the start; they claim the "only" way to keep up with power demand is through solar power. Whatever happened to nuclear? Reactors would easily cover any power demands for the next few centuries -- the next few millennia, if we ever get over the stupid dislike for breeder reactors.
The extreme (!) cost per pound to ship things by space shuttle would have to be dealt with before mining would be a possibility. Unless you're talking about mining the moon for use on the moon.
ignignokt: some would say the earth is our moon
err: we're the moon
ignignokt: that would belittle the name of our moon, which is the moon
This is just another cynical attempt to embezzle tax dollars - everyone knows there is no moon.
perl -e 'fork||print for split//,"hahahaha"'
...that Karma "does not cure cancer or grant you a seat on the secret spaceship that will be traveling to Mars when the Krulls return to destroy the planet in 2012." But will Karma get me on the next spaceship to the moon???
I am not watching everyone - Just You. I know that you are hiding your gun from me, but soon I will be able to see through that tin foil you coat your room with.
See you again soon,
The Moon
Mars is where we need to go. I agree that NASA does need some goal if they are ever going to do anything useful again but if they're going to set a goal, it should at least set a potentially habitable planet as a goal with the Moon as a sub goal or a proof of concept.
.pdf) and the proposed Bill from Congressman Nick Lampson TX to restore Mars as a goal and put NASA on a schedule. Here are a few sample letters if you want to write your congressman.
Robert Zubrin, president of Pioneer Astronautics and founder of the Mars Society has called for the mobilization of Mars exploration proponents to write their representatives on the future of post-Columbia NASA. From his announcement: 'This debate will play out over the next six months, and the result could determine the future of the American space program in our generation. Now is the time when anyone who cherishes hopes for a spacefaring future for humanity must step forward and speak up.'
This is happening alongside the recent testimony Zubrin gave to the full Senate Commerce Committee on Oct 29th (audio files here and the
Blaze a trail to the New World
For anyone interested, this story's author, apsmith, also wrote a longer, more detailed version of this story entitled "Politicians Catch The Space Bug", available here. It's an excellent read.
Looking for political forums? Check out "The World Forum".
For us to return to the moon, there has to be an incentive, and in the past we just weren't able to find one. Thank heavens these scientists finally stepped forward and are attempting to come up with excellent reasons to return.
Maybe some of these scientist ought to come up with a theory that is a massive amount of oil underneath the moons surface, that will really get us running.
Nonetheless, I would like to see us continue our space explorations and moon landings, to learn as much as possible.
YOU'RE WINNER !
Another lame blog
There is also supposed to be a lot of Helium-3 which many scientists consider an excellent fuel for a fusion reactor.
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.
"The Case for Mars", which makes the arguement that we should ignore the moon and instead head on out to the fourth planet.
His arguements:
1) In terms of energy, it's easier to go to Mars from LEO than the moon. (Takes longer, though.)
2) Mars is a more interesting destination: because it has an atmosphere, a lot of engineering obstacles are solved because you can do all sorts of nifty engineering tricks to steal resources from the air.
3) The moon is dead, and has always been dead. Mars, on the other hand, perhaps even once supported life. With effort on our part, perhaps it could again.
Anyways, go to the Mars Direct site.
-Brett
After the final lunar landings in 1972, NASA and the nation were at a crossroads. We landed on the moon but this was partially to make sure the Russians did not do so first. With the "Great Society" in the works and Vietnam still raging, the space program was put on the back burner in favor or funding for social programs and military expenditures. Russia never went to the moon and it looks to be at least until 2010 before China might try, thus there was no political incentive to sacrifice pork projects or "social" programs in favor of expanded space projects.
Though the Space Shuttle was supposed to reduce space travel costs dramatically and allow for low-cost LEO (Low Earth Orbit) launches, the costs proved so much greater than expected that NASA spends most of its budget maintaining the aging fleet and is hard-pressed to spare the cash for developing new launch vehicles. It was thought that space stations launched via space shuttle would be used as waystations to revisit the moon, but as the shuttles cost so much to move around, that plan became bunk fairly quickly.
We must return to the moon. Its natural vacuum and near-constant illuminated surface allow for massive energy and chemical manufacturing. Deadly plagues and other research requiring isolation could be done easily on our moon with minimal fear of contaminating the earth should their projects go awry. Telescopes on the far side of the moon would give us a new view of the universe uninterrupted by light (and for SETI et. al not so many electronic signals interfereing). If nothing else, the He-3 and solar resources could eventually help reduce our dependence on limited fossil fuels to run our economy. Some of the readers remember the OPEC crisis and no one wants those conditions to return. Finally, the moon serves as a waypoint to exploration of Mars and the Asteroid Belt, both of which contain abundant resources that could satiate our world's demands for resources far beyond the lifetimes of anyone reading this.
I'd like to hear from people who do not want to go back to the moon. Most of the soical programs they advocate funding in place of space exploration have their own difficulties, but maybe there are other reasons they have which get little/no attention.
As long as there is a Second Amendment, there will always be a First Amendment.
We definitely need a moonbase. It's going to get very expensive if we keep on launching probes from Earth. Imagine how much fuel you're wasting just to get something up to escape velocity. If we build a moonbase, and use that as an assembly/construction point, then we can dedicate that much more money to better sensor arrays, cameras, etc.
Not to mention, a moonbase is better than a space station because a space station has to correct it's orbit every so often, there's so much garbage in the space close to Earth, etc. At least the moon is a stable platform where we can build stuff on. Hell, perhaps we can find a cave or something and build laboratories inside that. That way, even if a rogue object hits the moon, the labs will be relatively safe.
We can also build better telescopes. Imagine a telescope on the moon. A scope on Earth has to contend with the irregularities of the atmosphere, etc. But a moon telescope, forget it. Clear view all the way to Andromeda.
What happened to all the dreams back in the 1970's? Wasn't there all sorts of notions about how soon man was going to have massive bases on the moon, etc? Now fast forward to 2003, oops sorry, no go.
On the other hand, there's pretty much no way the costs of getting the equipment there in the first place would ever be recouped from mining proceeds.
Don't blame me; I'm never given mod points.
That's a pretty big box! It's not like the damn thing is a laptop that needs padding for protection. Sounds like a typical government boondoggle for the taxpayers.
Problem is, once you mine a few tons of minerals, how do you get them back to earth?
You need to control the descent so you don't drop it on somebody's head and the cargo doesn't burn up on entry into the atmosphere. That's going to add a lot to the cost.
They'd have to be mining something with a lot of value/weight. Any guesses as to what would fit that category?
AFAIK mining operations would be to support other operations occuring in space. IOW it would have to be part of a space-based-infrastructure which means a huge investment over decades.
Like selling an acre of Lunar terrain for $29.95.
I just hope it doesn't turn into 4-1-9 Lunar scam spam.
-
Roses are #FF0000, Violets are #0000FF, find / -name '*base*' |xargs chown -R us && mv zig greatjustice
.....is well put at this website.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
Seeing as how China won in the enemy tryouts, maybe we are back to a mini cold war? I mean now that we have a new enemy?
Hot dog! It'll be just like to good ole days except we're trading partners too.
Wow, this is cool. According to the Committee's site, we could have watched a live webcast of the hearings. Too late now, though.
Anyone know where to get the transcript?
WeRelate.org - wiki-based genealogy
It would be nice if another race would start. I can see our gov (the US) getting worried if China starts landing on it.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying China is going to take it over or any do anything "bad" up there. But if China starts landing, they may decide to do what we were too afraid to: start building observatories or doing cool stuff up there.
Then, it turns into peer pressure. "Well, if China has an observatory up there, we should have one." Or something along the lines.
I think we need to scrap NASA and rebuild it from scratch. It needs a new budget and fresh blood; a complete overhaul.
Bethselamin was it? And do you remember why any discrepancy had to be excreted or surgically removed?
the cost of sending stuff from earth to the moon is prohibitive, but its a lot cheaper the other way (provided you manufacture the vehicle on the moon and never expect it back) so once you set up a (reasonably) self-sufficient mining operation on the moon you can send stuff back relatively cheap
...Where we would be if the Russians hadn't pulled out of the space race? We could already be on the moon and in our life times we could be watching a mars landing, now with the current rate of progress i doubt we will see any of it. At least MoonRaker wouldn't be the only James Bond film that is out of sync with the other movies. We could of already done that. Or as i die i'll hear something and miss it!
Jonathanjk.com
I'd much rather see us do things in space that lead us to establish a permanent presence in space than see a manned Mars mission. I'm always worried that the Mars mission would turn out like the Apollo program, where most of the gains are just abandoned after their political objectives have been obtained.
I like the idea of using the Moon as a base for industry and power generation. I've always maintained that humanity's presence in space will never be sustained until there's a buck to be made. Much better to have your pollution generated away from home, anyway.
I did RTFA on power collection from the Moon, but I'm still amused by the notion that the beams will be "less intense than the noontime sun." Don't we already get that much power already, *from the noontime sun?*
i've been told, don't see a "man in the moon" at all.
apparently they see a rabbit.
i checked it out the other night, and it does look like a rabbit.
Why would you want to have a base on the moon? The moon is at the bottom of a gravity well. It takes energy to get down and energy to climb back out. And all the time you are at the bottom of the well, random space rocks are being accellerated at you without the benefit of an atmosphere to afford you some protection.
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
What exists on the Moon that cannot be found or created at a price tag magnitudes lower on the Earth?
When we talk about going to the Moon, we're talking about Billions of dollars. That being said, I'm a _HUGE_ space and astronomy nut, but I do not see how going there will improve anything other than our nationalism. Perhaps it may help open the way for future cost effective space travel, BUT we are by no means anywhere near the point where we can justify the govt subsidizing such expenditures because the gains are VERY far away.
Yes, space gave us Tang and Velcro but putting Shuttles into orbit and people on the Moon have not cured _any_ diseases. I would *love* to see Americans on the Moon again and I'd even be willing to help front the bill, BUT the Country does not consider this important.
Don't you guys get it? We can use the moon to develop beings that can live in the vacuum of space. That way we can then go on to spend our entire lives floating aimlessly in space forever. Nice, eh?
Survival of the Fittest!
No, my miond isn't what it once was.
Stick Men
near-constant illuminated surface allow for massive energy and chemical manufacturing...... .... Telescopes on the far side of the moon would give us a new view of the universe uninterrupted by light
The moon has a 29.5 day cycle meaning that places on the moon experience about 15 days of daylight and about 15 days of night. The far side of the moon gets just as much (and just as little) sunlight as the near side. Only radio telescopes would see a big advantage on the farside by using the moon to block the Earth's noisy radio chatter.
Its a minor point, but it does have implications for what you can do on the moon and the special engineering challenges of the environment (e.g., storing 15 days of solar power).
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
Yes.
I've always thought the Moon would be a great place for a telescope, and he lays it all out in detail, including:
He does miss one trick, which is that the moon itself provides the stiff structure required for long-baseline interferometry, which would be necessary to image planets around other stars.
It's really nice to see this idea wrapped up in a neat package.
"You can't get something for nothing." - my grandfather, on the stock market and Reaganomics.
Well, the MPAA & RIAA haven't quite covered that area with lawyers yet.
:P
Might as well cover the moon before someone sets up a big movie & mp3 site, right?
How far would $87 Billion gone towards development of a research outpost on the Moon?
I wish we had leaders that are looking up and beyond and not try to right personal vendettes at the expense or our future.
And BTW If deficits are o.k., which is what I have been hearing lately, why not go into hock for something for something with vision and with real lasting value.
where else could we put the giant frickin' laser?
buy up that land quick n charge nasa to land/live on your land :P
Nope. That's the major difference between americans and sheeps:
- Sheeps need the leader;
- Americans need the leader AND the enemy.
If you don't like it then come to live in Europe - somehow they manage to live without an enemy AND without a leader too.Less is more !
I bought a copy back in 1973.
I've always wondered what the cheapest and best way would be to get to the moon. Initially I thought mount the Space shuttle to a bigger rocket (Say a Saturn V+) and put a lunar module of some sort into the cargo bay. Voila instant moon mission.
:-)
Either that or take one of the existing space plane projects to replace the Space shuttle and retrofit it with enough fuel to get to the moon (again maybe a bigger rocket required to launch this shuttle).
However IANAPM (I am not a physics major) so I throw the field open to anyone who is and ask for suggestions
...in bed
Hell, let's get all those unemployed Russian missle, err, rocket scientists on OUR PAYROLL, too. We should find a way to hire their unemployed nuclear enginneers also. But I have no idea how we can squeeze their biologists onto this plan -- maybe we need a seperate program to cure cancer. Yeaaaaahh, that's the ticket
Better spending the money on indirectly productive uses than pissing it away on some damn war or aid program later.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
When NASA was preparing for the Apollo Project, it took the astronauts to a Navajo reservation in Arizona for training. One day, a Navajo elder and his son came across the space crew walking among the rocks.
The elder, who spoke only Navajo, asked a question. His son translated for the NASA people: "What are these guys in the big suits doing?"
One of the astronauts said that they were practicing for a trip to the moon. When his son relayed this comment the Navajo elder got all excited and asked if it would be possible to give to the astronauts a message to deliver to the moon.
Recognizing a promotional opportunity when he saw one, a NASA official accompanying the astronauts said, "Why certainly!" and told an underling to get a tape recorder. The Navajo elder's comments into the microphone were brief. The NASA official asked the son if he would translate what his father had said. The son listened to the recording and laughed uproariously. But he refused to translate.
So the NASA people took the tape to a nearby Navajo village and played it for other members of the tribe. They too laughed long and loudly but also refused to translate the elder's message to the moon. Finally, an official government translator was summoned. After he finally stopped laughing the translator relayed the message: "Watch out for these assholes. They have come to steal your land."
include $sig;
1;
How long before the neocons see opportunities to "create wealth" (feh!) by making underground living spaces on the moon and nuke it to pieces. Anyone see the latest version of the Time Machine?
Un-news
About solar power beamed down from the moon...
;)
Holy Crap!
Hope their aim is good...
Interestingly, Sim City has had power plants like this in the game for several years. I thought they were just pipe-dreaming
But seriously.. I am failing to understand the difference in output between lunar collection and terrestrial collection.
Sure i understand things like clouds and nighttime will render terrestrial collection of solar energy. But on earth, don't we also require vast square miles of solar collectors to equal the output of a very small fossil-fuel power plant? I always understood that it takes a lot of surface area to gather a useable amount energy.
Does the lack of an atmosphere change this for lunar collection? Are the microwave beam projections less subject to scatter in the atmosphere?
Or are we simply going to do this by overkill- covering the entire face of the moon with solar collectors and processing facilities?
Anyone able to enlighten, or point me in the right direction?
Thanks.
do() || do_not();
so they can have some self esteem after getting their asses kicked by OU.
Wouldn't altering the mass of the moon alter its gravitational attraction to the Earth, and therefore its orbit and also the tides on Earth? You'd have the greens up in arms if you even suggested lunar mining.
..... I know it's big ..... but even a few gigagrammes could make a difference, especially if they were transported to Earth.
Now, space is pretty much unpollutable by human standards {there just is not enough junk on this planet} but actually going around transporting bits of rock from one lump of rock to another is asking for trouble. Anything mined on the moon, should stay on the moon. Alright
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
> No, my miond isn't what it once was.
Ah well. Personally, I don't see it happening, at least not with excrement. Maybe it would be significant if a billion megatons (bogus large mass) of resources were brought to the moon from some other place.
A giant LASER on the moon...two of them.....We'll call them:
Moon Unit Alpha
and
Moon Unit Zappa
MUHAAHAAHAA....MUHAHAA HAAHAA
WTF? Over?
I say we just shoot the damn thing down and be done with it.
--I'm not talking about dance lessons. I'm talking about putting a brick through the other guy's windshield.-
Quite frankly, I believe the military advantages would be what gets us back there. The old "Star Wars" missile destruction system concept and Dr. Evil-esque destructive lasers are far more likely to get funding. I'b betting the moon, if developed and used for research, is likely to be mostly military in its goals (the exploration/scientific projects would be good PR, can help keep the military projects secret, and can actually work to facilitate the military projects).
GL
I suggest you go read this paper about the economic viability of a Matian Colony. It was writtent by Robert Zubrin, of Lockheed Martin Astronautics.
Many people thought that there wasn't a buck to be made from the "worthless wilderness" in newly-discovered America or Australia back then.
Maybe we deserve this world ?
After the millions of years it takes to explore the galaxy, who will be "we"?
Internet reaches moon base... due to it's low gravity ejaculation reaches escape velosity... film at 11.
the moon
Creationists are a lot like zombies. Slow, but powerful and numerous. And they all want to eat our brains.
The Moon is just not worth it in terms of energy and materials - if you want solar collectors, a better place for them is in HEEO (highly elliptic Earth orbit), which experiences 99% sunshine, versus 50% for a location on the lunar surface. Add to that the difficulty in breaking down the highly oxidized lunar regolith, and the transporting the equipment to do so to the Moon, and you have one very expensive mining operation.
The Moon may be useful as a platform for observatories (both optical and radio), but it's important to recognize that those are not commercially viable enterprises.
Now, if you want to build things in space (solar collectors, colonies, etc), the best place to go looking for materials is the NEOs (Near Earth objects) that pass close to the Earth on a regular basis. About half of the NEOs out there are main belt asteriods that have had their orbits perturbed by Jupiter. The other half are extinct comets that have been pulled into short-term orbits and had all the ice in the first few meters of their surface removed. Between these two, you have everything you need: metals, organics, water, clays, salts, etc. All things that the Moon is severely lacking in. It has been remarked upon that the slag left over from processing the average NEO would be worht more than regolith.
---------------
Vpered na Mars!
So how soon after we start stripping the moon of resources are we going to experience the tidal waves. How about the hurricanes and other phenomena that the moon has been theorized as possibly affecting???
Does this seem like a scary idea to anyone else?
:-( --- argh. Despair, I owe again.
IMHO, throwing some money at nanotube research is a very good investment, considering the myriad applications. However, designing your entire space program around a technology that may never be possible seems overly risky.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
Forget about energy, resources, or research.
You know everyone just wants to be able to get laid in zero G!
hell, maybe we should have mentioned this back when clinton was still president....
"Computer games don't affect kids; I mean if Pac-Man affected us as kids, we'd all be running around in darkened rooms,
Telescopes on the Moon - COOL!
Instead of just mining the moon, it provides a perfect place to set up power generating stations.
No one lives there so you'll never hear the "not in my backyard" argument from anyone.
These would be atmosphere-independent power plants that beam down energy to earth for consumption. It would eliminate the risk of neighborhood casualties if something goes wrong as well as eliminate the risk to humans of accumulated pollution from these power plants (everything that converts energy generates some form of pollution). Examples of power generating techniques that come to mind are solar and nuclear.
And don't go dismissing nuclear! We've already launched nuclear fueled space probes. It's already out there. And on keeping space pristine - how about keeping Earth pristine? We're not going to stop power (and pollution) generation, so why not explore this feasibility?
One side of the moon always faces earth which may provide assistance in implementing the idea. It's still hard to accomplish, but at least we could make use of this unique orbit.
One problem to establishing any sort of above-ground structures on the moon is that its surface is visibly beat-up while Earth has less scars of similar type. Any structure there will not have the protection our atmosphere provides.
Another problem would be temperature fluctuations experienced due (again) to the lack of an atmosphere.
Just an idea, and I'm sure this is going to get picked apart.
This is not my sig.
What about people who bought acres of land on the moon?. Do we have any mineral rights? Propbably not, but I don't want them messing up my land digging holes all over the place.
First off, the air pressure, gravity, sunlight, and temperature in the upper atmosphere on venus is very close to earth's. It also has a ton of carbon based chemichals for sustained life and oxygen in such an environment could be easially extracted. If fact it is the closest in the solar system to earth.
Even though the upper atmosphere is mostly sulfuric acid, dealing with that is a lot easier than dealing with the vacume of space, lack of gravity, extreme tempurature shifts and almost complete lack of extra hydrogen, oxygen, and carbon. A slightly pressurized oxygen baloon could easially float on it's own weight and sustain large city complexes, and if it leaked it could be fixed in due time and wouldn't immediately kill everybody.
But most importantly - life on venus would be self sustainable because there are loads of natural resources and absolutely no shortage of carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, and a variety of other elements. (not in raw form of course)
plz help!
Wouldn't altering the mass of the moon alter its gravitational attraction to the Earth, and therefore its orbit and also the tides on Earth? You'd have the greens up in arms if you even suggested lunar mining.
Well said.
Maybe i'm not geeky enough, but my interests are to leave the moon as much alone as possible. The power from moon idea is interesting, but i hope it doesn't mean covering the entire White Face with solar collectors.
However, given the greed and short-sightedness of mankind on earth, i'm sure it's only a matter of time before it happens.
do() || do_not();
is that we like the moon
Earth First! (We can mine the other planets later.)
Seriously, has anyone given any thought to NOT fucking with the moon? I'm reminded of that episode of The Tick, where Chairface Chippendale carves his name into the moon with a giant laser.
I can finally start charging rent for what I thought was a gag gift from www.lunarembassy.com, yay! =]
Other than the fuel costs in getting to the moon, wouldn't the moon be a better place to have a base than in earth orbit?
Is the small amount of lunar gravity less of an obstacle to, say, Mars or elsewhere than Earth? Could we assemble a larger space ship on the moon than we could in LEO, or easier? (Some gravity being easier than the free-fall of orbit?)
Returning to the Moon should be our next step.
NO! NO! Mars is a much better place to go. The Moon is a pile of dead rock!
We need SSTO.
NO! NO! SSTO is too difficult and expensive! Expendables can do the job more cheaply until we've developed better technology.
Capsules are stupid, you have little control over your landing area.
Winged spacecraft are stupid! Wings are dead weight on the way up.
Coming down on rockets (Delta Clipper) is stupid. You have to carry your landing fuel up, and then down, again.
No concensus whatsoever. As a result, we either do NOTHING, or we do things halfway, and then change direction, which is WORSE.
IMHO, one thing the space station has taught us is that building and running a space station is HARD. If there's ONE piece of value we should get out of the ISS, it's how the heck we can do it BETTER, if we can just get a Next Time.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
Mars may be cool but if you don't want to tranform the whole planet into second Earth there are almost no advantages of having Mars colonies compared to Moon colonies and there are many disadvantages caused by its distance from Earth. On average opositions it is 202 times farther from Earth than Moon and light travels a few minutes from it. It takes months for spaceprobes to travel to Mars during most favorable conditions.
It is important to explore Mars but its colonization is a completely different story.
Save the bandwidth. Don't use sigs!
IMNSHO, we shouldn't be pushing for Mars *OR* the moon. The moon is better, simply because of its proximity and the small size of its gravity well, but even the moon should be second to our exploration of the asteroids. Raw materials found there would be readily exploitable, and given solar sail technologies would be cheap to move. This would allow us to build better infrastructure in Earth orbit which would assist in any future exploration.
Has anyone here considered the negative side effects to mining the moon? As we Luna, we will be removing mass. As we all should know, less mass means less gravity. Less gravity means our tides won't be as strong and our axis of rotation could wobble wildly and end up killing everything on the planet.
That's a Doomsday scenario that would take a very long time to be relevant, but it's worth consideration.
What is your penile percentile?
because the only name on every lunar lander's plaque is richard m. nixon...
Don't let anyone suggest storing nuclear waste there!
First off, scrap the space shuttle. It is NOT the economical means of getting cargo up into space. Everybody knows that.
There. Now that the boondoggole is jettisoned, we'll use rockets to launch the cargo.
A Good Intro to NetBS
It takes 1/50th the energy -- less, counting atmospheric drag -- to launch materials from the moon into space than from Earth. This could be accomplished using compressed gasses liberated from the lunar crust, or an electromagnetic accelerator.
It'll probably fall on deaf ears because we have a world empire to free while we let the home infrastructure crumble from lack of care. Besides, this is a presidency that doesn't need cabinet level advice on science.
But I suppose pessimism isn't really in order. The Russians had to shock us by orbiting first before we got it together to aim for the moon. Get a permanent Chinese moonbase and we'll see if we still have what it takes to top that. Valles Marineris here we come (taking the round-about route)!
Yeesh, that's pathetic. Sounds like Kucinich would have made a great Central Planner under Stalin...
Stop by my site where I write about ERP systems & more
I believe that more funding at NASA should be allocated for deploying probes instead of future lunar landings. The cost of sending humans into space far outweighs the cost/benefits of probe missions.
Nixon was well known for his hatered of JFK and anything dealing with JFK. In addition, he wanted to balance the budget (admirable). Once he got in, he told NASA to prepare for killing off future moon missions, so they came up with a shuttle that looked like Rutan's baby. Unfortunatly, it was going to cost a lot, so Nixon had them axe a lot of money, where they came up with the Current Shuttle (via a long road of deciet from Nixon and NASA).
The truely sad part is that every president along the way starts good and interesting projects, but a presidential party change will normally kill it off.
While I dispise the fact that GB allowed state influence to allow the Super Collider to go to Texas, It was clinton that killed in retaliation for democrat projects killed in the past. Bad way to get Large projects done. I suspect that the only way we will accomplish large projects is by having the same party in control for several admins (democrats through the 60's).
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
But if you're looking away from the sun, what stray light are you getting?
If you really start examining telescope optics, you find that many internal surfaces are "visible" to the detector. Light bouncing off of telescope structures, edges of apertures, and the rims of lenses all tend to get into the image. That is why the insides of optical systems are flat-black. The problem is that even the flattest, flat-black actually reflects some light (e.g., black velvet reflects 0.25% of light). Thus, a black object in full sun is much brighter than a magnitude 30 star. Also, any dust on the main mirror or defects in the mirror will scatter light into the optical path.
And if I hear one more person refer to the far side of the moon as the 'dark' side, I'm going to scream.
LOL! AGREED!!!
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
Given a large quantity of silicates to shield atmospheric descent, we could create chemical forms of energy and 'drop' them into earth's atmosphere. I wonder where we'd find all those silicates though, being that the moon is made of green cheese....
It was because the aliens were already there and told us not to go there. Why do you think we keep losing probes when they get near Mars?
We're not a presence in space because we can only go on camping trips there, and there's not much useful you can do on a camping trip other than take pictures of yourself among the beautiful scenery.
It's not enough to do camping trips. It's not enough to have an outpost that is continually restocked from home. It's not enough to have a self-supporting village out there. What is needed is a colony out there with the ability to build more colonies. Once we have a that, we can fill the space between the planets in the solar system. The reason to do that is to have more grandchildren.
We don't have the technology to build a self-supporting village, much less a colony that can build new colonies. The moon can give us raw materials, but I doubt that its gravity is enough to prevent long-term bone loss and muscle atrophy in humans. We should look into rotating structures for how to live in space. And we need to work on closed biosystems. We've made good progress on solar cells, computers, and robots in recent decades, which definitely helps.
So the value to harvest moon materials is creating things in orbit that we don't need so we can harvest more moon materials that are still cheaper to derive from the earth!!!!
Seriously, the resources available in Antarctica dwarf those compared to the moon. It is desolate barren and hostile. It is still MILLIONS of times cheaper to access than the moon. I haven't seen any great commercial effort to harvest antarctica!!!!!
-------- -------- Support Wesley Clark for president!!!
Lets face it, its sunset for the US manned space program. Huge, bloated projects like the $90 billion Space Station, that might not even be completed. then endless introspection when there is an accident.
China has an efficient, working space program. They've cloned, and modernized the Soyuez, which is a much more cost-effective space vehicle than the space shuttle. And China has a national spirit for science. Its not like the US and Europe when leftists endlessly whine about hazards of progress and diversion of funds from social needs. And the US in a new Vietnam, an interminable war in Iraq and sinkhole for any economic surplus for science.
"Ruguo nimen yao fangwen yuhuan, bixu xuexi Zhongwen!"
For god sakes. If they come across a large black obilisk, please leave it alone and put it back. You just don't know where those things have been.
I have a second sig, I call it sig#2.
And if the cloud bursts, thunder in your ear You shout and no one seems to hear. And if the band you're in starts playing different tunes I'll see you on the dark side of the moon.
There's a growing sense that even if The Future comes,
most of us won't be able to afford it.
-- Lemmy
Right now, our real problem is simply being able to put anything into space. So before worrying about sending ppl to Mars, lets just get rockets built again that can put real loads into space. From there, we can get to both Mars and the Moon.
One nice thing about going to the Moon, is that it is close and it is easy to get people (and politicians) interested in staying in space. Since 1972, we have slowly killed off our space capabilities at every single administration. If we can get to the Moon with any real capabilities, then we can go to Mars (and the opposite).
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I'd rather spend the money on a space elevator. Once you can get things into space at a lower cost and time frame, going to the moon and mars would be easier.
The whole mess we have with space travel looks astonishingly like a half-dozen Democratic Presidential candidates.
They're all criticizing the incumbent, be it Bush or NASA, they're all making their own proposals, and they're all tearing down the others' proposals. In the end, the incumbent (Bush or NASA) gets trashed and no viable alternative emerges.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
The issue here is not whether Criswell's moonbeam project is the right project to pursue with public funds.
The issue is whether congress should be trying to buy off the technologists of the US, who are being outsourced into oblivion, with another sham space program -- especially when private efforts are starting to pick up steam on their own.
Just let NASA die a natural death.
Seastead this.
Amazing. This person is more on track than off track. And yet you W nazi boys will mod down anything the least bit critical of your feuhuer.
I remember reading a few years ago that moon dust makes a lighter and stronger concrete. I think it was part of a study for colonizing the moon, if anyone knows what I'm talking about and has more details, please add to this.
doesn't mean it's not funny (and/or telling).
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
Boy, it sure would have been nice to see an $87 Billion appropriations bill for moon / Mars exploration. Oh, wait, the Congress and Senate did just pass an $87 Billion approprations bill. What say you we just up and leave and use the money for space exploration instead?
Don't you all know that Greys and others have bases on the Moon with ruins on the Moon and Mars, and assuming elsewhere in the Solar System. Earthlings have been held back by them, so we can't go out there without revealing to the average person the existence of the ETs and the lies the goverment has been telling us these many decades. If we all knew the lies there would be a revolution and heads will roll, literally.
Perhaps the folks at NASA have been thinking about this and it is no big suprise, three days to the moon, extended weeks with out support from earth(the present ISS)and what is waiting for us (I am sure we can not comprehend at the moment)says we need to go back to the moon. Having lunar operations under the surface is a great benifit to less wear on structures and increased safty from constant exposure to open space. Rescue would need to be considered but so far our fatal errors have been in land based testing and reentry to earth. IT will be the astronauts who will get us there(practicly and inspirationly), more so the ones who landed on the moon and were part of the program in the 60's and 70's. Their words and descriptions of their space experence are magic, if they were talking about something as simple as connection two wires I could easily listen for hours, hell days, weeks. I have a great deal of praise for the present astronauts, however I am sure they would agree it is time to stop going in circles (orbits) as a deffinition of our manned space exploration. OF course money will be a big factor but gold comes in more than one color, and once it is found on the moon.....
I eat my grapes at room temperature, cuz the cold ones hurt my teeth
It's really sad as I re-read that fine speech, and compare it with anything George W. Bush has ever written or uttered.
Holy crap man, take the stick out of your ass and stop eating those urine-flavored corn flakes already.
India has already decided to go to Moon, land, walk and setup stuff there. So why doesn't NASA out source its research projects to that mission.
ISS has shown, space can be reached together!
There is a significant problem with space-based solar collection. Suppose we begin collecting solar energy and beaming it to earth. This would be quite a bit of additional energy hitting the earth. What would happen if the earth suddenly was receiving much more sunlight? Global warming?
Perhaps the additional energy we would gather for electricity and automobile power would be insignificant compared to the amount of light energy the earth receives normally from the sun. But it should be investigated.
Stupid dislike of breeder reactors is holding back our progress, definitely.
Sincerely,
Iran and North Korea
TransOrbital wants to send its lunar orbiter to the moon so it can deposit a buch of people's random garbage:
Delivered to the Moon surface in a special capsule will be your certificates, business cards, cremated remains, jewelry, artwork and many other items of choice.
What? Does anyone else have a problem with this? Ok, so lots of people want to strip mine the moon and melt its polar caps and stuff, it's not a national park or anything, but depositing random junk on the surface? This is just plain stupid sentimental crap. I hope their orbiter burns up on the launch pad.
TallGreen CMS hosting
We should take our second conquest of the moon in phases:
1. (2004-2006) Design phase. Moon base designed and built on earth. New space vehicle designed and tested.
2. (2007-2008) Shipments of moon base go to the moon via rocket (sans humans). New space vehicle built and ready to fly.
3. (2009) First human mission back to the moon. Ten or so rockets with moon base materials have already arrived, and crew begins to assemble base.
4. (2011) Moon base finished. Moon base houses up to 25 humans at a time (with design such that this can be updated and upgraded at will). Space vehicle has a total trip time of one week (2.5 days there and back each, one day rest). Turnaround time on earth is one week. Ship can hold seven crew and very (sub 200-300lbs) small payload.
The moon base will be the new home to all research projects. Moon rover vehicles can be designed by engineers actually working on the moon, with schematics sent to earth, and the new rover(s) sent us in parts over 3-4 missions.
Also, the next generation of space vehicles can be designed, but here is the best part: you don't have to put any energy into escaping earth's pull of gravity. Everything will be launched from our new moon base. This is at least 10-15 years down the line, but the possibilities are endless. Maybe a ship that takes advantage of a maglev track built across 3 miles of the moon that can shoot our new ship off at extremely fast speeds with almost no energy required. That way, all energy on the ship can be used for flight corrections and other things.
This really is our future in space. If we decide to go to Mars, instead of the moon, get ready for another 25 years of lofty goals. It will be no different from when the space shuttle was first started. There is no reason to go to Mars yet. We can't get there in a good amount of time. Its (a lot moreso than the moon) dangerous to get there. And once we're there, the distance is so prohibitive that it makes Mars no more useful than the moon was 35 years ago. We can get a few samples, place a flag, but that's it. The moon can be our first true continuous presence in space (what'd you say? Space Station. Feh.).
Finally, the Chinese WILL be going to the moon. I read this premise on /. a few weeks ago. Think about a Taikonaut jetting to the moon, and softly touching down. He gets out of his ship, bounces around a bit, goes over to the American flag, pulls it out of the ground, throws it to the side, and plants a Chinese flag.
To me more than anything, that would show the end of American dominance in space. Personally, I'd like it so that when (if) our flag is displanted, we can just hop in our rover and go put it back up 10 minutes later. Or better yet, have a rover ready to meet our (hopefully) new Chinese friends when they arrive on the moon for the first time, and invite them to fill up the two empty spots in our rover to come over to our moon base and share a dinner.
When Apollo Mission Astronaut Neil Armstrong first walked on the moon, he not only gave his famous "One small step for man; one giant leap for mankind" statement, but followed it by several remarks, including the usual COM traffic between him, the other astronauts, and Mission Control. Before he re-entered the lander, he made the enigmatic remark "Good luck, Mr. Gorsky."
Many people at NASA thought it was a casual remark concerning some rival Soviet Cosmonaut. However, upon checking, [they found] there was no Gorsky in either the Russian or American space programs.
Over the years, many people have questioned him as to what the "Good luck, Mr. Gorsky" statement meant. On July 5, in Tampa Bay, FL, while answering questions following a speech, a reporter brought up the 26- year-old question to Armstrong. He finally responded. It seems that Mr. Gorsky had died and so Armstrong felt he could answer the question. When he was a kid, Neil was playing baseball with his brother in the backyard. His brother hit a fly ball which landed in front of his neighbors' bedroom window. The neighbors were Mr. and Mrs. Gorksy. As he leaned down to pick up the ball, he heard Mrs. Gorsky shouting at Mr. Gorsky, "Oral sex? Oral sex you want? You'll get oral sex when the kid next door walks on the moon!"
For more details: snopes.com
A speech...
ref to 1984 for the ones that did not get it
6E8C 8721 B3D9 5269 5A9B 1122 00C3 C03D 99A7 1CFC
Actually, since the moon had no atmosphere to defract light and give you a "sky", a hood or external shade to shade the opening of the telescope should be all you need to operate an optical telescope in the 15 days of light on the moon.
Power might still be a problem, as G4from128k pointed out, but I would think that NASA would be smarter and put a solar satellite in orbit around the moon. Could easily avoid being put in shadow, and beam power wherever it is needed - which could speed up new development and support mobil labs, mining, etc.
... but it moves. And if you count Earthshine as illumination enough to irritate you (and I'm sure it would bother most astronomers), then there probably periods when either the Earth or the sun are in your sky no matter where on the lunar surface you plant yourself. That's what deep craters are for!
Mars should be the ultimate destination for the next 15 years, but the moon should be a launchpad. Set up a small outpost on the moon and expand it from that point to a tiny village until it becomes the biggest extraterrestrial city in the solar system (that we know of). The resources of the moon are invaluable in our world's future, for its demanding energy requirements can easily be met by He-3 fusion and beamed solar electricity.
He-3 is worth $4 billion/ton and there are over a million tons of it. That's $4 quadrillion dollars (yes, quadrillion). Not to mention the lower cost of solar array deployment and relatively easy delivery.
Let's not forget that the number of graduates in the science and math areas DOUBLED during the 1960's because people were inspired to study hard and do something amazing with their lives. For the past thirty years we've been inspired by "ancient" technologies of Apollo, including computers with CPUs slower than that in my PDA.
I would argue that the space program is what made America the technological epicenter that it is today, and a return to the moon and Mars would only rejuvenate interest in the sciences. I know it worked for me, and hell I have to watch Apollo 13 every few months to remind myself!
Let's just see what the nation's reaction is when a new NASA direction is declared. Also, the American MER landers are arriving this January, and from what I learned in my interview with lead scientist Steve Squyres, it's going to be quite a show. Get ready for the next space race, and America ought to take the lead. Why? I think it's in our nation's collective blood. America is a nation of pioneers and was founded as one, and there's a whole lot of universe left to explore.
Furthermore, I want my damn Millenium Falcon!
Yeah, I bet ALL the big names in legislation were present for that hearing. Does something about the scheduling suggest that space policy is not exactly a top priority for our lawmakers?
Case AGAINST The moon... $$$ MONEY $$$ Until we can start funding life down here, we need to avoid funding the lack of life in the stars. There is no great need to go to the moon (been there, did that, got some useless museum rocks). Now, back to your normally scheduled life on /.
-Cnik
C'mon, just use a few nifty gears. Once you get past the static friction in the system, you could gear down some motor (or few for redundancy) and have a flywheel spinning at thousands of rpm. That's hardly jerky. Especially if you do something fun like lube the big turntable with some kind of buckyball suspension. (I assume)
But then again, I am not a rotational telescope designer, so I could be completely wrong.
Wensleydale? Stilton? Well, it's like no cheese I've ever tasted, lad!
End of line..
Why is unlimited immigration good? Unlimited immigration will raise unemployment and poverty. I am all for limited immigration. After all, the vast majority of people in this country can trace their ancestors back to immigrants. I am not sure of how all the details work here though.
Would this be unlimited immigration from certain countries or purely umlimited. Would this remove the necessity for green cards or visas?
Not everything is analogous to cars. Car analogies rarely work.
The original plan proposed by Goddard to go to the moon was Earth Orbit Rendezvous, as opposed to the Lunar Orbit Rendezvous we used. The Earth Orbit version had us building a space station and then launching the lunar craft from there. Goddard and others had the forsight to realize that without a permenant station in space it would be very difficult to maintain/repeat the exploration endeavors of the Apollo program.
Sure, it would cost more and take more time to do it with the space station but it would then be the launching pad for all the rest of the launches. Of course, it was decided to go with Lunar Orbit rendezvous because it was faster and cheaper.
The real reason the Space Shuttle failed is because of politics. In order to get it funded they needed the support of Senators and Reps. So, you have a machine whose major parts need to be rebuilt every launch. And where do those parts come from? Various congressional districts across the nation. And I do mean various, because the more districts you have the more Congressmen will get the jobs and money.
Of course, the second part of the plan - the Space Station - never materialized. Without it the Space Shuttle ended up being nothing more than an an extrememly expensive publicity machine searching for meaning.
"Trying is only the first step towards failure." - Homer
Just when you thought he'd disappeared, Christo is back with his biggest wrapping project yet!
This charade has gone on long enough. No one's going into the void to pick up "golf balls" from "the moon", unless of course they're authorized by the government to do so.
.. 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.
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!)
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.
I'm sure cars could have been invented earlier than they were but it made a lot more sense to wait until technology could catch up with our ideas. Sure we could spend billions on a new space program but what if the year after we have our new spaceship we invent nanobots that could have done the whole job for a fraction of the cost. In the grand scheme of things I think we should focus on core technologies rather than their fancy applications that grab the headlines.
What if Digg added local news and a Slashdot inspired comment karma system? ---
http://houndwire.com
I think we should build an amusement park on the moon.
Don't trust a bull's horn, a doberman's tooth, a runaway horse or me.
(1) It's expensive to build space vehicles and programs to go to the Moon (or beyond)
(2) It takes a long time to get a program running and producing results.
So without some sort of national vision (such as the one espoused by John Kennedy which led to the Apollo program), there's no government support. As Tip O'Neill said, "all politics is local". No politician is going to go out on a limb for a program which will not see any appreciable result for many many years. Not when that politician has to be re-elected at least once during that time, and his/her opponents will make the usual pork-barrel sound-bites in an effort to win election from the fickle and easily mislead general public.
It's depressing. When I first read 2001 (back when it was first published), I figured that there was a real good chance that by now we would have a functional orbiting space station which I would have a chance to visit (either on business or as a tourist if I made enough money). I wasn't sure that it would happen by 2001, but I figured that it would happen before 2010. Now I don't think that will happen. The ISS is a joke -- designed by a committee, built by the lowest bidder, and designed for propaganda rather than actual use.
Remember Mir? ISS is no better than decades-old russian technology -- indeed without the aged Russian technology, there would be no-one up there now.
And what do you want to bet (especially if the current American political climate continues for another 4 years) that the Chinese get added to the "Axis of Terror" for having a missile program that could be used to attack the US? This current collection of short-sighted politicians (and their financial backers) would be more likely to start a ground war against the Chinese than restart the moon-race.
Cthulhu Barata Nikto
if the moon had rotting dinosaur bones and pre-cambrian vegetation turning into black gold, we'd be up there faster than you can say "Halliburton".
"You want a toe? I can get you a toe by three o'clock... with nail polish."
Since we never really went to the moon before, I can't believe we want to go now.
Before we go anywhere else but here, we need to do a lot better job of lowering the cost of launching payloads to earth orbit.
Until we have that down, everything else, including a Moonbase, Mars, or a space elevator is just too expensive.
Jon Acheson
All opinions expressed herein are my own, and not those of my employers, who are appalled.
"The next bunch of terrorists won't need airplanes, they'll just hack into the targeting computers of your transmitters and have the beam take a walk through the nearest city."
Well, you could always build a failsafe into the satellite, where ground based communication over a tight beam is required for the satellite to transmit to the Earth, and if the satellite orientation doesn't remain right, it'll break contact with the ground stations and auto-shutoff. To avoid someone hacking the system with extra equipment, you'd have to keep the orientation of the ground stations, the communications protocols, and the messages themselves secret, but the idea has some merit.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
You forgot to include disco.
Am I the only one who thinks it would be really awesome if they set up a webcam on the moon?
Er, you seem to have missed out the rest of the mission goals which are somewhat more technical in nature. Why did you do this?
You are thinking of Kentucky, not Europe....
Begging your pardon, but has your shadow ever darkened the door of a physics class?
Simply expressed, the force of gravity between two bodies is expressed as F = (G*m1*m2)/d**2
Where:
Note than moving mass from one mass to the other affects the force of gravity not one tiny bit. So your "especially if they were transported to Earth" line should be "except when transported to earth, as it will have absolutely NO effect."*
The only effect that would happen on the gravitation of the Earth-Moon system is if some of the Moon's (or the Earth's) mass was removed from the system completely. Let's look at your assertion about a "few gigagrammes" could make a difference.
To help your case, I'm going to assume "a few" gigagrammes to be 1,000,000 gigagrammes. Personally, I think a million is a bit more than a few, but I'm feeling generous today. Let's run the numbers, shall we?
We'll use the cgs (centimeter-gram-second) system for all our measurements. G, the universal constant of gravitation, has been measured experimentally to be 6.6726E-8 (dyne*cm**2/g**2)
The mass of the Earth is: 5.98E+27 g.
The mass of the Moon is: 7.35E+25 g.
The distance between the center of mass of each of these bodies is 3.84E+10 cm.
The force of gravity between these bodies (in dynes) is computed to be 1.99E+25 dynes to the three significant figures we have the mass measured.
Now let's subtract a million gigagrams from the Moon's mass. This is a million billion (using the American convention for naming numbers), or one quadrillion grams, or 1E+15. 7.35E+25 - 1E+15 is still approximately equal to 7.35E+25. To be perfectly pedantic, it's 7.3499999999E+25, but we're dealing with numbers to three significant figures, so it's still 7.35E+25.
A million gigagrams is a billion kilograms, or one million metric tonnes. If we could haul away a million tonnes a year from the moon, it would take us 50 million years before we affected the Moon's mass to the third significant figure.
I think the tides are safe for a while.
*The pedants among would note that the transit time of some mass between one body and the other would have some impact on the system, as it becomes a three body problem. As above though, unless the mass being moved were a substantial fraction of the total mass, its impact is negligible, and doesn't warrant pulling out much nastier three body solutions.
Wouldn't it be easier to just go to North Dakota? There's just as little there, and almost as few people :-)
Seriously, what's the point in mining the moon for minerals? How can digging up copper on the moon be even close to as cheap as the giant Bingham Canyon copper mine?
And, of all the stuff we need most, oil is perhaps our biggie -- but I understand isn't a terribly common resource on the moon.
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Clever placement of your solar array will catch full sunlight 95% of the time.
A telescope on the lunar south pole can only observe half the sky, while a telescope on the lunar equator can observe all the sky (during one month). So why is the south pole supposed to be an ideal place for telescopes?
No one can defeat the quad laser.
The bullet is enormous, there is no escape!
Jumping; is useless!
sig?
Sure we could spend billions on a new space program but what if...
What if? That's not a good argument.
We already possess the core technologies - they won't be perfect, but they're there. Developing better/new tools should be emphasized, but not to the point of halting the development of applications that use these existing tools. Many times the two create a development cycle (developing a computer component on a computer, and then using that component on your next computer to develop better components which you'll use on your next...), in which case you can't ignore work in one area.
Those fancy applications are helpful by inpiring others to get involved in the develop of better methods and tools. Popular Science magazine is a good example.
This is not my sig.
SPSes shouldn't be put in geosynchronous orbit; it's more useful for other purposes, is a bit closer in than I think is wise, and has other issues. A non-equatorial orbit at around 50,000 miles would be IMO much more desirable. Given the right choice of orbit a SPS should never be in shadow or shade the Earth, and would never dip below the horizon for most of the planet. Geosync would let you build a static transmission system but dynamic positioning wouldn't add a lot of headaches.
Nixon is the reason we ro;led back the sapce program after Apollo. (He's also the reason for many of the ills currently afflicting this country's politics. but that's another post.)
A man of decidely narrow and short-sighted imagination, Nixon came to the presidency in 1972 replete with irrational venom against anything done by the Kennedy clan. Rather than provide any leadership at all on this issue, he simply browbeat NASA about their spending. So, because Nixon's brain couldn't figure out how to set the next destination in space, NASA's bureaucrats eventually secured their jobs with a plan to go round-and-round in circles in low Earth orbit, all to no apparent purpose. This is what we know today as the Space Shuttle and the International Space Station.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
No he isn't. If he was, he'd have modded it (-1, Shut up!)
ASSHOLE
You transport rock from the Moon to the Earth, so the sum of the two masses stays the same - I'll give you that - but the force of gravity depends on the product of the two masses. When I did my engineering degree, we didn't go assuming that simply because m1 + m2 == m1' + m2' then m1 * m2 == m1' * m2'. Try it with some figures ..... five sixes are thirty, but four sevens are only twenty-eight, and the error grows with the difference: three eights are twenty-four, and two nines are eighteen.
I've had too long a day to apply this to the figures and work out how much mass you'd need to shift before you got, say, a one percent change. And I'm not even sure what sort of a change you'd need before you got any effect.
And you might want to check your prefixes. A gigagramme is a thousand Mg or a million kg. A megagramme is as near a ton as damn is to swearing {2205lb vs. 2240lb; close enough anyway as any measurement in non-metric units is expected to be approximate}.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
Hey, Georgie-Pie knows how hard it is for you to put food on your family! He's going to make the pie higher!
That was only in the movie.
The book was an ironic allegory, and the Eloi weren't idyllic cutie-pies, but rather passive grazing idiots; the underground (underclass) Morlocks whose ancestors were exploited by those who gave rise to the Eloi finally turned the tables and started eating them.
I don't think the moon was mentioned at all in the book.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Zubrin is a Mars First zealot and bends the facts to fit his fancy -- and his fancy is Mars.
There's an easy answer to the nuclear waste "problem", but it isn't politically correct: dilute with the mine tailings from when you refined the initial material and put it back in the hole you dug it out of.
-- MarkusQ
You are quite correct. I had a complete brain fart on the math there. Knowing that it would still take a huge shift of mass to make a damn bit of difference, I got carried away and explained completely incorrectly. There actually isn't a real difference in *orbit*, but not because of my stupid error. Since the entire mass of the moon is barely significant next to that of the Earth, one can say that the gravitational force F is directly proportional to the mass of the Moon. So, change the Moon's mass by just about any amount and the force is changed similarly. This leaves the acceleration constant (F = ma), and consequently, the orbit. Therefore this wouldn't change the orbit (in the same way that heavy objects fall at the same rate as light ones, ignoring air resistance). However, we were talking about tides and it would certainly change the tides (as the total force has changed). In my defense I will say that I work with orbital mechanics for a living, but I don't do much calculation with tidal forces. Still, there's no excuse to assume (m1 + d) * (m2 - d) = m1 * m2 is true because (m1 + d) + (m2 - d) == m1 + m2. Sorry about that.
Yes, you are right on the metric units as well. A metric tonne is 1000 kg, FYI. I should have had "A trillion kilograms", since I established that I was using American nomenclature, but then slipped into UK nomenclature on that one conversion. I do that sometimes, and should've stayed in scientific notation (it's safer!). However, that error is in my favor, as now you have to ship a 1000 megatons off the Moon every year for 50 million years before you impact the Moon's mass to the third significant figure. That's a lot of space freighters! :-)
I think my base assertion still holds, but I thank you for pointing out the errors in my maths.
With it's low gravity, it's lack of atmosphere, and lack of development, the moon is the perfect place to build an experimental space elevator.
The grass is only greener, if you don't take care of your own lawn.
How can we look to exploit the moon for its resources when it is held sacred by American Indians?
Actually, I'm all for any kind of development on the moon; but expect trouble from environmentalists, New Age advocates, and other assorted neo-savages.
quiquid id est, timeo puellas et oscula dantes.
Just want to point out that Velcro was invented by a Swiss citizen in the early 1940's. Perhaps you meant to say 'Teflon'?
The US competition with China is quite different than that with the Soviets. The Communists clearly stated that their goal was to spread throughout the world, and the US was willing to risk nuclear war to stop them. The space race wasn't just for pride, but an attempt by each side to show the neutral parts of the world whose system was better. We all know that many people like to side with winners.
Our relationship with China is a lot more normal. They're not imperialist (less than we are), and they're a huge trading partner.
How do we get the power down here?
Use a very long extension cord.
Many sf books talk about "beaming" power from satellite's to the planet's surface. Heinlein used it in "Blowups Happen". But I do not think I have read a practical method for it.
I spend my life entertaining my brain.
"even if Congress were to produce the money needed tomorrow, it will take a minimum of five years before NASA is even capable of launching another Apollo-type mission.
"
I'd say more like ten years, if at all. NASA isn't the same agency today. The people that worked on Apollo are or will be retired in the next few years, creating a massive brain drain. And young people are showing little interest in a NASA career. This is not good.
In the thirty years since Apollo, like any beauracracy, NASA has become more snarled and calcified than it ever was in the 60's. Employees are regularly punished for pointing out safety problems - it makes their boss look bad. Visit www.nasawatch.com - some of the stories are incredible.
The documents and records from Apollo are in a Raiders of the Lost Ark style warehouse in Houston - and _none of it is cataloged or indexed_. If they wanted to know something from that time, they could not find it. That's just what they kept.
In the hurry to start work on the Shuttle, literally tons of documents regarding the Saturn V and associated systems were thrown away. If they wanted to make a similar vehicle now, or even just build F-1 engines again, they'd have to crawl over the display units with calipers and cameras. Yeesh.
They're going to build a new vehicle - if the Gubmint will let them. But civilian contractors will do the work, not the agency. Look to the private sector for innovation... Look to NASA for more pork, and amazing new ways to FUBAR.
Anon. Coward
"Though I Fly Through the Valley of Death I Shall Fear No Evil For I am at 80,000 Feet and Climbing." (sign over the entrance to the SR-71 operating location, Kadena, Japan).
In the case of rocketry, you mean done by Germans and lavishly appropriated by U.S. military to the shock and horror of the U.K. which lost so much to German rockets.
If the U.S. WWII generation was so great, they would have dealt with depotic "communists" with patience and economic superiority instead of going paranoid trigger-happy in Korea, Vietnam, and eventually Reagan's Afghanistan. As ye sow, so shall ye reap.
1. Q. What is White Nationalism?
A. The idea that Whites may need to create a separate nation as a means of defending themselves.
2. Q. Do White Nationalists feel they are superior to other races?
A. No. The desire of White Nationalists to form their own nation has nothing to do with superiority or inferiority.
3. Q. Do White Nationalists seek to dominate other races?
A. Not at all. In fact, formation of a White Nation removes any possibility of White dominance of other races, as well as the plausibility of the accusation that Whites wish to dominate others.
4. Q. Do White Nationalists seek to insulate themselves from competition from other races?
A. No. A separate White Nation would establish a policy of free trade with its new neighbors. Labor markets are global, and the formation of a White Nation would not protect Whites from economic competition.
5. Q. Well if White Nationalists don't feel superior, don't want to dominate others, and don't seek protection from competition, then why would they want a separate nation?
A. To avoid exploitation.
6. Q. Exploitation? This is rich! So how is it that Whites are exploited?
A. It is a long list. Burdensome racial preference schemes in hiring, race-normed employment tests, racial preference schemes in university admissions, racial preference schemes in government contracting and small business loans. Beyond quotas there is the denial of rights of free speech and of due process to Whites who are critical of these governmental policies. We have special punishments for vandalism and assaults committed by Whites if the accused White has ever expressed a preference for his own kind. In addition, Whites pay a proportion of the costs of the welfare state that is disproportionate to what they receive in benefits.
But the most exploitative aspect of the situation is that neither the racial quotas, the business preferences, the loss of freedom of speech, nor the disproportionate contributions to the welfare state have managed to sate the appetites of non-whites living in the United States.
The more Whites sacrifice, the more non-whites demand. Many Whites are beginning to believe that no amount of tribute, other than mass suicide, would satisfy the non-white demands.
If our presence stirs up that much hatred in the hearts of non- whites, then the only sensible course of action is to separate ourselves from them.
7. Q. You claim that non-whites are the aggressors and haters in race relations. Aren't you afraid that most Whites will think this is ridiculous?
A. Not in the slightest. For the past 30 years most Whites have taken part in a mass migration or "white flight" away from neighborhoods inhabited by non-whites. Aggressors don't flee. For example, on a per-capita basis, blacks are 49 times more likely to assault a White than a White is to assault a black. The best measure of racism is the number of non-economically motivated attacks. Whites score low in this regard, non-whites high.
The fact is that non-whites are clamoring to enter this country in droves. Whites are fleeing en masse to less densely inhabited areas to escape these new arrivals.
8. Q. But how can Whites be exploited when it is whites who have enacted these racial preferences, the taxation, the welfare payments and the immigration laws?
A. Excellent question! It is true that Whites are exploited by their fellow whites. In fact, we do not expect any resistance to the formation of a separate nation from non-whites. We expect white integrationist elites to resist. They are the ones who have a great deal to lose.
9. Q. If life in America is so bad for Whites why don't you just move back to Europe?
A. We are a majority. We do not have to move back. We can resolve to defend ourselves against this onslaught. We have the option of peacefully ceding lands already inhabited by non-whites to separate non-white nations. We would save money, and could restore our civ
So, wouldn't it be best to perfect fusion reactors (which have been estimated as about 30 years away for the past 50 years, and still are) before going after more than research quantities of fuel for them?
He had been president for 7 months when the first moon landing occured in 1969. Nixon was asked by NASA in the early 1970s where he wanted to see the space program go.
The choices given to him were: Mars, a Moon Base, a cancelled program or The shuttle. Nixon chose the Shuttle, since, in (roughly) his words, he didn't "care about space, but it would look bad for the USA to end its space program"
Um, what happens to the earth -- you know, tides and gravity and stuff like that -- when we've nibbled the moon down to the size of a Microsoft Mouse ball? Or will we exercise our usual restraint, good judgement, and far-sightedness? It's said that for all citizens of the earth to emulate the American Way Of Life (i.e. use resources at the rate Americans do), we'd need several earths. I guess we'll just practice by using up the moon, eh? Just wondering. (This is not a troll, just hoping to expand the discussion a bit.)
Choice quote from the story link http://www.house.gov/science/press/108/108-144.htm from the House Commitee on Science:
-------------------
"DEBATE ON REGULATING SPACE TOURISM HEATS UP
WASHINGTON, D.C., Novenber 5, 2003 - Commercial human space flight (space tourism) is a burgeoning industry in need of some degree of government regulation and oversight a panel of witnesses told the House Space and Aeronautics Subcommittee today. Witnesses varied widely, however, on the extent of regulations and the need for government indemnification of space tourism launches."
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"Space tourism?" In reference to "commercial human space flight?" Their mindset is all wrong here... "Goverment indemnification?" The government is indemnified for pretty much anything they want to be indemnified for. That's why they have these things called "insurance companies." "Regulation and oversight?" Please don't turn the commercial space race into NASA-II.
I thought the topic was most elequently covered (at least to my satisfaction) in James P. Hoagan's "Rockets, Redheads, & Revolution", in the chapter about the race to the moon in the 60's and what it did to the US's economy, focus, and other factors like abandoned projects. (Sorry, I can't recall the chapter name now, and the book is at home... and I call myself a geek! Sheesh!)
----
You don't need to see my sig. This isn't the sig you're looking for. Move along.
I wonder who would own the moon in the case that scientist actually found a strong resource that would be invaluable here on Earth, or something along those lines. Every country that has a space program would head on up there and try to stake their claim at the moon, and even countries that didn't previously have a space program would probably develop one if there was a valuable resource on the moon to be gathered.
Which brings me back to my original question, who would own the moon?
YOU'RE WINNER !
Another lame blog
Yes, most of the new teraforming books have sections on Venus, though they mostly detail atmopheric chemistry and the best mix ratios to induce climate change. I have seen hardly any papers detailing the obvious low cost alternative of floating balloon platforms at the outer edge of the Venusian atmosphere. jpaerospace.com did have some 3d renderings of their stratospheric platforms on Venus at one point. >Novice electronics/astronomy student vs radio >telescope [blogspot.com] Awesome to see you are having some fun in the woods! I am working on some CCD sensor plans (telescope3d.sourceforge.net) -- this could ultimately become a low cost alternative to the traditional lense. Concering the moon, I agree these guys are leading us in to another Time Machine scenerio. ..and turning the moon into another sweatshop for an enron style corporation may very well put these parasecs of space off limits ;-). As for the "pay to go" scenerio now becoming so in vogue, they have me looking for a good cave... you have to go all the way in to go all the way out.
Peace,
SA Thigpen
KL1FE
Imagine how much money you can free up once we're not looking over our backs to see which nation is about to backstab us... Iraq, Iran, N Korea, Germany, France...
In a few months, we will have smashed a longstanding dictatorship in the middle-east. N Korea is on the verge of backing down, if not already, since AP doesn't seem to be covering any non-Iraq news. Germany is already backing down from their appeasement stances. France is proving their irrelevance, not only by showing the inadequacy of Socialist health care when 15,000 of your citizens die of heat strokes, but the ineptitude of their international policies of supporting unstable despot nations. All the while, the USA is continuting to dominate in technological advancements, biological discoveries, and general progress everywhere...
To the USA, exploring is a whim, second to return on investment. When it's cheaper to build a factory on the moon than to build a cleanroom on earth, you'll see factories on the moon. Astronomy drives improvements in optics; the USA's telecommunications industry is currently saturated with fiber optic supply -- when the demand returns, then companies will seek new approaches. Exploring the Moon is predicated on the return of investment captical -- right now, we seem to be getting pretty good efficiencies here on earth for a lot cheaper, and when that's tapped, we'll move on.
No big wars, only small ones, and everyone lives happily together. A real land of peace...
Good thing it's safe to live in Europe! Maybe if we don't speak up about terrorists, they'll leave us alone...
It seems to me that many of the same Slashdotters ranting and raving against environmentalists, energy conservation, and solar power here on earth also are ardent proponents of colonizing the moon and the planets.
Why is solar power good if it is a light second away but bad if it is in much more accessible places like the Sahara desert? Why not first deploy solar power stations in the Sahara and then figure out how to do it on the moon?
And how do you think people are going to manage to live on the moon, where everything needs to be recycled, when we can't even manage to even keep our resource needs from growing disproportionately, let alone live in balance, here on earth?
I think manned space exploration is a waste of money and time. But perhaps there is one good thing that would come out of it: a lot of people would finally begin to understand what environmentalists have been saying all along.
That would be "paid", not "payed". Be a bit more careful when you call someone stupid in public. People in glass houses, and all that jazz...
who said we ever went to the moon? it was all set up in nevada by hollywood.
In case you haven't been paying any attention for the last 30 Years they cant really fly to the Moon. It was just a TV show! You've got the rest of your lives to accept reality because one thing you can count on is that you will never see people anywhere near the Moon. So you can go on scratching your heads and inventing bogus reasons for why your real space program is so pathetic or open your mind a little and accept the obvious. What's the point of pretending you can fly to the Moon when you can't even get off the launchpad?
By the tone and content of your message it is quite clear that you seem to believe that I just said that the ONLY factor affecting the consumer economy is the level of fear that can be inspired in the population. That is a classic mistake in debating and I will forgive you for it. Please re-read my message in which I state that one good way to get the people out of their seats and into the aisles is through fear. There are many other ways. Have a look at an advertising text-book because they can show you some other ways such as sex, violence, and sadness. Fear still reigns supreme though.
Also you have added your own value judgements into my argument. I'm not saying that American leaders stage wars in order to increase consumption, I am saying one outcome of war is increased consumption. The whole consumer economy is a product of World War I and did not exist prior to it. But dont think for a second that governments and corporations dont have agendas. They do. And talking about them isnt talking about conspiracy theories.
But regardless, its really annoying that people like you reject the fact that government and industry is interested in controlling people. Thats ALL they are interested in doing. When it treats things like objects, its ok : gun control, drug control, crime control, birth control, pesticide control, immigration control. No one argues that those arent worth talking about. But the minute the topic becomes people control, its labeled conspiracy and you start talking about tin foil hats. Get real buddy. Psychological advertising and marketing techniques have been studied since the early 1920s and are getting more refined by the year. As much as you wish it never existed and pretend it doesnt exist, it does.
Have a look at a few books on Advertising and marketing. Some of the concepts will make you cringe if you think about them in terms of what they really do : treat people like objects to be manipulated. In particular, look up Ernest Dichter and the Motivational Research industry or Behavioral psychologist/advertising executive John B. Watson.
-- "Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains." Jean Jacques Rousseau
The aforementioned example of trash collectors is a good one. It shows that although these jobs are not desirable in themselves, they are jobs that Americans want because of their compensation. It may not suit people's professional fulfillment, but it certainly suits people's economic fulfillment. Illegal immigrants prevent that from happening much to the delight of employers.
Politicus
There promotional literature mentions the scientific and technical mission goals briefly, I'm sure they are hoping to make good use of their lunar orbiter. I just think giving people a way to put their junk on the moon is silly. If I am ever on the moon and I find some junk, I'll make sure it gets recycled properly.
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