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US Space Firms Tell Washington: China Will Take Over the Moon if You're Not Careful (yahoo.com)
The US space industry is prodding the US government into refreshing its outdated laws on commercial activity beyond earth: scare it with talk of Chinese galactic domination. A report adds: At a Senate hearing on the space industry this week, companies that build rockets and space habitats and manufacture electronic goods in space spoke about a standard laundry list of complaints, from regulatory burdens to fears of subsidized competitors. But their message was wrapped in patriotic concerns about China's growing capacity for space action. These companies are eager for the US government to allow and invest in commercial activities in orbit and around the moon. Many think the laws governing action in space, and particularly the UN Space Treaty, need refreshing for an age when private companies are close to matching the space capacity of sovereign nations. The last major change was a law on asteroid mining passed in 2015.
There is no economic case for space exploration.
"companies that build rockets and space habitats and manufacture electronic goods in space"
Who is doing all of this manufacturing in space. I feel like I just woke up in the future. This is great!!
So, the laws do get updated, and far more regularly than most drug laws. What's the problem?
Nothing like a bit of it!
There's one way to get Trumps attention.
Put it in terms of China.
Trump, if we don't fund science, China will be #1 in RD
Trump, if we don't fund NASA, China will own the Moon!
They'll need to battle it out with the space nazi's that occupied the dark side of the moon post WW2. I say we let them clean them out before we start worrying about a base.
We can worry about that when we've accomplished the important things: filling our country with brown people and transgender bathrooms.
When it was the Russians. Worth a try.
It is there to be used to the benefit of all, no one can "own" it.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
We cannot let Red China control all the green cheese! http://uncoveror.com/moon.htm
The Uncoveror: It's the real news.
Considering that the US legislature has done everything they can to impede progress in space exploration, I don't think they deserve any say about the future of space exploration. China isn't great but at least they are investing in science instead of sticking their heads in the sand and saying global warming is a hoax.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
Seriously guys, this isn't hard to understand.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Everyone knows the Moon is a hoax concocted by the Chinese. Let them have it.
Haven't you seen the documentary called Iron Sky?
You say things that offend me and I can deal with it. Can you?
you allow avarice and greed dictate national policy.
will never allow the Chinese to take over the Moon.
slashdot: A failed experiment.
I don't care what motivation we have, if it takes sparking our president's over-prickly ego, or threatening ever-insecure America generally with the idea that someone else will get there first.
I truly don't care the excuse: just fucking go back to space already.
-Styopa
I thought we were going to extract all the resources using permanently based recyclable clones.
Trump, if we don't fund science, China will be #1 in RD
How is it not a problem if a repressive government gets ahead of the west in R&D? Do you like more, or less repressive government and the wrongful imprisonment of dissenters?
Trump, if we don't fund NASA, China will own the Moon!
Again, would you like a militarily aggressive force controlling the moon? That seems like a pretty valid concern for real, not just "a way to get Trump interested". In fact it's why Trump is already pretty interested in continuing NASA's work and why NASA didn't face any major budget cuts, in fact they increased planetary science spending, which is what you would hope from any rational president. We are all better off if a number of nations have operations on the moon, so we should figure out how to get more U.S. presence back on our nearest neighbor.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
it is send us more money! Regarding asteroid laws, Moon Treaty, etc. first gotta have capability to have Moon travel routinely. Right now it is really hard just to get there, "GAO: NASA Human Space Exploration: Delay Likely for First Exploration Mission" http://spaceref.com/news/views...
mfwright@batnet.com
Let's see, china's moon exploration program is called CLEP.
Trouble, oh we got trouble,
Right on the moon!
With a capital "T"
That rhymes with "C"
And that stands for CLEP,
That rhymes with "K"
And that stands for KLEP,
That's stealing the moon!
We've surely got trouble!
I say something like this and I get scoffed at as a paranoiac, but then here comes space industry leaders saying the same thing. You going to call them paranoid, too? Or are you all paid shills for China? Based on Chinas' history of behavior can you really rule out the possibility that they'd set up shop on the Moon and tell everyone else to bugger off?
... It will be fantastic. Believe me.
and anxiously awaits the arrival of our astromen.
Will you be among them?
Just build a wall... on the Moon.
I'm quoting you: "...repressive government and the wrongful imprisonment of dissenters".
As I seem to have to continually remind people on Slashdot, Hillary is not president.
Who exactly has Trump imprisoned wrongfully? Or are you saying it is wrong to imprison people who set cars on fire and loot shops? I know many on the left bellive this to be true but I had hoped that rot had not spread to the more rational denizens of Slashdot.
It's just their sheeple, drink the Kool-Aid given to them and think the other is more evil.
While that is indeed true of many Statists, it's not really true of the other more libertarian side of that equation - which only makes sense as the larger a government gets, the more unfeeling and cruel it becomes... so you can imagine what happens in essentially a world-wide government.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
You all seem to be making fun of this, but look at the territorial grabs that are taking place. Shoals and tiny islands that are very far from China and very close to other countries are being claimed, settled and developed by China. They don't give a shit about treaties, pacts or international laws. They take what they want.
It's Bigly Sad that Trump won't admit China already has a Lunar Base.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
I've been to the Moon, and the people there have the technology to keep the Chinese, or anyone, for that matter, from taking over.
Can't you see how much our space tech has been repressed? How much more time does a superpower need to colonize the moon?
1. those laws were passed so that companies in any nation, whether they surpassed local government capability, could not commercialise space. that's the point of the law, its purpose, not a bug that needs fixing.
2. the patriotic angle is both misleading and stupid as well as self-serving....if china's capacity and potential capacity for activity in space is so great, it will greatly outpace whatever a few US companies can do. the no-commercial-activity law restricts the chinese more than anyone - restrictions like that have an effect that is directly proportional to capability.
a successful repeal (unlikely) of the international laws would see china surge ahead of everyone else in space commercialisation, including american companies.
3. fucking corporations already own most of the fucking earth. we can't let them own space too, no matter how much they bleat and whine that they want to.
China has at least one HUGE advantage over the US: 3-4 times the number of taxpayers. As China becomes increasingly wealthy, it'll be easier for China to raise the funds for ambitious space-exploration projects.
If China prioritizes Moon-colonization over travel to Mars, it means only one thing: its leaders aren't confident that they can get to Mars with current technology & survive long enough to plant a flag.
The moon isn't a "stepping stone" to anything... even after you launch a rocket from the moon, you're STILL almost as deep inside Earth's gravity well as you'd have been after launching from Earth.
A colony on the moon itself is about as valuable as a house built (off-grid) in the Nevada desert 100 miles from Las Vegas... yeah, you could technically do it, and the land itself would probably be "almost free"... but the construction cost & ongoing supply costs would eat you alive, to the point where you could have paid less for a mansion in Henderson than you'd have ended up spending for a shack (with trucked-in water & electricity from a generator) in the desert.
It seems to me that we haven't really gotten past the moon yet. How about establishing a base or two there, build some stable science, refueling, and manufacturing capabilities there, and THEN start worrying about the trip to Mars.
"Who exactly has Trump imprisoned wrongfully?"
From this side of history, the will of Session to stoke up the war on drug and particularly get more repressive against Marijuana, is definitively wrongful imprisonment in my book, even if it is not the legal definition.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
I tell you my fellow Americans,
If we do not head back to the moon and on to Mars and then the Moons of Jupiter and Saturn, The Chinese will and we soon will be speaking Chinese and the whole solar system will be run by Communists! You don't want that to happen do you? Do you??
thanks george
all we need is canada and mexico to join the moon mission and russia for real and you'd have the world BUT the usa
Need global laws that restrict the size and power of corporations.
Space Exploration/Exploitation needs to be good for ALL of us, not just corporate entities and their clients and croonies.
Self-importance and self-indulgence is the root of ALL evil.
I remember, but can't find, a quote that came out in the late 50s or 60s, that went like this:
"What will we find on the Moon?"
"Russians!"
I thought it was Edward Teller, but I can't find any refs on the web to that. Of course it's entirely possible at my age, that I made it up...
And obviously that prediction failed badly.