What I wonder is why noone has done this on the moon yet. After venting the space it would make an ideal sealed container for colonization projects. If we had done this during some of the Apollo missions (or at least during that era) the caverns created would have had 30+ years to vent already.
Not a bad idea. Besides the general disinterest in the moon for the last 30 or so years, the reasons for not doing this are probably more political than anything else. First there's a treaty outlawing the detonation of nuclear weapons in space and the last time I checked, the moon was in space.
Second, remember the protests against launching extremely safe plutonium RTGs on NASA probes? Just think of what the protests would be like if we tried to launch an actual bomb.
P.S. Here's the actual link, it doesn't seem to be coming out right in preview (take out the extra spaces):
http://spacelink.msfc.nasa.gov/NASA.Projects/Human .Exploration.and.Development.of.Space/Hu man.Space.Flight/Shuttle/Shuttle.Missions/Flight.0 31.STS-34/Galileos.Power.Supply/RTG.Fact.Sheet
As someone previously mentioned, Matloff recently wrote an article in Forbes on this very subjet.
The Forbes article has a somewhat different spin. Rather than saying that a glut of foreign workers is responsible for the "labor shortage", Matloff contends that companies are setting unreasonably high standards for applicants. He says that companies are rejecting people that, while they may have experience and good programming skills, don't have the specific skills the company is looking for (although they could be retrained in a minimal amount of time).
There's probably some truth to this argument, but I believe that, as some others have brought up, age is more of a factor than this.
Good points. I remember my step-father going through things like this 6-10 years ago when he was job hopping in Silicon Valley. He was in his late 40s - early 50s at the time (he's retired now). He intentionally removed older jobs from his resume so that he would appear younger and less experienced. It seemed to work - he was able to get interviews and jobs.
A big advantage to launching at sea (besides not having the rocket fly over inhabited areas) is that you can move your launch site to the equator. Launching at the equator gives you the greatest "kick" from the rotation of the Earth which saves on fuel. In addition, at the equator you can launch into a zero inclination orbit (for geosync satellites). Anytime you're in an orbit and you need to change inclination it's hugely expensive in terms of fuel. So it makes sense to launch a geosync (which is what they just launched) as close to the equator as you can.
When I was a grad student in physics, I had the opportunity to teach undergrad physics lab before computers were introduced to the lab and after. I just wanted to throw in my $.02 about what I experienced.
Basically the lab computers were NT boxes that were used in the lab either to run Excel to make graphs or, for one lab, to actually gather the data. I didn't have much input into the design of the lab experiments, but they were well put together and didn't require much thought on how the computer was to be utilized.
The big difference I saw between pre- and post-computers was that the students got more done. The computers saved a lot of the busy work of creating the graphs and then computing the slope of whatever data was graphed. Excel could also do a log plot easily. However, the important part of almost all labs was what to DO with that slope. What did it mean? Computers didn't help there. Although with computer help there was usually more time to think about it, most of the students seemed more interested in writing something and leaving than really understanding what the lesson was about. Though that could be a commentary on my teaching technique rather than the computers.;)
But I think this was the way to go and some of the other folks on this thread have it right: the computer should not be the centerpiece - it should be a work-saving tool (as it was meant to be). The lesson should not revolve around the computer (unless it is a computer science class). The real learning happens in the interaction between the students and each other and between the students and the teacher. As much as computers have advanced they cannot replace a human teacher (yet) or another human student.
I would love it if the government were to support more scientific research, and huge engineering projects like building space colonies. Unfortunately the government doesn't seem too interested in what could be created from that.
That's why we need to do it privately. Avoid all the politicians and bureaucracy and budget cuts and do it with a private company. A company with dedicated individuals of any and all nations who all work toward a common goal.
Here's a few articles that point out there's a tenuous relationship AT BEST between cell phone use and brain cancer. No really hard evidence at all... from the New Australian
an article from the Wall Street Journal at junkscience.com. I like the last paragraph of the article that says: "Car accidents resulting from using a cell phone while driving are 'much more of a problem at this point' than radio emissions".
It's not quite that simple, you still need a non-trivial delta-V to get to the moon from Earth orbit. If I'm not mistaken, the "tip over" point is when the ICBM has exhausted its fuel and released its warhead(s). The warheads are now have the correct trajectory and need no further boost - only course corrections. You're right, though, a warhead is a lot less massive than a space capsule (which only contained 3 men, btw). It still strikes me as overdesign for a typical ICBM to be able to reach the moon especially ICBMs designed in 1959.
There's a couple of things in this article that make me suspicious that this was actually a real project. First of all, the only source is a 73 year old physicist who supposedly worked on this 40-50 years ago. He'd have been a pretty young guy to be working on such a highly secret project. Not only that - he was Carl Sagan's boss! Not completely out of the question, but we only have his word on it.
Second, here's a quote from the article:
it was 'certainly technically feasible' and that at the time an intercontinental ballistic nuclear missile would have been capable of hitting a target on the moon with an accuracy of within two miles.
It took a Saturn V rocket to get men to the moon in 1969, I doubt that an ICBM in 1959 could even reach the moon much less have an accuracy of 2 miles. And if you're a weapons designer only interested getting ICBMs to the USSR, why overdesign one that could go all the way to the moon? Especially if you're trying to make them as cheap as possible so you can crank out as many as possible.
Anyway, just a couple of things that struck me as odd.
2) Since radar can do this, ground based radar doesn't suffer nearly as much atmospheric distortion as a normal telescope does.
3) Radar is an active system, so a radar observer does not have to worry about reflected sunlight providing illumination.
4) Radar observations can easily provide lots of info like rotation rate, etc. See here for examples.
5) Radar can also, given sufficient info, provde 3D maps. For an optical 3D map, you either need a laser altimeter or a stereo imager
Also check out this quote from a NASA press release about radar imaging of asteroid 1999 JM8:
""Our finest resolution is 15 meters (49 feet) per pixel, which is finer than that obtained for any other asteroid, even for spacecraft" said Dr. Jean-Luc Margot, one of the team members from Arecibo Observatory. "To get that kind of resolution with an optical telescope, you'd need a mirror several hundred meters across. Radar certainly is the least expensive way of imaging Earth-approaching objects.""
Certainly seems to me that radar is a very useful tool for observing near-Earth and even belt asteroids which could lead to later exploration and exploitation.
... the network of satellite dishes-turned-radio telescopes that Charlie Sheen created in The Arrival. Hmmm... it has been getting warmer in recent years. Just a coincidence I'm sure.
I took a look at the patent application and here are a few problems that I see with it. BTW, my background is in physics.
To start, there's almost theory behind this device. The author states that it works by poking "a small hole into another dimension... which allows transmission of energy to exceed the speed of light." How it does the poking is not explained nor is any characterization of this other "dimension" given to explain why it would allow "transmission of energy to exceed the speed of light." Just because you claim to be able to transmit energy in another dimension does not automatically guarantee that it will travel faster than light. If I shine a flashlight straight up, the light will not travel any faster than if I shined the flashlight straight ahead even though these are two different "dimensions".
Second, his statement that the magnetic field can be produced by either a permanent magnent or an electromagnet is almost laughable. The field of an electromagnet is much more predictable and controllable than a permanent magnet. Besides which, the intense heat source (1000 F) would probably tend to de-magnetize whatever material was used for a permanent magnet. No experimental physicist worth his oscilloscope would use a permanent magnet over an electromagnet.
Next, think about this: Black holes are probably the closest thing to a "wormhole" and black holes take an enormous amount of energy to create - the energy of a collapsing star. To generate that kind of energy with the proposed device is impossible. The author must be relying on some kind of "cold fusion" type argument where the RF transmission "tunnels" into and out of hyperspace without the actual creation of a wormhole.
Finally, consider this. The author claims that to create a hyperlight antenna one basically only needs 1) an intense heat source and 2) a strong magnetic field. One also needs to be able to locate the "injection point", presumably where the proper mix of 1 & 2 is. Is there any naturally occuring phenomenon that has 1 & 2? You betcha! We call it THE SUN. If such a hyperlight antenna actually worked as stated, there would certainly be ample "injection points" all over the surface and interior of the sun. Do we see light mysteriously vanish from the surface of the sun? No! (Yes, sunspots appear dark in visible light, but if you look at different wavelenghts you can see them, so sunspots cannot be explained by this). Also, our knowledge of the interior workings of the sun is not complete, however we know enough to say that there is no anomalous disappearance of energy into hyperspace inside the sun (if there were, the sun would have collapsed long ago). There is the solar neutrino problem. Yeah, that's it! All the solar neutrinos are being zapped into hyperspace!
In my humble opinion, Mr. Strom's invention is far from being a wormhole generator but extremely close to being a BS generator.
If you've read the book, you probably won't like the film. This is true for most book-based films, not just Dune.
I think you're exactly right. I've noticed that usually the inverse is true also. When a book is printed based on a movie (usually to try and cash in on a successful movie), almost always the movie is better. This is probably because the writer hired to do the novelization just can't capture the style of the movie.
Your argument and other "conservation" arguments for not mining asteroids simply don't make a whole lot of sense when you figure out the amount of asteroid material actually available out there. Let me throw out some numbers:
Let's say that we've mined 1% of the Earth's crust down to a depth of 1 mile. The actual amount is probably way, way less than this, but let's just go with it for the moment.
The radius of the Earth is 3960 miles, so this gives us roughly 2 * 10^6 cubic miles of material.
Let's say a decent size asteroid has about a 12 miles radius. We will probably be able to mine the entire asteroid which gives us about 7200 cubic miles of materials. This means that mining about 275 decent sized asteroids equals the amount of material mined from the Earth.
According to my Compton's 1998 Encyclopedia (I know, it's outdated, but it's the closest at hand), there are over 5000 known asteroids! Many are smaller than 12 miles in radius, but some are considerably larger. There is easily 100s of times more material in asteroids than has ever been mined from the surface of the Earth! And this doesn't consider other sources like the moon, other planets, etc.
I've made a few simplifying assumptions, but the point is, there's more than enough material to go around for mining, conservation, starship production, etc.
"Nomad is a powerful computing platform. Its size allows all necessary processing to be performed on the robot. There are four computers on Nomad during this expedition.... A third computer running Red Hat Linux ..."
Metal fatigue in airplanes only comes about because of the tremendous strain put on the airframe during takeoffs and landings. Although a rocket launch is no stroll in the park, once a satellite or space station component gets there it doesn't ever undergo that stress again (unless it is deorbited). So metal fatigue is not a worry for a space station.
Radiation is a danger along with something almost as dangerous if not more so: meteorites and space junk. Normally these things burn up in the atmosphere, but above the atmosphere these objects are travelling at tremendous speeds. Even tiny objects can have huge kinetic energies. And a collision with such an object would be disastrous.
Slashdot Mirror
Not a bad idea. Besides the general disinterest in the moon for the last 30 or so years, the reasons for not doing this are probably more political than anything else. First there's a treaty outlawing the detonation of nuclear weapons in space and the last time I checked, the moon was in space.n .Exploration.and.Development.of.Space/Hu man.Space.Flight/Shuttle/Shuttle.Missions/Flight.0 31.STS-34/Galileos.Power.Supply/RTG.Fact .Sheet
Second, remember the protests against launching extremely safe plutonium RTGs on NASA probes? Just think of what the protests would be like if we tried to launch an actual bomb.
P.S. Here's the actual link, it doesn't seem to be coming out right in preview (take out the extra spaces):
http://spacelink.msfc.nasa.gov/NASA.Projects/Huma
The Forbes article has a somewhat different spin. Rather than saying that a glut of foreign workers is responsible for the "labor shortage", Matloff contends that companies are setting unreasonably high standards for applicants. He says that companies are rejecting people that, while they may have experience and good programming skills, don't have the specific skills the company is looking for (although they could be retrained in a minimal amount of time).
There's probably some truth to this argument, but I believe that, as some others have brought up, age is more of a factor than this.
Good points. I remember my step-father going through things like this 6-10 years ago when he was job hopping in Silicon Valley. He was in his late 40s - early 50s at the time (he's retired now). He intentionally removed older jobs from his resume so that he would appear younger and less experienced. It seemed to work - he was able to get interviews and jobs.
I think you mean Mozart.
LOL! I always figured humanity's last word would be something like, "Oops."
I've got a bridge in New York to sell you as well as a wormhole generator.
Basically the lab computers were NT boxes that were used in the lab either to run Excel to make graphs or, for one lab, to actually gather the data. I didn't have much input into the design of the lab experiments, but they were well put together and didn't require much thought on how the computer was to be utilized.
The big difference I saw between pre- and post-computers was that the students got more done. The computers saved a lot of the busy work of creating the graphs and then computing the slope of whatever data was graphed. Excel could also do a log plot easily. However, the important part of almost all labs was what to DO with that slope. What did it mean? Computers didn't help there. Although with computer help there was usually more time to think about it, most of the students seemed more interested in writing something and leaving than really understanding what the lesson was about. Though that could be a commentary on my teaching technique rather than the computers. ;)
But I think this was the way to go and some of the other folks on this thread have it right: the computer should not be the centerpiece - it should be a work-saving tool (as it was meant to be). The lesson should not revolve around the computer (unless it is a computer science class). The real learning happens in the interaction between the students and each other and between the students and the teacher. As much as computers have advanced they cannot replace a human teacher (yet) or another human student.
That's why we need to do it privately. Avoid all the politicians and bureaucracy and budget cuts and do it with a private company. A company with dedicated individuals of any and all nations who all work toward a common goal.
As mentioned, The Mars Society, as well as the Space Frontier Foundation, the Artemis Project, and the X-Prize are all great examples of stimulating private space exploration and development. Click here for another site with some good links.
an article from the Wall Street Journal at junkscience.com. I like the last paragraph of the article that says: "Car accidents resulting from using a cell phone while driving are 'much more of a problem at this point' than radio emissions".
Another good one from junkscience.com
Especially when you cut in front of them on the freeway.
It's not quite that simple, you still need a non-trivial delta-V to get to the moon from Earth orbit. If I'm not mistaken, the "tip over" point is when the ICBM has exhausted its fuel and released its warhead(s). The warheads are now have the correct trajectory and need no further boost - only course corrections. You're right, though, a warhead is a lot less massive than a space capsule (which only contained 3 men, btw). It still strikes me as overdesign for a typical ICBM to be able to reach the moon especially ICBMs designed in 1959.
Second, here's a quote from the article:
it was 'certainly technically feasible' and that at the time an intercontinental ballistic nuclear missile would have been capable of hitting a target on the moon with an accuracy of within two miles.
It took a Saturn V rocket to get men to the moon in 1969, I doubt that an ICBM in 1959 could even reach the moon much less have an accuracy of 2 miles. And if you're a weapons designer only interested getting ICBMs to the USSR, why overdesign one that could go all the way to the moon? Especially if you're trying to make them as cheap as possible so you can crank out as many as possible.
Anyway, just a couple of things that struck me as odd.
This is really interesting stuff to me because of a couple of things that radar measurements can do that optical either can't or has difficulty doing.
1) Radar can penetrate clouds. Witness Magellan.
2) Since radar can do this, ground based radar doesn't suffer nearly as much atmospheric distortion as a normal telescope does.
3) Radar is an active system, so a radar observer does not have to worry about reflected sunlight providing illumination.
4) Radar observations can easily provide lots of info like rotation rate, etc. See here for examples.
5) Radar can also, given sufficient info, provde 3D maps. For an optical 3D map, you either need a laser altimeter or a stereo imager
Also check out this quote from a NASA press release about radar imaging of asteroid 1999 JM8:
""Our finest resolution is 15 meters (49 feet) per pixel, which is finer than that obtained for any other asteroid, even for spacecraft" said Dr. Jean-Luc Margot, one of the team members from Arecibo Observatory. "To get that kind of resolution with an optical telescope, you'd need a mirror several hundred meters across. Radar certainly is the least expensive way of imaging Earth-approaching objects.""
Certainly seems to me that radar is a very useful tool for observing near-Earth and even belt asteroids which could lead to later exploration and exploitation.
... the network of satellite dishes-turned-radio telescopes that Charlie Sheen created in The Arrival. Hmmm... it has been getting warmer in recent years. Just a coincidence I'm sure.
They don't.
To start, there's almost theory behind this device. The author states that it works by poking "a small hole into another dimension ... which allows transmission of energy to exceed the speed of light." How it does the poking is not explained nor is any characterization of this other "dimension" given to explain why it would allow "transmission of energy to exceed the speed of light." Just because you claim to be able to transmit energy in another dimension does not automatically guarantee that it will travel faster than light. If I shine a flashlight straight up, the light will not travel any faster than if I shined the flashlight straight ahead even though these are two different "dimensions".
Second, his statement that the magnetic field can be produced by either a permanent magnent or an electromagnet is almost laughable. The field of an electromagnet is much more predictable and controllable than a permanent magnet. Besides which, the intense heat source (1000 F) would probably tend to de-magnetize whatever material was used for a permanent magnet. No experimental physicist worth his oscilloscope would use a permanent magnet over an electromagnet.
Next, think about this: Black holes are probably the closest thing to a "wormhole" and black holes take an enormous amount of energy to create - the energy of a collapsing star. To generate that kind of energy with the proposed device is impossible. The author must be relying on some kind of "cold fusion" type argument where the RF transmission "tunnels" into and out of hyperspace without the actual creation of a wormhole.
Finally, consider this. The author claims that to create a hyperlight antenna one basically only needs 1) an intense heat source and 2) a strong magnetic field. One also needs to be able to locate the "injection point", presumably where the proper mix of 1 & 2 is. Is there any naturally occuring phenomenon that has 1 & 2? You betcha! We call it THE SUN. If such a hyperlight antenna actually worked as stated, there would certainly be ample "injection points" all over the surface and interior of the sun. Do we see light mysteriously vanish from the surface of the sun? No! (Yes, sunspots appear dark in visible light, but if you look at different wavelenghts you can see them, so sunspots cannot be explained by this). Also, our knowledge of the interior workings of the sun is not complete, however we know enough to say that there is no anomalous disappearance of energy into hyperspace inside the sun (if there were, the sun would have collapsed long ago). There is the solar neutrino problem. Yeah, that's it! All the solar neutrinos are being zapped into hyperspace!
In my humble opinion, Mr. Strom's invention is far from being a wormhole generator but extremely close to being a BS generator.
I think you're exactly right. I've noticed that usually the inverse is true also. When a book is printed based on a movie (usually to try and cash in on a successful movie), almost always the movie is better. This is probably because the writer hired to do the novelization just can't capture the style of the movie.
Hmm.. the last time I watched it, the director was listed as "Alan Smithee". :)
Let's say that we've mined 1% of the Earth's crust down to a depth of 1 mile. The actual amount is probably way, way less than this, but let's just go with it for the moment.
The radius of the Earth is 3960 miles, so this gives us roughly 2 * 10^6 cubic miles of material.
Let's say a decent size asteroid has about a 12 miles radius. We will probably be able to mine the entire asteroid which gives us about 7200 cubic miles of materials. This means that mining about 275 decent sized asteroids equals the amount of material mined from the Earth.
According to my Compton's 1998 Encyclopedia (I know, it's outdated, but it's the closest at hand), there are over 5000 known asteroids! Many are smaller than 12 miles in radius, but some are considerably larger. There is easily 100s of times more material in asteroids than has ever been mined from the surface of the Earth! And this doesn't consider other sources like the moon, other planets, etc.
I've made a few simplifying assumptions, but the point is, there's more than enough material to go around for mining, conservation, starship production, etc.
"I am Nomad. I am perfect."
"... Two PCs running Windows NT "
"Error! Error! Sterilze error!"
Since when has he had any use for her BRAIN?? ;-)
"Black holes don't suck. They swallow."
Radiation is a danger along with something almost as dangerous if not more so: meteorites and space junk. Normally these things burn up in the atmosphere, but above the atmosphere these objects are travelling at tremendous speeds. Even tiny objects can have huge kinetic energies. And a collision with such an object would be disastrous.