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Reported Obama Plan Would Privatize Manned Launches
couchslug writes with this excerpt from the not-yet-paywalled New York Times: "President Obama will end NASA's return mission to the moon and turn to private companies to launch astronauts into space when he unveils his budget request to Congress next week, an administration official said Thursday. The shift would 'put NASA on a more sustainable and ambitious path to the future' said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. But the changes have angered some members of Congress, particularly from Texas, the location of the Johnson Space Center, and Florida, the location of the Kennedy Space Center. 'My biggest fear is that this amounts to a slow death of our nation's human space flight program,' Representative Bill Posey, Republican of Florida, said in a statement." If true, this won't please the federal panel that recommended against just such privatization.
Before anyone jumps up and shouts make sure that you're not being taken in by lobbyists who are trying to either support specific companies or jobs in specific states. They are apt to shout out about the sky falling before the real information is known.
Sit back, relax and wait until the report is actually published, read it and make up your own mind. Don't believe what has been filtered through potentially biased news media companies.
Agrajag: "Oh no, not again!"
That Obama is practically a COMMUNIST, I tell you!
Plan : increase the budget to NASA, and ask for them to purchase rides to space from newly formed private companies.
The article says that NASA has "50 years of institutional experience" in doing spaceflight, and that this would be a bad idea.
The "institutional" part of that statement is the problem. NASA stinks for spaceflight. The problem isn't in their engineering, it's in the fact that they have many, many masters all trying to stir the pot. Their budget depends upon the whim of Congressmen, not performing to a contract.
Privatization has many failures. There's a lot of goods and services that it doesn't make sense to privatize. But I think the high tech industry of space travel is one that will benefit enormously from privatization.
The only downside? Private firms can probably get a LOT more manned launches done per year for the same cost, but they'll be a little riskier. More astronauts will be killed. I don't see this as a problem : there's 6 billion people on the planet, and I for one if faced between possibly dying during a trip to space or dying from old age would choose the former.
I do not find your ideas intriguing and would like to unsubscribe from your newsletter.
Does anyone else see the irony in two Republican congressmen complaining about the privatization of space flight?
How is that Hope and Change working out for you NASA. I see this as a way to siphon off funds to be redirected to more social programs (I mean buy votes). Flame On!
Conservative, mod down for violating
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Who gives a flying fuck about privatized LEO launches of some tycoon (apart of the tycoons themselves)? Private companies will not undertake the large-scale, visionary projects like sending people to Mars, building permanent bases on Mars and Moon, reaching Europa and exploring her oceans. Private companies only produce as little science as they possibly can get away with, putting much more emphasis on patenting the crap out of the little they do produce, and then keep it for themselves.
In other words: FAIL!
When Obama said he'll cancel Constellation, he crushed the dreams and hopes of MY generation. Those who grew up in the 50s and 60s in the US and Europe had the ride of their lives, if they had even the slightest affinity for science. That was science that inspired millions, and from the sci-fi movies of the 70's, I'd say people were probably less dumb on average than they are today ("Andromeda Strain", for one example. Compare that to the blockbuster space-operas some call "Sci-fi"). Nowadays scientists are only prodded to make cheaper electronic components and larger plasma screens.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
Sounds like some bigwigs with enough lobbying power in DC decided they wanted to rape the USA for more money. I mean, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are the perfect models for contracting to civilians agencies, who take a 110 million dollar contract, and subcontract it, paying the subcontractors about 10% and they get to pocket the rest. Of course with such public program, this could never happen you say. All it takes is some byzantine law that says they arent required to disclose budgets and suddenly we have no idea where the money goes (besides the pockets of corrupt politicians and greedy C level officers) They say in TFA they wan't to increase "entrepreneurial interests" WTF. I'm so sick and tired of washington politics it makes me so disappointed in my country. With the public fighting over partisanship ("Obama's the antichrist","Bush done it") people need to wake up and realize that the problem is greed for money and power. Both fucking parties are just as at fault for everything that is wrong with the USA right now. First step to a better America IMO is to completely stop the ability for corporations to make donations to any type of political party or anyone with political affiliation. Lobbying should be an intellectual exercise, not a who can buy off who exercise. This would proportionately seem to put more power back in the people hands, at least as a start. Second? American people need to start using their brains. Stop watching 5 hours of TV a day and read a good non-fiction book about the middle east, american politics, anything to expand your mind. Learn how to stop being so damn religious and start thinking rationally and objectively (all of these things are also parts of basic education, something which is also failing horribly) Washington needs to stop using their own heads and start listening to Think Tanks and people with practical experience equally. Have accountability in everything. The sad part? It will more than likely never happen. Its a prisoners dilemma sort of situation. Most of use know the government and corporations are horribly corrupt and inefficient, they screw us over all the time. So what is your response? "Well all I can do is look out for me and my family" which is the same thought process the corrupts people have. Everyone (with exceptions of course, comon, I'm making a bunch a generalizations to get my point across) has this attitude and it never changes. If you were that C level person, what would you do? Even if you think you would do the right thing, studies show that by nature to higher you get the more likely you are to be stricter about moral issues on other people but more lax on them with yourself. The problem is that it seems to be human nature. Send 50 people to colonize a new earth duplicate planet, and within months I guarantee there would be thievery, repression, greed ect. Yep, pretty much humanity seems to be like a virus, and one of these millennium the universe is likely to swallow us whole and try and start over.
"It's ok, I'm completely secure as long as my iron is off"
http://xkcd.com/695/
somebody please think of the robots...
Every damn article posted on Slashdot about privatization of space has been packed with complaints that this is the end of the world. It's really not. God willing, it may be the start of a new one.
NASA was pursuing a completely impossible architecture. Ares was underfunded and unable to be effectively used until 2017 at the latest. By forcing NASA to buy services from private corporations we can develop our domestic launch infrastructure as opposed to keeping it under government control.
And yes, I said BUY! This is not cost-plus contracting, which defense contractors famously use to rip us off every chance they get. This is a straight purchase of services, cash for deliveries and milestones met. In other words, actual free-market capitalism.
As for those claiming that we should have blown our cash on another Apollo-like shot: what cash? Obama is not a dictator, he's a President. His budget requests have to be approved by Congress which would have balked at any substantial increase in spending on space exploration. Not to mention that we tried Apollo and it was nowhere near substainable. Development of regular deliveries to orbital space by private companies - that's sustainable. That's what will provide us with the groundwork to move beyond earth orbit and lower the cost to orbit to the point where we can actually do something.
I value politeness. If you extend it to me, I'll extend it to you.
No check-in. You have to schlep all your moonwalk gear yourself to the launch vehicle: "All you can carry." This cuts down on excess weight, saving fuel costs. Do you really need that extra oxygen tank?
A glass of Tang? "That will be 10€, sir."
Online Gambling! Your now have no incentive to return safely to the Earth . . . you are now bankrupt.
. . . and when you do get back, they lost your luggage filled with priceless moon rocks . . .
"I'm sorry, sir, your baggage was inadvertently placed on one of our flights to Mars. We should have it back for you in a couple of years time.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
Income Redistribution
Man! You went there!
Bend over!
Do mean all that money (bank bailouts) that was taken from the middle class in the form of taxes to bail out the filthy rich bankers so that they can get their BILLIONS of dollars in bonuses paid for by the US taxpayer?! THAT INCOME REDISTRIBUTION?!? ($$ Poor => Rich and well connected)
Yep, that's REAL leftist alright.
Nowadays everything is about branding, even politics. In order to differentiate their brand from brand of the Democrat Party (as they like to call it), the Republic Party (as I like to call them) has to avoid showing any support for anything Obama does. Their marketing division (or, to use an old-fashioned term, their political strategists) understand that any show of bipartisanship confuse the consumers (I guess most people still call them "voters") and dilute the brand. So the party has to maintain a uniform anti-Democrat (not to be confused with anti-Democratic) message, even when the Democrats propose a product (officially a "policy") that the Republics invented in the first place.
Obama's attempts to achieve a consensus show his utter contempt for the way business (isn't government a business? if not it should be) is done in the 21st century. If that doesn't convince you he's a communist, nothing will!
On one side I know that (in this economy) there are many more ways to spend money than space.
But few things united the US as much as the space program.
When the political climate was different, the reasons for going to space were different.
Now that the Cold War is over, space has become a primarily scientific endeavor. I'm happy that science (instead of politics) is the motivator, but now it seems that politics is choking one of the greatest achievements of our species.
The idea behind this "private taxi service" to space could go either way. We all know how recent new aircraft have suffered delay after delay. But what if a more competitive environment brings innovation that otherwise would have been unattainable? After-all it was a competitive environment that pushed us to be the first on the moon.
What I am really sad about though is the lack of interest in the moon. I believe that a permanent, self sufficient (however difficult that might be) settlement on the moon should be a priority. And if we don't start soon, India or China might beat us to it.
While I believe that any mission to the moon is an international event, other countries/cultures might not share that view. I would prefer for us to set the bar in both - returning to the moon, and sharing that experience with the rest of the world.
Privatisation isn't privatisation when your primary customers and sources of funding come from the government. There is in fact no difference, just an illusion of competition. What is needed is for them to remove the regulations that exist against private space travel. Remove the monopolistic government funded NASA entirely, leaving the playing field completely open for private firms to build a true spot in the marketplace. That is the only way space exploration, tourism and travel will be able to survive.
If necessity is the mother of invention, its time we get to inventing. Nasa has subsidized extremely expensive shuttle launches that cost us $500 million a pop. Ares I wont put a man into space until 2017 at the EARLIEST if at all. Ares V is a bad joke thats already on the verge of being scrapped. The current plan would not get men back to the moon before 2028 at the earliest, project constellation was an epic fail. Lets give private companies like spacex (which will test launch a man ready falcon 9 THIS YEAR) a chance
Privatization may seem like a good idea, and I hope it will turn out to be. But I doubt it. Right now, the US has one - count them - one man-rated orbital vehicle. That's the shuttle, and it will be ending soon. Without a replacement, the US will be forced to hitch rides in the short term with Russia, maybe even China. In fact, since we've outsourced much of our manufacturing base to China anyway, why not our space program? Well here's why: other countries, maybe even private companies in the future will fly in space. Maybe they'll let the US hitch rides. Maybe not. Either way they won't be building their launchers and space vehicles with US program goals in mind. They'll be building whatever makes sense for them. It may or may not be what makes sense for US goals. So in the end, we'll have an ISS that we continue to pay for - funding for that is in the budget, and no way to get there from the US. Excellent. The Mercury astronauts had it right... No Bucks, No Buck Rogers. We'll continue to send neat probes to other planets. And we'll continue to get amazing pictures. But in the end, people will tire of that too. That'll leave us with No Bucks. When you look back 200 years from now, this will be the moment that people say the US "jumped the shark"...
Brawndo: It's what plants crave!
During the election, about 95% of African-Americans voted for Barack Hussein Obama due solely to the color of his skin.
And 95% of McCain voters voted for McCain due solely to the color of his neck.
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
most nations recognize the value of capitalism, but they yoke it with socially-conscious goals, to effective and ineffective results
but the usa is a cult of capitalism. they think it answers every question (it doesn't). they invoke market principles where market principles make no sense, such as in healthcare. they remove financial regulations and then act surprised when the markets bubble and burst (and then some of them, in their denial, even blame the government, magically somehow, for the market's failure, confusing cause and effect)
that space exploration should be privatized is yet another absurdity of the monomaniacal american obsession with elevating market principles as the driving force behind everything in the world. americans: of course capitalism is important. of course capitalism works. but capitalism is a beast of burden, it needs to be tamed and controlled. it needs to be fenced and given limits, or it will run roughshod and destroy your society with its extremes and stampedes of panic or greed. you need social safety nets, and you need to tame the excesses. understand this or understand nothing and be just a market fundamentalist, as foolish and blind to reality as any religious fundamentalist
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Finally the Administration is doing something to end corporate welfare and make the US aerospace industry competitive once again. If it forces Republican congressmen to stand up and trumpet there support for pork barrel projects while crying for fiscal conservatism I'm sure the Irony will not be lost on the general population.
Give such corporations as Space Exploration Technologies a chance, there founder, Elon Musk, his comparison of other aerospace companies to "Dilbert in real life" is spot on.
I say this as an aerospace employee.
For those of you who are wondering about this and not just using it to blast Obama/dems with ever breath,
then read the last 10 pages of the Direct forum.
In a nut shell, Boeing, et. al. will be building Direct and offering it for commercial space. Yes, SpaceX, Orbital, and even the EELVs will have their role in space. HOWEVER, direct will now be allowed to be developed by Boeing and offered for commercial launches. Once that happens AND they have 2 launches per year via commercial, it will drop the price per launch. And what commercial space will be interested in this? Well Bigelow figures VERY prominently in this. That is why we are seeing them suddenly get active. That is also why they shifted their schedule to have station in 2015. Basically, we are about to see a MASSIVE expansion into space, but via the commercial world. Think of the railroads for USA in the mid 1800's.
This is not the end of America's human flights. It is the FINALLY the beginning of it. Most importantly, it will remove Space from politicians hands like W's who said that we were going to the moon and the provided next to ZERO funding for it. Heck, only in 2007 and 2008 did NASA budget increase. Prior to that it was being cut.
NASA will instead do what it does best; high tech RD as well as getting all parties to connect well (ignoring a mars probe).
Windbourne.
This just sounds like another oligopoly to bail out. Seriously how many different vendors will actually pop up? I'm gonna apply to be a space vendor im pretty sure my back yard would make a nice site for a launch pad.
And 95% of Sarah Palin enthusiasts voted for her solely due to the color of her parachute.
You are welcome on my lawn.
And 95% of McCain voters voted for McCain due solely to the color of his neck.
Liver spotted? Why would anyone vote for that.
Knowledge = Power
P= W/t
t=Money
Money = Work/Knowledge so the less you know the more you make
The real reason the government was running it previously was because of the incredible risk. They could ask Marines and other service-members to risk their lives, and they were excited for the chance to get into space. Those brave men and women are still there and more than ready to put their lives on the line for their country. Unfortunately, as more and more civilians crept into the program, their tolerance for risk evaporated to the point the just getting a rocket off the pad is a nightmare.
It is a tragedy that this country lost 2 shuttles. But in this country, about 100 people die in traffic related incidents EVERY DAY. Spaceflight is a RISKY proposition, but we MUST be willing to simply accept some of that risk. We should take reasonable and responsible precautions, but we are currently so risk intolerant that we don't have a real manned program right now. Not because we don't have smart and brave folks ready to go, but because the bureaucrats running the show are cowards.
They're so scared they are trying to pawn it off on industry, and we can expect tons a litigation and finger pointing from the government following the first INEVITABLE death.
I think I agree with something the President said. Now, if we can guarantee property rights for those companies in space, too, this'd be amazing! Maybe Mr. Obama read Robert Heinlein when he was a kid and hasn't told anyone yet.
Obama has never liked the space program, at least not since running for president. His campaign website actually had a proposal to create a nationalized pre-school/daycare program and fund it by cutting NASA's budget. Someone must have informed him that the space program is important for the United States, because this proposal was removed before the election. Some educators also called into question the need for such a pre-school program.
NASA has always had its ups and downs, perhaps more downs than ups lately. It helps to have a sympathetic President in office. Kennedy wanted a moon landing, and his successors honored his memory by following through. Nixon was lukewarm to the space program, and he used NASA as a diplomacy tool--during his time they had Skylab (somewhat useful) and the Apollo-Soyuz space linkup (pure entertainment).
Reagan was a space nut and an enlarged NASA fit into his SDI/Star Wars vision. Bush I spoke of a Mars mission, but left before he could really push it through. Clinton was lukewarm to space but lucked out with a temporary stock boom that filled the tax coffers, so NASA could keep rolling while he partied. Bush II liked space and authorized new missions. That brings us down to Obama who is the first president in my memory to shut down a manned space project.
NASA is a victim of politics and of poor leadership in the 1970s and 80s, leading up to the avoidable Challenger tragedy. To spread the wealth (and pain of cuts), NASA in the 1970s embarked on a decentralization project to spread out its facilities all over the country, thus maximizing Congressional support for its various missions. The unfortunate side effect as pointed out by many observers over the years was to dissipate engineering teams. Perhaps today in the new century, with our modern communications abilities, virtual teams can work almost identically to localized teams, but this was not so in the 1970s. Thus, the rugged and long lasting space ships of the 1960s such as the Pioneer which survived decades beyond anyone's expectations gave way to buggy, incomplete efforts such as the Shuttle and some of the planetary probes.
NASA's never been a perfect space agency but it has contributed hugely to improving the human condition through science and technology. It keeps hundreds of thousands of aerospace engineers and scientists employed, who would otherwise have gone to law school or some other less productive field. It keeps the U.S. at the forefront in aerospace technology which it needs in order to maintain its military edge. It promises great riches should we ever get self-sustaining stations online in near-Earth orbit or beyond--moon mining, asteroid mining, solar power, zero grav manufacturing, and all the scientific and engineering developments which will be a part of these efforts.
We simply can't afford to not go into space. The Constellation program has been harshly criticized by some dissident engineers--fine, that's what engineering is all about. You design something, find the flaws, fix them, and move on. It's an iterative process.
Simply walking away from billions of dollars of effort is not only a waste of time and money, it displays a distressing lack of vision by the current leadership. Obama obviously feels we can't afford a national space program, so he's sloughing it off on the private sector. Privatize it, he says. Indeed? Then the U.S. will no longer have a manned space exploration program at all, but only a very cautious and profit-oriented space tourism program. Others will pick up the slack and take over space exploration--the Chinese, the Japanese perhaps, the Russians, and the Europeans. Some day, we will sit in our yards and watch them through our Chinese-made telescopes. Look, Dad, there's the China Station! There's the European Station! There goes another Russian moon shot! And we can look back on this pivotal time in our history when we turned our back on the future and technological leadership.
it's = "it is"; its = possessive. E.g., it's flapping its wings.
It's not about logic, it's all about the size of the voting bloc whom you can make beholden to you.
You Sir, have said this before and are an idiot. If he was republican, then republicans would like him. Take time out from smelling your own farts to visit the outdoors and clear your head.
Private industry has proven no capability yet in space, yet alone one which is reliable. This is truly putting the cart before the horse. Another bad move is to cut out returning to the moon. The moon is far easier and far safer (if one can truly use that word in space) as a first attempt at man setting up any form of long term camp/colony. There is something to be said about learning to crawl, walk and run in that order. I'm not sure we are even past crawling yet. There is no reason why we should attempt to do this on a far more distant planet without first having proven the technologies feasible closer to home where failure need not necessarily mean a death sentence.
Coach passengers may opt to purchase oxygen.
Orwell: "In a Time of Universal Deceit, telling the Truth is a Revolutionary Act"
It's the same percentage of the Afrian-Americans that voted for Clinton.
I'm sorry, the number you have dialed is an imaginary number. Please rotate your phone 90 degrees and dial again.
If you want to start a discussion like this, please also provide the number of white americans who did *not* vote for barack based solely on the colour of his skin.
Oh, and also some references to where you got your numbers. Until then, I'm just going to ignore your post and assume you just invented the numbers.
What a depressingly stupid machine.
As someone who has personal (and close) contacts and friendships with people in the various X-Prize contests (including the latest winner), I'm a bit biased here.
However, what Obama is talking about is really changing the ways that NASA procures it's systems. Right now, they get practically everything from one of about 3 or 4 big contractors, and essentially run like a massive Defense Contractor, complete with problems around innovation and cost-inflation.
The proposals are to quit funneling every significant contract just to these Big Space corps. Rather, the "hobbyist" rocket industry is now sufficiently mature to begin competing for real space equipment. What it needs to continue to grow and innovate are a steady, reliable supply of work. NASA is the only place this can happen right now (though, likely once the market is more mature, private space use/trips will fund more and more of industry). Breaking the grip of Big Space means that NASA can continue to use it's hard-won knowledge of manned missions as a information resource for these "space entrepreneurs", and at the same time, open up the infrastructure for better efficiencies.
Of course, Big Space sees the end of the NASA-funded (and guarantied) gravy train, so they squeal about safety and other issues that Little Space couldn't possibly (no, never!) do, forgetting (conveniently) that they themselves were once Little, and only became Big by sucking on NASA's teat. What we're talking about here is NASA enabling a new, vibrant market for space systems from a wide variety of suppliers.
To use the tired car analogy: NASA current designs the car, but farms out the manufacturing and design of the parts to SuperMegaCorp1 and GiganticConglomerate2, all of which use the notorious "cost-plus" method of development. Instead, Obama wants NASA to be deciding the PURPOSE of the car, and the desired CAPABILITIES of it, but then put out for bid all the different parts to anyone capable of making that part to the desired specs. So, perhaps we get a Volt, an Accord, and a Caravan all offered from various suppliers, rather than a Greyhound bus with all but 5 seats removed, as we would under the old system.
I hate to break it to everyone, but LEO Rocket Science is no longer, well, Rocket Science. Masten won the latest X-prize with a staff of 10, working out of a small machine shop, using only about $2 million. Putting people into orbit is not that difficult anymore (though, it's still dangerous), and it's entirely reasonable to start moving away from the single-entity agency and into a more competitive, cost-effective marketplace.
There are always four sides to every story: your side, their side, the truth, and what really happened.
by tipping it towards having the private sector to do the launches he can blame them for not jumping on the opportunity and therefor excuse the lack of progress in NASA's mission. It is killing two birds with one stone.
Almost as good as "reaching across the aisle" when you know the other side doesn't have the votes to do anything
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
While I think the future of space travel will be in the hands of the private sector, NASA are currently the only ones really equipped to do this stuff.
fair warning: this may get a little "everybody just get along"-like, so I apologize in advance for any hippy attitude you take from this
It's hard nowadays to sell a space program to the public, but it can be a unifying thing. Countries are still working seperately (except for the ISS, which is quite an achievement). What really needs to happen is the space programs of the world need to come together and work together. If all the nations with major or developing space programs pooled their knowledge and resources, we could have a moonbase going in the next 10 years and be on Mars shortly thereafter. The problem is that each country has a few super brilliant people. Space travel requires a LOT of brilliant people.
Living With a Nerd
How are the banks anyway? How much dole did they collect? Billions in government handouts?
Maybe the US car industry? How much did they get from the state?
Electricity? How is California doing?
Trains? The US gotten up-to-date yet, or still clunking along?
How about the medical industry? More money spend in the US then anywhere else, yet one of the worsed results.
Private industry, if you want to be sure it won't work, will be over budget and delayed until the end of time.
And before you protest, it was the STATE that put men on the moon. Private industry hasn't even come lose in all these years. Count the years between US starting and the appollo 11 mission, then the years of private spaceflight. Notice a difference? And private industry doesn't have to do all the early research anymore.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
http://science.slashdot.org/story/10/01/27/1931202/India-Moves-To-Put-Its-First-Man-In-Space-By-2016?art_pos=1
It seems like an awful coincidence that as the U.S. cannot afford to fund space flights and is seeking to privatize launches, India (and China) are seeking to invest in manned launches. Why do we in the U.S. continue to "invest" in things like the "War on Terror," yet can't see fit to invest in science or the education of our children.
Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty whites are free at last!
Well, except from a generally unconstitutional Federal government...
Seastead this.
I can't wait to see how the conservative "Pundits" spin this.
Rush: The companies developing space flight are going to have to borrow a lot of money. What does that mean? Banks. What do banks mean? Jews. OMG Obama is taking money from teh Jews!
Glenn: This draws interesting parallels with Germany in the late 1930s, when many things that had been run by the government were privatized. OMG Obama is taking us down the road to Nazism!
The average Slashdotter: This just opens the door to more government regulation of the companies developing space flight. How's that hope and change working out for you? [Gets modded up to +5, insightful]
so, African Americans are non-mainstream Americans?
Guess he's been scared off that. Won't get any crap in the Senate at least.
He gave up space.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
If we used aeroplanes to get to a decent altitude, then fired the rockets, the cost to launch would go way down.
No, actually it wouldn't.
First, you may be able to get above some of the atmosphere, but not all (because an "aeroplane" needs to be in atmosphere to fly.) But, mainly, you can't get any significant percentage of the orbital energy while you're in atmosphere-- you need to get to the equivalent of Mach 25 to make orbit.
Second, though, is that rockets are simply heavy. You can lift a Pegasus up in an airplane, but it takes a 747 to do it, and it's a tiny rocket. Even there, the airplane doesn't give you much of a boost toward orbit (the real advantage the air launch gives you is the ability to chose your launch point.) If you try to ask, how big would the airplane be if you were to launch something much bigger than a Pegasus with the capability to make orbit, the answer is that it would be unrealistically huge, andairplanes stop being practical when they start getting that big, because they are structurally inefficient.
(And, before you shout "Space Ship One" at me, let me remind you that SS-1 achieved the edge of space in altitude, but only got a whopping five percent of orbital energy),
But this isn't economical when there are huge public subsidies for a hugely flawed system.
This sentence would be correct if you simply put the period after "this isn't economical".
This wouldn't have become an issue if the budgeting committees had actually given NASA a budget to work with. Their current budget stands around 19 billion dollars. Now if that sounds like a lot to you, to put it in perspective, the DoD received over 3/4 of a trillion dollar for FY 2009. http://www.federalbudget.com/
Where has reason in the world gone? Have we abandoned it in favor of power and politics?
During the election, about 95% of African-Americans voted for Barack Hussein Obama due solely to the color of his skin.
And 95% of McCain voters voted for McCain due solely to the color of his neck.
Had the GOP nominee been Mike Huckabee, an Arkansas pol, then the joke might have hit home. But part of McCain's problem was that he was decidedly un-redneck. Much of the southern and mid-western base sat the last one out because he didn't connect with them.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
I wanna work in the Space Industry! Whoohoo!
The truth is, if we really want to succeed in space, we have to privatize. Government cannot (and should not) be the only ones going up there. Once private industry realizes the resources (and hence, the money) that's available in outer space, they'll want to get there. In the long term, that will include going to Mars, the outer plants, the asteroid belt, and mining (think, "gold rush", except on a larger scale). In the near term, it could potentially be quite lucrative for a company to develop its own near-Earth transit system, not only for trips to the ISS, but also to launch and maintain the vast array of satellites that other corporations use (and deem quite vital) to earth-based activity.
It's kind of like the Internet. The government got that started, too. That led to a mad dash by everybody to get websites and to make some money on the Internet, which led to our economic successes of the 1990s. Perhaps the same thing will eventually happen with space travel? It may take longer than the next decade, but maybe 2020 or 2030,. . . 2040? That's the future! The future is not simply having government be the only ones with the ticket to space, though,...
Obama concedes that government doesn't have all the answers to mankind's problems, and announces his switch to Libertarianism!
Voting for Obama because he is black is not necessarily racist.
Voting for him because you think that the fact that he is black means he is superior or inferior in some some traits like intelligence, moraility, etc. would be.
So, apparently the free market works, except near Houston, Texas, or the Cape in Florida. Interesting. Does this imply that these two areas are in fact, socialist states, or that they want to be? Their congressman's reaction certainly implies this.
Stay tuned to this blog for further developments....
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
The politics of NASA killed the plans of NASA.
At one time, they had a plan that would have put a base on the Moon by the end of the 70's and missions to Mars in the 80's. Some of the Apollo astronauts saw themselves as part of that.
After we went to the Moon, Nixon killed the hope. Under his 'leadership' we scrapped the last three planned Moon missions, stopped building anything new outside of an under-funded (and possibly ill-advised) Space Shuttle, and those that led us to space, from Astronauts to Engineers to Machinists and Janitors, left NASA with the cuts. We never regained the drive, or the ability we had since then. NASA had become a tool of politics, which it hadn't really been before.
Sure, we went to the Moon to beat the Russians. Along the way, we learned things, and we even maybe pulled the nation and the world a BIT more together. Is that so bad?
Whether you like Obama or not, whether the realities of our current crises are the end, are we not losing sight of the grand picture given us by those who came before?
-- I really need to bleed off some of this
Soooo... no speculation about what SSTO or other solutions might already be floating around out there? I mean, ya really think XB-70 was canned?
The Slashdot Paradox: "100% Overrated"
Can you really fault someone for making a living by race-baiting and cultivating an attitude of victimhood?
for accepting bigger risk in space exploration?
Lower cost (resulting in less safety) increases profits. Profit is not so important for NASA but it is important for commercial space exploration. It'd be great for that fledgling industry if it could start out with lower safety standards than what NASA now has to comply to.
It may work just so long as the consumer thinks it's acceptable, which in the case of space exploration is in part a matter of public opinion.
Risk Aversion At Odds With Manned Space Exploration
http://politics.slashdot.org/story/09/09/11/1421233/Risk-Aversion-At-Odds-With-Manned-Space-Exploration
Reminds me of the Chris Rock quote: "We're not just voting for him 'cause he's black, we're voting for him 'cause he's black AND qualified." Besides, majority of African Americans vote Democrat anyways. This statistic is only newsworthy now that the Democratic candidate was African American.
I will bend like a reed in the wind.
Now, you get to test the limits of your faith in the "free market" panacea literally with your lives! All aboard!!!
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
Bullshit. Sorry, but all you had to do was either 1) turn on the news or 2) go vote and you could hear countless blacks (many of whom openly acknowledged that they knew nothing about what was going on in the election) talk about how they'd never voted before in their lives, but they registered to vote just for Obama. Now, seeing as how Obama's policies are pretty much the standard DNC views, what made him so different that millions of blacks would sign up to vote after going decades without voting? Oh, that's right. His skin color.
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." ~Thomas Jefferson
Don't forget, dear lefty , that the red on the neck is an indicator of working in the sun to grow the food you eat, build the house you live in and load the truck that brings the britches on your butt. Now quit smokin' pot, pull up your pants and put a belt on and get back to class.
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
Ever lived in Arizona? Neck and all turn red, brown and then beef jerky.
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
Don't forget the number of white and other americans who didn't see the skin color obscured by the clown makeup like his predecessors, Carter and Clinton. I think you'll find it to be an overwhelmingly larger demographic.
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
I'm a REpublican and gov't privatization is the biggest failure ever..
My rebuttal is simple. If privatizing SSA won't work, or security contractors in Iraq don't work, or any of the other things, then why would NASA?
My bet is that somewhere along the way, you've got some private space firms, read - Space X, funneling some big money to the Democrats, to kill NASA, which are in GOP leaning states anyway.
That's all this is, a big looting of the gov't in exchange for a bribe. NASA couldn't come up with enough patronage jobs, so Obama and the Dems are going to get rid of it.
This is my sig.
It's the same percentage of the Afrian-Americans that voted for Clinton
Blacks always vote for Democrats. It's been that way for 50 years.
This is my sig.
this ended with the shuttle, NASA's current deathtrap LEO vehicle. For the good of the US, NASA needs to take a break, redesign itself from the bottom up, get rid of any republican cronies, and become a top knotch space agency again. NASA was a can-do enterprise in the Kennedy years, but too many Republican administrations have since turned NASA into the money wasting, astronaut killing joke it is today.
There are efficiency advantages to launching rockets into space from aircraft.
A: Rocket motors work best when there is little or no air pressure for them to burn into, increasing the jet speed and the Isp figure. Solid boosters benefit more than liquid fuelled rockets as the exhaust pressure is less. At 35-40,000 feet the air pressure is about 30% of that on the ground, making rockets a few percent more efficient at that altitude compared to sea-level.
B: Existing land-based launchers have to spend a significant chunk of their fuel and oxidiser getting to the velocity and altitude an aircraft launcher has already reached using conventional Jet-A fuel and atmospheric oxygen. This is why there are no single-stage-to-orbit launchers, they all have to lift off heavy and throw away sections of their airframe on the way up so the remaining parts can make it to orbit.
C: The addition of 1000km/hr horizontal velocity from the launcher is, as you say very much less than the orbital velocity of 25,000 km/hr required for LEO, but it's 4% which is worth having.
A rough BOTE calculation suggests an air launch to LEO can be done for about 10-12% less fuel load than a similar launch from the ground. That parlays into less parasitic airframe, tankerage etc. that has to be flightworthy and capable of withstanding extended multiple-G accelerations and which requires fuel and oxidiser to get it off the pad.
As for size limitations on air launches that's due to a lack of really big off-the-shelf aircraft capable of being modded for use as launchers. If there was a determination to build an air-launch system for getting, say, 20 tonnes of payload into LEO per launch then designing and building a couple of dedicated carrier aircraft to do the job would be easy. They don't have to be efficient fuel-misers the way modern airliners or even military aircraft are, they can use multiple off-the-shelf aero engines to make up for the lack of efficient design and excess weight as their fuel costs are going to be a minor part of the operating TCO. My own thoughts on what they would look like tend towards a land-launched catamaran high-wing seaplane with the orbital vehicle suspended between the hulls (a bit like the Virgin Eve carrier aircraft).
No, red.
There are some very eloquent public speakers that will not enter the bathroom before turning on the light; so maybe going to the Moon is just to scary for some of them?
but notice the rhetoric over the healthcare debate. what i'm describing in terms of an attitude towards capitalism and deregulation as if it were a universal salve without any bad side-effects is certainly a common delusion. its an attitude also certainly not unique to the usa, but certainly most potent here. and of course, plenty of things should be privatized and deregulated, and work optimally and most efficiently, for society and for economic growth, that way. but there's also plenty of other industries/ companies/ sectors that must be regulated, and must be socialized (oooh! scary word!) to function maximally for the benefit of reliability and social good
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
As off-topic as the OP was, he's right and everyone doesn't want to admit it. Black people are more racist than Whites, plain and simple. In my 30+ years of life, I have only seen 1 White group of people attack a Black guy (and this guy had the nerve to blatantly, sexually harass the daughter of the local KKK leader, while living in the same trailer park - I call that "death by sheer stupidity", as he was found hanging from a tree at the front of the park, and all of a sudden there were a bunch of people that developed mass amnesia about where they were that night and "must have stayed home with the family, right honey?"). I've seen the reverse multiple times (and actually been the target once - some dumb bitch on an interstate bus who had been openly bragging about running phone sex lines with her mom accused me of not being Christian because of my tattoos...like "What the fuck do my tattoos have to do with religion, bitch?"; harsh words were said at a rest stop, I sent my now ex-fiancee inside, and duked it out with the half-dozen or so "brothas" "defending" a "sista's" honor (I believe that was the gist of their beef, it's hard to translate Ebonics while fighting for your life), ended up stabbing a couple of them before it was over). So "don't call me whiteboy, nigger" (famous Ice T & Perry Farrell song if you don't catch the reference.). Hate breeds hate, plain and simple.
And if you think Chris Rock is anything other than a loud-mouth toad with an inferiority complex (and probably a crack habit, the way he runs off at the mouth), you need your head examined. And if you believe that as well as his assertion that Obama is qualified (especially when measured against John McCain), we can skip the examination and just move you somewhere where you can chew on the crayons during Art Therapy.
You'll probably eat all the brown ones is my guess.
PC moderators can suck my White pierced, tattooed dick. If you think pride == hate, s/dick/Aryan meat mallet/g.
You have a truly dizzying intellect.
Nice anecdote...
1) The news does not show a random sampling of people, they hand-pick people who will make for good TV. People who are disproportionately excited about what's going on make for better TV than ordinary, sensible people.
2) This was not my experience.
Bow-ties are cool.
Don't forget the number of white and other americans who didn't see the skin color obscured by the clown makeup like his predecessors, Carter and Clinton. I think you'll find it to be an overwhelmingly larger demographic.
You totally lost me here. So you're saying Obama didn't have clown makeup, or that he did and people didn't see it? And that the same, or opposite, is true of Carter and Clinton?
Bow-ties are cool.
Now quit smokin' pot, pull up your pants and put a belt on and get back to class.
Right. 'Cause no one smokes pot in the south. ::eye roll::
Living With a Nerd
That would be really shocking if there weren't dozens of news stories, with interviews, about how many white voters in the (surprise!) South were devastated that a black man had just been elected President. Not a Democrat. An African-American. Go cry me a river, you reverse-racist troll.
I live ze unknown. I love ze unknown. I am ze unknown.
The "Yellow Stars"? The "Spinning Wheel"? The "Rising Sun"? Maybe NASA would consider changing "NASA White" to Pantone #14-0848, "The color yellow exemplifies the warmth and nurturing quality of the sun, properties we as humans are naturally drawn to for reassurance".
From posting summary: "If true, this won't please the federal panel that recommended against just such privatization."
ASAP is not a 'federal panel' in that it is a panel of members of a federal agency. The members are primarily consultants for and members of commercial concerns in aerospace. When tasked with something like an accident investigation or other safety related issue, they do a fine, objective job. When they undertake to advise NASA on what do to when it comes to contracting and such, they invariably favor themselves and their clients, which so far have not been the start ups that the Obama administration is considering using for future human spaceflight.
The panel members are listed, along with their relationships to the areospace community, in attachment 5 of the 2009 ASAP/NASA report at http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/oer/asap/documents/2009_ASAP_Annual_Report.pdf For those listed as consultants and giving the name of some consultancy concern, go to the web site of that agency and see who they consult to. The answers aren't very surprising given the recommendations that suggest NASA stick with the BigAero companies.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
From reading a few of the posts, it already proves what Im about to say.
Does anyone find it funny that the Republicans want to privatize _everything_, and the Democrats want to government-ize everything.. and yet, here's a Democrat wanting to privatize a govt sector, and the Republicans are screaming the end of the world?
It also continues to strengthen my belief that the Democrats and Republicans are brothers who fight over everything because they're too immature to talk about things rationally, and are taking us all down with them.
Need more Libertarians, damnit. Stop thinking you're throwing your vote away if you dont vote for a Republicrat.
GWB to President of Brazil - "You have blacks, too?"
But it's also curious that while President Obama is moving towards a kind of nationalization-lite with other major industries... autos, banking, etc...
The "nationalization-lite" we've engaged in is actually unfortunately consistent with hypocritical market fundamentalism that passes for our free-market gospel: just enough conservatorship to bleed resources into specific large institutions in those sectors, but not enough receivership to actually work effectively. Socialize losses, sure, but don't you dare interfere with corresponding private gains, because *that* would be Socialism(TM)!
Other countries with comparable market economies and levels of personal economic freedom wouldn't and haven't hesitated to simply do the effective if "socialist" things to clean up their industries when corruption and crisis break things. But *we* have to take the effective thing and bend it to the private advantage of the sector we're working with, because that's just The American Way.
In other words, far from being inconsistent, the "nationalization lite" and the privatization of space are pretty much manifestations of the same underlying economic/political philosophy.
Tweet, tweet.
It's not about logic, it's all about the size of the voting bloc whom you can make beholden to you.
Privatize something that isn't an essential service to citizens, and nationalize something that is. Its actually quite logical. You may not agree with the ideology behind it, but there is definitely a rational basis to the decision.
tsk tsk
such comments only imply your lack of sensitivity training and stupidity in realizing a moron for who he is now what color he is.
Wait, what? GP posted a statement, you call his statement bullshit, and then you offer absolutely no evidence against his claim? Was his claim true or not?
If it's in you sig, it's in your post.
How's that "hope and change" thing working out for you now?
It's not about the money being saved. Lord knows they waste more than that every single day! When you figure out why he's doing this, then you'll be one step closer to knowing the truth about Obama.
We tried to warn you.
I don't think he ever promised that. A lot of his *supporters* wanted this, but I think his attitude has always been to let bygones be bygones.
Similar to the upcoming US election results
until he actually got elected and realized that he couldn't.
I'll raise you one.
Obama always knew he couldn't affect that much change -- although he always wanted to. In the end, politics is about power and if power is wielded effectively it is more about practicality than idealism.
Keep in mind that if you want to change the direction, it is much more effective to reach for the steering wheel -- than rocking the boat, sinking it, and trying to build a new one.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
Did I read that correctly? A Republican just argued against privatizing a huge government program??? Beware the coming plague of locusts! The apocalypse is near!
"I'm too busy to research this and form an educated opinion, but I do have time to tell everyone my uninformed opinion."
Wow, i must've missed the memo where everyone thought farmers that grow our food (and all that other stuff you mentioned) also live in trailer parks, are unintelligent, illiterate, work dead-end jobs, tend to date/mate with close relatives, become the jokes of b-rated horror films like Wrong Turn, and to boot, are ALWAYS right on the political spectrum. You know, all those typical red-neck associations.
.... Because that's all you ever heard being talked about (comparable to Obama being black) that was time and time again brought up in the media ..
anyway to the point -- I took the McCain neck voting jab to mean his military service decorations
It's the same percentage of the Afrian-Americans that voted for Clinton
Blacks always vote for Democrats. It's been that way for 50 years.
and racists anti-democrats always cite your false claim.
In all fairness, Clinton was the first black president.
"From the depths of my skeptical and rationalist soul, I ask the Lord to protect me from California touchie-feeliedom."
Your BOTE calculations more or less agree with the calculation that it makes no economic sense. You're going to design and build a gargantuan aircraft, far larger and far lighter than any aircraft ever built, capable of carrying a fully-fueled orbital launch vehicle, and the net result of doing so is... a ten to twelve percent reduction in fuel use of the launch vehicle? That's a vast amount of complexity for a trivial amount of gain-- make the tanks on your booster 3.5% larger in all dimensions, and you got the same result.
Dear Representative Posey,
My tax dollars were not given just so your state can waste them on a glorified make-work program. NASA's human spaceflight program has been dead since the Apollo program ended. Everything since has just been throwing money away on PR and bullshit spin.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
i am more interested in ranting about healthcare. you have every right to now detest me, and/ or appreciate my honesty
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
I got to see the Challenger launch before NASA and Thiokol blew it up. I was at the launch of STS-41B. I was an officer in a chapter of the AIAA that sponsored a get away special canister (G-008) that flew on Challenger carrying experiments put together by local high school and college students.
The engineer who blew the whistle on the deadly o-rings was a member of our chapter. We held a special meeting in hist honor. Funny, isn't it, that just behaving according the expected standards of your profession can make you a hero. But, it is true, so few people live up to the minimal expected standards of morality or professionalism that when someone does it proves that they are a hero.
What a lot of us learned from the destruction of the Challenger and her crew was that NASA lies. (I'm not talking about the idiots who think we never went to the moon... god what idiots...) I'm talking about the kind of lies they tell to get what they want. They lie about what projects will cost. They lie about safety. They lie about performance. Can anyone name a successful space launch vehicle created by NASA in the last 20 years? (And, no, the shuttle doesn't count. That project started, officially, around 1966. In reality it started a lot earlier. Maybe as far back as the late 1930s or early 1940s.) I can't. I can give you a long list of failed projects. Even NASA's very successful Mars explores caught a ride on commercial Delta IIs.
NASA is primarily in the business of keeping its self alive. NASA is not in the business of exploring space. In fact, it has worked hard to keep people who wanted to explore space, or do business in space, or even build a high performance rocket, from being able to do any thing. It took decades to the legal system in place that is needed to allow private operations. It took decades not because our representatives didn't try, but because NASA with the help of the DOD worked as hard as they possibly could spreading FUD to stop the laws from passing. I know you won't believe me on this. So what, ask Jerry Pournelle he has been following and reporting on NASA's lies for longer than anyone. Go ahead, ask him. (No his is not a friend of mine. But, he is the guy who taught me about 75% of what I know about flame wars. Yeah, back in the days of the ARPA net...)
Ever wondered why space shuttles are so damned expensive? Ever wondered why there are so few of them? Ever wondered who owns the shuttles and the tooling to make space shuttles? If you ask you'll be told that there are so few of them because they are so expensive. They are so expensive because they are so high tech and complex. And, of course, everyone knows that NASA owns the shuttles and everything having to do with them. How about this question "Why do the space shuttles have a hypersonic glide capability with a 1500 mile cross range capability?" A cargo van doesn't need to be able to drive like a formula 1 race car. Giving the space shuttle those capabilities added weight, reduced payload, and dramatically increased its cost. So, why did they do it? BTW, One of the last shuttle designs considered, before the current design, reentered with the body and wings perpendicular to its direction of travel and only switched to gliding, rather than falling, after slowed to below mach one. It had a landing speed as slow, or slower, than a commercial airliner and could land on any runway and was not capable of flying at supersonic speed.
When you start saying that only NASA can build a manned space craft please remember that NASA approved the designs of the original Apollo that cremated its crew. They also approved the design of the space shuttle that has so far killed two crews in 134 flights. If a commercial aircraft had that kind of safety record in testing it would never be allowed to operate. Home built aircraft have a better safety record because of the inspection requirements for licensing. Even the X-15 which was a purely experimental aircraft that was deliberately flown at speeds and altitudes never before reached by any manned
Reminds me of the Chris Rock quote
Chris Rock should never be quoted...
For once I was trying for "Funny" but instead I get two "Insightfuls" and an "Infomative." Despite their fondness for low humor, geeks take themselves way too serious.
Farmers from all over are proud to be called redneck. Yeah, I've been all over the states.
Sorry if they don't associate your pop culture definition with reality.
Guess you watch too much t.v.
Media morons from Hollywood are no authorities on anything to do with life or anything important for that matter.
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
It's funny that your sig and your moderation match up. Off-topick for sure, but flamebait? Come on, mods, he might not be popular with everyone, but he's not picking any fights. Just talking about r
Glad I'm not the only one that sees Chris Rock for what he is, an idiot who repeatedly attacks people of other races and plays his race card whenever someone points it out. Though I think Obama is as about as qualified as most presidenta we've had before - weak in some areas, strong in others, and a career politician.
You have a truly dizzying intellect.
WAIT TILL I GET GOING! Where was I?
Geez, am I really the only person who thought that read 'Reported Plan Would Privative Manned Lunches'?.
Oh wait. There was a movie about that. Didn't work in fiction. What makes anyone think "for profit" will actually benefit the country in some way?
There are other advantages to air launch -- no large pad structures required, blast protection systems etc. as the motor only ignites in free air. The payload rocket can be built and handled horizontally throughout its entire lifespan until it is actually fired in flight etc. Adding the extra fuel tankerage to give the rocket that extra 10-12% is not a trivial matter; it needs extra strengthening to carry the extra mass on the pad and under acceleration which adds to the all-up launch weight requiring more fuel and oxidiser to carry it. That extra structure all costs money that is thrown away on every launch, never to be seen again.
As for building a gargantuan aircraft, it's not difficult to do with today's engineering knowledge and materials. It wouldn't even be that expensive to do since it's not meant to be a cost-competitive commercial airliner design built in the hundreds to carry fare-conscious passengers and air freight. A brute-force design would do the job -- big strong wings plus lots of engines for thrust. It doesn't need endurance to fly for ten or twelve hours at a time, it is not fine-tuned to carry passengers and freight at minimum operating costs, its fuel consumption per kilometre flown doesn't need to be cut to the bone because of marketing constraints. There would be at most three aircraft in the fleet, two minimum to maintain a schedule of launches but the project could start with just one so no need for a production line and the expensive engineering optimisations that requires.
YOU bullshit. Blacks routinely vote vote for Democrats by over 90%. That wasn't the case when the GOP was still the Party of Lincoln, but spend a few decades appealing to racism via the Southern Strategy, and blacks have few reasons to vote for Republicans. Another fact inconvenient to your storyline: Obama was the second or even third choice for black voters at the start of the 2008 primaries. They supported Hillary, because they didn't think they'd see a black president in their lifetimes.
You want to change this, do something about the racism that's been part and parcel of the Republican party for the last 40 years.