The NASA impact probability page has been updated - it's a miss!
(Almost certainly - less chance than random debris)
It's down to Torino 0, Palermo -2.23, cumulative impact probability 0.0018%.
Propellant can be replaced (so you are allowed to refuel)
Other mass: If anything is jettisoned it must be recovered if it would require replacement of >10% vehicle mass. So first stages if used, drop tanks if used, one-shot heatshields etc. must be carefully looked at to make sure that the vehicle (excluding propellant) is at least 90% reuseable.
Got my figures from 03-Multi-Year_Budget.pdf, but these are always subject to change, obviously.
From that, I got 5.868 billion for Human Space Flight out of 15.690 billion budget for 2004. I checked this some months ago, and it took a bit of finding again. I remembered "5 billion and something out of 15 billion and something" for next year, which is why I called it "Roughly" above.
Your figures are obviously later than mine (and they break down into more detail - thanks for the link). I note that the 2004/05 estimates for the Space Station are up from 1.2 billion to 1.7, the Shuttle is up from 3.301 to 3.968. Total Human Space Flight (including Ops Support, Payload and ELV support is up to 6.1 billion.
You can add in X-37, OSP, PAD and DART, for an extra 550 million, taking Manned Space Flight Ops and research to 6.65 billion out of 15.469 billion. Not really a majority of their resources - the 7.7 billion figure that you mention includes general (unmanned) launcher research and engineering and Robot systems research (which you really can't put down against the Manned Space Flight side of the ledger:-). )
Solar Systems exploration weighs in at 1.3 billion, Mars Exploration at 570 million, Astronomy at 877 million. Including other Space Science programmes, Space Science is just over 4 billion.
Earth Science is at 1.5 billion, Biological and Physical research at a hair under 1 billion, Aeronautics also at a shade under 1 billion. Total Science expenditure is totalled as 7.66 billion.
You could well argue that manned flight gets more than unmanned flight - it does cost more. There's more to the science than the launcher and probe costs, though, and the largest chunk of NASAs budget goes to science.
You don't have to guess at my meaning for Quote: Not to mention that the program of Lunar Base plus Manned Mars program will be unlikely to be anywhere near one thousand times the price of Spirit and Opportunity, and I didn't mean that it would be a lot more. The bit in my post breaking down the trillion dollar claim (which is far better done at The Space Reviewbreaks it down far better. The estimated price in using the 1989 price (inflation adjusted for 2004 dollars) for a Mars mission is $276 billion (including development of a new manned launcher of noticeably greater capacity than the Saturn V). Using ISRU techniques and lesser launchers, and benefiting from improvements in the launcher field, this figure could be drastically reduced. The moon missions and Lunar Base (including operating costs and support over 20 years) should also be far less than the (inflation adjusted) $336 billion for the gold plated solution of the SEI).
So your contention that "It can't possibly be less [than 1000 times the price of Spirit and Opportunity, i.e. $820 billion]" puzzles me. If the gold-plated solution for everything comes in at about $500 billion (over 30 years), and we're planning on using more intelligent, far cheaper approaches, why do you feel that this cheaper solution has to be more than $820 billion?
Some errors or omissions
on
The Wrong Stuff
·
· Score: 4, Informative
Quote: Ever since NASA was founded, the greater part of its resources have gone into putting men and women into space
Untrue. Roughly one third of NASAs budget (5 billion of 15 billion) is devoted to manned space flight.
Quote: After the former President Bush announced a similar initiative in 1989, NASA estimated that the cost of sending astronauts to the moon and Mars would be either $471 billion or $541 billion in 1991 dollars, depending on the method of calculation. This is roughly $900 billion in today's dollars. Whatever cost may be estimated by NASA for the new initiative, we can expect cost overruns like those that have often accompanied big NASA programs. (In 1984 NASA estimated that it would cost $8 billion to put the International Space Station in place, not counting the cost of using it. I have seen figures for its cost so far ranging from $25 billion to $60 billion, and the station is far from finished.) Let's not haggle over a hundred billion dollars more or less--I'll estimate that the President's new initiative will cost nearly a trillion dollars.
This old figure has been comprehensively debunked. The 1989 initiative was used as a dream sheet for every blue-sky project in NASA over the next twenty years, with no attempt at reducing costs anywhere and then inflated by 50% anyway. Taking that figure, adjusting for inflation (approx. 1.6 multiplier, giving 750-865 billion), taking the higher figure, rounding it up and then adding 100 billion on top anyway does not seem to be an unbiased type of approach.
Another way to put it would be that every blue sky project that NASA had in 1989, less the deliberate 50% addition and extra roundings up, would be 314-361 billion in 1989 dollars; 502-577 billion in todays dollars. For every blue sky project. Over 20 years.
Quote:Compare this with the $820 million cost of recently sending the robots Spirit and Opportunity to Mars, roughly one thousandth the cost of the President's initiative.
And roughly one-thousandth the utility of a manned mission (for a summary of the humans versus robots debate please see robots versus humans
Not to mention that the program of Lunar Base plus Manned Mars program will be unlikely to be anywhere near one thousand times the price of Spirit and Opportunity.
Quote: It had been hoped that the shuttle, because reusable, would reduce the cost of putting satellites in orbit. Instead, while it costs about $3,000 a pound to use unmanned rockets to put satellites in orbit, the cost of doing this with the shuttle is about $10,000 a pound. The physicist Robert Park has pointed out that at this rate, even if lead could be turned into gold in orbit, it would not pay to send it up on the shuttle.
Indeed, the shuttle is the least cost effective vehicle for space travel. Unlike, for example, Soyuz. I also agree that manning the launch of payloads that can be unmanned is not at all essential.
(Skimming through, because I have to get back to work)...
Quote: After NASA had pushed the Apollo program to the point where people stopped watching lunar landings on television, it canceled Apollo 18 and 19, the missions that were to be specifically devoted to scientific research.
Which implies that no other Apollos were specifically dedicated to scientific research. Apollos 15, 16 and 17 were dedicated to scientific research; when NASA had to cancel two landings originally, it cancelled the original Apollo 15 (which wasn't dedicated to scientific research) and Apollo 20. 18 and 19 were chopped later, after the "J-series" missions (scientific research) were in full swing. No other missions could be cancelled.
One reason that so many people complain about the cost is that when we talk about millions, billions and trillions of dollars, we have no real feel of the numbers
So how about looking at them if we set the US Government budget equal to $33,000 per year - which is in the ballpark of median salaries. So compare these figures to average US citizen monthly outlays:
Welfare costs $651.75 per month
Medicare, Medicaid and SCHIP consume $561 per month.
Defense comes in at $517 per month
Manned space travel costs $7.98 per month.
The first three are on the order of mortgages, taxes and major credit repayment. The last is on the order of a cinema ticket.
For the entire robots vs humans debate, a good debate is transcripted here
You have made some excellent points (as an amusing sideline, from the figures I've seen, a human would easily have survived the airbag landings. Not sure that it would be a popular choice, however...)
However, the "killer" point to me is that humans are so bloody adaptable. As a quote from the linked article says:
"DR. BRENT BOS: Thank you. I'm Brent Bos from NASA Goddard. This is a question for Dr. Park. I've heard you tonight and in other various venues talk about how our robotic landers on Mars are superior geologists to a human. As a graduate student I worked on Mars Pathfinder and have also had the opportunity to go on various field exercises with geologists. I was very surprised to find out that a geologist was about a thousand times more effective on site -- when he can examine the rocks, pick them up, have that dynamic interaction with them..."
We can climb inclined surfaces, clamber down sink-holes, manipulate fine objects, shove large objects, use a huge variety of tools, change what we are doing on a moments notice... and most importantly, run experiments that were not foreseen. Which is the whole point of exploring.
As you accurately highlight, this has to be weighed against the extra cost and the very real risk to the astronauts and to NASA if they are lost.
The thing is - regardless of the safety issues, is it the most cost effective solution?
As Jeff Foust points out in Life after Hubble, we could get one brand new Keck sized ground based observatory plus 2 Explorer sized missions for the price of that one Shuttle servicing mission.
Adaptive optics systems have gone a long way to closing the gap between image quality on the ground and above the atmosphere. There are some advantages for Hubble - seeing frequencies that the Keck can't see, no weather restrictions, etc.
However, a ground based telescope can be far larger, far cheaper, and far easier to maintain. We've got to weigh it up in terms of science return, and the ground based systems are definitely catching up.
"observation: humans have evolved in a atmospheric environment. they are not designed for vacuum environment. they are fragile and need extensive life support systems. proposal: send ONLY beings designed for space travel. "
Further observation: Humans have evolved in a sub-tropical environment. They are not designed for cool temperate or sub-arctic conditions. proposal: Send only robots to these latitudes on Earth
A trained human is between dozens and hundreds of times as effective as any robot. Compare the results of Apollo to the results of the Lunokhods.
Or offer to replace a single trained geologist on a field trip to a site in the Rockies with fifty Spirit robots parachuted randomly into the Rocky mountains. No contest.
How long will it be before we can get a robot that can climb down lava pipes and into tunnels? Fifty years?
The first manned mission may cost as much as fifty "Spirits" but would produce far more than fifty times as much science.
The second manned mission would be noticeably cheaper, and more effective.
The knock-on benefits throughout the space industry would be noticeable all round, from the technology that would have to be proven for the manned missions.
As an aside, looking from the ESA side of the fence, I've noticed that the old saying that was trotted out after Apollo ("No bucks, no Buck Rogers") is far more accurate when reversed:
After all, that money goes directly on jobs. Everyone who receives the money pays a healthy chunk of it straight back into government coffers. The remainder they spend on, say, cars, computers, clothes, food,... you name it. So those directly employed by NASA and the contractors aren't the only beneficiaries - the others in the economy benefit.
What else is there? Well, following large investment in aerospace related technology and computer technology in Apollo, surprisingly enough, the USA dominated those fields afterwards. The economy grew, so those slices handed out in benefits, health care etc grew bigger overall - the "pie" itself grew, so the amount in those "slices" grew.
So if this causes a doubling in NASAs manned spaceflight budget (at an annual cost equivalent to 3 days welfare spending (2 days, if you take into account the taxes paid directly back), or 6 days DoD spending), it would seem to be worthwhile.
So, yes. Employing more people (with a major focus on college grads) and expanding the economy (so that extra money would end up rolling into health care and unemployment benefits) would make a lot of sense.
The parent poster is referring to the 6-digit Slashdot ID, and possibly implying that later Slashdot members (6-digits) are more likely to hold the grandparents point of view.
------ Dear BBC, Your story "Linux cyber-battle turns nasty" by Stephen Evans has caused me to write in to point out a number of issues with both the tone of the story and the "facts" portrayed by it.
Firstly, Mr Evans has stated that the virus was unleashed by Linux advocates to damage SCO. He has stated this as a fact, not an allegation. The MyDoom virus has, in fact, been traced back to Russia and is believed to be the work of organised crime. Most reputable news sources have reported this and it saddens me that the BBC, which I have always believed to be one of the best news sources, has fallen down badly in this respect, reporting an unsubstantiated allegation (which was easily checked) as fact.
He also states the virus is written specifically to take down SCO's servers. It is not. It appears designed to turn desktops into remote controlled robots that log keystrokes (such as credit card details) and act as spam relays. Thus it would be of great use to organised crime.
He further states that "internet zealots... believe that code should be free to all (open source)." They do not. "Open source" means that the source code may be viewed. It does not mean that it is free. It can be checked worldwide and modified (under license) as needed by individuals, corporations and countries.
Overall, the story appears to be slanted unquestioningly against the Open Source community, accepting allegations as facts and ignoring available contradictory evidence. Could you explain why this line has been taken?
It does seem to me to fall well short of the BBC's standards of reporting. It also fails to highlight the largest concern that may affect your readers - the fact that the virus turns their machines into remote controlled traitors, logging their keystrokes (and jeopardising their privacy and any banking details) and relaying illegal spam. A reference to the story of the Dorset father who lost custody of his daughter after a similar trojan deposited child pornography on his computer, acting as a safe remote storage site from a technologically skilled pervert, would not have gone amiss here , to highlight the severity of the case and remind your readers to take care online.
For information on SCO's IP claims against Linux, please see www.groklaw.net.
1% of this is 735,000 trillion tonnes. If that were used up over 10,000 years ("Several thousand year period of time"), this would require 73 trillion tonnes per year to be ferried to Earth or 2 million tonnes per second.
The Moon is _big_
Anyway, there is nowhere near that amount of He3 in the lunar regolith. I've seen estimates of on the order of 1,000,000 tonnes of the stuff mixed in the top 10 feet of the dirt over the face of the Moon. This is about one thousandth of one trillionth of one percent of the Moon's mass. I don't think that we need to worry just yet.:-)
Slashdot Mirror
The NASA impact probability page has been updated - it's a miss! (Almost certainly - less chance than random debris) It's down to Torino 0, Palermo -2.23, cumulative impact probability 0.0018%.
Propellant can be replaced (so you are allowed to refuel)
Other mass: If anything is jettisoned it must be recovered if it would require replacement of >10% vehicle mass. So first stages if used, drop tanks if used, one-shot heatshields etc. must be carefully looked at to make sure that the vehicle (excluding propellant) is at least 90% reuseable.
From that, I got 5.868 billion for Human Space Flight out of 15.690 billion budget for 2004. I checked this some months ago, and it took a bit of finding again. I remembered "5 billion and something out of 15 billion and something" for next year, which is why I called it "Roughly" above.
Your figures are obviously later than mine (and they break down into more detail - thanks for the link). I note that the 2004/05 estimates for the Space Station are up from 1.2 billion to 1.7, the Shuttle is up from 3.301 to 3.968. Total Human Space Flight (including Ops Support, Payload and ELV support is up to 6.1 billion.
You can add in X-37, OSP, PAD and DART, for an extra 550 million, taking Manned Space Flight Ops and research to 6.65 billion out of 15.469 billion. Not really a majority of their resources - the 7.7 billion figure that you mention includes general (unmanned) launcher research and engineering and Robot systems research (which you really can't put down against the Manned Space Flight side of the ledger :-). )
Solar Systems exploration weighs in at 1.3 billion, Mars Exploration at 570 million, Astronomy at 877 million. Including other Space Science programmes, Space Science is just over 4 billion. Earth Science is at 1.5 billion, Biological and Physical research at a hair under 1 billion, Aeronautics also at a shade under 1 billion. Total Science expenditure is totalled as 7.66 billion.
You could well argue that manned flight gets more than unmanned flight - it does cost more. There's more to the science than the launcher and probe costs, though, and the largest chunk of NASAs budget goes to science.
You don't have to guess at my meaning for Quote: Not to mention that the program of Lunar Base plus Manned Mars program will be unlikely to be anywhere near one thousand times the price of Spirit and Opportunity, and I didn't mean that it would be a lot more. The bit in my post breaking down the trillion dollar claim (which is far better done at The Space Reviewbreaks it down far better. The estimated price in using the 1989 price (inflation adjusted for 2004 dollars) for a Mars mission is $276 billion (including development of a new manned launcher of noticeably greater capacity than the Saturn V). Using ISRU techniques and lesser launchers, and benefiting from improvements in the launcher field, this figure could be drastically reduced. The moon missions and Lunar Base (including operating costs and support over 20 years) should also be far less than the (inflation adjusted) $336 billion for the gold plated solution of the SEI).
So your contention that "It can't possibly be less [than 1000 times the price of Spirit and Opportunity, i.e. $820 billion]" puzzles me. If the gold-plated solution for everything comes in at about $500 billion (over 30 years), and we're planning on using more intelligent, far cheaper approaches, why do you feel that this cheaper solution has to be more than $820 billion?
Untrue. Roughly one third of NASAs budget (5 billion of 15 billion) is devoted to manned space flight.
Quote: After the former President Bush announced a similar initiative in 1989, NASA estimated that the cost of sending astronauts to the moon and Mars would be either $471 billion or $541 billion in 1991 dollars, depending on the method of calculation. This is roughly $900 billion in today's dollars. Whatever cost may be estimated by NASA for the new initiative, we can expect cost overruns like those that have often accompanied big NASA programs. (In 1984 NASA estimated that it would cost $8 billion to put the International Space Station in place, not counting the cost of using it. I have seen figures for its cost so far ranging from $25 billion to $60 billion, and the station is far from finished.) Let's not haggle over a hundred billion dollars more or less--I'll estimate that the President's new initiative will cost nearly a trillion dollars.
This old figure has been comprehensively debunked. The 1989 initiative was used as a dream sheet for every blue-sky project in NASA over the next twenty years, with no attempt at reducing costs anywhere and then inflated by 50% anyway. Taking that figure, adjusting for inflation (approx. 1.6 multiplier, giving 750-865 billion), taking the higher figure, rounding it up and then adding 100 billion on top anyway does not seem to be an unbiased type of approach. Another way to put it would be that every blue sky project that NASA had in 1989, less the deliberate 50% addition and extra roundings up, would be 314-361 billion in 1989 dollars; 502-577 billion in todays dollars. For every blue sky project. Over 20 years.Quote:Compare this with the $820 million cost of recently sending the robots Spirit and Opportunity to Mars, roughly one thousandth the cost of the President's initiative.
And roughly one-thousandth the utility of a manned mission (for a summary of the humans versus robots debate please see robots versus humans Not to mention that the program of Lunar Base plus Manned Mars program will be unlikely to be anywhere near one thousand times the price of Spirit and Opportunity.
Quote: It had been hoped that the shuttle, because reusable, would reduce the cost of putting satellites in orbit. Instead, while it costs about $3,000 a pound to use unmanned rockets to put satellites in orbit, the cost of doing this with the shuttle is about $10,000 a pound. The physicist Robert Park has pointed out that at this rate, even if lead could be turned into gold in orbit, it would not pay to send it up on the shuttle.
Indeed, the shuttle is the least cost effective vehicle for space travel. Unlike, for example, Soyuz. I also agree that manning the launch of payloads that can be unmanned is not at all essential.
(Skimming through, because I have to get back to work)... Quote: After NASA had pushed the Apollo program to the point where people stopped watching lunar landings on television, it canceled Apollo 18 and 19, the missions that were to be specifically devoted to scientific research.
Which implies that no other Apollos were specifically dedicated to scientific research. Apollos 15, 16 and 17 were dedicated to scientific research; when NASA had to cancel two landings originally, it cancelled the original Apollo 15 (which wasn't dedicated to scientific research) and Apollo 20. 18 and 19 were chopped later, after the "J-series" missions (scientific research) were in full swing. No other missions could be cancelled.
Oops, gotta go. Boss is coming ...
So how about looking at them if we set the US Government budget equal to $33,000 per year - which is in the ballpark of median salaries. So compare these figures to average US citizen monthly outlays:
The first three are on the order of mortgages, taxes and major credit repayment. The last is on the order of a cinema ticket.
You have made some excellent points (as an amusing sideline, from the figures I've seen, a human would easily have survived the airbag landings. Not sure that it would be a popular choice, however ...)
However, the "killer" point to me is that humans are so bloody adaptable . As a quote from the linked article says:
"DR. BRENT BOS: Thank you. I'm Brent Bos from NASA Goddard. This is a question for Dr. Park. I've heard you tonight and in other various venues talk about how our robotic landers on Mars are superior geologists to a human. As a graduate student I worked on Mars Pathfinder and have also had the opportunity to go on various field exercises with geologists. I was very surprised to find out that a geologist was about a thousand times more effective on site -- when he can examine the rocks, pick them up, have that dynamic interaction with them ..."
We can climb inclined surfaces, clamber down sink-holes, manipulate fine objects, shove large objects, use a huge variety of tools, change what we are doing on a moments notice
As you accurately highlight, this has to be weighed against the extra cost and the very real risk to the astronauts and to NASA if they are lost.
As Jeff Foust points out in Life after Hubble, we could get one brand new Keck sized ground based observatory plus 2 Explorer sized missions for the price of that one Shuttle servicing mission.
Adaptive optics systems have gone a long way to closing the gap between image quality on the ground and above the atmosphere. There are some advantages for Hubble - seeing frequencies that the Keck can't see, no weather restrictions, etc.
However, a ground based telescope can be far larger, far cheaper, and far easier to maintain. We've got to weigh it up in terms of science return, and the ground based systems are definitely catching up.
proposal: send ONLY beings designed for space travel. "
Further observation: Humans have evolved in a sub-tropical environment. They are not designed for cool temperate or sub-arctic conditions.
proposal: Send only robots to these latitudes on Earth
A trained human is between dozens and hundreds of times as effective as any robot. Compare the results of Apollo to the results of the Lunokhods. Or offer to replace a single trained geologist on a field trip to a site in the Rockies with fifty Spirit robots parachuted randomly into the Rocky mountains. No contest.
How long will it be before we can get a robot that can climb down lava pipes and into tunnels? Fifty years?
The first manned mission may cost as much as fifty "Spirits" but would produce far more than fifty times as much science.
The second manned mission would be noticeably cheaper, and more effective.
The knock-on benefits throughout the space industry would be noticeable all round, from the technology that would have to be proven for the manned missions.
As an aside, looking from the ESA side of the fence, I've noticed that the old saying that was trotted out after Apollo ("No bucks, no Buck Rogers") is far more accurate when reversed:
No Buck Rogers ... no bucks. :-(
So spending money on space travel will help.
... you name it. So those directly employed by NASA and the contractors aren't the only beneficiaries - the others in the economy benefit.
After all, that money goes directly on jobs. Everyone who receives the money pays a healthy chunk of it straight back into government coffers. The remainder they spend on, say, cars, computers, clothes, food,
What else is there? Well, following large investment in aerospace related technology and computer technology in Apollo, surprisingly enough, the USA dominated those fields afterwards. The economy grew, so those slices handed out in benefits, health care etc grew bigger overall - the "pie" itself grew, so the amount in those "slices" grew.
So if this causes a doubling in NASAs manned spaceflight budget (at an annual cost equivalent to 3 days welfare spending (2 days, if you take into account the taxes paid directly back), or 6 days DoD spending), it would seem to be worthwhile.
So, yes. Employing more people (with a major focus on college grads) and expanding the economy (so that extra money would end up rolling into health care and unemployment benefits) would make a lot of sense.
And, almost certainly, to the book "6 dinner Sid"
I guess. (Grandparent had a "cat" themed name).
I've also complained - text below
... believe that code should be free to all (open source)." They do not. "Open source" means that the source code may be viewed. It does not mean that it is free. It can be checked worldwide and modified (under license) as needed by individuals, corporations and countries.
------
Dear BBC,
Your story "Linux cyber-battle turns nasty" by Stephen Evans has caused me to write in to point out a number of issues with both the tone of the story and the "facts" portrayed by it.
Firstly, Mr Evans has stated that the virus was unleashed by Linux advocates to damage SCO. He has stated this as a fact, not an allegation. The MyDoom virus has, in fact, been traced back to Russia and is believed to be the work of organised crime. Most reputable news sources have reported this and it saddens me that the BBC, which I have always believed to be one of the best news sources, has fallen down badly in this respect, reporting an unsubstantiated allegation (which was easily checked) as fact.
He also states the virus is written specifically to take down SCO's servers. It is not. It appears designed to turn desktops into remote controlled robots that log keystrokes (such as credit card details) and act as spam relays. Thus it would be of great use to organised crime.
He further states that "internet zealots
Overall, the story appears to be slanted unquestioningly against the Open Source community, accepting allegations as facts and ignoring available contradictory evidence. Could you explain why this line has been taken?
It does seem to me to fall well short of the BBC's standards of reporting. It also fails to highlight the largest concern that may affect your readers - the fact that the virus turns their machines into remote controlled traitors, logging their keystrokes (and jeopardising their privacy and any banking details) and relaying illegal spam. A reference to the story of the Dorset father who lost custody of his daughter after a similar trojan deposited child pornography on his computer, acting as a safe remote storage site from a technologically skilled pervert, would not have gone amiss here , to highlight the severity of the case and remind your readers to take care online.
For information on SCO's IP claims against Linux, please see www.groklaw.net.
Moon's mass = 73,500,000 trillion tonnes
:-)
1% of this is 735,000 trillion tonnes. If that were used up over 10,000 years ("Several thousand year period of time"), this would require 73 trillion tonnes per year to be ferried to Earth or 2 million tonnes per second.
The Moon is _big_
Anyway, there is nowhere near that amount of He3 in the lunar regolith. I've seen estimates of on the order of 1,000,000 tonnes of the stuff mixed in the top 10 feet of the dirt over the face of the Moon. This is about one thousandth of one trillionth of one percent of the Moon's mass. I don't think that we need to worry just yet.