India and NASA to Explore Moon Together

hotsauce writes "NASA administrator Griffin on a visit to Indian space facilities in Bangalore has signed an agreement to explore the moon with the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). This agreement will see NASA instruments on a 2008 Indian moon mission, and further cooperation is being explored. An Indian paper has a different take on the visit. Interesting answer by Griffin on NASA outsourcing to ISRO."

Comments

Can you hear me now?

[grub]

And you thought the latency on calls to Dell's help desk was bad now...

Re:Can you hear me now?

[jamiesan]

Was gonna post something about NASA being outsourced, but I was beat to the punch. :-)

Re:Can you hear me now?

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh oh! Another post on India and Technology. Let me guess: Most comments will have something to say about outsourcing or that they should spend the money for getting rid of poverty and the like.. instead of launching satellites. Correct?

Re:Can you hear me now?

[Anonymous Coward]

More US jobs being lost now....Oooh Yes!!!!

Re:Can you hear me now?

[Creepy]

hadn't you heard? NASA dropped about 500 contractors last year, and plans a 15.3% workforce cut by summer (though they're trying to buy out jobs and keep layoffs to a minimum). Now they're outsourcing work to India...

Welcome to my world, boys and girls - enjoy those 5 and 6 AM meetings - I certainly do. My eyes are naturally red now.

Griffin's answer

[pq]

Since most people won't bother to read TFA to get the answer to the tease:

Griffin said NASA was not looking to outsource some of its work to ISRO. NASA was looking to combine the resources both agencies to undertake ventures of mutual interest.

(Yeah, yeah, I know I'm enabling bad behavior, but slashdot needs all the help it can get.)

Re:Griffin's answer

[Midnight Thunder]

Since most people won't bother to read TFA to get the answer to the tease:

Griffin said NASA was not looking to outsource some of its work to ISRO. NASA was looking to combine the resources both agencies to undertake ventures of mutual interest.

That sounds like the mantra just before they officially announce 'well yeah, they are so cheap we will start outsourcing our engineers'. Now just how long before congress and the president is outsourced to india? ;)

Re:Griffin's answer

[LordNimon]

From what I hear, NASA engineers are already cheap - they willingly get paid less than they would in the private sector because they love their work so much.

Re:Griffin's answer

[eviloverlordx]

Now just how long before congress and the president is outsourced to india? ;)

The correct verb is 'sold' :).

Seriously, though, getting to the moon on the cheap with India seems a lot more likely to succeed than any space plans involving cooperation with Russia.

Re:Griffin's answer

[Anonymous Coward]

...not looking to outsource... ...looking to combine the resources both agencies...

It still has the outsourcing taste to it.
May be true the nobody will lose their job to outsourcing in this case.
More likely true that extra engineering help won't be hired from the USA, but from India.
It feels like outsourcing just the same.

Re:Griffin's answer

[javamann]

"Now just how long before congress and the president is outsourced to india? ;)"

If there is a God... Tommorrow

Re:Griffin's answer

[plantman-the-womb-st]

Actually, an agreement with India is a good thing in terms of launch site choices. Easier to lauch the higher above sea level you start. India does had those little foot hills called the Himalayas.

Re:Griffin's answer

[H0p313ss]

Now just how long before congress and the president is outsourced to india?

It can't be too far off, you've been outsourcing your comedy from Canada for years.

Re:Griffin's answer

[Rei]

If the goal is "on the cheap", there are much better solutions.

1) Put off the landing date to give tech a chance to advance further; there are a number of interesting techs on the horizon.
2a) Cancel the CEV; launch astronauts on Shenzhou and Soyuz.
OR
2b) Finish the CEV, but with a disposable or minimally reusable design, launched atop an EELV to reduce development costs.
3) Complete the DART program to eliminate the need for shuttle-delivered ISS components.
4) Reduce manned spaceflight.
5) Funnel the savings into many launch cost-reduction programs at once. Possibilities:
5a) Scramjets
5b) HEDM fuels (cubane compounds, nitrogen rings, solid ozone grains, etc)
5c) Cryogenic solids/hybrids
5d) OTRAG-style vehicles
5e) Nuclear thermal propulsion
5f) Materials tech (cheaper superalloy production methods, cheaper/stronger carbon structures, better linings, etc; especially important for reusables)
5g) General engine tech (there's always exotic engines like aerospikes, but I was thinking more along the lines of flometrics-style pumps, simpler turbopump designs, better self-contained hydraulics, better sensors, etc)
6) Also funnel the savings into in-space cost reduction tech:
6a) In-space assembly.
6b) Tether reboost
6c) Magnetoplasmadynamic thrusters and associated high energy density nuclear power plants
6d) Orbital tugs (rocket powered or ion powered)
6e) Solar power tech (to reduce mass and increase power)
6f) Exotic propulsion methods - antimatter-catalyzed microfission/microfusion, nuclear saltwater rockets, etc.
6g) Lots of other miscellaneous craft tech that I don't want to have to take the time to enumerate. ;)

Only after several generations of the smaller projects and one or two generations of the larger projects do you actually work on a vehicle that you plan to use as a workhorse and take a moonshot. By cutting back on the big capital expenses (the manned exploration program), you free up funds to take several technological routes at once, so you can pick the winner.

Re:Griffin's answer

[Anonymous Coward]

First they let the hispanic workers take the low skill jobs. No problem, we'll go mid level.
Then they outsource our mid level jobs to Indians and Chinese. We're told highly skill fields will be our edge.
Now the Indians have infiltrated the highly skilled fields. Unemployed. Fries? No, those jobs are taken by the hispanics.
Welfare! Shit, it ran out as the elite spent it all on the oil war.
Pray to God? He's not home. Islamation of the western world is busy removing said diety.
Bit fucked now aren't we? How dare our government let us fall. Anger! How about civil war?
The elite few will fix that as the final part of their plan of global totalitarian socialism, the New World order.

Re:Griffin's answer

[Phillup]

Tommorrow

You mispelled 'Yesterday'.

Re:Griffin's answer

[spun]

Newkyuler power in space? Good god man, you'll kill us all! If the thing blows up or de-orbits, that amount of newkyuler participles could, uh, well I don't really know but I'm going to go with "reduce the planet to a glassy sphere." Won't someone think of the children? You can't hug a children with radioactive satellites.

Re:Griffin's answer

[Bluesman]

You mean Jim Carrey? The SNL crew?

This is just more evidence that outsourcing, while it may seem appealing at first, just doesn't work over time.

Re:Griffin's answer

[Anonymous Coward]

Highest isn't best. You want to be as far from the earth's axis as possible (aka The Equator). The Himalayas are really tiny vs the shape of the Earth. If you made a globe to scale you wouldn't be able to see a bump. You probably couldn't even free it.

To get into orbit, you can't just go up. You need to go sideways. Watch a space rocket launch and notice how soon they start to tilt the rocket. Ever bit of velocity you get from the Earth's rotation is free.

Oh, and no one wants to haul a rocket up a mountain anyway.

Re:Griffin's answer

[plantman-the-womb-st]

Correct Mr. Coward, "highest" isn't the issue. Height from sea level is, I'll give you a hint why, it's called friction. The height matters very little but the density of the atmosphere matters lots.

Re:Griffin's answer

[SenseOfHumor]

I guess rocket science is not this slashdotter's cup of chai. If you read TFA, they are not talking about launching gliders(himalayas of all the places!). And India's launch sites are along the coast (far away from the Pakis I guess :-) And boy - how many language errors in one short sentence!!! 'does had' 'foot hills'.... Foothill doesn't just mean a small hill :-) It has to be like a foot(of a mountain or range)

Re:Griffin's answer

[Jafafa Hots]

um.... not a single one of your suggestions would be cheap. Soyuz? Well, if you leave off the habitation module leaving only the rentry module, and reduce your crew size from what we want, and then invest billions to recreate the monstrous N1 booster, then... um...

Scramjets? Nuclear thermal? everything else you mention??? Sure, they would be good things to pursue on their own merits, but they would ALL be extremely expensive to develop. Saying they would be cheaper is like saying in 1970 "the Space Shuttle will be cheaper than expendables because you don't have to throw it away each time."

They said that, and of course they were laughably wrong.

Re:Griffin's answer

[plantman-the-womb-st]

You are correct, I'm not really into rockets, electronics is more my thing. And yes, Himalayas of all the places, in case you've never heard of ideas like this one.

Re:Griffin's answer

[Sitrix]

Last I recall there was already a craft with nuclear propulsion launched a while back, not to mention a good share of nuclear powered satellites are already up in orbit. Space is full of radioactive particles, so it's not a big deal.

I do agree with Rei. NASA needs to fund research a little better at this time, instead of trying to waste available resources on useless missions. If they would just push technology research just a few years, they could have a lot of options to choose from to accomplish their goals a lot more efficiently. I realize that by going to Moon, it could increase public interest and potentially gain additional funding for technology research related projects, yet it can also backfire in many ways which could set NASA back later on.

Re:Griffin's answer

[Glonoinha]

Regardless - I hope the motherfucker blows up and destroys what's left of NASA's credibility in the process. I can think of a lot better ways to spend US tax dollars than on oursourcing the money and years of knowledge to help the Indians along in their space program.

All you terrorists out there - if you want to really cripple America, you want to hurt the USA in a way that they will never recover from? Destroy all the tech centers in India and you will succeed in your goal. It would be a lot easier, and much more damaging to the US economy giving you a much higher return on investment than the hassle of striking them on US soil.

Re:Griffin's answer

[purfledspruce]

These are only workable if they are politically viable. None of them are politically viable. It is not in the United States' interests to lose the capacity for human spaceflight.

We can't launch the CEV on an EELV; man-rating any of those vehicles would be a nightmare. We can't launch only on foreign launch vehicles, as said above. Technology development will NOT inspire the next generation of scientists and engineers, which is one of NASA's ultimate goals--human spaceflight is inspirational and helped us with the cold war, after all.

The fact that you know so much but know so little is shown by your desires for NTP -- not only is Nuclear Thermal Propulsion going to cost billions of dollars and take years to finish, it really doesn't help that much for going to the Moon. Sure, you could launch a more capable system and take the same time to get there (or you could get there faster), but if you have to spend $5B on the engine alone, and probably $B for each copy of it, you're not going to have a space program left to train the astronauts, much less build the spacecraft.

And don't get me started with the "high-density nuclear power plants"! Sheesh, that's ANOTHER $5 billion--and if we're successful, we'll have the largest ever nuclear protest group at the launch site...ASSUMING that we can get launch approval! Never mind that it'll only be politically viable for 2 more years (6, if we get another republican, or maybe 10 if we get two) and the system will take at least 15 years to build. Look at SP-100's future if you don't believe me.

"Antimatter-catalyzed microfission/microfusion"?!?!?! What are you smoking? If we have problems launching something like New Frontiers, which had an RTG on it, how are we going to launch the most dangerous thing known to mankind? Oh, and that's forgetting that a project manager is incentivized to put things on his mission that will WORK...which means TRL 7, minimum, and this is, what, TRL 2? I doubt that there's a workable science bench microfission...and even if there were, it's got to fit on a conventional launch vehicle to get into space.

Technologists always forget to think of things like a project manager: A project manager wants a piece of equipment on his spacecraft to 1) work, 2) fit, 3) weigh as little as possible, and 4) take up as little electricity as possible. PERFORMANCE IS SECONDARY to all of these.

A technologist, on the other hand, is looking for a new, more powerful, more efficient thing. He usually thinks that, once performance is achieved, then putting it into the package that will fit on the spacecraft is no big deal. It's usually the most technically challenging part! Look at how long it took the MER rovers to unfold...well, all of those mechanisms had to be designed and built, which cost a lot of money--if a larger aeroshell could have been used (technically difficult, reentry is tough) then the rovers could well have been less expensive.

In the end, though, the real problem is political viability--and none of your suggestions take that into account. If you're going to spend $17,000,000,000 of the taxpayer's money, then it has to be acceptible to their elected representatives, or it's not going to fly.

Re:Griffin's answer

[Anonymous Coward]

--f you're going to spend $17,000,000,000 of the taxpayer's money, then it has to be acceptible to their elected representatives, or it's not going to fly.--

Just tell them that you've actually SEEN Iraq's nuclear weapons up there. Then nobody will mind the price.

Re:Griffin's answer

[Rei]

"Soyuz? Well, if you leave off the habitation module leaving only the rentry module, and reduce your crew size from what we want, and then invest billions to recreate the monstrous N1 booster"

What the heck are you talking about? The first thing that I said was to put off moon/mars/CEV and reduce manned spaceflight. The only heavy lift vehicles needed would be to complete the ISS, and that's why I mentioned completing DART so the launchers don't need to be manned, and thus we can use things like modified Delta IV heavys.

"Scramjets? Nuclear thermal? everything else you mention??? Sure, they would be good things to pursue on their own merits, but they would ALL be extremely expensive to develop."

Cut half the money from the moon/mars/CEV programs in order to fund cost reductions, and you have a fortune to spend. I'm not talking about building monstrous craft here - just vehicles that give us the technology to see what works and what doesn't for a next-gen vehicle.

Re:Griffin's answer

[Rei]

First off, I agree that it's not politically viable. I'm just talking technology and economics.

We can't launch the CEV on an EELV; man-rating any of those vehicles would be a nightmare.

It'd be nothing compared to the difficulties they're having trying to get a working CEV design using SRBs. Cut the mission scope to be nothing more than ISS, cut the anticipated lifespan, and you have a much simpler engineering task.

not only is Nuclear Thermal Propulsion going to cost billions of dollars and take years to finish

True, at least in the case of a full-scale craft based on it. Hundreds of millions to the low billions for research (NERVA did most of it for us), and upper tens of millions per engine.

but if you have to spend $5B on the engine alone, and probably $B for each copy of it,

Way out of the ballpark. NERVA-2 (the spacecraft) was expected to cost 266m$ per 870k kg rocket in 1985 dollars (perhaps 400m$ today).

Sheesh, that's ANOTHER $5 billion

Um, no. The entire JIMO probe was slated to cost 400m$, which included a gas-cooled nuclear reactor.

and if we're successful, we'll have the largest ever nuclear protest group at the launch site...ASSUMING that we can get launch approval!

As stated, I deliberately ignored political consideration and approached only from a technological and economic standpoint. However, that's not really true. While they're popular to pillory, the Cassini protests were pretty darn small. Nuclear thermal propulsion might get a higher political profile, but a gas-cooled electricity-generating reactor won't.

"Antimatter-catalyzed microfission/microfusion"?!?!?! What are you smoking? If we have problems launching something like New Frontiers, which had an RTG on it, how are we going to launch the most dangerous thing known to mankind?

Okay, now you're off the deep end here. Do you know what *catalyzed* means? The amount of antimatter is miniscule. We simply cannot affordably produce (nor trap) enough antimatter with current technology to produce a pure antimatter thruster. Antimatter *catalyzed* microfission/microfusion uses energetically irrelevant amounts of antimatter to trigger fission or fusion reactions in microscopic specs of fuel.

I doubt that there's a workable science bench microfission...

Google it. I'm not here to teach you Advanced Propulsion Concepts 101.

and even if there were, it's got to fit on a conventional launch vehicle to get into space.

Penning trap + pellet injector + antimatter injector + bell nozzle + pellet tank = antimatter catalyzed microfission/microfusion rocket. Which component, may I ask, are you picturing as being huge/heavy?

I'm almost surprised that you didn't rail against HEDM, cryogenic solids/hybrids, OTRAG, or any of the other things I mentioned.

Re:Griffin's answer

[utnapistim]

Now just how long before congress and the president is outsourced to india?

Actually, I think we can all agree that this would be a big improvement.

Re:Griffin's answer

[purfledspruce]

but if you have to spend $5B on the engine alone, and probably $B for each copy of it, Way out of the ballpark. NERVA-2 (the spacecraft) was expected to cost 266m$ per 870k kg rocket in 1985 dollars (perhaps 400m$ today). Okay, now you're off the deep end here. Do you know what *catalyzed* means? The amount of antimatter is miniscule. No, my point was not that we would be using a lot. The point is that, politically speaking, if you're launching a single positron, there will be no way to launch it. The next point that I made was that you're dreaming if you think that we can have a space-qualified rocket using these technologies within 15 years' time. Penning trap + pellet injector + antimatter injector + bell nozzle + pellet tank = antimatter catalyzed microfission/microfusion rocket. Which component, may I ask, are you picturing as being huge/heavy? You're probably right about this. I thought that a penning trap was, right now, about the size of a desk, perhaps 1m on each side...but I haven't looked in a while. the Cassini protests were pretty darn small You're absolutely right, and the New Horizons launch was even smaller...so we're getting there. Um, no. The entire JIMO probe was slated to cost 400m$, which included a gas-cooled nuclear reactor. Really? I was under the impression that JIMO was cancelled because its costs were going through the roof. The technology program alone was in the hundreds of millions. After all, SP-100 did most of the work for an in-space reactor, and that was 100's of millions just for the reactor. I'm almost surprised that you didn't rail against HEDM, cryogenic solids/hybrids, OTRAG, or any of the other things I mentioned I din't have time...and I think that my first point of inspiring future engineers and scientists is a real one, as is the political nature of the program. Your answers are good and well-thought out, though--you obviously work in the industry and know more than I. Cheers,

Re:Griffin's answer

[joeljkp]

NASA's been partnering with Russia, Japan, and the EU for years. Why only when they start partnering with India do people suddenly scream "outsourcing!"?

Re:Griffin's answer

[Midnight Thunder]

NASA's been partnering with Russia, Japan, and the EU for years. Why only when they start partnering with India do people suddenly scream "outsourcing!"?

Stereotyping is so easy ;)

Re:Griffin's answer

[rochi]

uh, please don't bring politics into this. I mean the republicans (who are now taken over by the neocons) distrust anything that goes against the bible. All you would have to say is that newkewler power runs on aborted fetuses/ god came to you and told you that man, evil sinful apple/knowledge seeking beast that he is, came to you and told you to blow up nasa, and nasa would be up in flames, just like this post will be.

Two Words

[Aqua_boy17]

Curried Tang

Re:Two Words

[Chagatai]

That just makes my colon hurt by looking at it. Thanks for the nightmare fuel.

Re:Two Words

[NotBorg]

Cowboys and Indians... on the Moon?

* ducks *

Re:Two Words

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

In a confined space?! Are you mad!?

Re:Two Words

[craXORjack]

Curried Tang

Yes I'm very sorry but we do not carry Tang. Perhaps you would like to be trying a nice glass of Mang.

Re:Two Words

[Silver Gryphon]

Hey, they wanted a new means of propulsion...

Avoid duplication of efforts, or?

[foundme]

ISRO Chairman: "We (ISRO and NASA) would like to see how best we can avoid duplication of efforts, especially in areas like earth observation and space sciences."

It sounds great, but it can also be seen as piggybacking on NASA's technology.

So what does NASA stand to benefit? To prove that they did land on the moon?

Re:Avoid duplication of efforts, or?

[Anonymous Coward]

Seems you are incapable of thinking that anybody other than NASA can have some very advanced space programs - esp a third world country like India.

I think it will be impossible to penetrate your thick skin and empty head, but let me still try to give you just one link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Space_Research _Organization

Its assholes like you who give USA a deservedly bad name.

Not quite

[CXI]

The summary author would have been more correct in linking to the following story rather than attempting to make commentary by selecting the link they did: http://sify.com/news/fullstory.php?id=14200860

It's not "another take" they link to, but rather "another story". Related, yes, but lets try a little harder (yes, it's slashdot, etc, etc but it doesn't hurt to try)

For Mankind.

[ZSpade]

Since progress in this field is really beneficial to all of humanity, it's really good to see more countries joining forces to move progress along. I think in the long run privitization of the space industry is the way to go, but until that industry takes off a world wide coalition to push things forward might be our best bet for progress.

And so it begins...

[Locke2005]

The race to open the first lunar Kwik-E-Mart.

Re:And so it begins...

[Anonymous Coward]

SIMPSONS LOL! APU LOL! Kiwk-E-Mart jokes are never old. They're as funny now as they were in 4th grade.

Cowboys and Indians on the Moon, Oh my!

[Attaturk]

Sounds like an Irwin Allen sci-fi series.

Re:Cowboys and Indians on the Moon, Oh my!

[Anonymous Coward]

East Indians...not Red Indians

Re:Cowboys and Indians on the Moon, Oh my!

[Anonymous Coward]

That would be red-dot type Indians, not woo-woo type.

Re:Cowboys and Indians on the Moon, Oh my!

[Attaturk]

Yeah thanks. It was a joke. Believe it or not most people always knew the difference. ;-)

Re:Cowboys and Indians on the Moon, Oh my!

[zakezuke]

Yeah thanks. It was a joke. Believe it or not most people always knew the difference. ;-)

I'm not sure it was a joke. I don't know all of Irwin Allen's work, nor have I watched much Lost in Space, The Time Tunnel, Land of the Giants, or whatever else he's done. But it woudln't shock me if there was a Lost in Space episode where they landed on some planet and met some evil alien East Indians or another with evil Cowboys. It wouldn't shock me at all if if there was an episode with East Indians and Cowboys flying away on Persian carpets showing "you don't need a carpet, you need a r-r-r-r-r-r-ug".

Re:Hello!

[Anonymous Coward]

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RTFA

[GillBates0]

Under an accord between the countries' space agencies, India's first unmanned lunar mission will carry two scientific payloads from the US agency, Nasa.

ISRO's mission will carry payloads for NASA. It is piggybacking in a literal sense, but the other way around.

This Assumes That We're All Still Here...

[Chagatai]

It amazes me that no one has picked up on how there is a comet nearby that has shattered into over 64 different pieces. NASA is tracking one piece that has a minimum distance of just 9300 miles away from the earth, with a flyby on May 11. Given that some of these fragments have discrepancies of over 100% between their nominal miss and minimum miss distances, I find it a little hard to believe the NASA line that we should clearly miss this comet. If nothing else, from their graphs and such, it looks like the earth will be going through the comet's tail later this month.

Re:This Assumes That We're All Still Here...

[Locke2005]

What part of "minimum miss distance" do you not quite understand?

Re:This Assumes That We're All Still Here...

[Amouth]

Intresting.. they have a good simulation here http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/db_shm?sstr=73P-BD looks like a near miss to me.. yes it is close but it is a miss and that is all that counts

Re:This Assumes That We're All Still Here...

[oni]

The minimum shown there is based on a three-sigma variance - there's only an 0.03% chance the comet fragment will come closer than that. So, one in ten thousand. Don't lose any sleep over it.

Re:This Assumes That We're All Still Here...

[MrTester]

I think you have been reading too much Yahoo! news.

http://www.badastronomy.com/bad/news/index.html

Re:This Assumes That We're All Still Here...

[HardCase]

A miss is as good as a mile. Or 5 million miles.

Re:This Assumes That We're All Still Here...

[HardCase]

How dare you pollute this off-topic discussion with FACTS??? Oh, the shame of it all!

India on the moon

[Anonymous Coward]

U send me ur message from otr space 4 ur outsourced job!

Thx.

Indian Space Units

[TubeSteak]

I think that, when they talk about lifting sanctions on "Indian space units", they mean relaxing/removing the sanctions imposed on high-tech exports to India.

1998 was when the U.S. flipped out over India's nuclear tests.

It has little to do with altruism.

[Anonymous Coward]

I doubt that "benefitting all humanity" has anything to do with this partnership. It's about the economics of it.

First of all, we must remember that Indian engineers are just as capable as engineers from any other part of the world. While we have all had horrible experiences talking with tech support representatives over there, that is in no way indicative of their engineering talent. India especially has become one of the world leaders in aerospace research.

Second of all, at this time, an American dollar goes a very long way in India. As with outsourcing in the IT field, it is often cheaper for American companies to buy the services of Indian engineers, rather than hire domestic workers.

Third, we must also remember that America has lost much of its heavy manufacturing to nations like India and China in the past two decades. Indian firms may be better equipped to actually manufacture the rocketry and componentry needed for missions to the moon.

I doubt that trying to benefit humanity has any significant role in this decision. It seems more like a prudent financial move, in that it may significantly reduce costs.

Re:It has little to do with altruism.

[ZSpade]

Yes, but the end results are still the same. If we can do more with the resources we have this way, then there are tangible benifits to the field. That's the whole point of countries teaming up like this.

United we rise, divided we... stretch our budget a little thinner to rise.

Re:It has little to do with altruism.

[Anonymous Coward]

Personally, I would guess that this is very directly linked to trying to help India keep up with China in terms of development, especially in the missile development. Space exploration has historically been little more than a politically correct testbed / research laboratory / smokescreen for hi-tech weapon development. And considering that USA is probably not perfectly happy with the fact at how quickly China is heading to the superpower level it is not at all outside of reasonable thought to wonder if this move by NASA serves a double purpose of helping one of China's rivals in Asia.

Re:It has little to do with altruism.

[Anonymous Coward]

Indian engineers are just as capable as engineers from any other part of the world?

That's why Indian cars, like the 'Tata', are so famous for their performance, quality and reliability. When I think BMW, Mercedes Benz, Lexus/Toyota, Audi....I also think 'Tata'.

In related news,

[CCFreak2K]

NASA has decided that it would be cheaper to send Indian employees up with the astronauts and sell the radio equipment. If the austronauts have a problem, they can ask the tech support crew, who will have scripts for the most common problem situations.

Re:In related news,

[AuMatar]

The helpdesk people will speak in heavily US-accented Hindi and claim there names are "Habib", to give them the full helpdesk experience we've been getting for years.

Re:In related news,

[monopole]

To outsource where no H-1B has gone before!

Outsourcing/offshoring

[Anonymous Coward]

Now that we've outsourced (offshored) offworlding to India... The country with the least space experience that still can launch sats... we could buy off-the-shelf Mars systems Made-in-China or somesort instead of doing a stupid space-exploration thingy... Afterall, isn't that what made WalMart great?

NASA is aware...

[Hamster Lover]

that flying carpets are a myth, right? I know NASA is under some budget crunches, but honestly...

Re:NASA is aware...

[OleblueTheheretic]

At least flying carpets will not cost so much, after all, a billion dollars to explore a rock that humans will not be able to get to for a long time sounds a little expensive.

Re:NASA is aware...

[greengoo42]

NASA is dying from all I can tell. They have cleaned out several of the space centers turning them into almost ghost towns by cutting funding for everything not directly related to the moon mission. That means that most projects were dropped dead in the water. The few people remaining had to shift to different projects to stay afloat. With all of the crazy cuts of funding, it doesn't surprise me if the only way we can afford to go to the moon would be to piggyback on somebody else who is willing to put the $$ into it.

Re:NASA is aware...

[nganju]

Flying carpets come out of Persian or Arab folklore, not Indian. I know you think they're all the same, but you're just displaying your typical Western ignorance, as are the moderators that modded you funny.

Your joke is equivalent to if NASA decided to work with the French Space Program and I made some jokes about German stereotypes (all the astronauts will have to eat sauerkraut, etc). It doesn't make any sense, and I doubt it would be modded funny.

Re:NASA is aware...

[Anonymous Coward]

Flying carpets are from Persia, which is now known as Iran.

Re:NASA is aware...

[slashdotnickname]

Flying carpets come out of Persian or Arab folklore, not Indian. I know you think they're all the same, but you're just displaying your typical Western ignorance, as are the moderators that modded you funny.

Didn't we land, and subsequently conquer, you Indians back in 1492? Sheesh, show some respect to your overlords.

Re:NASA is aware...

[zulux]

I know you think they're all the same, but you're just displaying your typical Western ignorance, as are the moderators that modded you funny.

Typical Western ignorance?!?!?!!?

As you type your screed on a digital computer, and send it over the internet with satellite linkups.

I'll say one thing: At least Western ignorance is rather inventive.

Re:NASA is aware...

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you know how many Indian brains are involved in the foundation of Internet,Computer Networks etc..
Go read networking research papers and find it yourself.

Re:NASA is aware...

[Anonymous Coward]

Did you seriously just complain about inaccurate stereotypes in the same sentence as the phrase "typical Western ignorance"?

Thanks for so masterfully demonstrating the blatant hypocrisy of the humorless political correctness brigade.

Re:NASA is aware...

[hackstraw]

I'll say one thing: At least Western ignorance is rather inventive.

Its the confidence in it that counts.

Re:NASA is aware...

[FurryFeet]

Please re-parse that sentence. You assumed it meant that Western people are typically ignorant. A second interpretation could be that GP is displaying a specific type of ignorance, one that is typical to Western people, namely, in the area of foreign cultures. I move that he's quite right.

Re:NASA is aware...

[Anonymous Coward]

Typical Western ignorance?!?!?!!? As you type your screed on a digital computer, and send it over the internet with satellite linkups.

Having or having invented technology does not stop you from being ignorant. The GP's comment is valid.

Re:NASA is aware...

[xamomike]

Actually I do believe most of the technology is invented by the non-ignorant Americans... or it comes from Japan.

Re:NASA is aware...

[Anonymous Coward]

I would like to disagree. Canadians and Europeans tend to study foreign cultures as part of our public education (as I can attest to having spent half my primary and secondary schooling in Canada and the other half in Europe). I believe only a certain subset of Western people have this deplorable understanding of foreign cultures.

Re:NASA is aware...

[woolio]

I'll say one thing: At least Western ignorance is rather inventive.

Many of those 'Western Inventions' were due to easterners living/working/studing in the west...

Try visiting a communications (engineering) research group at a local university.... You will be lucky to see a non-zero number of Americans there.... (besides the janitoral staff). And if you are lucky, then you should be buying lottery tickets if the one you see is pursuing a PhD.

Re:NASA is aware...

[Anonymous Coward]

No, you dumb cracker. That was the Spaniards in 1492. Your criminal forefathers massacred the native americans later.

Re:NASA is aware...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's the masses that are ignorant, at least a large part of them. It's like the cat, the goose, and the dog that didn't help the hen, but would pride themselves in something of good being produced in their neck of the woods, but having nothing to do with it. AmericA FUck YEAH!

Re:NASA is aware...

[Anonymous Coward]

I would like to disagree. Canadians and Europeans tend to study foreign cultures as part of our public education (as I can attest to having spent half my primary and secondary schooling in Canada and the other half in Europe). I believe only a certain subset of Western people have this deplorable understanding of foreign cultures.

America Fuck YEAH!

Re:NASA is aware...

[zulux]

Many of those 'Western Inventions' were due to easterners living/working/studing in the west...

They may be genetically white, but they are imersed and adopting Western culture.

"White" people are a minority, but the Western culture is spreading.....

Moon

[stormphr34k]

okay. Moon. been there, done that. why are we going back?

Re:Moon

[methodic]

Because we never went there in the first place dummy, why do you think there is all this hype to "go back"

Oh No!

[ikejam]

...They programmed in kilometers! ...You mean Launch was supposed to be in IST? ...standard a/c input is 220 V? ...Space Shuttle Console is an ASCII game, and navigations were in PSLVconHE?

Well that's cool

[Malakusen]

I just think it's neat that India is sending a mission to the moon, allbeit an unmanned one. And for all the outsourcing jokes, the fact that it's NASA getting payload space from India seems to make NASA seem like more of a joke. Of course, to them it probably is a joke, since they've already been there. It looks like, with the ESA and Bulgaria also sending payloads, the better joke would be one about the Indian mission being like a taxi driver. If it was Indian astronauts in a NASA shuttle, then there'd be a good opportunity for outsourcing jokes.

I wonder who the next nation to walk on the moon will be?

Re:Well that's cool

[Pchelka]

Actually, I think that this is a sign that NASA and the U.S. government are finally changing their attitudes about the developing space programs in India and China. We missed out on a big opportunity to participate in China's Double Star mission not too long ago, solely for political reasons. The European Space Agency did cooperate with the Chinese on Double Star, and European scientists are now reaping the benefits. President Bush has done a lot to undermine NASA's credibility, but Michael Griffin is trying to maintain NASA's reputation as a leader in space exploration and science. Even though this new lunar mission will be primarily an Indian mission, NASA can now claim that India wouldn't be able to do it without our support. We can't say that about the recent Chinese space exploration efforts.

Re:Well that's cool

[Malakusen]

I think NASA would be talking out thir ass if they tried to imply it couldn't have been done without our support; India is driving the car, we're just packing along a couple of hitch-hikers. More beneficial would be to say it was a cooperative effort, not that they needed us.

Minimum Miss Distance, etc.

[Chagatai]

Well, there are several problems with this concept of the "minimum miss distance" that bug me analytically:

1. The current nominal miss distance is 33LD, with a mimium miss distance of .04LD. When two estimates are so darn far apart, it makes it difficult to have any faith in their estimations. It's like saying, "between 4 and 33 million people will die of the bird flu". Some of the larger parts have been calculated more accurately, but this one has not been updated in over a week.

2. The nominal miss distance is calculated on a two-body system (comet and sun) that does not accomodate for the earth's gravity, as I understand it. Furthermore, the distance is from the center of mass of the two objects, which when you add the radius of the earth, drops the distance to just over 5,000 miles. This leads into the next problem...

3. The Roche limit for the earth is 11470 miles. That is the point at which tidal forces would tear an object apart. That would mean that the 5,000 mile estimate would put this thing in a place where it could be further fractured.

So, with all that in mind, plus the fact that there may be hundred of more chunnks of comet that no one has seen yet, plus several asteroids that will be passing within 6LD around the same time, makes me raise an eyebrow.

Re:Minimum Miss Distance, etc.

[PitaBred]

Umm... actually, that'd be more like saying "between 4 and 3300 people will die of the bird flu.". Nice try though. I think those boys at NASA know a bit more about math than you do. They don't want to be hit with a comet either.
Your analytics leave a bit to be desired. I think you're more into fearmongering with pseudo-science.

Re:Minimum Miss Distance, etc.

[Retric]

FYI: Roche limit does not apply for three reasons first the fragment is probably held together by chemical bonds not gravity and second on a near miss there is little time for such effects to take place. (Yes over time a glass of water will evaporate in a low humidity room but it take more than a few min for that to be significant.) And finally even where the fragment to break apart each fragment would continue more or less on the same path which would cause it to miss the earth. As to why you ignore the earth's gravity in all but the closest near miss: With a V relative of 15km(km/s) and a distance of 15,360 KM the object is being accelerated by a force of (12,756.3/(12,756.3+15,360)) * .0098km/s/s = 0.00445km/s/s and that's tangential to it's path but it's passing the earth at that point so it makes little difference. Steeping back to 30,000 KM the object is accelerating at .00111km/s but most of that vector is not pulling the asteroid into a collision course. You can think of it as a large vector along it's path and a much smaller vector pulling it into a collision course. The further out you go the smaller the net force and the smaller the fraction that's pulling the object into a collision course. Earth's gravity is important when you want to know how the object is being deflected but it does little to alter the probability of impact for objects with a high relative velocity. PS: Feel free to calculate the two vectors at 30,000KM and 60,000KM on a near miss.

Re:Minimum Miss Distance, etc.

[Retric]

FYI: Roche limit does not apply for three reasons first the fragment is probably held together by chemical bonds not gravity and second on a near miss there is little time for such effects to take place. (Yes over time a glass of water will evaporate in a low humidity room but it take more than a few min for that to be significant.) And finally even where the fragment to break apart each fragment would continue more or less on the same path which would cause it to miss the earth.

As to why you ignore the earth's gravity in all but the closest near miss: With a V relative of 15km(km/s) and a distance of 15,360 KM the object is being accelerated by a force of (12,756.3/(12,756.3+15,360)) * .0098km/s/s = 0.00445km/s/s and that's tangential to it's path but it's passing the earth at that point so it makes little difference. Steeping back to 30,000 KM the object is accelerating at .00111km/s but most of that vector is not pulling the asteroid into a collision course. You can think of it as a large vector along it's path and a much smaller vector pulling it into a collision course. The further out you go the smaller the net force and the smaller the fraction that's pulling the object into a collision course.

Earth's gravity is important when you want to know how the object is being deflected but it does little to alter the probability of impact for objects with a high relative velocity.

PS: Feel free to calculate the two vectors at 30,000KM and 60,000KM on a near miss.
(Now with line breaks...)

So finally

[geekoid]

Astronauts can get purchas a cool refreshing Squishy.

Thank you! Come Again.

The target is China, not the moon

[miletus]

This, combined with the recent nuclear deals with India, are prettly clearly geopolitical moves to bolster an economic and technological counterweight to China. Space science has little to do with it.

Re:The target is China, not the moon

[big dumb dog]

Your theory is very insightful, but it seems a little too cleaver for our current administration. (or the one before that)

Re:The target is China, not the moon

[JAYOYAYOYAYO]

i think you have mistaken eloquence for political cunning.

Missing Genie?

[Bruteus]

Maybe they figured out where the Genie in the Lamp is really at!

Summary Author Here

[hotsauce]

I purposely worded the phrase "another take on the /visit/" and not "another take on the story" because I found it interesting that while the BBC thought Griffin's visit important for the moon exploration cooperation, Sify (and others) thought the visit important as a sanctions ender.

I did see the link to the Sify story that reported on the MOU (it's clearly in the story I linked to), but thought the end of (most) sanctions to be an important story, too.

Japan vs. India

[Anonymous Coward]

When Japan was a 3rd-world nation, its government spent almost no money on space development. Rather, Tokyo plowed money into developing industry so that Japan could reach 1st-world status as quickly as possible.

By contrast, the Indian government wastes huge sums of money on space exploration and nuclear-weapons development. Meanwhile, the majority of Indians live in squalor. Many Indian children continue to work as slaves.

There is a horrific comparison here. Japan, a nation with virtually no natural resources, has reached 1st-world status. India, a nation with plenty of resources, remains a cesspool of poverty. Why did Japan succeed but India fail?

Re:Japan vs. India

[Liveandletlive]

Because Japan was never ruled by greedy idiots (British and Muslims). Because India was dumb enough not to invest in its own military and modernization.

Those who give stupid comparisions need to understand that there still are homeless and starving population in US of A and that these two things are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

Re:Japan vs. India

[Anonymous Coward]

The Japanese were way ahead of Indians in many respects. Singular language and religion for the most part, with general homogeneity. The Indians have a fragmented culture - hundred of subdialects, subsects of religion that are well nigh incompatible with one another. Indians and Africans are very interesting to me, because most people see them from the outside as one monolithic culture, but they are an amalgam of dozens, hundreds of cultures. They get along imperfectly because they are different. This is mis-perceived by outsiders. India and Africa also share the same problems associated with Imperialism - and how it negatively affected their populace. Africa, moreso, obviously. The Japanese, by and large, are one people.

NATIONALISM: Getting their asses kicked in WWII was a GREAT motivator. No offense to any Japanese members of our community. India has no such unifying struggle.

Also, even back then, the Japanese were working towards a urban environment. Cities all over. Things go way faster the denser the population is in an urban center with access to education and opportunity. India is not as such.

Indians also has entrenched cultural mores that make their society resistant to change. Not so Japanese. They are a remarkably adaptable people.

SCALE: India is a billion people+. There is no dictatorship/regime to issue authoritarian demands. JApan is a much smaller country. Scale counts. Bigger things move slower. Exceptions are dictatorships - etc, where there are singular visions and people are forced to adhere.

Re:Japan vs. India

[ThreeE]

Like there is any comparison between poverty in the United States and poverty in india... Comparing the poverty in the United States to the poverty in indian is like comparing a pinprick to decapitation.

Re:Japan vs. India

[iggymanz]

oh no, India had its problems WAY before British imperialism, people were treated even WORSE before then.

Re:Japan vs. India

[Anonymous Coward]

Parent is correct. The only way anybody starves in the U.S. is if they go on a hunger strike. Most of the poor have TV and running water.

Re:Japan vs. India

[SoumyaRay]

wow. how can such a (presumably) well educated crowd as slashdot remain so fricking ignorant about the world? whats with all these racist jokes? sometimes when i read slashdot's blatant racism, methinks that india is doing the world a huge favor by taking away valuable jobs from the hands of such ignorance.

first, you forget that the US dumped tons of $$ into the reconstruction of japan. the british did not do that for india, despite having wrecked the indian economic potential far more surely than the americans did the japanese. you forget that india suffered 200 yrs of brutal colonial rule that left all but a tiny fragment of its ppl uneducated. you forget that under colonialism, indians weren't even allowed to run anything that resembled industry... it was illegal to do more than grow basic commodity crops for british consumption. when india got indepedence, it had an industrial revolution to catch up on. japan did not have to go through that -- they had industrial know-how all along.

the indian space research organization is single-mindedly dedicated to the development of technology that benefits civilians. you can read about that yourself. the moon-mission is the first gamble they are taking wherein they hope that a challenging outer-space mission will both boost their technological know-how and in turn help civilians in the future, and also ignite the minds of indian children regarding technology and space. yes, i understand that americans who were born before the 90s can't see anything outside the cold-war prism. but really, indians just want to push their technology further...

why did japan not invest into military and nuclear technology the way india has? simply b/c it has always been under the american military and nuclear umbrella. india, on the other had, was treated as a pariah by the US for not kowtowing to american foriegn policy. india has had to suffer embargos and sanctions for its right to defend itself. in contrast the obstentatiously peace-loving japanese could pretend that it didn't want to develop a strong military or militaristic technology, when in reality it has just counted on the US to protect it.

ok, enough. i'm not getting paid to educate this lot. nor is it entirely feasible.

Re:Japan vs. India

[fm6]

When Japan was a 3rd-world nation, its government spent almost no money on space development. Rather, Tokyo plowed money into developing industry so that Japan could reach 1st-world status as quickly as possible.

You're as ignorant as you are anonymous. When was Japan a "third world nation"? That refers to a country with no industrial infrastructure. Japan hasn't been in that category since 1868, when they were forced to give up isolationism and modernize. They've been an industrial nation ever since. Perhaps you're thinking of the period right after WW II, when they were recovering from the destruction of their industrial centers. But even then, they hardly resembled a "third world" nation: they were still an industrial economy, albeit a badly damaged one.

By contrast, the Indian government wastes huge sums of money on space exploration and nuclear-weapons development. Meanwhile, the majority of Indians live in squalor.

Well, I'm not going to endorse nuclear weapons in India or anywhere else. But if you think that spending money on technological developement has no impact on India's poor, you're as ignorant of economics as you are of history. In order to take better care of its people, India has to grow its economy, and to do that, they need to invest in intellectual capital. They've been very successful at that, as a lot of Americans who've seen their jobs taken over by Indians will tell you.

Re:Japan vs. India

[Anonymous Coward]

As an Indian I'd like to provide a different viewpoint.
Firstly India's space and military programme are two entirely seperate things with different objectives. Sure they share some tech, but not as much as they would if they both were building the same stuff.
India's space programme is mainly focussed on developing satellites for broadcast and remote sensing of natural resources. Both these technologies are needed by nearly all countries (irrespective of whether you're third world or first world) and it makes a lot of sense to develop them on our own. Remember, if we paid other countries for these services we'd end up spending more money. The moon satellites are less immediately practical they're more about creating offshoot technologies/ R&D.
There's less justification for India developing nuclear weapons. But it does exist. Look at it this way; America is seperated from China by two large oceans. Yet it considers China to be it's main strategic enemy in the long term. We share a border with a nuclear China that's now increasingly resource hungry and willing to do anything to get those resources. Burying our heads in the sand is a pretty stupid strategy. Sure that money is better spent on development. But what about the small chance that China attacks us? We're not willing to pay the large price that entails. It's insurance; you always hope you don't need it but you'ld be a fool to not have any.
Finally our space programme and nuclear programme are heavily cash strapped; they're operating on shoe string budgets compared to those of almost any other country (which is another reason we're so proud of them). We spend as much as we can but no more. Sure development suffers a little, but it's a price we feel is worth paying in the long run.

Re:Japan vs. India

[mrops]

"Why did Japan succeed but India fail?"
I think comparision between India and Japan is wrong. Japan was fighting the world during WWII i.e. it was a world power, India at the time was coming out of a British rule that had slaved it.

All Japan really had to do is recover from WWII and the nukes. India had to start from scratch. Its only been 55 odd years or so since British rule ended in India. 55 Years is not a lot of time for a country to get freedom and stand on its feat.

Closest I would compare here is that Japan has succeeded and India is still writing its exam, judgement is still out.

There is a reason to why everyone is worried about outsourcing to India. This is also where NASA can learn from India. Budget for ISRO is nothing compared to that of NASA, nonetheless ISRO is in a select class of organization that has managed to launch a one ton plus satellite into orbit.

This is where NASA has most to gain, getting things done for lesser costs. Further, no single event except for wars have helped technology as much as NASA's Man on the Moon mission.

ISRO's exploration of the moon has similar objectives as well.

Re:Japan vs. India

[enrevanche]

After WW II Japan's government was for a long time controlled by the US. They were not allowed to build a large military or develop nuclear weapons. The Japanese did not really have much say in this. Even today, the US has substantial influence and the current governmental structures would take a monumental effort to change. It had nothing to do with the "nuclear umbrella". To some degree it was the same for West Germany. Neither the British nor French felt safe under the American Umbrella and so developed their own nuclear weapons.

Re:Japan vs. India

[hughk]

You forget the real issue is that India can afford nukes and a space program. Unfortunately, it can't afford literacy or infrastructure development.

As for your misrepresentations about the Brits not permitting industrial development, you may want to have words with this company as well as others. When the Brits left, the Indians did not want major assistance programs from any western power and were prefering to flirt with the Soviets at the time.

Re:Japan vs. India

[The Cydonian]

Not to mention, India's budget allocations for space exploration is miniscule compared to, not just imperial Japan's war-budget, but also to India's own spending on poverty alleviation. Perhaps not compared to primary education or healthcare in some parts, but hey, you weren't complaining about the state of schools in Bastar region were you?

Re:Japan vs. India

[syslog]

>Because Japan was never ruled by greedy idiots (British and Muslims).

And you bring religion into this because??? Just proves you are a bigotted idiot.

kind regards.

Re:Japan vs. India

[afaik_ianal]

Ahh - when was India ruled by Muslims? Are you sure you're not thinking Pakistan?

Re:Japan vs. India

[Anonymous Coward]

First of all when Japan was a "third world" country, which I pressume you mean when it was not industrilized. First of all look up the Meiji Restoration which was when Japan really took major steps towards industrializing. This occurred in the late 1800's. The main reason they did so was not to bring their working class out of poverty but for millitary purposes and imperial ambition(ex. Ruso-Japanese war). In addition after the World War II Japan had a large amount of support from the U.S. to rebuild its country. Most notably this all occured before even the existance of a U.S. or Soviet space program!

During this time India was still a colony of the UK. Only after World War II did India/Pakistan gain independence. So only in the last fifty years have post colonial have had the time to control their own resources and learn to adminster their own countries. Even the U.S. had a very turbulent start with quite a few notable rebellions(see Shays' rebellion. So how can India have failed when they have been in control of their country for about a half century?

Yes, India still has problems with child labour, but in a country with a massive population through out its history, not everyone is going to get rich at the same time. Hopefully their goverment will keep education of the poor as one of their priorities.

So what should you learn from my little rant? Poverty/wealth distrubution between and within nations have complex historical socioeconomic factors. Its rarely as simple as they did or did not have a space program. India could allocate its entire tax revenue to just education or wealth redistrubtion. Or they could use a small portion of it for projects, which may have long term positive impacts for their nation economy. Budget allocations are not all or nothing

Re:Japan vs. India

[Anonymous Coward]

There were these semi-famous people called Mughal. Look it up. And there are many other muslim rulers beside them in Indian history.

Re:Japan vs. India

[the100rabh]

Well there is a difference between India and US and other countries...US was unable to get Statue of Liberty from across the Atlantic even after 100 years of Indipendence...Contrast India...Its planning to help go across the boundries of Earth in just over 60 years of Indipendence...Call it greatness of a nation or whatever....But the fact is India is not targetting just one thing...It beleives in all round development....Indian are inclined intellectually in general and have a strong desire to excell....To top that environment factors are right now faverable to allow Indian to expore their dream...Guess u guys forgot that India sent help for Katrina Disaster...and refused any help when Tsunami struck....instead help others nations like Sri Lanka and Maldives.....It just shows the growing strength of India in all fields.....Rome was not built in a day and India had been destoyed and pushed further down during the rule of Brits....Thats a fact none can deny....Now India is coming up...But the fact is that NASA is interested because it wants to cover up the big Apollo Hoax that it went to moon. Guess those radiation and X-Ray sensors will tell a big story....Waiting for that truth to come up

Re:Japan vs. India

[deltacephei]

how can such a (presumably) well educated crowd as slashdot remain so fricking ignorant about the world?
The handful of posts you are referring to are hardly reflective all of slashdot readers. And further, possession of an education does not necessarily equate to good judgment and a reasonable assessment.

the indian space research organization is single-mindedly dedicated to the development of technology that benefits civilians
Actually, this ISRO/NASA agreement is a very interesting proposition. It will be a benefit to the entire world if ISRO becomes a major player in space exploration.

yes, i understand that americans who were born before the 90s can't see anything outside the cold-war prism
Hmm. A blatantly racist and ageist sounding statement. It may suit your anger to lump everyone together and assume ignorance, but this is an act of laziness and ignorance on your part. Quite a few of us pre 90s people are not in agreement with decisions our government has made. Policy is bought by special interests, not through wise decision making by fairly elected leaders.

Re:Japan vs. India

[ghoul]

Japan had one big advantage over India . They never let themselves be colonized at the height of imperialism. Even when they finally became a colony of the US it was after a long war which had taught the Americans fear and respect for their colonial subjects. In contrast when the British came to India , India was going through a pretty bad period of Muslim colonization and Hindu resistance with the result that India was a patchwork of small Hindu and Muslim states each fighting each other and not having any sense of national identity. In fact the current India is not really a nation state in the modern sense. Places like the Northeast have always been more part of South East Asia than India while places like Pakistan and Afghanistan which had been the nurseries of Hindu culture are overrun by Muslims and no longer part of India. The amazing thing is India stays together instead of breaking into 10s of states like Africa. Comparing it with a homogenous state like Japan is patently unfair. Despite all this if India is managing to launch satellites its very creditable.

      Also the cheap shot about nuclear weapons versus development is not really fair. India had the theoretical knowledge for nukes well before anyone else. The basic equations for nuclear physics are the Bose-Einstein equations invented by J C Bose an Indian scientist and published jointly with Einstein( In the racist academia of 1930s an unknown Indian scientist could not get even path breaking discoveries published until Einstein recognized his genius and offered to copublish). So India could have been working on nuclear tech as soon as Independence i.e. 1947 and probably beat even the French to the punch. However the Indian government made a concious decision not to work on nuclear research and to concentrate on development. However after being defeated by China in 1962 and with the explosion of the Chinese nuclear weapon India was left with no choice and had to start a nuclear weapon program and within the decade they had the bomb in 1972.

Its easy to say money should only be spent on development but one should understand the bigger picture. India lives in a very hostile neighbourhood and sometimes Guns have to come before Butter.

Besides the nuclear and space programs are a way of having opportunities for highly educated and intelligent Indian scientists else they will all emigrate to US and Western Europe. Once the top scientists leave even the other parts of the technological infrastructure (the part related to development) tends to collapse.

So just like the US government spends money on University research and Nasa the Indian government spends money on ISRO. Call it welfare for techies but its a necessity

Re:Japan vs. India

[Anonymous Coward]

The handful of posts you are referring to are hardly reflective all of slashdot readers.

 
Perhaps you didn't see the comments in the first 10-20 minutes. I found one comment that was on point. There were about 60 others all referring to kwik-e-mart, outsourcing, flying carpets and genies (isn't that Arab folk lore?), and call centers. Since then, most have been modded down and others have chimed in. However, the comment you have responded to was spot on when it was posted.

Re:Japan vs. India

[deltacephei]

I said readers, not posters to this particular thread. There is a difference. Perhaps you really didn't understand this. However it certainly is pathetic to make comments about flying carpets, etc.

Re:Japan vs. India

[XchristX]

I basically agree. The India/Japan comparison does not hold water. In fact, a comparison with India and Israel would be more accurate and meaningful.

1) Both countries have ancient cultures with long histories of many achievements. Both cultures are widely misunderstood and demonized in many parts of the world.

1.5) Both countries have multi-ethnic and pluralist societies and have absorbed many cultures into their flock.

2) Both countries went through periods of severe unrest when the majority group were persecuted by foreign powers and driven out (in the case of Israel) or enslaved into dhimmitude (in the case of India).

3) Both countries were British colonies.

4) Both countries spawned nations in the same year (1947-48).

5) Both countries are surrounded by intensely hostile enemies with a deep-seated hatred for their country (though, as an Indian, I'll admit Israel has done a better job of tackling them, as our government did not prioritize military development and anti-terrorism until our rather embarassing retreat in the face of Chinese aggression during the SI war, and increasing terrorist attacks in Kashmir). This lends credence the the parent's point about the importance of military development in India.

6) Both countries have a growing urban middle class, with a strong technokrati and educational institutes like the Indian Institutes of Technology, BITS etc and Technion,Ben-Gurion University etc. which have produced highly successful graduates that help build up the nation.

7. Both countries want to invest in technology and in building a modern economy.

  Unfortunately, these similarities have escaped many of my countrymen, as, throughout the cold war, the leftist fools in our govenment (not my government, I never voted for them) ran behind everything the Bolshies said or did, and this included cold-shouldering Israel (though we did buy newer RADAR technologies from Israel during the SI war and the war with Pakistan, and MOSSAD agents helped train RAW). India and Israel established full diplomatic relations in 1992, and now political relations ar better. India should carefully observe Israel and learn from it's success, as the social and political raw material does exist in India to build a nation modelled on Israel and achieve their level of success.

Re:Japan vs. India

[Critical_]

I wasn't sure I was going to mod you down for being an idiot or responding to your comment. I will be the bigger man and respond. The Mughal Era was from 1526-1707 and was defined as a Muslim empire. The era after that was the Maratha Era who were (from Wikipedia): "The Hindu Marathas long had lived in the Desh region around Satara, in the western portion of the Deccan plateau, where the plateau meets the eastern slopes of the Western Ghats mountains."

If you have parsing troubles, since 1707 India was ruled by Hindus. During the colonial period, the British had an influence but most of the dirty work was done by Hindus who were sympathetic to British goals. To blame Muslim governance for modern poverty in India shows you are not only ignorant but also a bigot. I know it is the "in thing" these days to blame everything on Muslims but try to pick some more obscure events for we can't easily prove people of your ilk to be wrong.

Re:Japan vs. India

[rsidd]

You seem pretty clueless about Indian history. There has never been an empire, before the British, that ruled all of present-day India. (Actually, not even the British did -- Pondicherry was French and Goa was Portuguese.) Before the British, the last significant empire /was the Mughals, up until Aurangzeb. They lasted beyond 1707 -- until 1858 (Bahadur Shah Zafar), in fact -- but their reach did not go much beyond Delhi after Aurangzeb's time. As for the Marathas and others -- they were regional rulers (in present-day Maharashtra), like many others through India's history.

Not that I agree with the ancestor post that the Muslims were to blame for anything. They had a lasting influence on Indian culture, and some (like Akbar) contributed to learning in many respects. The first Mughal (Babar) may have been a foreign invader but his descendants weren't.

Re:Japan vs. India

[Anonymous Coward]

Nuke development wothout having support from anywhere out (till now)....first test after (just) 27 years of independence.....testing thermonuclear devices in 1998....launching their (and many other western countries' as well) space vehicles by its own....enough to justify the indian capabilities.....wat is needed is only time. About Japan, they have enough cheap energy sources (many nuclear power-plants), access to all the new technological advances bcoz of being blessed by USA. If denied (which is happenning till now), india can develop it by its own. But it takes time and that is all what indians need.

Re:Japan vs. India

[thej1nx]

Dear idiot, Muslim is not a religion. Islam is the religion. And GP is correct. India was invaded first by mughal/muslim invaders that came via Afghanistan and ruled it for a few hundred years, and then finally by british who came masquerading as traders and then managed to rule it by their policy of divide and rule and betrayals. GP is referring to muslims as a community identifier rather than having anything to do with Islam the religion. He is also off the mark. Muslim rulers of India at least did not loot the country and take its riches elsewhere. At worst they just imposed their own conservative culture on the vanquished. British on the other hand, tried their utmost to steal the riches and resources for centuries. The diamond jewel in the crown and scepter of the Queen itself for example, is property of India that was stolen away by the british, and has still not been returned despite repeated requests by the Indian government. Or you can look at the examples of cruel exploitations like chopping off the hands of hundreds of "neel" dye farmers of Bengal, who were much more skilled than the machines of the textile industry of Britain, and were considered a major hurdle towards establishing a market for british textiles in India. Go and read up a bit on history please.

Re:Japan vs. India

[mukund]

You talk lines quite easily.. if you were Indian or know our history, you wouldn't generalise.

It's hard to trust "western powers" after 200 years of colonial rule. Colonial rule started cause we (Indians) trusted the British in business in the first place.

About health and literacy programmes, yes it's unfortunate that our level of literacy is low. But it doesn't mean there isn't enthusiasm to help. Factors such as corruption have hurt this.. but we still have goals to make everyone literate. It is in fact a basic right of every child in India to be entitled free and compulsary education. But in a highly populated country like India, it's easier said than done.

But all things must move, and just cause we want health and literacy, it doesn't mean that we just ignore other development. There's greater room for development.. due to the amount of population (which also means high competition) and the _quality of education available to the middle classes_, India has a large number of intelligent people. Scientific research and development, and engineering would usher in development of infrastructure.. these are related.

Again, all this is easier said than done.. but instead of pooh-poohing our approach, you should be glad we are doing something about it. India is not very far off from the likes of the U.S. We value freedom too.. we are a democracy. Our markets are just as capitalist.

There are incidents you'd prolly hear about, about communal violence, etc. But do you hear about the number of Indians of different religions, cultures, etc. living in perfect harmony (read the vast majority of the Indian public)? It's quite a feat to pull off. It's no simple task to administer a country of this size.

Progress can only be slow and steady. It's certainly not flat as you can see.

Re:Japan vs. India

[johansalk]

Wow what bullshit. How can you be modded insightful?>! For a start, Japan was already an advanced nation before the US "dumped tons of $$ into its reconstruction". Do you really think that attack on Pearl Harbour was done by a third world nation?! Second, "all but a tiny fragment of" india's "ppl" were "already uneducated" before they saw British rule. Don't blame it on the Brits. Blame it on the Indians themselves and their thousands of years of rotten caste system that favours only a tiny fragment of the population to receive education and anything resembling human rights, while the rest toil in shit. And, guess what, a friggin' huge fragment of its population are STILL uneducated, hundreds and hundreds of millions, and the upper castes that fill up the political bodies STILL don't friggin' care much about them! Compare that with China and how well China did on eradicating illiteracy, disease and hunger in its population. Countries that have advanced had a strong ethic of equality and solidarity, for everyone in them; where on Earth have you heard of "untouchables" except in India?! India is the place where if you're toiling in shit and on the verge of starvation you're thought of "it's your karma, you had been been wicked in a past life, you deserve all you get you POS!".

Re:Japan vs. India

[AtomicBomb]

you forget that the US dumped tons of $$ into the reconstruction of japan. the british did not do that for india,

You've forgetten an important fact: India is largely unaffected by the WW2 (when compare with most of the countries in Asia/ Europe). No major battle has broken out on her soil. So, the rebuilt effort after independence is more about how to revert to normal life after colonialism. (Well, the Bengal famine did kill many civilian, but it mainly affects the regions in where known as Bangladesh rather than India proper. ). India was in a much better starting line than most in the region.

The ridiculous fact after World War Two in Asia is the penality is inversely proportional to the suffering. The aggressor (Japan) was rebuilt with the help of US. Apart from token gesture (e.g. left the factories and machinery in occupied land) Japan did not compensate to anyone to any significant extend (Korea/ China/ Philipine/ Indonesia/ Vietnam just name a few, of which their countries were absolutely devastated by the invading Japanese army).

Re:Japan vs. India

[afaik_ianal]

I hereby stand corrected. <insert image of afaik_ianal(nor a historian) running away with tail firmly between legs>

Re:Japan vs. India

[afaik_ianal]

Wait a second. This is slashdot. Aren't I supposed to find some subtle reason why I'm technically right? Oh, wait - I must be new here ;)

Re:Japan vs. India

[Anonymous Coward]

When was Japan a "third world nation"? That refers to a country with no industrial infrastructure.

Technically, it refers to countries which were unaligned in the USA/USSR cold war (mainly because they were so poor). "First World" meant aligned with the USA, and "Second World" is a rarely used term for those aligned with the USSR. (The terms originated in the US aligned countries, hence the bias against the USSR by placing it second.)

On that scheme, Japan is most definitely a "First World" nation, due to the protection sought from the USA against invasion by USSR-aligned communist China.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_world
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_World

Re:Japan vs. India

[amberp]

Let me fix some misconceptions that you have.

"The Indians have a fragmented culture - hundred of subdialects, subsects of religion that are well nigh incompatible with one another."

The Indians have a diverse culture (and not a fragmented one). They do get along with each other quite well.

"The Japanese, by and large, are one people."

Well, that may not be accurate. But I am not the best person to comment on that.

"India has no such unifying struggle.
Also, even back then, the Japanese were working towards a urban environment. Cities all over."

Indian were fighting against the Brits for freedom.

Exceptions are dictatorships - etc,

I am sure you are not suggesting that dictatorship is good. Although US of A has a bit of it.

BTW, How many times have you visited India ?

Re:Japan vs. India

[Anonymous Coward]

Ahh, another hard-up nerd jumping the gun. I'm the AC that wrote

There were these semi-famous people called Mughal. Look it up. And there are many other muslim rulers beside them in Indian history.

in response to:

Ahh - when was India ruled by Muslims? Are you sure you're not thinking Pakistan?

My post simply pointed out India had Muslim rulers. Go take your self-righteous indignations to fellas who give a shit about blaming Muslims.

Btw, "Maratha Era" is misleading. After Mughals' decline, India disintegrated into numerous kingdoms, rajs, sultanates, etc., and Marathas' sway over India was no where near that of Mughals - no central Hindu regime reigned over India.

Re:Japan vs. India

[prurientknave]

the original parent was a bit off the mark lumping the vocal retards as a representation of the majority view, but your ridiculously retarded retort isn't helping the situation any.
 
If you think Europe hasn't had its share of untouchables, namely the lowly polack migrants, the gypsies and various other subhuman castes of europeans then you are extremely misinformed. Every society has had, and still has a disdain of the working class, the poor, the weak and the sick; generally people who have through no fault of their own are destined to live in the rough, and cruel fringes of society, where human beings are still trafficked like livestock and life is worth very little. The ultra rich in america would never think of even passing through certain sections of america. These people were at a loss to explain why evacuation plans for katrina could not assume that everyone had a car and family scattered in suburbs all across america. These same rich people in america would NEVER think of visiting the land of starving african skeletors plagues by insect infestations, disease and malnutrition. In fact would you? The peacecorps is admirable in theory but a very large percentage of us would never raise a finger to help the horrible conditions in darfur or the various other deplorable regions of the world. Do you have any idea why we find paris hilton's antics on her show kind of strange? Today, right now there is a global underclass, a global batch of untouchables that only the most pious, principled individuals would go out of their way to aid (mother theresa comes to mind). In fact religious orders all over the world exist and have existed to keep this class sedated. The hindus had their religious order to spread their BS about karma and the christians had their BS about the elect, and divine right of kings for the dirty dirty serfs (let's not forget concubines, primanocte etc hmm? )
 
The original poster wasn't fair in lumping all slashdot americans into the same misinformed racist category that you inhabit, but you have not acquitted yourself any more admirably.

Good day sir.

Re:Japan vs. India

[The Cydonian]

Not to rain on your parade, but umm, "boundaries of Earth"? Isn't the Earth an oblate spheroid in shape?

Re:Japan vs. India

[the100rabh]

Guess you forgot what it means...where do u belong to...earth or mars???

Re:Japan vs. India

[The Cydonian]

:-)

Mars, naturally.

But my bad; didn't quite notice that you were denying Moon landings as well.

Re:Japan vs. India

[the100rabh]

C man, I have seen the documentry of this moon landing being fake...The xray and the radiation meter will give the conclusive proof of Moon landing being a fake or genuine one...Check on google video of that documentry...you will definately find it...See that and we can continue our discussion about it :-)

Re:Japan vs. India

[hughk]

Half a century later, colonialism is still being blamed although it brought national unity (with the exception of partition), democracy and infrastructure. The problem is too little has been done to develop the infrastructure.

I say forget the fscking space program at ISRO in Banglaore, why not just make sure that the people there all have access to clean running water, or perhaps the politicians owning the water trucks won't like it. Access to clean water is seen as a key indicator of development, not a space program.

Then there are the towns and villages vs the big cities. It is great that so many have jobs in the big cities, but what about the rest? It is a very interesting to drive to a major Indian software company (sitting in its customs zone) and compare the affluence of the company in its shiny new campus to the poverty outside.

Apparently it costs around $2.5K to have a child in a big city if you want proper medical care. I know plenty of Indians that can afford it, but their drivers, cooks etc., won't be able to. They can just afford to exist.

Will the poor people accept this for a long period, well probably not? Historically this will mean civil unrest, which is why those big software companies stockpile supplies (diesel, food, water and so on).

Lastly, if India was a true democracy, please can they dispose of their dirty politicians and get some things done for the ordinary people!!!

Re:Japan vs. India

[Anonymous Coward]

Well if you think India was not affected by WWII, read this and this. Compare the number of death in the stated artificial 'famine' with that of the holocaust.

Stunning accomplishments by India

[marlinSpike]

My My! This is truly a stunning accomplishment by India, to see its Space Program (by far, the most advanced amongst developing countries, and very favorably comparable to even the Japanese program), recognized so well by NASA. This is truly a coming of age for a very important country in the world, and I have to say, Hats off to the Indians -- they are making their rightful claim to being one of the most important nations in the world.

India has been courted by Presidents of both parties in America, and counts a full 1/3 of Congress in the India Caucus. That speaks volumes for how important India is to our American interests. Then there's the obvious close ties India has to Europe, and especially Britain. American foreign policy interests are also greatly helped by a country that is the world's largest democracy in a rather un-democratic neighborhood, and has very good relations with Israel, also in a neighborhood where Israel has few friends.

The cold war relations between America and India were truly a mistake, and a lost opportunities for both our countries, and I'm glad to see the US finally form the strong bonds with a country that will necessarily be one of the most important in the world in the coming years.

Years of propping up dictators in Africa and Pakistan have done us no good, and have only bred festering flash-points. It's time we gave some serious thought to a relataionship that has and will continue to produce excellent dividends for both parties.

Re:Stunning accomplishments by India

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, you are a genius man, whoring karma from all those Indian moderators. There's like a billion of em! I never thought to try that. My hat is off to you, sir.

Re:Stunning accomplishments by India

[William Robinson]

whoring karma from all those Indian moderators

Does it work? Ok, let me try...

Kudos to Manmohan Singh and his team, who have brought liberation and economic reforms. India is on the road of becoming superpower. Ellora and Taj Mahal are great piece of art.

Ok..I am waiting.. +5?

Re:Stunning accomplishments by India

[argStyopa]

Peace, love, and happiness notwithstanding, I'm sure any apparent connection between India and America's "newfound friendship", and the rise of China, is entirely coincidental.

Not that I'm saying it's not a good thing; it is. But once the Soviets folded, it was geopolitically necessary for the India/US axis to form.

Two more:

[spun]

Chutney Squishee

Already Been There

[hotsauce]

Of course, to them [NASA] it probably is a joke, since they've already been there.

A surprising number of people are expressing this sentiment. NASA "has already been there" with much older equipment, most of which was simply geared to keep humans alive. This mission gives the opportunity to do real science with modern equipment, and answer new questions, for instance Smart 1's survey of surface elements to confirm theories about the origin of the moon.

Re:Already Been There

[Malakusen]

I'm just guessing that the sentiment at NASA is "already been there", I personally think it's a pretty cool idea and one that will advance human knowledge and be a good first step in the eventual colonization of the Moon. The more we know, the better we'll be able to do it. Hell, maybe they'll find something really cool and useful there, and it will provide incentives for colonization.

Conversation from the mission...

[geobeck]

...received from my Crystal Ball(TM):

"New Delhi, we have a problem."
"Thank you for calling Mission Control. May I be having your name, address, and current software version please?"
"The software has locked us out. We need you to make a course correction in exactly 20 seconds!"
"Certainly sir. If I could just be having your license number please."
"License number?! Just fire thrusters 2 and 3 for 4.5 seconds on my mark!"
"You're Mark? Thank you for giving me your name, but I am needing your license code too please."
"Our license number is going to be 3-D-E-A-D-G-U-Y-S if you don't fire the thrusters in--5 seconds!"
"If this is an emergency request, please be giving me your express service code."
"Express... Hey Buzz, crack the main hatch open for 5 seconds on my mark... NOW! We'll have to hope this works."
"I'm sorry sir, but it appears you have voided your warranty. Please be having a nice day."[click]

Re:Conversation from the mission...

[EntropyXP]

omfgroflmao

Re:Conversation from the mission...

[geobeck]

Racist?! For a simulated accent imitation? Would I be a racist if I imitated a Newfie accent? Or a Southern accent? How about Cockney or Scots?

I read a tech support horror story from the customer's point of view once where the support tech had such a heavy accent that the customer could not understand what he was saying. The customer asked to speak to someone else. The supervisor called him a racist and hung up on him, even though he had made no other comment than "I cannot understand what this technician is saying."

You, sir, are a knee-jerk reactionary. People talk differently. People think differently. Misunderstandings between people with different dialects, and different thought patterns, are funny. They have been since Much Ado About Nothing, and most likely long before that.

Do you complain about every comedian who makes a culture-oriented joke? Must keep you busy, because that's pretty much all of them.

Re:Conversation from the mission...

[gubol123]

Oh come on.. he is far from being a racist. he is just being funny.. for your info i am Indian

Re:Conversation from the mission...

[bgarcia]

Well, I have read thousands of stories of pathetic helpdesk services years before dell outsourced its helpdesk to India. The fact that you had to pick ONLY Indian helpdesk to do some karma whoring definitely makes you a racist, and nothing else.

LOL! Yeah, why didn't he pick some other nationality to post in a story about INDIA AND NASA???

You probably think that this is racist too. Oh my god! They just called an Indian woman a "curry & rice girl"! How racist of them!

Privatization != Pancea

[hotsauce]

The privatization pancea comes up on every space story, but science is not neccessarily profitable. That's why there has always been a strong government role in fundamental research. Hence government funding, and (even in the US) institutions like the NIH, CDC, and yes, NASA.

Re:Privatization != Pancea

[Anonymous Coward]

Yup... international government cooperation (through academia and research bodies) is probably the best bet to drive forward the cutting edge of what's possible.

The private sector can increase the availability of the technology to the general public (making it more affordable/practical), which then, in turn increases available funds (in part due to increased public willingness to spend government money when they can more directly enjoy the benefit, and also since the government agencies can now buy the (hopefully) cheaper privately-produced components) to develop the next generation cutting-edge.

(Wow... this is a super-obvious point to be making. I'm glad I'm posting anonymously, so I'm not accused of karma-whoring.)

Berserkers with Turbans

[Anonymous Coward]

Will India help with the design of the berserkers with tentacles? Will they ask that we add turbans as well? Will India help us advance the technologies required to truely become servents of our robotic inventions by providing the necessary English (sort of) technical support that is required in these trying times?

Re:Berserkers with Turbans

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe they will, and maybe they won't. But for now, I would be happy to help you with *your* English...
1. Not "truely" but "truly"
2. Not "servents" but "servants"

And fyi, I'm an Indian.

You were modd'ed "Troll"

[Anonymous Coward]

for having a funny comeback to an obvious Karma Whore. /. is getting dumber and dumber.

Re:You were modd'ed "Troll"

[spun]

It's troll tuesday. Slashcode turns all troll downmods into positive karma on tuesdays, didn't you know? Anyways, I've been here since the beginning. My karma was crazy high before the cap. It hasn't budged from "excellent" since. I make 4-5 +5 comments per week, at least. I could give a rats ass if some humor impaired mod thinks I'm a troll.

Re:You were modd'ed "Troll"

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, your ego clearly isn't impaired.
(Posted AC because I modded another thread)

Re:Blatant Racism...

[paraax]

Then to even things out...

"First lunar McDonalds"
"deep fried tang"

Hmmm, not sure what I can substitute for the Dell Helpdesk.

It's a joke...

[Hamster Lover]

lighten up. Of course I know the difference between Perisans and Indians, Indians listen to Bhangra dance music while they drive their cabs.

You people and the truth. The truth is in your gut and I felt that a joke about India and magic carpets would be funny, and it was, but then along you came with your facts and books and shit.

Contentless post shamelessly searching for mods.

[Anonymous Coward]

Synopsis/key quotation lifted from article, to get mod points. Inoffensive mildly articulate paragraph of 'views' intended to get the agreeable to mod up, but the disagreeable to ignore. Snide comment about 'slashbots' and 'group think'. General lamentation that post will be modded down because Slashdot 'is broken' as such a comment often produces the reverse effect. /mention of a meme, hoping for lazy +1 funny on top of the rest.

Economic Policies

[hotsauce]

Poor economic policies. It's easy to call them poor in hindsight, but many countries thought them a good idea at the time (witness the Soviets, with otherwise very impressive achievements). Also, these policies were born out of fear--India had been colonized by a company, and was very concerned about foreign trade and private companies.

Since the 1990s, India has changed economic course, with good results. The Indian government still believes that satelite communications forms an important part of basic infrastructure in a country that large, and studies have shown that it is cheaper for India to run its own space program than pay others to build and maintain satelites and infrastructure.

India spends $700 million a year on its space program. So the choice is: give each citizen less than a dollar a year, or build a modern communications and research infrastructure that enables enterprise and creates jobs. No country ever got rich off handouts.

Re:Economic Policies

[oakgrove]

No country ever got rich off handouts.

I beg to differ.

Actually, India's strat is more similar than not

[AHumbleOpinion]

Your argument is weak in the sense that when Japan developed it's industry, 100+ years ago, it was betting on the emerging technology and economy. India is also making a bet on what the emerging technology and economy will be. I think there is actually some similarity to Japan's strategy. Also, given India's population, they need a big win. Space based technology and industry could provide that big win, competing with China over who is going to be the low cost industrial manufacturer would not be a big win.

Its beneficial

[Anonymous Coward]

The as expected Indian jokes are plentyful to be seen as usual. Surely the head of NASA is not an idiot to collaborate with ISRO, there is good reason. Lets not forget the current president of India was instrumental in carrying out India's first and very successful integrated missile program. He put india on the world map with fairly advanced missiles such as the Agni, Trishul..etc. And he did this all with what the US government would consider chump change. My point is that India is no stranger to aerospace technologies I'm sure a lot of this has to do with politics also, the US seems to be cozying up with India to counter the largely unexplained enlargement process the chinese military is going through. With the advent of multiple technology hubs in India, they will have the capability to do space exploration. I'm sure it would be in the US taxpayer's benefit also if the US can save some cash by collaborating with India on a moon mission. Obviously the taxpayer got screwed on the f-22, when Ben Rich (former head of Skunkworks) predicted in the 90's that procurement costs would be 60 mil a pop....that figure today is in the mid 300 million per f-22. Maybe the United States could learn about getting things done on a budget from India? or we should continue to ignore india and use bullshit patriotic pride and racist joke excuses like the last idiot always ends up using. Take your pick. Love it or hate it, India is an expanding economy. This is especially true in the tech sector. I'll just end this by saying most Americans should be happy to know that 75% of India thinks of the U.S. positively. India might be the one country out there...(I forgot Poland..) that respects the U.S. so why the hell not?

Call me crazy, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

...wouldn't it be a whole lot better to use our collective brainpower and money to start an "Apollo" program to develop alternative fuels here on Earth? Wouldn't that be an effort that's needed much more than another moon program?

MOD PARENT DOWN, Please

[WindBourne]

Japan targeted a number of industries. In particular, they targeted autmobiles and electronics. This was set up by the gov. (MITI). At first, they were considered inferior products. But as time went on, they improved with quality while keeping costs low. That allowed them to build up a nice middle class. And now, of course, they are the power house that they are.

India targeted Hollywood (bollywood). Most of their films are sold outside of india, just not big in USA/Europe. In USA, you can see them at the local artistic theaters.

About 20 years ago, they started targeting software by sending students to the states. More so, the amount of outsourcing that has gone on is now allowing India to create a small amount of in-country software. You will soon see a number of exported software coming from them (esp in linux).

Now, they are targeting space and nukes (esp power generation using iodine). It will take them 20 years, but they will most likely have very large thriving industries developed that will lead to more middle classes.

India is doing the japan trick in the same way that Korea did. China is taking a different tack.

Re:Actually, India's strat is more similar than no

[Tiro]

True; there are only so many countries that can be in high profit industries before they become competitive low profit industries. India has to try to jump ahead to have a chance at anything that will bring in a lot of $$$.

We have enough experience in this field

[calcutta001]

We practice day in and day out on the roads over here. The goverment strongly believes that all the citizens of calcutta should be able to drive on the surface of the moon, just in case an opportunity like this comes by.

Re:We have enough experience in this field

[Anonymous Coward]

You have to have experienced Kolkata traffic and roads to be able to appreciate the parent's comment. However I personally believe that driving on the moon would be a more enjoyable experience than driving in Kolkata.

Great News

[XMilkProject]

This is not 'outsourcing' as some said, but is in fact a very good step in the right direction.

As we know, space exploration is not cheap, and to advance the knowledge and technology at a significant pace often requires the resources of a government, or several governments.

With very few politicians seeing a return on investment (justly or not) in space travel, NASA budgets are shrinking, and cooperation between governments to reduce the financial burden sounds like a great thing.

I think this also might help bring about a sense of global ownership and responsibility regarding space exploration, which in my opinion is crucial to significant advances.

Out Out and to Sourrrrce!

[Tablizer]

"Griffin said NASA was not looking to outsource some of its work to ISRO. NASA was looking to combine the resources [of] both agencies to undertake ventures of mutual interest."

Uh, like what exactly is the difference and how does one tell?
       

India and NASA to Explore Moon Together

[PigIronBob]

I noticed that the jokes (or what passes for a joke) are linguistic in nature, what makes it even funnier is that they come from inhabitants of a nation that has bastardized a perfectly good language themselves and would not be able to save their live reciting one word of Hindi.

Re: India and NASA to Explore Moon Together

[Anonymous Coward]

You dare speak of the sacrosanct English language and then use a word with an 'ize' ending? Pshaw. Anyone that knows anything about linguistics at all knows that languages constantly evolve. To clutch at one's own linguistic heritage or some more 'classical' or 'correct' variant than what might be typical is to be, simultaneously, a hypocrite and an idiot.

Re: India and NASA to Explore Moon Together

[ramnishkalsi]

I normally resist the temptations, but this time I simple could not. Perhaps, we have forgotten, why the languages exist. They exist to communicate, and to stake a claim on a language is the funniest thing ever. On a more specific note, perhaps you need to read more about the seven year war between french & english. You will know more about, why most of the world speaks english & not 'french'. But then again, you are going to discount it because the word 'french' is mentioned in there... Imagine an Indian saying - this world has bastardized 'zero'. We invented it, huh.. But, again, coming from an Indian, you may even discount all of it. -cheers.

ITAR

[Rock Wallaby]

International Trade in Arms Regulations (USA law) will probably scotch any cooperation agreement NASA would like to have with anybody outside the USA (except Canada). Space related technology is listed as 'arms'.

European satellite manufacturers are marketing "ITAR Free" products - meaning no USA technical input whatsoever.

Stupid headline

[hero_or_what]

Why is it "India" and NASA? ISRO (Indian Space Research Organization) is funded by the Indian Govt, using Indian taxpayers Rupees just like how NASA is funded by American taxpayers dollars.

At the same time when Daimler-Benz bought out Chrysler, nobody went out saying that Germany has bought Chrysler. If NASA collaborates with the European Space Agency, are we going to see a headline that says - NASA and Europe to collaborate?.

Its the same regardless of whether its India or China.

Re:Stupid headline

[gfreeman]

I'm guessing because a very small minority will know what ISRO is. Even in Europe and the US, not many people would be able to tell you what ESA is, let alone ISRO. But the vast majority of people - if not all slashdotters - could tell you what NASA is.

Being a European in North Amercia, I can easily imagine a UK newspaper headline "NASA and Europe to join forces". In the broadsheets you're more likely to see "ESA" rather than "Europe", but I'd bet that newspapers would refer to "India" before they refer to ISRO.

I'm not saying that's right, or even a good thing, it's just the way it is.

satellite linkups?

[Anonymous Coward]

ah-ha-ha-ha! Who's the dumbass now?

ISRO

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm:

"India cant afford a space program when there is still poor"

This is rather stupid, it is akin to saying:

"India cant afford to develop the IT sector when there is still poor"

Only a retard who dosent know anything about economics would say the ISRO is a waste of money. The benefits to industry, job creation, technology expertise, etc, all pay for a space program tenfold. Except in the case of the cash cow programs of the old superpowers.

That wiki said it best:

"Some critical opinion is sometimes aired questioning the relevance of the ISRO in light of the low per capita income of the average Indian citizen, usually from foreign observers. In response to this, defenders of the Indian space programme point to the fact that it isn't considered a waste in other countries, all of which have some measure of homelessness or poverty. Also it is pointed out that the ISRO is unique amongst space programmes for its focus on developmental applications such as educational broadcasting and remote sensing. In addition, the ISRO is arguably the most financially successful space programme, with very cheap development and launch capabilities, and a budget of which 45% spent goes to Indian industry - it is arguable that the ISRO has paid for itself several times over already, not just in terms of success, but also in terms of commercial return. Finally, it seems obious to many that a country the size of India needs independent launch capabilities, and a full spectrum of scientific institutions and industry. [Ref: New Scientist]"

Ref Link: http://www.newscientist.com/special/india/mg185248 71.000

I am game

[crazybunny]

if they can send a mission to moon and do all the launching stuff they have been doing over the years with about $700 mn annual budget i am all for it (source :http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Space_Researc h_Organization) For comparision the alaskan bridge costs about 250 million!

Will the truth if Apollo Hoax be revealed

[the100rabh]

Will the radiation and Xray detectors tell the real story of Apollo Mission...Will the truth be revealed....Or NASA is doing a coverup by joining forces with ISRO.

Re:Hello!

[Shrithe]

You've replaced THINK ABOUT YOUR BREATHING as my favorite slashdot troll. I salute you, good sir.

The cold war...

[Rix]

Didn't exactly hurt space science...

India vs. South Korea vs. Taiwan vs. ...

[Anonymous Coward]

An Indian supremacist wrote, " first, you forget that the US dumped tons of $$ into the reconstruction of japan. the british did not do that for india, despite having wrecked the indian economic potential far more surely than the americans did the japanese. "

The Indian supremacist forgot South Korea, Taiwan, etc. All these nations, including Japan, were bombed into rubble. Their economies were in shambles in 1950. Malnutrition was widespread in Japan in 1946.

Yet, they survived and prospered.

India is a profound failure due to its people. Indians have been in charge of Indian affairs since around the 1950s. The Indians have made all the wrong choices.

There is 1 profound difference between Japan and India. The Japanese, before Japan became a 1st-world nation in 1980, considered Japanese culture to be inferior to Western culture. This notion of inferiority and respect for the West lead the Japanese to emulate the West wholesale.

Now, look at the Indian bigots in this forum. Despite the fact that millions of Indians continue to flee to the USA via the H-1B program, the Indians insist that Indian culture is just as good as Western culture.

Here's a clue. Japan is now a Western nation.

P.S.

During the Meiji restoration, Japan received no help from the West. The Japanese became a 1st-world nation within 20 years.

What the hell is wrong with the Indians?

Re:India vs. South Korea vs. Taiwan vs. ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Nothing is wrong with the indians rather wrong is with ppl like you who are thinking that they are getting H1-B VISA even if they dont deserve it. Understand the fact that u ppl r getting lazy and incapable and r in dreams that nothing is outside ur so called "A" world. Wake up. After 50 years of independence from those britons, USA was fighting with slavery and hunger....practically no tech advance and blah blah. And abt Japan has become west, u cant b more wrong. I study here in Japan and I never saw it yet. (Talk with the people here in Japan, of course if u know Japanese). If you said so after keeping in mind the technical advancements of Japan, be warned that technology is not only west's right. Every one can have it. I dont think if India would also be having access to its freedom from long back (like USA), it would have not been in "A+" category.

About india's decision to invest in its nukes and space missons, India prefer to live in sovernity rather than being administated by others as it was the case in past. Only money is not everything. Everyone (including u) can see what is happenning with Iran and what had happenned with Iraq (even though they have a hell of Oil and so money). It is a mindset of the ppl....few ppl wanna live in a golden prison with all the good bed and nice food and others outside in a jungle having no bed but FREE.

India belongs to the latter.

And one more thing, the American payload is for free. Absolutely no money is getting charged.

good for nasa bad for india

[Anonymous Coward]

Now that India signed a "pact" they will have to keep their mouths shut.

NASA gain's by letting India do their grunt work.

The only way we are really going to have real development out in space now is to get rid of NASA / Military. They run hand in hand.

Oh sure NASA will give India a cookie or two. But they would have been better off doing everything themselves. If you want to be strong you need to have a strong foundation, that means you build your OWN FOUNDATION. not rely on someone else's, this will only weaken knowledge and development.

Who in their right mind would sign a pact with the USA right now?!
Especially with the facists in charge.

New call center location?

[Potent]

And you think computer tech support is bad now... Just wait until our calls are answered by Mooninites!

Let outsource to India

[Anonymous Coward]

Let outsource all the tech and science to India. They can hire 100 engineers for the price of one here. Think of the amount $$$$$$$$$ NASA can save by outsource to India!!