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NASA Funds Sci-Fi Technology

Posted by michael on from the thinking-different dept.

Michael Huang writes "Wired News profiles the NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts (NIAC), the $4 million-a-year agency most famous for Bradley Edwards' study of the space elevator. Lesser known studies include weather control, shape-shifting space suits and antimatter-powered probes to Alpha Centauri. Remember, 'if it's not risky, it's not going to get funded'."

16 of 135 comments (clear)

  1. What? by Neil+Blender · · Score: 5, Funny

    NASA is getting into space things? That's odd.

    1. Re:What? by linzeal · · Score: 5, Funny
      Nasa getting into sci-fi would be like the US Military getting into video games, never going to happen.

      --
      An Education is the Font of All Liberty
  2. I hope they keep their funding... by James+A.+O.+Joyce · · Score: 5, Interesting

    When I skimmed the article summary I was going to write a comment complaining th at NASA should be investing in "proven technologeis". After all, it's the "proven technologeis" that help us about our daily lifes and help us fulfilll ourselves: space elevators don't enter into it, right? Besides, NASA needs to bring in some green and they can only do that by making proprietry software and crafts.

    But then I realised something important; no matter how important it is for NASA to make money, we still have to spend money to make money. Even if spending money on space lifts causes taxes to get nothced up by a few dollars, it will all be worth it in a few decades because we will all benefit from the advanced cabling tech. Besides, every dollar that's spent on this is another dolll ar that isn't spent on military applications or other less savoury things.

    Still, judging by their website, I'm a little suspicious of what they're up to! ;-) I guess their just busy working on something cool like transforming space suits, heh. Keep up the good articals, simoniger. (The shape-shifting space suits are almost certainly more useful than the shape-shifting trainers I saw linkked on Fark, anyway.)

    --
    nigritude ultramarine
    1. Re:I hope they keep their funding... by theM_xl · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Aye, if everyone only invests in "proven techonologies" we can forget about progress... Sure, we'll probably refine things, but some new ones would be nice. We can't rely on the guys in basements to do everything... Somebody has to do the hard science that at least on the surface offers little. If the NASA is the one to do it, more power -and funding- to them.

    2. Re:I hope they keep their funding... by Neil+Blender · · Score: 5, Funny

      Buckminster Fuller. Now that guy had balls.

    3. Re:I hope they keep their funding... by Nerd+With+Nalgene · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Actually, that's more than a little optimistic. Theoretically, having a single space elevator might drop the price for lifting material to geosync to under a thousand dollars a kilogram. That's still a big improvement over tens of thousands, but it doesn't mean you'll be sending up your kids' science projects anytime soon.

      --


      "as if nothing were solid...and that would be the end of the world, not fire and brimstone, but goo."--Rand
    4. Re:I hope they keep their funding... by xmath · · Score: 5, Informative
      Quoting the site:
      The first space elevator would reduce lift costs immediately to $100 per pound, as compared to current launch costs, which are $10,000-$40,000 per pound, depending upon destination and choice of rocket launch system.

      Plus, if you look at their studies it seems they have figured out pretty much everything already. The only technical detail they're waiting for is a sufficiently strong carbon nanotube composite to make the cable of, and they're already making good progress there. After that, apparently it becomes just an engineering/funding problem.

      Of course the studies could be mistaken, but still it's definitely not in the pure "Sci-Fi" category anymore. With a bit of luck, we'll still live to see it built. :-)

    5. Re:I hope they keep their funding... by Daniel+Dvorkin · · Score: 5, Insightful

      If GE invents superior cabling, then only GE and its licensees get to use it, and they pass the cost on to you, the consumer. If NASA invents superior cabling, then everybody (including GE) can use it to deliver better products (including suspension bridges) at a lower price.

      Government expenditure on science is an investment by the people of the US (or whatever country is doing the spending) -- and one which (especially in the case of NASA) has quite often had a rate of return on investment which few if any private R&D operations can match.

      --
      The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
  3. Reminds me of a quote by jafo · · Score: 5, Funny

    This reminds me of one of my favorite quotes, by Gordon Moore: "If everything you try works, you're not trying hard enough."

    Sean

  4. Do they have 500 Altairan dollars for by Intocabile · · Score: 5, Funny

    .. for the triple-breasted whore of Eroticon 6? Or is that not risky enough?

  5. 250x less by DAldredge · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It costs more than 250 times their yearly budget to fly one shuttle mission...That is a sad joke, I bet there budget is less than what NASA spends each year to fly the NASA highups around the country.

  6. The most important thing said in the article by cft_128 · · Score: 5, Insightful
    The most important thing said in the article was a quote by an analyst "It's impossible to make breakthroughs if all you're funding is immediate, near-term applications".

    In society today we all seem to concentrate on short term benefits and ignore the long term consequences, be it government budget deficits, long term research funding, balking at online music distribution, moving jobs off shore or the environment.

    --

    Underloved Movies and Pub Quiz: donotquestionme.org

  7. Re:Be honest... by Reorax · · Score: 5, Funny

    I was outraged to hear that funding was given to their wacky pseudo-science projects. Still nothing for my magnetic levitation air-hockey table.

    --
    This sig is only here so people stop skipping the last lines of my posts.
  8. Space Elevator is not sci-fi by Nerd+With+Nalgene · · Score: 5, Interesting

    My dad has worked with Brad Edwards on the Space Elevator extensively, and I can tell you from experience that it is not wacky science fiction. It is a six billion dollar investment that isn't likely to appear anytime soon. However, it is almost certain to happen within the next thirty to forty years. While it is nice that the government can handle that kind of long-range vision occasionally, if they are the only ones providing investment into technologies like this one then they will end up controlling those technologies. What would really be nice is if the private sector could see into the future too and fund some of this kind of stuff without NASA's help.

    --


    "as if nothing were solid...and that would be the end of the world, not fire and brimstone, but goo."--Rand
  9. Science fiction inevitably becomes fact... by Humorously_Inept · · Score: 5, Interesting

    It's too bad that a defenseless program like this is just the sort that would be hacked apart if some hackney news agency decided to do an expose on the $4m it gets. I'm sure John Stossel could paint horns on it.

    Even outlandish ideas deserve study. This isn't "duh" stuff like the speed at which ketchup comes out of the bottle, etc. I think it's important to keep an eye out on the horizon and if a couple bucks is enough motivation, then go for it!

    --

    ~Someday, I hope to be an aspiring author.
  10. 4 Milion.. is pocket change by NoMercy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Goverments deal in milions, 50 milion there, 20 milion there, the cost of some piece of stupid artwork to stick at the end of a bridge cost a insane ammount of money while another piece of local-goverment artwork is spiraling though milions of dolars while its schedule is pushed furthur and furthur back...

    Benifit of this is, a) the costs are fixed, b) we might just get that anti-mater powered probe to aplha-centuri ;)