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NASA Seeking Innovative Ideas from Public
Mike Peel writes "Science Blog is reporting that NASA is seeking proposals 'for creating and managing innovative activities, events, products, services, or other types of formal or informal education methods for the purpose of disseminating information nationally about NASA's projects and programs.'" Sadly I don't think simply providing them with a list of people you want shot into space counts.
"NASA is seeking proposals 'for creating and managing innovative activities, events, products, services, or other types of formal or informal education methods for the purpose of disseminating information nationally about NASA's projects and programs.'" Seriously, I have no idea what this sentence says.
Czech language for absolute beginners
"In exchange for a collaborator's investment to creatively distribute NASA information, the agency will consider negotiating brand placement, limited exclusivity and other opportunities as part of a strategic collaboration."
Does this mean we're gonna see big "Drink Coke!" advertisments next time we look through a telescope at the ISS? That would be some impressive brand placement...
Will program for karma.
Call your next spacecraft the Wii.
I'll never give up my tin-foil hat design!!!
Seriously. The shuttle program at this point in time is insane. We do not have the technology yet to make space travel cost-effective. Instead of pointlessly doing it wastefully now for no other purpose than habit, why not pour all that money into a program to develop new forms of propulsion and energy, and come back to spacefaring when we have a better solution?
,etc.!
It's not like sending humans into space serves any real purpose anyway. Robots can carry out virtually everything we need to do for FAR less payload cost. People often whine about the limitations of the robot missions compared to human missions, but these people have simply not thought through the cost-benefit analysis. Sure, a human mission payload can do more than the current robot misisons: the payload of the human missions is many many many times greater than the robot missions. If any of the Mars lander people could fill something the size of the shuttle with robot equipment, we'd be able to set up huge self-sustaining robot colonies on Mars easily. Instead, we want to send humans in what will then have to mostly be wasted space.
Look Mars, we bring you... poop! And urine! And lots and lots of empty space for our various gases! And tons of food! And energy for a return trip! And beds, chairs, tables, toilets
It's just nuts.
Make our lifes worthwhile. Disclose the information you keep about UFO-s, aliens and the alien technologies you've reversed engineed, you sneaky bastards.
And if all of that is just the product of some paranoid conspiracy theorists, oh well, just make it up and lie to us.
We'll love it.
Start working on things that average people (e.g. non-scientists) can get behind.
The shuttle program and space station may be incredibly valuable to the scientific community for research purposes, but there's nothing about it that captures the imaginations and emotions and concern of the general public. I hate to break it to NASA, but there's really nothing you can do to make average people excited about nerdy harcore scientific research.
That's the difference between today's NASA and the old JFK-era NASA.
You geek types out there may say, "but NASA isn't a popularity contest, it's a scientific endeavor". But you have to remember who funds NASA: ordinary taxpayers.
Moderator hint: a comment is neither "Flamebait" nor "Troll" if it is true.
Most people are aware of many NASA space programs. Hardly anyone appears to be aware of NASA's aeronautics programs. You get the occasional show on the Discovery Channel but that's it. I liked the one about control an aircraft in three axes using thrust only (the project was inspired by the Sioux City DC-10 crash).
Please, this is not a troll. I renember reading that back in the 70's, somebody got a bunch of companies together to try and buy an unused Atlas rocket from the government and form a private space program - NASA killed it. Do I even need to mention the cost and problems with the space shuttle, or the meter to feet conversion disaster of the mars mission, or the lenzing error on the hubble telescope. The simple truth is that by being there, they make it so that nobody else in private enterprise wants to act. For chrissake, why did a private millionaire space tourists need to go to Russia? Why did the X-prize happen without NASA at all? The writing has been on the wall for a long time, the future of space is here and it is not NASA.
Killing NASA will not kill the geniuses who work at NASA, all it will do is shut down the bureauocrats while the talent finds ways to be applied thru the rest of the private market.
Yes, but sending robots tootling around the solar system is frankly not very exciting, and the biggest payoff of all from spaceflight derives from the extent to which it captures the public imaginations.
Oh no... it's the future.
Well, if several years of reading sci-fi novels and watching sci-fi movies has taught me anything, YOU DON'T LET ROBOTS BECOME SELF-SUSTAINING! Cuz once they are, they get all kinds of crazy ideas about saving humanity from itself and decide to rule us for our own protection. Or, sometimes you'll get robots that have a persecution complex and decides that humanity needs to be obliterated because we are "imperfect," and thus a threat to their orderly existence.
Nope, if we let robots build colonies on Mars, it'll only be a short time until humanity is either subjegated, or annihilated.
When I worked there it was an amazing culture of self-absorbed, self-agrandizing, self-promoting bullshit artists, retired military, political appointees, and rednecks that has probably ever been assembled. It might have been funny if it weren't so painful.
NASA should send a "Highlights" DVD to every American citizen every year, right before Christmas. Which includes a free login to a NASA video site. And a summary of the ROI on NASA expenses, as well as its tiny percentage of the budget.
I've told that to every NASA and aerospace exec I've ever met. Now I'll use the webform, too.
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make install -not war
...the "Sii"
Yes, we do. What we don't have is political commitment for a government backed development (which some may argue is a Good Thing) nor sufficient venture capital available to the private sector to get off the ground floor (if you'll excuse the horrible pun).
Instead of pointlessly doing it wastefully now for no other purpose than habit,
Pointless? Hardly. The Shuttle is the only launch vehicle capable of completing ISS (International Space Station). Whether we're better off ditching the whole ISS/Shuttle program because it's wasteful is a separate, though related, argument.
why not pour all that money into a program to develop new forms of propulsion and energy, and come back to spacefaring when we have a better solution?
This really bears repeating: the viability of a successful space program -- public or private -- has nothing to do with technology; what we have now is totally adequate for the task and has been for at least the last 20 years.
The plea to "come back when..." is a specious bumper sticker argument that emerged in the early 1970's though it usually goes like "... when we've solved the problems here on earth!" as if the space program exists to "solve problems in space". The suggestion that we wait until we've developed "the right" technology betrays enormous ignorance.
As for doing science, an astronaut can stop, look, say "ooh, what an interesting rock!" then walk over, pick it up, and examine it closely with a Mark I eyeball in, what, 30 seconds? It takes days if not weeks for a Mars rover to do the same thing.
So answer me this, earthworm, what "new forms of propulsion and energy" should we wait for? Scramjets? Totally unsuitable. A large, lightweight tank filled with LOX (liquid oxygen) is a far superior solution than a heavy air breathing engine that carries a huge drag penalty. Better to get out of the atmosphere quickly and carry your own oxidizer. LOX is cheap, as is rocket fuel be it RP-1, liquid hydrogen, or whatever.
It's not like sending humans into space serves any real purpose anyway. Robots can carry out virtually everything we need to do for FAR less payload cost. People often whine about the limitations of the robot missions compared to human missions, but these people have simply not thought through the cost-benefit analysis.
As if you have done a thorough analysis? Right. So what benefit are you talking about? Science? Economic return by exploiting an extraterrestrial resource? Human colonization of the solar system?
Why would we build a colony of and, presumably, for robots on Mars? As for any sort of "easy" robotic mission to Mars, forget it. The robotic technology simply does not exist. It's likely, but by no means certain, that the cost of developing the robot technology would be at least as much as it would to develop a human mission. Why? Human beings are a well developed technology; the technology to send humans on long space voyages also exists -- because we've been doing it for over 40 years when we include the Shuttle program. Duh.
Geeks of Slashdot, I bring you the link to The Case for Mars by Robert Zubrin. It's not the latest treatment on a manned Mars mission but it indicates that we've had sufficient technology to begin development of Mars mission at least as early as 1996 when the book was written. Goo
"Where's my other sock?" - A. Einstein