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On Fourth Launch Attempt, SpaceX Falcon 1 Reaches Orbit
xp65 writes with the just-announced success of Elon Musk's SpaceX's long efforts to reach orbit with a privately-developed launching craft: "T+0:08:21 Falcon 1 reached orbital velocity, 5200 m/s Nominal Second stage cut off (SECO) — Falcon 1 has made history as the first privately developed liquid fueled launch vehicle to achieve earth orbit!"
dbullard adds "This was a completely new vehicle — it's not using any previously developed hardware. All developed from scratch. No government supplied hardware, Russian engines, or old ICBM motors. My hat's off to the employees of Space X — all 550 of them. (Note — no 'cast of thousands,' just 550).
They've got video of the entire launch."
It's like a car. The first mechanically propelled vehicles were military ones, made by governments. Troop trains, steam ships, and so forth. There were very few of them and they were very expensive.
Next, someone put a steam engine into a moving carriage and a rich guy wanted to try it out, so he bought one. That commercal exchange marked the beggining of car sales. When the maker of that primitive automobile saw that he could make money selling them, he began to make more, and to find other rich guys to buy them. And when someone else saw that money was to be made selling cars, he made a whole factory for them.
While its true that the 1900s saw expensive, unreliable cars, the 1920s saw massive mobilization of a whole society. That first commercial transaction was the herald of our current urbanized environment.
You're the kind of guy who would point out the first pre-Ford cars and say, "Almost thirty-one years after the steam truck, the private sector catches up, sort of. Woo-hoo, Urban America here we come."
If video games influenced behavior the Pac Man generation would be eating pills and running away from their problems.
I'm also curious, but at what point would you consider SpaceX deserving of congratulations? Their first successful Falcon 9 launch? Their first manned launch? Their first launch to a private space station? Their first circumlunar navigation? Their first lunar landing? Their first Mars landing?
I, personally, will say that they're deserving of congratulations with their first successful launch to orbit.
Conrgratulations, Space-X!
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escape_velocity
Genius.
How we know is more important than what we know.
You are correct -- I am against all taxes that do not provide for the common defense (national security).
Having said that, I appreciate, and agree with many of your points. However, your list of justifiable projects to spend my money on is just your opinion. I have my opinion as well, and while it is nicely aligned with yours, I have no right to force you or anyone else to fund my projects. If I (or you) believe in them we should enter the capital markets with our reputations in hand to get them funded.
What I don't agree with is your thesis that these things wouldn't be done without a government and the requisite taxes. I do believe that corporations would do many of these things. More importantly, as Elon has demonstrated, I believe that individuals with means would fund the riskier things. But, we have to allow them to build up discretionary funds and not suck them up with taxes.
Finally, anyone that has seen the inner workings of NASA today will likely attest that it certainly isn't "pushing the envelope" in the way that its funding (~$18B/year I believe) should.
would you care to refute his points?
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No power in the 'verse can stop me