The purpose of the space program was to show that we were going to be the uber-advanced space age society that would ultimately win the cold war. The space program was a pageant put on for the sake of countries sitting on the fence between dealing with the Soviets and dealing with the USA.
There is no such war now. If anything we've thrown in that towel since we now have no trouble trading outright with the worlds largest oppresor of people... CHINA.
We don't have to compete with China in this regard. We pretty much figured out that getting OFF the planet is so freakin expensive that you'll bankrupt youselves by doing it too much.
Yes there are resources in space. But there aren't any that are economic to harvest. Space travel is a money pit.
Now if we can get a space elevator online, that might change some of the economics. Getting OFF the planet (and returning) is really the biggest hurdle. I would rather put NASA money into develpment of techologies and materials that a space elevator would require.
In the interim, the "to the moon" plan is OK with it's phase one orbital service vehicle that makes a trip to the moon more like riding a taxi cab instead of a freight train (shuttle).
You're leaning on a tired old worn out notion that even the U Chicago boys would laugh at.
Yes we CAN run out of money. Money is something real and tangible, and we are spending more of it than we've got. The irony is that the CHINESE are buying up our debt. The greater irony is that we're financing our OWN DEBT with our purchases at Wal-Mart. We'll just owe it to China at the end of the day.
We are in the STUPID economy. People don't understand the cost of destruction. They only bring up idiotic economic theories whose real purpose is justify wealth transfer from the poor to the rich.
$100 billion is just a small investment into a 1 trillion boondoggle to enrich the aerospace industry, and the side-effect of putting men on Mars to collect rocks.
As opposed to the moon which would be flying up, up, up to the moon, than down, down, down, back to Earth.
Don't give me that habitat and colinization crap. These missions have NOTHING to do with science they are just joy rides and pork for aerospace contractors.
BTW, I agree that the shuttle was a dumb concept. They let spacelab de-orbit in favor of a space station that could be launched and recovered.
Space exploration should be left to dedicated, life-long career profesionals.... ROBOTS!!!!
Otterbox makes a nice line of cases for iPods (and others) that make all of these feats possible. You can drive cars over these cases and they'll be fine.
They will ship robots to Mars. And than they will BUILD the robots on mars. And then the robots will buy things from each other making them self-sufficient.
I am 100% AGAINST government subsidization of manned space exploration. It's a colossal waste of money.
But if private companies want to exploit a dead ball of rock, I say they should go for it.
This would follow the method in which the New World was colonized. The big difference is that there was a breathable atmosphere and easily harvested resources in the new world.
Well, thats what political parties are after all. But once upon a time there was some accountibility and the politicians had an eye out for taking care of people.
The creeps in office now are just a bunch of lying thieving crooks. They've got the media largely in their pocket and they've got America stoned stupid with Faux News. They are sitting on a mountain of lies, and every time they start getting called on one, they just make up new lies.
Are the Democrats any better??? Some are. I like to look at it as a party that I deeply loathe (as well as self loathing as I used to be Republican) and a party that I'm deeply dissapointed in.
At the end of the day, Ralph Nader does have the right call. Almost ALL our politicians have been bought off. Direct connection with the citizens is no longer possible. Everything is filtered through a mass media that relies on advertising revenue from the same people who buy off the politicians. Is the internet our saving grace???
At the end of the day though, they do love a scandal. And hopefully the whole Plame affair (traitor gate) will be the thread that will unravel the entire quilt of lies that these neo-cons have built.
Ya know those AOL anti-spammer commercials really piss me off. Because what should REALLY happen to that guy bothering people is two big security guards should come out and beat the SOB within an inch of his life.
When you live beyond the reach of the law, don't be surprised if the law doesn't protect you.
Good bye and good riddens. This is a cathartic experience.
Yes PPC efforts will continue after Apple, but IBM seems to pushing in the game console direction. No doubt we'll see IBM supercomputers running off of 2000 Playstation CPUs.
But methinks that PowerPC for destop and especially MOBILE systems is OVER. And I wouldn't expect SPARC or any other high power CPU platform to survive long either. Everything is now going x86.
If Apple gets fed up with Intel, they can switch to AMD and everything is still compatible.
According to Steve Jobs, Apple will do nothing to prevent these machines from running Windows.
Personally, I think it would be an incredible tactical mistake to prevent these machines from running Windows. There are too many people out there who would LOVE to have a multi-boot machine. This could be Apple's key to reclaiming LOTS of lost market share.
There are too many people out there who USED to be Mac fans but left when the Mac platform stagnated or when market pressures pushed them into the PC world.
I think you will see Intel iBooks as soon as the Intel PowerMacs come out.
Near term the G5 can compete with desktop Intel processors. It was the fact that IBM couldn't deliver power efficient CPUs that really pushed Apple over the edge.
I think you will see the big software manufacturers with binary updates available as soon as the Intel Macs ship. And I think that the processors being used in these new Macs will be so fast that emulation won't matter much.
Some of us have gotten too used to keyboards that fit our hands instead of the other way around.
But I can see all the graphics art and video-agraphers going ga-ga for this thing.
I can also see versions of this released for cash registers where "pictures of food" are more desirable than letters and numbers. A cash register terminal could be made very dynamic and hence easier to train cashiers.
And the first chance was NEVER. They didn't have WMD and the administration knew it.
The same people who are running the Bush administration today sat back and watched the Kurds being gassed during the Bush I regime and didn't bat an eyelid. Why would they? They were the same people who sold those chemical weapons to Saddam Hussein during the Reagan administration.
If aliens came to Earth to impose a "more enlightened" form of liberal society with technological advances in trasportation and medicine, I'd probably be out setting roadside bombs to stop them and targeting collaborators.
Iraq is being colonized, not freed. Why would I want to go there???
The message coming from Iraq is very clear. "Get the FUCK out of our country." They don't want us there. And I gladly respect that.
Oh BTW, since you're a "believer", when are you enlisting and volunteering for Iraq duty????
Yes good idea, as long as you're running a wireless video link. Otherwise, the guy wearing the helmet cam will have to carry a $1000 laptop to record instead of a $300 camcorder.
Annoying as hell an unelegant. Yet, cheap and outrageously scalable. Magnetic tape has been with us for quite some time. And at this rate, it's unlikely to go away anytime soon.
Why would you want to replace cheap tape with expensive flash for an application that must be laid down and read linearly. Random access isn't a concern until editing. At that point, it's on your hard drive at home.
The idea of replacing tape for video with hard drives is a dream. Perhaps when 2.5" are up to 1.5 terrabyte capacities, than you will have a practical device. Until then, cheap and disposable tape will rule.
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The purpose of the space program was to show that we were going to be the uber-advanced space age society that would ultimately win the cold war. The space program was a pageant put on for the sake of countries sitting on the fence between dealing with the Soviets and dealing with the USA.
There is no such war now. If anything we've thrown in that towel since we now have no trouble trading outright with the worlds largest oppresor of people
We don't have to compete with China in this regard. We pretty much figured out that getting OFF the planet is so freakin expensive that you'll bankrupt youselves by doing it too much.
Yes there are resources in space. But there aren't any that are economic to harvest. Space travel is a money pit.
Now if we can get a space elevator online, that might change some of the economics. Getting OFF the planet (and returning) is really the biggest hurdle. I would rather put NASA money into develpment of techologies and materials that a space elevator would require.
In the interim, the "to the moon" plan is OK with it's phase one orbital service vehicle that makes a trip to the moon more like riding a taxi cab instead of a freight train (shuttle).
They are brutal FASCIST regime now. They've given up the pretext on caring for the welfare of their people.
You're leaning on a tired old worn out notion that even the U Chicago boys would laugh at.
Yes we CAN run out of money. Money is something real and tangible, and we are spending more of it than we've got. The irony is that the CHINESE are buying up our debt. The greater irony is that we're financing our OWN DEBT with our purchases at Wal-Mart. We'll just owe it to China at the end of the day.
We are in the STUPID economy. People don't understand the cost of destruction. They only bring up idiotic economic theories whose real purpose is justify wealth transfer from the poor to the rich.
$100 billion is just a small investment into a 1 trillion boondoggle to enrich the aerospace industry, and the side-effect of putting men on Mars to collect rocks.
...
.... ROBOTS!!!!
As opposed to the moon which would be flying up, up, up to the moon, than down, down, down, back to Earth.
Don't give me that habitat and colinization crap. These missions have NOTHING to do with science they are just joy rides and pork for aerospace contractors.
BTW, I agree that the shuttle was a dumb concept. They let spacelab de-orbit in favor of a space station that could be launched and recovered.
Space exploration should be left to dedicated, life-long career profesionals
http://www.otterbox.com/products/ipod_cases/index. htm
Otterbox makes a nice line of cases for iPods (and others) that make all of these feats possible. You can drive cars over these cases and they'll be fine.
Though, I might have a seaport in Wyoming to sell soon.
They will ship robots to Mars. And than they will BUILD the robots on mars. And then the robots will buy things from each other making them self-sufficient.
And then Battlestar Galactica will show up
More likely it's a "privatization" effort that Bush chronies will poor 3/4 of NASA's budget into without expecting any results.
... so we don't have to fight them here. ;-)
I am 100% AGAINST government subsidization of manned space exploration. It's a colossal waste of money.
But if private companies want to exploit a dead ball of rock, I say they should go for it.
This would follow the method in which the New World was colonized. The big difference is that there was a breathable atmosphere and easily harvested resources in the new world.
There is a great war looming over who will control oil.
There is a bigger war looming over who will control the fresh water resources on our planet.
We will be building a LOT of nuclear power plants long before anyone starts burning water.
Well, thats what political parties are after all. But once upon a time there was some accountibility and the politicians had an eye out for taking care of people.
The creeps in office now are just a bunch of lying thieving crooks. They've got the media largely in their pocket and they've got America stoned stupid with Faux News. They are sitting on a mountain of lies, and every time they start getting called on one, they just make up new lies.
Are the Democrats any better??? Some are. I like to look at it as a party that I deeply loathe (as well as self loathing as I used to be Republican) and a party that I'm deeply dissapointed in.
At the end of the day, Ralph Nader does have the right call. Almost ALL our politicians have been bought off. Direct connection with the citizens is no longer possible. Everything is filtered through a mass media that relies on advertising revenue from the same people who buy off the politicians. Is the internet our saving grace???
At the end of the day though, they do love a scandal. And hopefully the whole Plame affair (traitor gate) will be the thread that will unravel the entire quilt of lies that these neo-cons have built.
Ya know those AOL anti-spammer commercials really piss me off. Because what should REALLY happen to that guy bothering people is two big security guards should come out and beat the SOB within an inch of his life.
When you live beyond the reach of the law, don't be surprised if the law doesn't protect you.
Good bye and good riddens. This is a cathartic experience.
Yes PPC efforts will continue after Apple, but IBM seems to pushing in the game console direction. No doubt we'll see IBM supercomputers running off of 2000 Playstation CPUs.
But methinks that PowerPC for destop and especially MOBILE systems is OVER. And I wouldn't expect SPARC or any other high power CPU platform to survive long either. Everything is now going x86.
If Apple gets fed up with Intel, they can switch to AMD and everything is still compatible.
According to Steve Jobs, Apple will do nothing to prevent these machines from running Windows.
Personally, I think it would be an incredible tactical mistake to prevent these machines from running Windows. There are too many people out there who would LOVE to have a multi-boot machine. This could be Apple's key to reclaiming LOTS of lost market share.
There are too many people out there who USED to be Mac fans but left when the Mac platform stagnated or when market pressures pushed them into the PC world.
I think you will see Intel iBooks as soon as the Intel PowerMacs come out.
Near term the G5 can compete with desktop Intel processors. It was the fact that IBM couldn't deliver power efficient CPUs that really pushed Apple over the edge.
I think you will see the big software manufacturers with binary updates available as soon as the Intel Macs ship. And I think that the processors being used in these new Macs will be so fast that emulation won't matter much.
That is unless your some kind of knuckle dragging creationist.
Some of us have gotten too used to keyboards that fit our hands instead of the other way around.
But I can see all the graphics art and video-agraphers going ga-ga for this thing.
I can also see versions of this released for cash registers where "pictures of food" are more desirable than letters and numbers. A cash register terminal could be made very dynamic and hence easier to train cashiers.
And the first chance was NEVER. They didn't have WMD and the administration knew it.
The same people who are running the Bush administration today sat back and watched the Kurds being gassed during the Bush I regime and didn't bat an eyelid. Why would they? They were the same people who sold those chemical weapons to Saddam Hussein during the Reagan administration.
Palm should sue DVForge because they've apparently patented the portable device cradle.
This is ridiculous, all those iPaq sleds adding wireless networking would be infringeing under this nonsense.
Next thing you know, someone will patent the CABLE and sue everyone else in the universe.
... like armor peircing "cop killer" bullets???
If aliens came to Earth to impose a "more enlightened" form of liberal society with technological advances in trasportation and medicine, I'd probably be out setting roadside bombs to stop them and targeting collaborators.
Iraq is being colonized, not freed. Why would I want to go there???
The message coming from Iraq is very clear. "Get the FUCK out of our country." They don't want us there. And I gladly respect that.
Oh BTW, since you're a "believer", when are you enlisting and volunteering for Iraq duty????
Yes good idea, as long as you're running a wireless video link. Otherwise, the guy wearing the helmet cam will have to carry a $1000 laptop to record instead of a $300 camcorder.
Annoying as hell an unelegant. Yet, cheap and outrageously scalable. Magnetic tape has been with us for quite some time. And at this rate, it's unlikely to go away anytime soon.
Why would you want to replace cheap tape with expensive flash for an application that must be laid down and read linearly. Random access isn't a concern until editing. At that point, it's on your hard drive at home.
The idea of replacing tape for video with hard drives is a dream. Perhaps when 2.5" are up to 1.5 terrabyte capacities, than you will have a practical device. Until then, cheap and disposable tape will rule.