SpaceNow, a New Space Education Initiative

Avacar writes "SpaceNow has officially launched their new website. It contains fairly detailed and technical explanations on how standard rocketry works, as well as orbital mechanics for interplanetary travel. They advocate putting fusion engines in space as a clean, cost-effective way to travel between planets. They also have a full curriculum for educating youth about space, and will soon be starting up weekly debates on touchy issues with space travel on their forums."

Comments

Universal Warming

[fragmentate]

Thank God it's clean. Last thing we need is Universal Warming. Imagine if the universes Vacuum Layer had a hole in it!

not much content

[Liquid Tip]

I was expecting a lot more from this website. It looks nice you first load it up, but the information content is quite sparce. Not even pretty pictures or informative diagrams to explain concepts. Section 6.2 on aging stars as an example is dismal.

The CASCA Education website is much, much better:

http://www.cascaeducation.ca/files/index.html

Check it out.

Re:For the public good?

[EccentricAnomaly]

The research and development of Nuclear Fusion, for spaceflight applications and clean alternative energy on Earth;

Why do we need space for this? Realistically, fusion is being sought after by many organizations. The dilemma is that radioactive materials are so closely regulated and guarded, there isn't a lot of room for private individuals and companies to see better solutions.

1) Fusion doesn't require any radioactive materials. 2) Fusion engines are very efficient and would allow not just single stage to orbit vehicles, but single stage to Mars surface and back to Earth without refueling and taking only a couple of months for the round trip.

The technology is very exciting, but it will take a tremendous breakthrough for it to be practical. Even beyond the technology needed for fusion power stations on Earth... you'll need lightweight, compact fusion reactors for space.

Space: it's time to go back and revisit it again.

[Sheetrock]

When I was growing up, astrology was becoming a keen area of study. Theoretical science became applied science as the weapons of war were turned to plowshares of exploration and propelled us into space, to the moon and back to Earth.

Then we stopped.

Some may say that it was a waste of time and money, but a great deal of practical good was done by the space program. Many space-age foods, polymers and foams were created and found to do as much for our planet as they did for those who orbited it. Besides the ocean, it is the last frontier available to us, and unarguably the one whose exploration will do the most for us.

I applaud the concept of bringing these ideas to a new generation who will, hopefully, not forsake them as ours has. I was just thinking about this today during my ruminescing about the crazy and sometimes haphazard ways in which the scientific process is refined -- in it's own way, the question about continuing space exploration is tied in inexorable fashion to the battle against entrenched interests that new theories must undergo before they become the accepted norm.

Take, for example, the struggle of Galileo against the church to permit society to recognize the fact that the world is round. Or perhaps the modern day battleground of evolution against the challenging new scientific theory of intelligent design, which suggests that certain biological features such as the flagellum are irreducibly complex and therefore could not possibly have been developed by increments as evolutionists would have it -- answers and proof to the contrary must be found out there, because like the proverbial blind men describing the elephant we find ourselves struggling with only our piece of the jigsaw puzzle to determine the complete picture.

Re:For the public good?

[eaolson]

Fusion engines are very efficient

The real downside to fusion engines is that they are also very fictional.