Give Space a Chance, Says Phil Plait

The Bad Astronomer writes "A lot of pundits, scientists, and people who should know better are decrying the demise of NASA, saying that the President's budget cutting the Constellation program and the Ares rockets will sound the death knell of manned space exploration. This simply is not true. The budget will call for a new rocket design, and a lot of money will go toward private space companies, who may be able to launch people into orbit years ahead of Ares being ready anyway."

Comments

Yeah, orbit!

[Anonymous Coward]

Weee! They'll be able to launch people into orbit years ahead of Ares! Because putting people into orbit is exactly why Ares was being built, since NASA can't do that with their current rockets.

The private industry is decades away from what NASA can do today. It's at least a century away from what NASA could do 40 years ago. They're never going to get us into mars, because there's simply no profit in it. Government funding is the only way space exploration can go forward.

Re:Yeah, orbit!

[wizardforce]

They're never going to get us into mars, because there's simply no profit in it.

Oh really? Because to me, Phobos and Deimos (Mars' moons) are little more than a few trillion tons of metal, ceramics, volatiles and a few million tons of precious metals sitting in a nice stable orbit over Mars. Just perfect to supply the Earth with some rare metals, the moon and LEO with volatiles and any space tourism around Mars. The view is fantastic and I'd bet there's people who would pay pretty big bucks to take a vacation to Martian orbit or even visit the surface. You woyuld have to have a profound lack of imagination to not see any "profit" in going to Mars and in space exploration in general. Resources, tourism, research etc. plenty of profit to be made, it's just a matter of building up the necessary technology and infrastructure.

Re:Yeah, orbit!

[icebike]

Seriously?
I just can't see mining a trillion tons of anything to carry it back to earth being a good idea. And mining a moon seems fraught with peril, an generally a bad idea. For Christ sake if exhaling can destroy earth's environment, how could de-orbiting a trillion tons do the planet any good?

The only way to gain the riches of mars is to live there. You can't bring it home.

 

Re:Yeah, orbit!

[wizardforce]

The supply of space metals shipped to Earth can not lower the price of precious metals on Earth lower than what it costs to ship them no matter how abundant they are in space. Hence why even though there are quadrillions of tons of salt on Earth, the price isn't near zero due to the cost of transport and extraction.

Wishful thinking is bad science too

[syousef]

What you need is for people to realise the benefits that come with space exploration so that they demand, through their votes, that it be included in the budget. What you don't need to do is give up on NASA in favour of private companies that can only ever be expected to be SELF serving. Capitalism as a tool is a good thing, but as a religion it is as stupid as any other religion.

Re:Losing Constellation is a set back

[osu-neko]

Years of work have gone in Ares I,5 and the capsules. ... but if its cancelled and NASA have to restart then those years and dollars are gone

You are suffering from the "sunk costs" fallacy. Those years and dollars are gone, not "if its cancelled", they're gone, period. The question is, what is the best way to proceed from where we are today. If the Ares program is not a good investment, then we shouldn't throw any more money at this. This is equally true whether we've spent nothing or spent a trillion dollars...

Re:Bravo.

[EzInKy]

Poverty is a social problem, not a technological one.

Social problem: Famine
Technological Solution: Irrigation
Result: Civilization (Just ask Sid)

Solving social problems with technology is what separates men from animals.