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NASA Pondering L2 Outpost, Return To Moon
New submitter Joiseybill writes "Now that the election is over, any voters that may have been influenced can rest easy. Space.com reports that the agency has been 'thinking about setting up a manned outpost beyond the moon's far side, both to establish a human presence in deep space and to build momentum toward a planned visit to an asteroid in 2025.' Space policy expert John Logsdon said, 'NASA has been evolving its thinking, and its latest charts have inserted a new element of cislunar/lunar gateway/Earth-moon L2 sort of stuff into the plan. They've been holding off announcing that until after the election.' According to the article, 'Rumors currently point toward parking a spacecraft at the Earth-moon L2 gateway, so NASA (and perhaps international partners) can learn more about supporting humans in deep space. Astronauts stationed there could also aid in lunar exploration — by teleoperating rovers on the moon's surface, for example.'"
I am pretty sure it has been discussed couple weeks ago on this very website.
Tomorrow is another day...
Does the congress have a budget for this kind of thing...? Considering they are doing quite a lot of cuts.
Some NASA funded summer research interns did some La Grange point studies a few years ago at Embry - Riddle. They worked out a scheme where a resupply space ship would show up at each point every 2 months. Details are fuzzy now, but the point being they have been working on the basic science for awhile.
Given the budgetary constraints that will exist for about the next 10 years, it is ludicrous to continue insisting on manned space missions. An L2 way station, as well as multiple way stations on the way to Mars can only be affordable and practically achievable for unmanned missions. Even then it will be a struggle to keep such projects funded.
The presence of humans adds essentially nothing of practical utility, and certainly nothing whatsoever of scientific utility. Its sole enormous contribution is expense. If the point is to explore space, then adding humans to the mix will stop these projects cold.
Often, I hear people demanding to know what practical reason humans would have to travel to the moon again. Many people bring up pipedreams like space ports, or lunar mining complexes.
I have a better reason.
The moon is tidelocked with the earth, has a very stable orbit, and a fairly large circumference. We should put an interferometric space telescope on the dark side of the moon. We could then use the entire circumference of the "visible/invisible" hemisphere terminator zone as the effective aperature size, and be free of atmospheric distortions.
The kinds of pictures we could get from such a telescope would make hubble look like a cheap webcam in comparison.
Put the command/control antenna on the visible side of the moon, and have it garanteed to always be pointed at the earth.
Ummm, how are they going to get there? Obama killed the space ship.
There's only a 1.3 second one-way communication delay between here and the Moon, making real-time control from Earth perfectly feasible (unlike Mars which has a 3 to 22 minute delay). The L2 point is even further away from the moon than the Earth is (on average around 4-5 times further) , thus there is an even larger communication delay which would make real-time control far less practical. Teleoperating a rover on the moon is a very contrived reason to place humans at the L2 point.
Better known as 318230.
We only have one L2 point what happens if other countries other than the US wants to use it?
Yeah...how how how how... how how how how ... at that base out at .... Lagrange (2) ......
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
I think it would be awesome for man to finally set foot on the moon.
Here at Lagrangian Virtul Realty we offer solutions to the three body problem to suit all budgets. Missed L2 by 'that much' ? Check out the broad kidney shaped boulevards of L4 and L5.
You seem to regard science as some kind of dodge... or hustle.
I keep seeing aburd rhetoric like this. At this point I am not sure if this can be ascribed to shameless trolling, or to poes's law gone terribly wrong.
Regardless, the concentration of melanin in human skin does not have a demonstrable relationship with mental ability. If it did, there would be a profound trend in medical literature, as people would become dumber after summer sun exposures. This does not occur. Therefore, the color of the skin is meaningless for the ascribed metric.
What you are really trying (and failing) to say, is that you feel that the subset of people who naturally have dark skin pigmentation are statistically more likely to suffer from a medley of social and psychological ills, and appear predisposed toward deleterious behaviors. I would conjecture that this is cultural, and has nothing to do with the actual skin pigmentation level itself, due to the lack of evidence to substantiate such a claim. The pigmentation itself does not appear to have any deleterious effect on human behavior, else getting a tan would have significant effects. Getting said tan does not appear to do so. Thus, skincolor does not appear directly causal.
The issue therefore, (should there even really be such an issue to begin with) is not one of skincolor at all, but with a cultural subsegment which engages in deleterious practices.
History suggests that this subsegment of the population came to exist because of unsubstantiatable biases on the part of the lightly pigmented demographic in the first place. The same outcome would have occured if the conditionals had been reversed.
The assertion that the problem has to do with skincolor, despite the lack of substantiatable evidence, would seem to be nothing more than a perpetuation of the incorrect and insubstantiatable assertions that gave rise to the very problem said assertion claims to address. More of the same will not solve the problem, and only an irrational or insane mind would attempt such when presented with actual data.
Skin color is not the causal factor. Institutional and cultural ostracism, and disenfranchisment is demonstrably at fault for any percieved inequality. Purpetuation of those practices will NOT improve things, no matter how much you want for it to be so.
Accept this fact, divert your attention from skin color to the actual problem, and stop wasting bandwidth.
Of course, if you are just a troll, go die in a fire.
Maybe someone should explain L2? LaGrangian points are not exactly common things discussed over coffee, and the importance of the Earth/Moon L2 isn't going to be readily understood by most people.
L2 is referring to the L2 Langrangian point
Quick Primer:
Any time two planets interact with each other there are 5 points where gravity is essentially zero. These can be though of as eddies in a stream. These are known as "Lagrangian Points". They are referred to as L1, L2,...L5. L1 is the point between Earth and the Moon. L2 is the point behind the moon. L3 is the point behind the Earth. L4 and L5 are not in a direct line between the two bodies. They exist at a 60 degree angle off of the first 3.
These Lagrangian points exist between ANY two gravitational bodies. The greater the gravity, the larger the 'hole'. Anything that falls into this 'hole' stays there. This makes it ideal for a satellite or similar. It wouldn't drift away. Just like the eddy in a stream, the external current keeps forcing everything back into the hole.
Is there a "dark orbit" about the moon that stays perpetually in shadow (28 day period), or would that be too close to earth to be stable?
If it could work, that would be a neat place for a deep space station - giant solar radiation shield, all you have to do is bring your own nuke powerplant instead of using solar panels. Still get to see the earth most of the time, too.
I've just read an excellent book by aerospace engineer Robert Zubrin, called "The Case for Mars", in which he argues in great detail for the possibility of puting humans on Mars in our own generation. His project is called "Mars Direct", and involves basically a Saturn V class launcher, which can take, on a first mission, an habitat which would be used to generate supplies (fuel, oxygen, water etc.) from Mars natural resources, and on a second mission, a crew of four Earthlings. The idea is that when the crew arrives, the factory from the first mission has generated enough fuel, water &c. for the return trip, as well as to power rovers ando other equipment.
His project is very credible, and he estimates a cost of 30 billion USD (which is peanuts when compared to other manned Mars missions projects [vide "90-day report", on the order of 450 billion USD]) for the first launch, with costs amortized over multiple launches.
Mr. Zubrin also argues that going to the Moon is pretty much useless, because it has nearly no natural resources to be explored and exploited, and almost as costly as going to Mars.
If you will, his site is at http://www.marssociety.org/ . The book is great reading too, and inspiring as it gives me the hope to see one of my own species walking over the Red Planet.
Stupidity is an equal opportunity striker.
Fellow slashdotter Bill Dog
Regardless, the concentration of melanin in human skin does not have a demonstrable relationship with mental ability. If it did, there would be a profound trend in medical literature, as people would become dumber after summer sun exposures. This does not occur. Therefore, the color of the skin is meaningless for the ascribed metric.
Excuse me, have you ever seen Jersey Shore? Not to say you're wrong, I just had to throw that out there.
This is a frivolous waste of what remains of vital earth resources needed to save this planet.
by teleoperating rovers on the moon's surface, for example.
I read the above as "teleporting"! (snicker) Got a little excited until I re- read it! (sigh) Reality strikes again.
Wouldn't an L2 outpost be the perfect assisted living center for old guys-n-gals?
No gravity to fight - no need for hip/knee/shoulder/heart replacements
If Harvey is found wandering the halls, just give him a big floaty shove in the right direction
We already know a lot of stuff [well, except for dementia...]
We'd be highly motivated to be away from Earth politics & wars
We aren't nearly as addicted to cellphones
The delay in communications would fit right into our ponderous pace
Burial would be easy - just a shove out the airlock
Hilarious.
I wasn't talking about skin COLOUR, I was talking about RACE. Albino Africans are just as stupid as 'black' Africans.
"Regardless, the concentration of melanin in human skin does not have a demonstrable relationship with mental ability. If it did, there would be a profound trend in medical literature, as people would become dumber after summer sun exposures. This does not occur. Therefore, the color of the skin is meaningless for the ascribed metric."
No, of course not. Nobody is talking about "the concentration of melanin", I was talking about GENETICS - RACE.
"The assertion that the problem has to do with skincolor, despite the lack of substantiatable evidence, would seem to be nothing more than a perpetuation of the incorrect and insubstantiatable assertions that gave rise to the very problem said assertion claims to address. More of the same will not solve the problem, and only an irrational or insane mind would attempt such when presented with actual data."
My god - it's Mr. Logic from Viz comic! Hilarious!
Non-whites are CLEARLY destroying white countries. Non-whites CLEARLY prefer white countries to their OWN countries.
You still haven't explained why.
MOST white people don't agree with you, Mr. Logic. You arrogant cretin.
And as for "go die in a fire" - how typical of a left winger who can't think for himself, to wish death upon anybody who disagrees with him. You arrogant moron.