NASA's problems started when the beancounters got into power after Apollo. After all, we'd won the pissing contest with the Soviet Union. What else was there left to do? The US was going through double digit inflation in the 70's, everybody was screaming about government spending, hell, they even wanted to pull the money plug on the Vietnam War.
I see two problems that have yet to be surmounted to get government exploration/exploitation of space.
First off, it's easier to defund programs like NASA and use the cash for other 'more important' things, like buying votes in the next election. And there's always an election. No bucks, no Buck Rogers.
Second, there's that damned treaty that says everything outside the atmosphere can't be 'owned', and must be used for the 'betterment of mankind', which means, if some pygmie on the outskirts of the Congo doesn't directly benefit from it, it ain't allowed. Get rid of this treaty. Allow direct ownership of non-Terran objects. Keep it reasonable, say, only what you have direct control of. None of that nonsense of the Pope carving up the New World between Spain and Portugal.
We already have a permanent human presence in space. For the last 11 years or so people have been onboard ISS has be continuously. Before that, the MIR space station had a record of 10 years. If (I frankly don't know) the MIR and ISS missions overlapped we have been in space for more than 20 years. I'd say that qualifies as permanent presence.
The ISS is only funded through 2020, though it may continue operations until 2028. I don't know offhand of any 'successors' to the ISS. Likely, it'll get defunded way before 2020, and allowed to deorbit shortly afterwards.
Hardly a 'permenant' presense in space, to my way of thinking. Anybody care to sanity check me on this?
Sure, it was perfectly safe. Just ask the Donner Party. Or those poor bastards who likely died of vitamin starvation according to their diaries, but were found laying next to watercress, one king hell of a source of Vitamin C. A lot of people died crossing the American prairies due to lack of (knowledge of) local resources. The environment on the prairies was just as hostile as anything else on the planet.
There have been a lot of papers done on these subjects. Even books like G Harry Stein's "The Third Industrial Revolution", not to mention the works of Freeman Dyson. People have been thinking about this hard for over 5 decades.
Every ounce of rare earths we bring back from space is one less we have to mine here. Think of the environmental damage caused by that mining. That's that much less damage being caused to the ecosphere fucking up the living spaces of those 6 billion people you claim to love so well but want to put back into a Stone Age society.
Just wait, it's not going to seem strange at all in a decade.
I'm wondering if they'll be able to find a place on their station for an old tore-up space cadet who could benefit from microgravity. Hell, I'd push a broom for 'em. Tend bar. Whatever. Sign me up!
Once upon a time, they thought the atmosphere ended about 70 miles up, because that's what the math pointed at. Now we know better, you can still find traces of atmosphere up to a thousand miles up, particularly when solar conditions heat the upper atmosphere with solar flares, etc. It expands and contracts, it's a dynamic system. This creates drag on satellites and junk. Neither is gravity a constant in an orbital path. There are some slight variations that will perturb an orbit, eventually putting a satellite into an orbit that might decay into the atmosphere.
Finally, let's keep in mind that an asteroid the size that is being looked at for mining in orbit reentered the atmosphere over the weekend and exploded over California without hitting the ground. And it was on a parabolic course, moving a lot faster than orbital speed. They estimated a 3.8 kiloton airburst from it, with no damage to the ground, no EMP, no radiation.
You sir fail at knowing the definition of meek. It is often misconstrued as meaning weak. However, it more closely approximates a definition of strength under intelligent control. The fact that a meek person may be perceived as humble or unaggressive is merely a by product of aggression usually being counter productive.
The meek also tend to worship the status quo, stout proponents of 'Not Invented Here' syndrome. I assure you, AC, I'd taken that into account. They wanna 'just stay here', I have no problem with that. It's when they demand I 'just stay here' as well that I take issue with.
Yeah, back in the day, Bill Gates got his teeth wet writing BASIC interpreters for ROM chips. They turned front panel switch programmed paperweights into something a hobbyist computer geek could play with and actually do fun stuff, back in the Stone Age.
You can't sue the Federal government unless they give you permission to sue. IIRC, that comes from the Justice Department. You really think the Justice Department is going to give you that permission? And no, you can't even sue the 'footsoldiers' in this one, they were acting in a 'lawful capacity' and did not exceed their (currently) lawful authority.
Neither party has given a shit about 'smaller government' for decades. Truth be told, they both love the idea of big government these days because they can stuff all their brothers in law into the bureaucracy and guarantee them jobs til they decide to take their bribes and retire. Plus, with compatible people in the bureaucracies, the regulations will be written to benefit the various party's plans. Course, it means regulation hell for the rest of us, but what the fuck, we ain't the 1%.
Love to see the UN come up to enforce that treaty. The current players all pretty much ignore the UN, and the small fry don't have the funding. Truth be told, the UN is so broke it can't pay attention.
Of course there's life in space. We've already been invaded by the Ferrengi. Just look at Perot Sr. And just like them, he follows the First Rule of Aquisition: "Once you get their money, never give it back!"
Gold is great for electric & electronic circuits. It won't corrode like copper in an oxygen atmosphere (and yeah, you'll need one if you wanna breathe around there), has less resistance than aluminum wire. Fiber optics are great, but fiber optics doesn't conduct electricity.
I cordially invite you to do the math on transporting raw materials in space versus boosting said raw materials from Earth. Two of the people most interested in investing in this venture each have probably more smarts than the two of us together, and they think it's a good idea, or they would have blown it off,
The 'We Only Need Earth' religion DEMANDS we do everything from Earth, that there are no exploitable resources offworld. They would have had each and every settler from Europe to San Francisco to pack every single gram they needed in supplies and tools plus the entire vehicle used to get across the ocean, all the way from Europe to San Francisco. At those kind of costs, nobody would have ever left, which suits the 'We Only Need Earth' crowd just fine, thank you.
I've been told a famous man once said 'The meek shall inherit the Earth'. That man was spot on. The rest of us are going to figure out a way to go to space and make it pay.
The orbiter had a dry weight of 78 metric tons, not over 2000 tons. max payload was about 25 tons to LEO in an orbit they almost never used. Mostly, they went to the 51 degree orbit for the ISS which meant they could only put about 18 tons aboard at launch. Figure best-orbit payload, that 500 ton asteroid represents 20 shuttle launches into a VERY low Earth orbit at about 1.5 billion per launch (the whole shuttle program amortized over the 135 missions it flew from '82). 20 launches at 1.5 bil is 30 bil. Simple math says that 500 ton asteroid in lunar non-Earth approaching orbit is worth about 30 billion if launched in pieces from Earth. A 30 billion reward for 2.6 billion invested? How soon can I invest???
Also, in the PDF file linked in the main paragraph, they talk about how doing a couple robocaptures of these little rocks will help us deflect the big ones by giving us expertise in handling them. Sounds win/win to me.
Well, you know what they say in real estate: Location, location, LOCATION.
I'm thinking they don't want to bring 'Mineral X' down to Earth unless it's in ton lots. What they want is, the materials right where they are, in space, where they will provide materials to work with in space. Yes, it could take $2.6 billion to bring a random 500 ton asteroid to lunar orbit. It would cost over 10 billion to launch that 500 tons into orbit at the current guestimated going rate of $10,000 per pound.
What can you do with 500 tons of materials in orbit? Lots of things. 500 tons of very high grade iron ore, the purity of which we haven't seen on Earth in almost a millenium, would make the basis for the frame of a decent sized space station. For comparison, the ISS at full buildout is about 37 billion plus overruns and weighs in approximately 450 tons plus about 13 billion so far in supplies etc to date. Grabbing a carbonaceous asteroid could offset some of that 13 billion on the 'next-gen' space stations, when we learn to 'convert' that carbon into foodstuffs in space.
Sure, we'd need to put a smelter assembly in orbit to refine the metals & scavange the carbon/etc from any asteroid, but add a machine shop as well, adn we can duplicate the factory complex and build out from there, at ZERO boost from Earth costs. Again, why would we want to send asteroidal material to Earth when we need it so badly in space?
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NASA's problems started when the beancounters got into power after Apollo. After all, we'd won the pissing contest with the Soviet Union. What else was there left to do? The US was going through double digit inflation in the 70's, everybody was screaming about government spending, hell, they even wanted to pull the money plug on the Vietnam War.
I see two problems that have yet to be surmounted to get government exploration/exploitation of space.
First off, it's easier to defund programs like NASA and use the cash for other 'more important' things, like buying votes in the next election. And there's always an election. No bucks, no Buck Rogers.
Second, there's that damned treaty that says everything outside the atmosphere can't be 'owned', and must be used for the 'betterment of mankind', which means, if some pygmie on the outskirts of the Congo doesn't directly benefit from it, it ain't allowed. Get rid of this treaty. Allow direct ownership of non-Terran objects. Keep it reasonable, say, only what you have direct control of. None of that nonsense of the Pope carving up the New World between Spain and Portugal.
Good for them. That treaty has been one of the biggest legal barriers to space development ever created. It just has to go.
The ISS is only funded through 2020, though it may continue operations until 2028. I don't know offhand of any 'successors' to the ISS. Likely, it'll get defunded way before 2020, and allowed to deorbit shortly afterwards.
Hardly a 'permenant' presense in space, to my way of thinking. Anybody care to sanity check me on this?
Sure, it was perfectly safe. Just ask the Donner Party. Or those poor bastards who likely died of vitamin starvation according to their diaries, but were found laying next to watercress, one king hell of a source of Vitamin C. A lot of people died crossing the American prairies due to lack of (knowledge of) local resources. The environment on the prairies was just as hostile as anything else on the planet.
Yet.
There have been a lot of papers done on these subjects. Even books like G Harry Stein's "The Third Industrial Revolution", not to mention the works of Freeman Dyson. People have been thinking about this hard for over 5 decades.
Think it through.
Every ounce of rare earths we bring back from space is one less we have to mine here. Think of the environmental damage caused by that mining. That's that much less damage being caused to the ecosphere fucking up the living spaces of those 6 billion people you claim to love so well but want to put back into a Stone Age society.
I'm wondering if they'll be able to find a place on their station for an old tore-up space cadet who could benefit from microgravity. Hell, I'd push a broom for 'em. Tend bar. Whatever. Sign me up!
Once upon a time, they thought the atmosphere ended about 70 miles up, because that's what the math pointed at. Now we know better, you can still find traces of atmosphere up to a thousand miles up, particularly when solar conditions heat the upper atmosphere with solar flares, etc. It expands and contracts, it's a dynamic system. This creates drag on satellites and junk. Neither is gravity a constant in an orbital path. There are some slight variations that will perturb an orbit, eventually putting a satellite into an orbit that might decay into the atmosphere.
Finally, let's keep in mind that an asteroid the size that is being looked at for mining in orbit reentered the atmosphere over the weekend and exploded over California without hitting the ground. And it was on a parabolic course, moving a lot faster than orbital speed. They estimated a 3.8 kiloton airburst from it, with no damage to the ground, no EMP, no radiation.
While we're at it, just suppose the Moon was just one giant cream pie (even though we know it isn't). And somebody decides to 'pie' the Earth...
The meek also tend to worship the status quo, stout proponents of 'Not Invented Here' syndrome. I assure you, AC, I'd taken that into account. They wanna 'just stay here', I have no problem with that. It's when they demand I 'just stay here' as well that I take issue with.
Why bother sending that gold to Earth when you can use it in fabricating integrated circuits in orbit?
Scriptsit was DA BOMB back in the day, just like VisiCalc was for an Apple spreadsheet.
Yeah, back in the day, Bill Gates got his teeth wet writing BASIC interpreters for ROM chips. They turned front panel switch programmed paperweights into something a hobbyist computer geek could play with and actually do fun stuff, back in the Stone Age.
You can't sue the Federal government unless they give you permission to sue. IIRC, that comes from the Justice Department. You really think the Justice Department is going to give you that permission? And no, you can't even sue the 'footsoldiers' in this one, they were acting in a 'lawful capacity' and did not exceed their (currently) lawful authority.
You, sir, have just won the thread.
Neither party has given a shit about 'smaller government' for decades. Truth be told, they both love the idea of big government these days because they can stuff all their brothers in law into the bureaucracy and guarantee them jobs til they decide to take their bribes and retire. Plus, with compatible people in the bureaucracies, the regulations will be written to benefit the various party's plans. Course, it means regulation hell for the rest of us, but what the fuck, we ain't the 1%.
Yeah, people mostly forget that the lesser of two evils is still evil.
Lemme repeat myself for those that missed it the first time. The lesser of two evils is still evil
Yeah, let's not fuck the 1%. They're creating jobs.
In Asia.
Love to see the UN come up to enforce that treaty. The current players all pretty much ignore the UN, and the small fry don't have the funding. Truth be told, the UN is so broke it can't pay attention.
Of course there's life in space. We've already been invaded by the Ferrengi. Just look at Perot Sr. And just like them, he follows the First Rule of Aquisition: "Once you get their money, never give it back!"
Gold is great for electric & electronic circuits. It won't corrode like copper in an oxygen atmosphere (and yeah, you'll need one if you wanna breathe around there), has less resistance than aluminum wire. Fiber optics are great, but fiber optics doesn't conduct electricity.
I cordially invite you to do the math on transporting raw materials in space versus boosting said raw materials from Earth. Two of the people most interested in investing in this venture each have probably more smarts than the two of us together, and they think it's a good idea, or they would have blown it off,
The 'We Only Need Earth' religion DEMANDS we do everything from Earth, that there are no exploitable resources offworld. They would have had each and every settler from Europe to San Francisco to pack every single gram they needed in supplies and tools plus the entire vehicle used to get across the ocean, all the way from Europe to San Francisco. At those kind of costs, nobody would have ever left, which suits the 'We Only Need Earth' crowd just fine, thank you.
I've been told a famous man once said 'The meek shall inherit the Earth'. That man was spot on. The rest of us are going to figure out a way to go to space and make it pay.
The orbiter had a dry weight of 78 metric tons, not over 2000 tons. max payload was about 25 tons to LEO in an orbit they almost never used. Mostly, they went to the 51 degree orbit for the ISS which meant they could only put about 18 tons aboard at launch. Figure best-orbit payload, that 500 ton asteroid represents 20 shuttle launches into a VERY low Earth orbit at about 1.5 billion per launch (the whole shuttle program amortized over the 135 missions it flew from '82). 20 launches at 1.5 bil is 30 bil. Simple math says that 500 ton asteroid in lunar non-Earth approaching orbit is worth about 30 billion if launched in pieces from Earth. A 30 billion reward for 2.6 billion invested? How soon can I invest???
Also, in the PDF file linked in the main paragraph, they talk about how doing a couple robocaptures of these little rocks will help us deflect the big ones by giving us expertise in handling them. Sounds win/win to me.
Well, you know what they say in real estate: Location, location, LOCATION.
I'm thinking they don't want to bring 'Mineral X' down to Earth unless it's in ton lots. What they want is, the materials right where they are, in space, where they will provide materials to work with in space. Yes, it could take $2.6 billion to bring a random 500 ton asteroid to lunar orbit. It would cost over 10 billion to launch that 500 tons into orbit at the current guestimated going rate of $10,000 per pound. What can you do with 500 tons of materials in orbit? Lots of things. 500 tons of very high grade iron ore, the purity of which we haven't seen on Earth in almost a millenium, would make the basis for the frame of a decent sized space station. For comparison, the ISS at full buildout is about 37 billion plus overruns and weighs in approximately 450 tons plus about 13 billion so far in supplies etc to date. Grabbing a carbonaceous asteroid could offset some of that 13 billion on the 'next-gen' space stations, when we learn to 'convert' that carbon into foodstuffs in space.
Sure, we'd need to put a smelter assembly in orbit to refine the metals & scavange the carbon/etc from any asteroid, but add a machine shop as well, adn we can duplicate the factory complex and build out from there, at ZERO boost from Earth costs. Again, why would we want to send asteroidal material to Earth when we need it so badly in space?