It has its uses. It keeps the Mars Society people happy and interested. They, in turn, lobby for funding for Mars exploration, and even kick in a little funding of their own.
For the foreseeable future, it's robots or nothing. Your "man" is a paper tiger. It's just not going to happen. There is no political will for a manned mission, and the price of one is too high. If we're lucky, the NASA budget will stay roughly level for the next few years. The only way to get any science out of that is to do it on the cheap - robotically.
They weren't guaranteed to do squat. Part of the reason for having two rovers was a hedge against failure. The MER team basically decided that it was cheaper to send two and hope one survived than to design out the risk on one rover.
Two rovers let them cover more ground, see more stuff, and still have a mission if one rover failed. Notice that while Spirit is in trouble, Opportunity is still operating.
What I meant to ask really is I would love to know what the world would be like if everyone decided to do away with their sticks.
You'd have an unstable system that would be wildly upset by the first person that decided to pull out a stick. You'd keep them in check with a stick which would be wielded by [x]. Many would view [x] as inattentive/ineffective/corrupt, and would wield their own sticks, or very stiff twigs (technically not a stick, your honor), or complex financial weapons.
On the other hand, I think the Marshall Plan is a good example of your thoughts in action.
To your point 0, though: It would be a lot easier for the public to get excited about NASA work if NASA did a better job of presenting that work to the public. I know this has been said many times before, but that might be because it's a valid point. The problem as I see it is that the guys doing the work have bigger things to worry about than getting involved in marketing.
I noticed that too. The "coastal borders" seem to intrude pretty far inland of what I think of as the US silhouette. Lynchburg, VA is almost 100 miles from Richmond, which is about 50 miles from what I would call the main body of Chesapeake Bay, but both Lynchburg and Richmond are within 100 miles of whatever you want to call the body of water that feeds Hampton Roads Bay.
The problem is that we, as Americans, would not like the consequences of having those particular businesses fail. (Or so we're being told.) That raises the questions of how much freedom those business should have in their actions, or whether or not they should be private at all.
On the one hand, their whole approach to this endeavor screams failure. They have insisted on relearning the lessons of the past 60 years the hard way. Predictably, they've paid for it. I simply don't think a private corporation can afford the learning curve.
However, I truly hope they pull it off. I fear that failure by SpaceX would dry up entrepreneurial space efforts in a big way.
Phoenix is too far north for it to do much good this time. From the UofA page: The far northern latitudes on Mars experience no sunlight during winter. This marks the end of the mission because the solar panels can no longer charge the batteries on the lander and the frost covering the region as the atmosphere cools will bury the lander in ice.
Slashdot Mirror
This is stupendously stupid and idiotic.
It has its uses. It keeps the Mars Society people happy and interested. They, in turn, lobby for funding for Mars exploration, and even kick in a little funding of their own.
Try it this way: What are the legitimate, non-creepy uses of Google StreetView in a residential neighborhood?
An attack by Igor Padzhitnoff and the Tovarishchi Slutchainyi, perhaps?
I think The Airplane, The Dead and Hendrix played at that gig.
Too bad they weren't Starship yet.
Oprah will co-opt him somehow. He'll make a few appearances on the show with tech tips or something like that, and then he'll write a book.
Throw rocks? You and your fancy tools. It's club-wielding whippersnappers like you that chased us away from the watering hole years back.
For the foreseeable future, it's robots or nothing. Your "man" is a paper tiger. It's just not going to happen. There is no political will for a manned mission, and the price of one is too high. If we're lucky, the NASA budget will stay roughly level for the next few years. The only way to get any science out of that is to do it on the cheap - robotically.
It's also screaming for a Tony Stark reference.
How does this work with something normally innocuous but seriously harmful to an individual, such as food allergies?
They weren't guaranteed to do squat. Part of the reason for having two rovers was a hedge against failure. The MER team basically decided that it was cheaper to send two and hope one survived than to design out the risk on one rover.
Two rovers let them cover more ground, see more stuff, and still have a mission if one rover failed. Notice that while Spirit is in trouble, Opportunity is still operating.
...Google's method applied to the past four years very closely mathches trend data ...
Have I got a sure-fire investment method for you!
What I meant to ask really is I would love to know what the world would be like if everyone decided to do away with their sticks.
You'd have an unstable system that would be wildly upset by the first person that decided to pull out a stick. You'd keep them in check with a stick which would be wielded by [x]. Many would view [x] as inattentive/ineffective/corrupt, and would wield their own sticks, or very stiff twigs (technically not a stick, your honor), or complex financial weapons.
On the other hand, I think the Marshall Plan is a good example of your thoughts in action.
If the government also taxed the "profit" the corp made before you paid yourself, you would be getting taxed TWICE on the same money.
That makes sense if you fail to draw a distinction between the company's money and your money. People go to jail for that.
I have seen lakes that were so saline or full of some organism that they could not support life.
They were so full of some organism that they could not support life? Yogi Berra, is that you?
Mod parent up.
To your point 0, though: It would be a lot easier for the public to get excited about NASA work if NASA did a better job of presenting that work to the public. I know this has been said many times before, but that might be because it's a valid point. The problem as I see it is that the guys doing the work have bigger things to worry about than getting involved in marketing.
I noticed that too. The "coastal borders" seem to intrude pretty far inland of what I think of as the US silhouette. Lynchburg, VA is almost 100 miles from Richmond, which is about 50 miles from what I would call the main body of Chesapeake Bay, but both Lynchburg and Richmond are within 100 miles of whatever you want to call the body of water that feeds Hampton Roads Bay.
Well its a good initial number. If you would like to refine, go ahead. Yes there are problems with the number.
Open source accounting too?
To quote from "Papazian": "There are no known pathogens that are able to survive in beer."
Nothing that'll kill you, no...but a bad batch can consume an awful lot of toilet paper.
The concern is that we won't cut back CO2 enough (and looking at the current state of things, this is quite likely)
In that case, we should start carving a message to the flying saucer people in big letters on the side of the grand canyon:
WE COULD HAVE SAVED IT, BUT WE WERE TOO DOGGONE CHEAP.
The problem is that we, as Americans, would not like the consequences of having those particular businesses fail. (Or so we're being told.) That raises the questions of how much freedom those business should have in their actions, or whether or not they should be private at all.
It also means "not our problem if it craps out on you".
On the one hand, their whole approach to this endeavor screams failure. They have insisted on relearning the lessons of the past 60 years the hard way. Predictably, they've paid for it. I simply don't think a private corporation can afford the learning curve.
However, I truly hope they pull it off. I fear that failure by SpaceX would dry up entrepreneurial space efforts in a big way.
I'm thinking of a radio controlled 4wd you can get from a serious hobby shop that'll do at least 1km between charges!
I invite you to run it for 5 years in abrasive grit with zero intervention.
they are good for the rovers
Phoenix is too far north for it to do much good this time. From the UofA page:
The far northern latitudes on Mars experience no sunlight during winter. This marks the end of the mission because the solar panels can no longer charge the batteries on the lander and the frost covering the region as the atmosphere cools will bury the lander in ice.
cell phones, ability to choose phone providers, and being able to actually purchase your own home phone
Please, please, please offer me some better consolation for standing down the lab that discovered evidence of the big bang.