Best of luck. hopefully by the time I'm having my midlife crisis, I can afford a trip up there too.
This is really historic and very exciting. This is capitalism, pioneering and ballsiness at its best. All the stuff that made America great in the past. Nice to see it in the present.
Dude, what are you talking about? The Senate gave it more money than expected. Just because they got a few percent less than the president asked for doesn't mean it's a dead duck. Politics is all about compromise. Bush asked for more money than he wanted and they give him a little less. Things are right on track and Bush even threatened a veto if they cut too far. Despite what you may have heard, Bush has been doing a good job supporting this effort.
To Bush: As part of your Vision for Space Exploration that you laid out earlier this year, do you intend to direct NASA in the direction of human settlement of space, or just scientific research.
To Kerry: As president, would you direct NASA to continue with human space exploration of planetary bodies or would you contract it's focus to Earth and near-Earth subjects? (Please provide specifics as previous answers to this have been very vague.)
Even if it were true, the Soviets would have kept it under wraps. NASA underwent a lot of public crap whenever something blew up on the launching pad. In Soviet Russia all they had to do was tell Pravda to shut up and their space program looked flawless. If it never got out of Russia, how would we find out about it?
I just told a coworker who grew up in Romania under the Soviet influence about this. He said that it was sort of common knowledge that Yuri Gagarin was by far not the first human in space. Rather, he was the first one to come back.
Of course, there's no way to prove that one way or the other but it does illustrate the fact that the soviets didn't have the "burden" of a free press to publicize when things went really haywire as this shuttle seems to have.
Of course, I could always trust estimates that work like this: "It costs $X to do something easy. Therefore, it will cost 1000 times that to do something harder".
Again with the "how the hell can we fund Mars" argument.
NASA gets around $16 billion a year. With the new plan of scrapping the shuttle and abandoning the ISS, that' frees up about $6 billion. If we have a timescale of say 20 years to get a presence on Mars, that's $120 billion. If you're a member of the church of the $1 trillion mars mission, that's not enough. However, if you use Mars Direct or the NASA Mars reference mission plan, that's plenty of money.
As long as the American people are willing to pay 1 cent on the dollar for NASA as they currently do, the money to get to Mars will be there. It's just a matter of maintaining the political will to do it.
To inform you, Bush's "manned mission to mars" initiative is going to cost more than the budget increase alone
Have you considered that the grounding of the Shuttle and disengagement of ISS will free up an additional $6 billion per year which will go straight into the VSE?
NASA's funding to projects with scientific merit (according to scientists, not politicians) is going to get cut.
Steven Squire of Mars Rover fame gave a speech recently where he said that human exploration of Mars is going to be needed to produce more and better science than we can get from robots. Given that this came from a scientist who is very closely involved in robotic exploration, I'd say that there is scientific merit in manned space.
I agree it's not worth $500 billion. However it does not have to cost that much. Do a google for "Mars Direct" to see one of several mission plans that can be done well within NASA's current budget.
A space elevator would be nice but Louis and Clark didn't wait for the interstate highway system to be built and the car to be invented before they explored the west.
I'd be careful accepting predictions about nanotube strengths being up to snuff in 5 years. Even if they are, will they be cheap enough to make an elevator a better option than chemical/electrical propulsion?
So you want him to fund a space elevator which is currently impossible with our current nanotube tech? If going to the Moon and Mars has no point as you just stated, why build a space elevator to go there in the first place?
Since Kerry has pretty much sided with Bush on most of the big issues that matter to me (No Child Left Behind, Use of Force in Iraq, Patriot Act), the only things left for me to vote on are terrorism and science.
Since I'm a big backer of a manned space program, Bush's stance on that issue actually carries quite a bit of weight with me.
Do you mean out the tailpipe or out the smokestack/cooling tower. If you want energy for a net zero environmental change, you've got a long (infinite) time to wait.
Fission, wind, solar, coal, geothermal... They all have some impact on the environment. Energy for nothing is just wishful thinking.
Slashdot Mirror
I love how it's going to take a multi-million person death and trillion dollar amount of damage before asteroid impact is seen as a real threat.
I think at least the EAS was working on some kind of detection/deflection scheme but I don't know how that's going.
The Producers was made in 1968.
Maybe this will be as good as Robin Hood: Men in Tights. Oh wait, that sucked.
Mel's great but he jumped the shark after Young Frankenstein, Blazing Sadles and the Producers.
I'm hoping to do some homesteading on Mars in my retirement years. Maybe we'll do some trade, hydrogen for uranium.
This is so damn exciting, I can't even see straight.
Good thing Ashcroft wasn't appointed his position for life.
Best of luck. hopefully by the time I'm having my midlife crisis, I can afford a trip up there too.
This is really historic and very exciting. This is capitalism, pioneering and ballsiness at its best. All the stuff that made America great in the past. Nice to see it in the present.
"Which one of these buttons calls your parents to have them drive you home?"
Too republican? Would you rather wait for a solar powered rocket made out of hemp to send a team of married homosexuals into orbit?
seriously though, space is big. There is enough room for everyone to go. Looks like democrats want to stay earthbound for the moment.
Dude, what are you talking about? The Senate gave it more money than expected. Just because they got a few percent less than the president asked for doesn't mean it's a dead duck. Politics is all about compromise. Bush asked for more money than he wanted and they give him a little less. Things are right on track and Bush even threatened a veto if they cut too far. Despite what you may have heard, Bush has been doing a good job supporting this effort.
To Bush: As part of your Vision for Space Exploration that you laid out earlier this year, do you intend to direct NASA in the direction of human settlement of space, or just scientific research.
To Kerry: As president, would you direct NASA to continue with human space exploration of planetary bodies or would you contract it's focus to Earth and near-Earth subjects? (Please provide specifics as previous answers to this have been very vague.)
Like I said, it may or may not be true.
Even if it were true, the Soviets would have kept it under wraps. NASA underwent a lot of public crap whenever something blew up on the launching pad. In Soviet Russia all they had to do was tell Pravda to shut up and their space program looked flawless. If it never got out of Russia, how would we find out about it?
I just told a coworker who grew up in Romania under the Soviet influence about this. He said that it was sort of common knowledge that Yuri Gagarin was by far not the first human in space. Rather, he was the first one to come back.
Of course, there's no way to prove that one way or the other but it does illustrate the fact that the soviets didn't have the "burden" of a free press to publicize when things went really haywire as this shuttle seems to have.
How many people bet the headline should have been that?
Alternate joke: Things have ground to a halt at the DMV? You mean it's been more than 5 minutes since the doors opened?
I don't care how many authors and futurists claim that it's only going to cost 79 cents to pull off the mission.
How about NASA and the ESA saying that it will cost tens of billions? Do the analyses of rocket scientists and nuclear physicists carry any sway with you?
Of course, I could always trust estimates that work like this: "It costs $X to do something easy. Therefore, it will cost 1000 times that to do something harder".
Also from the article.
Retire the Space Shuttle as soon as assembly of the International Space Station is completed, planned for the end of this decade;
If you want to talk about quagmires, the Shuttle and ISS are poster children. Planning to disengage from it ASAP is the best thing that NASA could do.
here
in a nutshell: get shuttles flying again, finish building ISS to fulfill commitments, ground shuttles, stop burning money on building/maintaining ISS.
Again with the "how the hell can we fund Mars" argument.
NASA gets around $16 billion a year. With the new plan of scrapping the shuttle and abandoning the ISS, that' frees up about $6 billion. If we have a timescale of say 20 years to get a presence on Mars, that's $120 billion. If you're a member of the church of the $1 trillion mars mission, that's not enough. However, if you use Mars Direct or the NASA Mars reference mission plan, that's plenty of money.
As long as the American people are willing to pay 1 cent on the dollar for NASA as they currently do, the money to get to Mars will be there. It's just a matter of maintaining the political will to do it.
To inform you, Bush's "manned mission to mars" initiative is going to cost more than the budget increase alone
Have you considered that the grounding of the Shuttle and disengagement of ISS will free up an additional $6 billion per year which will go straight into the VSE?
NASA's funding to projects with scientific merit (according to scientists, not politicians) is going to get cut.
Steven Squire of Mars Rover fame gave a speech recently where he said that human exploration of Mars is going to be needed to produce more and better science than we can get from robots. Given that this came from a scientist who is very closely involved in robotic exploration, I'd say that there is scientific merit in manned space.
I agree it's not worth $500 billion. However it does not have to cost that much. Do a google for "Mars Direct" to see one of several mission plans that can be done well within NASA's current budget.
A space elevator would be nice but Louis and Clark didn't wait for the interstate highway system to be built and the car to be invented before they explored the west.
I'd be careful accepting predictions about nanotube strengths being up to snuff in 5 years. Even if they are, will they be cheap enough to make an elevator a better option than chemical/electrical propulsion?
Wake me up if he ever decides to actually do more than talk.
Psst, wake up!
So you want him to fund a space elevator which is currently impossible with our current nanotube tech? If going to the Moon and Mars has no point as you just stated, why build a space elevator to go there in the first place?
Since Kerry has pretty much sided with Bush on most of the big issues that matter to me (No Child Left Behind, Use of Force in Iraq, Patriot Act), the only things left for me to vote on are terrorism and science.
Since I'm a big backer of a manned space program, Bush's stance on that issue actually carries quite a bit of weight with me.
zero pollution
Do you mean out the tailpipe or out the smokestack/cooling tower. If you want energy for a net zero environmental change, you've got a long (infinite) time to wait.
Fission, wind, solar, coal, geothermal... They all have some impact on the environment. Energy for nothing is just wishful thinking.
Helicopter
(I think there may be silicon life on earth near deep ocean vents, but I can't remember)
I think you might be watching too much Star Trek TOS.