Slashdot Mirror
Iran Says It Sent Monkey Into Space and Back
Iranian state TV is claiming that the country has successfully sent a monkey into space and back, bringing Iran one step closer to its goal of a manned space flight. According to the report, the rocket named Pishgam, or Pioneer in Farsi, reached a height of 120km. From the article: "Iran has long said it seeks to send an astronaut into space as part of its ambitious aerospace program, including plans for a new space center announced last year. In 2010, Iran said it launched an Explorer rocket into space carrying a mouse, a turtle and worms."
Sometimes his policy explanations are as believable as a monkey's.
Ahmadinejad made it all the way back safely
Congrats Iran!
--- rapper/producer/bachelorette party stripper
Firing defenceless animals off into space for their twisted pleasure ?
BOMB THE BASTARDS.
Sky subscribers are morons. They pay to be advertised at !
Sounds like some sort of Flintstones / Jetsons crossover.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Where did it land? Iran? No way. They would have to target the ocean and their navy is well monitored, blockaded and (honestly) fairly weak.
I'm surprised they didn't start with some something more disposable, like a woman. I'm sorry, but it just shocks me that a society can make this kind of technological achievement and still treat some humans as second class citizens.
Its probably just to cover the news that their nuclear weapon research bunker was blown up.Don't look here, watch the monkey!
Isn't this something that would be easily confirmed by the nations watching Iran's rising power? Or is it confirmed already? Iran is famous for its photoshopping skills and their knack for skewing propaganda in their favor. On the other hand, they do have the technology to do this. At least in theory.
- Henrik
- when the Shadows descend -
To be experts, you have to be convincing.
Iran usually isn't.
Self proclaimed typo king, and inventor of the bear destroying coffee table (patent not pending).
Correct, an orbit is a lot harder than just achieving an altitude.
I do however, disagree with you about the conclusion you are trying to prove with your analogy.
If you have never built any sort of a vehicle before, evolving from the toy stage through many many many steps to a formula 1 car may actually be a logical process, and therefore is relevant.
Likewise, a progression from earthbound to an orbiting space station and beyond, may include a developmental step of placing a monkey in a missile.
Cheers
Kenny
Are you sure they aren't treated badly?
Some people die at 25 and aren't buried until 75. -Benjamin Franklin
Yes, the difference in energy required to reach orbit is enormous.. Though I don't think you can quite orbit at 120km, there must be terrible atmospheric drag there.
What's notable is that all the talks about space tourism in the US : they're mostly about achieving that same kind of suborbital roller-coaster that breaks an arbitrary 100km threshold. Making it cheap is probably the interesting part, I wonder if the Iranian version of this was cheap (taking your time to build a boring old rocket domestically), or expensive (throw money at the problem to build that boring old rocket instead of trying e.g. a cheap space plane thing).
What I happen to think sadly is such rollercoaster trips for millionnaires are pointless and a waste of resources! Color me uninterested. Unless you do useful things (probing the high atmosphere, have a quick look at cosmic rays related stuff etc.)
A space program on the international stage isn't about getting people to like you. It's about getting people to fear you. You're basically showing the world that you have the infrastructure, cohesion, and technology to pull of a milestone feat for a nation. And it also implies that you can drop a nuke on any point on the globe.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
Nowhere in TFA does it say the monkey survived. For all we know it came back as chunky salsa...
This is a sig. This is only a sig. Had this been an actual sig you would have been informed where to tune for more sigs.
That stops working the millisecond a mushroom cloud appears over Iran.
North Korea has a powerful friend (China). Iran burnt all their bridges, and thus has very few friends at all.
Having powerful backers is more important than possessing a weapon too powerful to use.
While I am sure the parent was kidding...I have a friend who is only moderately stupid that firmly believes that the moon landings were faked. I found this a couple weeks ago, an interesting point of view.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGXTF6bs1IU
We would have faked it...but actually doing it was easier at the time.
Super-intelligent monkey manipulates another nation-state into providing it with a free joyride into space.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
From all of these anti-Iranian comments I guess the US propaganda is working well. Pretty soon you all we clamor for war and sign up to fight. It's amazing how people can hate those they never met.
I love Jesus, except for his foreign policy.
FTFA:
said the monkey returned safely.
I presume that means "alive," unless Iran has a very different take on the word "safely."
What political party do you join when you don't like Bible-thumpers *or* hippies?
Well, to be fair, this is Iran. I mean look at the typical Islamist regime and their claims of "The Religion of Peace" while chopping off hands.
I got here through a series of tubes
North Korea announced that it had put a "satellite" into "orbit," accomplishing two goals: artificially inflating national pride and telling the world "we're actually just practicing building rockets that may one day deliver nuclear weapons to your cities." Iran plays the same games with its own people and the world, so it's logical that they had to craft a similar announcement, whether it's true or not. The day North Korea announced the "success" of its satellite, you can bet Ahmadinejad called his advisors and said, "I need a space program milestone announcement ASAP!" Ahmadinejad doesn't want his people, or the world, to think he's not keeping up with poor Kim Jong-un.
In both cases, you have countries that can barely afford to take care of their citizens, yet they are claiming to be building a full-fledged space program. Iran is a far more resource-wealthy country and its GDP is more than 10 times North Korea's, but its economy is suffering badly because of the international sanctions for its nuclear program, and the health of its people is suffering even worse. So the only reason they would make such an announcement would be to artificially inflate national pride and try to scare the rest of the world.
Of course, Iran's people are not cut off from news from the outside world as effectively as North Korea's (despite police ripping satellite dishes off rooftops and a plan to unplug the country from the Internet), so this could backfire when the people protest about resources being spent on keeping monkeys breathing in space when there isn't enough air to breathe on the ground in Tehran.
Iran said it launched an Explorer rocket into space carrying a moose
A space møøse once bit my sister...
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Moderately stupid. I need to remember that one, it could be precious one day. "You Sir, are only moderately stupid! Why can't you see reason?"
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
I have a friend who is only moderately stupid that firmly believes that the moon landings were faked.
I would submit to you that if your friend firmly believes that the moon landings were faked, he's far more than moderately stupid. With all the evidence, believing the moon landing was faked is right up there with believing that the moon is made of gouda cheese. There's a reflector on the moon. If you know the coordinates, you can actually bounce a laser off of it back to Earth.
The US has many allies, including most of the West, Japan, and many other countries. Iran has (ummmm...) Venezuela (actually, Hugo Chavez and his friends), and North Korea. I think it would take a LOT to have the Muslim world fall in behind a handful of crazed Twelver shi'ites who hate their guts, against the mighty United States.
I doubt anybody would be willing to militarily have a go at the US and Israel for glassing Iran. Israel flattened half the Middle East with one hand tied behind it's back several times since 1948. What makes people think that they can't do it again, especially when the United States comes to their aid, and ESPECIALLY when the gloves comes off. And then they do, the world will truly understanding the meaning of crushing military defeat.
My money is on the States. Iran is its own worst enemy.
A reflector on the moon isn't a sign that humans ever went there; an unmanned rover could have easily left it behind.
Remember that when you're dealing with conspiracy theorists, evidence contrary to their belief will be dismissed out of hand. But that's fine - when they hold such a minority opinion, the burden of proof is on them, not you. The only way to have them see reason is to tirelessly rebut everything they come up with until, finally, they start to realize that the true explanation might be the one that doesn't nned to invoke mind control or aliens to fill in the gaps. In the specific case of the moon landings, it comes down to proving that the tech does work, that humans can survive in space, and that so many people could keep quiet for so long if there actually were a conspiracy. If there's no reason to believe we couldn't go to the moon, there's no reason to disbelieve the people who say we did.
Everything is better with chainsaws.
If a western nation ever did anything bad, at any point in their history, that is remotely like something a non-western nation is doing today, well then the non-western nation gets a total pass. You can't criticize them because at one time something bad happened somewhere else!
This false moral equivalency bullshit is just retarded. Every country has done bad shit in the past. Every country does bad shit now. That doesn't mean that we cannot, or should not, point out when it happens. This idea that every country that isn't the US, or at least every country that isn't western gets an automatic pass on everything they do because of bad shit that happen sin other places is beyond stupid and counter productive.
When I said "you", I should've said "astronomers". This is an experiment that has been done at many observatories, all over the world. It's easily falsifiable by any sufficiently sophisticated nation, and I can think of at least one that would've loved to have called "Bullshit!" on a moon landing, if it never happened.
Iran has had 3 successful confirmed satellite launches. This one is a smaller rocket and it has failed once before. When the last launch failed Iranian head of IASA confirmed the failure.
The rocket used for this launch is one of the smaller rockets Iran uses for the purpose.
Their main rocket carried a 50kg satellite to 500km in 2011 and their new rocket (i.e. Simorgh with 4 engines in first stage) is able to launch very much bigger loads.
When I said "you", I should've said "astronomers".
In other words, you haven't actually done it yourself, you just read about someone doing it.
The point was, if you aren't going to believe that men have landed on the moon after someone else tells you it has happened, why would you believe that there is a reflector or three on the moon that those men you don't believe were there left behind just because someone else tells you they are there?
The argument that someone is stupid for not believing we've been to the moon (and when I say "we", I should've said "astronauts") because someone else has said there are ways of proving it, is self-defeating.