Slashdot Mirror
Debunking the Trillion-Dollar Space Myth
jfoust writes "When the President and NASA announced the agency's new space initiative, including sending humans back to the Moon and on to Mars, many news reports claimed that the plan could cost as much as $1 trillion. According to this Space Review article, that trillion-dollar price tag is a myth: it was based on erroneous data and analysis, in large part by a single Associated Press reporter, and propagated by many other reporters too busy -- or too lazy -- to check on the facts. Could this kill the plan before it has a chance to start?"
A reporter not checking facts? I'm shocked I tell you!
Next thing you know, you'll be telling me that someone on slashdot did the same thing!
If we send our unemployed people to Mars, then we have less here on Earth.
if you give me 1 trillion dollars
perl -e '$_="\007/4`\cp%2,".chr(127);s/./"\"\\c$&\""/gees
"Humor writer Dave Barry, however, may have summarized the situation the best. "The Bush administration says the Mars mission can be accomplished for only 143.8 zillion dollars," Barry wrote. "But critics claim that the true cost is likely to be much more like 687 fillion dillion dollars. (These numbers are imaginary, but trust me, they're as accurate as any other cost estimates you see about the Mars mission.)""
I mean, how the hell are we going to put a man on Mars for 1 trillion dollars when it takes one hundred billion dollars alone to keep a laser on the moon from destroying Earth?
Really people, think it through.
- sm
"It's probably a misplaced decimal point....I always screw up some mundane detail like that"
WTF? Over?
Heck, I'll even kick back in a hefty campaign contribution.
BTM
That was the turning point of my life--I went from negative zero to positive zero.
" The Pentagon will pay over $500 for a screw,"
That's nothing, I've gotten married, and believe me, those few screws were hardly worth the $500K its cost me over the past 20 years.
Before cleaning up the messes made from wars.
...with out unemployed people who would be left to post on slashdot??
Hello, this is Linus Torvalds, and I pronounce Linux as Linux!
Duh! Misexuals have sex with one gender. Bisexuals have sex with both genders. Trisexuals add animals to the mix.
some rouge asteriod
Well at least it wasn't a rogue rouge asteroid, they are some bad mofos, heaps worse than the verte and bleu asteroids, rogue or not.
After further investigation, the budget breakdown is as follows:
Space craft - $500 Million
Mission control &
Support crew - $2 Million
Fuel - $800 Thousand
Diebold navigation system - $20 Million
SCO license for onboard CPU's - $699 * 500
Anti Virus software to ensure Windows
based fire suppression system
isn't infected before liftoff - $200
Man hunt for someone smart enough
to operate the spacecraft yet dumb
enough to ride it to Mars - $1 Trillion
Slashdot Syndrome: the sudden, extreme urge to correct someone in order to validate one's self.
Insert inappropriate sexual reference to "screw" here.
or a strike from some rouge asteriod! ...from the red light district of space!
There's a simple solution - I bet we can outsource it to India. They can probably send a guy there for a hundred bucks or so.
Whether or not he arrives in one piece, however, was a minor omission in the requirements document, much to his later dismay.
You can accomplish anything you set your mind to. The impossible just takes a little longer.
the plan could cost as much as $1 trillion
Yea, but what the reporter failed to mention was that this is Canadian dollars.
The whole mission will actually only cost $9.99. With a few subsidies...
Perhaps they could sell a few screws to the Pentagon... the going rate is about $500 I think.
This article in Spacedaily does a good job of explaining why Bush's costs are both too much and too little to do what he wants. I love the quote:
If $3B can manage to pay off consultants to think deep thoughts about a project and an artist to draw up a rendering then $1T isn't really that much in the world of gov't finance, high payed consultants and contractors used to dealing with the military where any price goes. It would be interesting to see what an X-Prize sized budget passed 100km orbit would look like.
$#!^ happens, but why does it always have to happen to me???
What about Tang?
UNIX/Linux Consulting
And why not? In some parts of Vegas, $500 is the market price for a screw...
2*3*3*3*3*11*251
If Dad can be believed, there was plenty of good tang around before Apollo...
"Consider yourself a member of a virtual corporation with Mr. Torvalds as your Chief Executive Officer." - Linux Advocac
Similarly under scrutiny is the Bush Administration claim that an extended mission into space could be paid for with a fifty dollar Sears gift certificate and another round of tax cuts. The administration has asserted that the devil is in no way involved in this particular figure, but has not ruled out the future involvement of the Prince of Darkness.
You are in error. No-one is screaming. Thank you for your cooperation.
Why go to Mars? The weather is miserable. You can't get the red stains out of your knees if you fall down. The views are great but the all you can eat buffet are over rated and the shows are lame...Vegas is Cheaper!
Maybe NASA could do a better job at managing tight-budget programs if they blocked access to /. for people embroiled in start-up operations.
There is nowhere remotely inhabitable anywhere near us we could have any hope of colonizing in a sustainable way in the time frame.
Well, NASA says that they might be able to turn New Jersey into a viable colony through only minimal terraforming... about 50 years I think it was. So cheer up!
I hear there's rumors on the Slashdots
If he gets re-elected, *I'm* going to Mars....
Congress asked NASA to compute how much money they'd need. Unfortunately, one of their scientists mistakenly converted dollar amounts to pesos early in the calculation, and the amount was never converted back.
MSIE: The world's most standards-complaint web browser.
Dogs and cats will live together!
Darkness over the Earth!
Mass Hysteria!
But now it's available in flavours other than just "Poon".
Hey! Yeah! Maybe we can send Bruce Willis and a bunch of oil riggers to drive around the asteroid in a dune buggy on steroids setting nuclear charges.... Oh, wait, they did that in a (really bad) movie already.
I can't believe you got modded up as "Insightful."
-matthew
"THERE IS NO JUSTICE, THERE IS ONLY ME." -Death
So we should explore space in order to mine minerals in order to explore space. Nice circular argument.
Could you do us all a favor and take Alec Baldwin with you?
-Peter
I'll beam him up later, we're fresh out of ice cream sandwiches at the moment.
End communication.
Your argument would make sense if a navy aircraft carrier could fly.
They're coming to sap and impurify our precious bodily fluids...that's what Red asteroids do.
20 January 2017: the End of an Error.