Obama to axe Ares Rocket?

[brimic]

If NASA is given a free hand for scientific inquiry into this matter, I suspect that solar flare cycles will end up being given credit for a respectable portion of the zOMGGlobularWarmCooling and we can get past this crap.

This only works if you assume that the researchers involved don't have a career plan of suckling on the .gov money teat for putting out bogus research on man made climate change.

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

Million years, billion years, blah blah blah.

It took human civilization a measly 3,000 years to go from stone age to space age.  Where do you think we'll be in another few thousand years?

We could learn intergalactic travel, and then forget all about it and learn it all over again, a thousand times over in the amount of time the earth has left.  We could all abandon this rock, and there'd still be plenty of time for an entirely new species to evolve here and learn intergalactic travel on their own.

It surprises me that people say we need to do it all this right now or else we're DOOMED.  I don't get that at all.

[S. Williamson]

And any exoplanets, supposing there are any, are so far away as to be irrelevant. They are far. Like really far. Like so far that when we find one, we won't even know if it's there because the light will be centuries old by the time it hits our telescopes. Using the possibility of interstellar travel to justify NASA funding is basically a joke. Oh, it sounds romantic though.

Am I the only one here who didn't think immediately of terraforming and colonization of planets?

I've always thought the plan was to
1) create an indefinitely-sustainable environment inside a really, really huge ship,
2) fill it with the best people humanity can offer, and
3) send it in the most likely direction.

zahc makes a good point.  Current technology cannot allow us to find other Earth-life-friendly planets, much less terraform and colonize them, but what we can do is start sending out ships anyway.

You don't learn to ride a bicycle by reading about it.

And exploration isn't exploration if you *know* what you're going to find.

[S. Williamson]

And I'm probably going to get flamed for posting a YTMND here, but I'll do it anyway:

http://thefutureofourworld.ytmnd.com/

[MillCreek]

I've always thought the plan was to
1) create an indefinitely-sustainable environment inside a really, really huge ship,
2) fill it with the best people humanity can offer, and
3) send it in the most likely direction

.

This concept of 'generation ships' has been around for years in the science-fiction literature.  You plan for a 200 year journey by filling the ship with a breeding population that has several generations during the trip.  The generation that makes planetfall may be the great great great great grandchildren of the launching population. 

Another concept, pending some sort of FTL travel, relies upon advances in medical technology that makes long-term hibernation and revival feasible.  I think this may be more realistic for initial surveys to find planets capable of sustaining life or being terraformed.  You put a small crew into the freezer, launch them off to some feasible-looking planets, the onboard computer does an initial survey and wakes up the crew if further exploration is warranted. 

[Regolith]

It surprises me that people say we need to do it all this right now or else we're DOOMED.  I don't get that at all.

Again, there are other threats besides the sun going nova.

Asteroids are far, far more common, and we are not even close to finding each and every one that could threaten Earth.  There could be an undiscovered asteroid sitting out somewhere on the other side of Mars that has the Earth's name on it.  And it could hit next year.  NASA is the agency currently charged with tracking these objects, but they don't really have enough funds to do a complete survey. 

Five billion years is the time until earth is turned into a cinder.  Until then, the Earth will probably be struck on average of ten or more times with an object large enough to bring down human civilization, and quite possibly destroy all major life forms.

Having a robust space program that can find these threats and mitigate them before they actually pose a hazard IS something that we need to be doing ASAP.

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

Ok, so taking your numbers, 5 billion years left, and 10 cataclysmic events that threaten life within that span.  On average that's one end of the world event every 500 million years.

It only took us about 3,000 years to get to the moon.  We could take our sweet time from here on out, maybe spend approximately another 1,000 years reaching another star, and approximately another 1,000 years after that to found the first viable off world colony.

That'd leave us with a comfortable 499,998,000 years to spare, on average.  That's roughly 170,000 times longer on average than civilization has existed to date.  I think we're safe for a while.  

Now I don't have a problem with space exploration or technology development.  Both are good and I encourage them.  I just don't see the dire urgency of it.  

[MillCreek]

Ok, so taking your numbers, 5 billion years left, and 10 cataclysmic events that threaten life within that span.  On average that's one end of the world event every 500 million years.

Ah, the dangers of averages.  Stick your head in boiling water and your feet in frozen brine.  On average, you should be at a comfortable temperature.

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

Eh?  On average my head would be way too hot, and my hands way to cold.  Not particularly applicable to our discussion here.

[RevDisk]

Eh?  On average my head would be way too hot, and my hands way to cold.  Not particularly applicable to our discussion here.

Actually, that is the point he's trying to make.  You did your math as if it was a fixed fact that mass extinct events occur on a set schedule.  Problem is, we can't know when one will happen.  It bloody well could be next week, a thousand years from now, or 499,998,000 years.

I don't think anyone here is saying "zomg!  We need to throw everything we have into NASA this second!!!11!!!".  I think most folks on "This is a concern" side are merely pointing out it is a possibility that warrants some attention.  Enough that we should keep the science progressing. 

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

Oy.  I specifically said these events occur on average every 500 million years.  I didn't say they occur exactly every 500 million years.  And while I didn't repeat the "on average" caveat over and over again, I'm sure it was clear that all the other numbers were intended as averages as well.  

I'm not sure why anyone reading a discussion on average intervals would confuse them with specific periodic intervals, unless they were trying to nitpick or deliberately misunderstand.  I'll edit my post to eliminate either possibility.

[brimic]

It took human civilization a measly 3,000 years to go from stone age to space age.  Where do you think we'll be in another few thousand years?

We could learn intergalactic travel, and then forget all about it and learn it all over again, a thousand times over in the amount of time the earth has left.  We could all abandon this rock, and there'd still be plenty of time for an entirely new species to evolve here and learn intergalactic travel on their own.

It surprises me that people say we need to do it all this right now or else we're DOOMED.  I don't get that at all.

I don't think there's any urgency.

Ask yourself this: if Uncle Sam is going to pick your pocket to fund programs as he sees fit, what would you rather have it spent on: coddling and catering to the lowest common denominator which will always be a part of human existence or for greatness and pushing the boundaries of human achievement?

Mankind's crown achievement thus far in the totality of our history has been to put men on the moon- and that's been 40 freaken years ago! Our society has declined since then. Nearly everyone is in their own Attention Deficit Disorder self absorbed media world and really don't care about anything beyond their next text message or episode of American Idle. Now I don't believe that the bloated NASA is the complete answer, but to turn them from an agency of exploration into an agency of promoting mediocracy is sickening.

[MillCreek]

Actually, that is the point he's trying to make.  You did your math as if it was a fixed fact that mass extinct events occur on a set schedule.  Problem is, we can't know when one will happen.  It bloody well could be next week, a thousand years from now, or 499,998,000 years.

I don't think anyone here is saying "zomg!  We need to throw everything we have into NASA this second!!!11!!!".  I think most folks on "This is a concern" side are merely pointing out it is a possibility that warrants some attention.  Enough that we should keep the science progressing. 

Precisely. 

[MillCreek]

Oy.  I specifically said these events occur on average every 500 million years.  I didn't say they occur exactly every 500 million years.  And while I didn't repeat the "on average" caveat over and over again, I'm sure it was clear that all the other numbers were intended as averages as well.  

I'm not sure why anyone reading a discussion on average intervals would confuse them with specific periodic intervals, unless they were trying to nitpick or deliberately misunderstand.  I'll edit my post to eliminate either possibility.

Not to nitpick, but I am sure you grasp the concept of the average incidence of natural events being somewhat random.  This has important implications for preparation for such events.  A town a few miles from me has experienced '100 year floods' three times in the past ten years.  Fortunately, the town government opted to not play the odds and defer mitigation and recovery efforts on the basis that such a flood may not happen for 100 years. 

[erictank]

Travel to other planets is such a practical scientific impossibility that nasa is completely irrelevant.

Seriously?  You REALLY think so?

I ask because, well, WE'VE ALREADY DONE IT.

We've sent robots to multiple other planets, and actual human beings to our nearest planetary neighbor (Luna *IS* a planet...).  So much for your "practical scientific impossibility". 

Saying that traveling to the moon is a first step to interplanetary travel is about like saying that traveling to the top of mount Everest is an important first step to the moon. If you want to get to the moon, you need to build rockets; climbing mountains is a distraction; you can't climb to the moon no matter how good of a climber you are. If you want to get to another planet, well, I think you are going to need hyperspace or wormholes or other physics that don't really exist yet, in which case your breakthrough is going to come in a chalk room or physics laboratory, and prancing around on regolith is a similar distraction.

As already shown, your thoughts on the matter would be... incorrect.  There are DOZENS of other planetary bodies in THIS system which we can reach using any of a variety of rocket technologies.  But we'll assume that you wanted to refer to other systems' planets, in which case rockets would certainly make for an awfully slow trip.  Do you really think that we can't learn from the ENORMOUS variety of planetary surfaces, atmospheres, chemistries, etc. available to us here in the Sol system?  That learning here would be of zero, or even NEGATIVE, value once we can get to a different system?  That spreading out into other bodies in the system won't reduce or remove potential threats to our species' survival prospects?

People think technology is magic, so if we can go from the pony express to cell phones in a couple hundred years, it will only be a matter of time until we have one of those fancy space ships they saw on TV. But technology will never invent a perpetual motion machine or a single-reservoir heat engine and it's NOT a matter of time or a matter of wanting it bad enough. And any exoplanets, supposing there are any, are so far away as to be irrelevant. They are far. Like really far. Like so far that when we find one, we won't even know if it's there because the light will be centuries old by the time it hits our telescopes. Using the possibility of interstellar travel to justify NASA funding is basically a joke. Oh, it sounds romantic though.

People with mindsets like that thought the same thing about travelling across the Atlantic, or manned flight, or supersonic flight, or spaceflight, or landing a man on the moon...

Humanity does lots of stuff despite the actions and outcries of naysayers.  Probably a good thing, that - plenty of things are only impossible until someone (or many someones) figures out how to actually DO them.  I may never see it personally.  Probably won't, in all reality.  So what?  Doesn't mean it's not worth working for, and believing in.

You don't need to, I suppose.  Just don't stand in our way, is all I ask.

FYI - they've located over a hundred exoplanets already, many (IIRC) within 100 lightyears - right next door, in relative terms, considering the size of the galaxy.  Yeah, I'm not walking there, or even taking a shuttle trip.  Who knows what we'll come up with in the next hundred years, to get us out into nearby - or distant - galactic space?

Million years, billion years, blah blah blah.

It took human civilization a measly 3,000 years to go from stone age to space age.  Where do you think we'll be in another few thousand years?

We could learn intergalactic travel, and then forget all about it and learn it all over again, a thousand times over in the amount of time the earth has left.  We could all abandon this rock, and there'd still be plenty of time for an entirely new species to evolve here and learn intergalactic travel on their own.

It surprises me that people say we need to do it all this right now or else we're DOOMED.  I don't get that at all.

By some accounts, we're already overdue (given the rough averages) for either a climatic or space-related catastrophe.  That, and averages can be off in either direction, as has been noted.

It might not happen for another million years, sure.  It could happen in a hundred years, too.  Heck, "it" (whatever "it" is) could happen tomorrow - in which case, we're all toast, because we aren't further along and able to either stop the threat or avoid it.  Some circumstances, we can't overcome.  Others, we can.  We should, IMO.

[Harold Tuttle]

Reportedly being heard at NASA shops right now:

Stepping up to create this 21st century space program will require us to embrace some significant changes in our current plans and how we conduct our business. The Administration is committed to flying out the remaining five flights of the Space Shuttle Program, even if it requires that the last flight takes place in fiscal year 2011. However, the President has directed us to cancel the Constellation program and instead invest in the building blocks of a more capable, forward-looking approach to space exploration. To the NASA employees who have worked so hard and tirelessly on the Constellation projects: While the program ultimately was not sustainable, your efforts and dedication are genuinely and deeply appreciated. I realize that many of you will be affected by these changes, and at times it will be difficult to meet the challenges that will come before us. But with challenges come significant opportunities, which I am counting on you to embrace.

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

Not to nitpick, but I am sure you grasp the concept of the average incidence of natural events being somewhat random.  This has important implications for preparation for such events.  A town a few miles from me has experienced '100 year floods' three times in the past ten years.  Fortunately, the town government opted to not play the odds and defer mitigation and recovery efforts on the basis that such a flood may not happen for 100 years.  

Yes, they're random.  But the average intervals serve to indicate the likelihood of the random event occurring withing a given span.  Comparing 3,000 years to 500,000,000 years should illustrate the utter unlikelihood of any cataclysmic events happening within human reckoning.

The point, lost in all the noise, is that the odds of any such even happening are so small as to be effectively zero for our purposes.  We'll all be dead and forgotten before any of these events come to pass, so quit worrying about it.

[MillCreek]

Yes, they're random.  But the average intervals serve to indicate the likelihood of the random event occurring withing a given span.  Comparing 3,000 years to 500,000,000 years should illustrate the utter unlikelihood of any cataclysmic events happening within human reckoning.

The point, lost in all the noise, is that the odds of any such even happening are so small as to be effectively zero for our purposes.  We'll all be dead and forgotten before any of these events come to pass, so quit worrying about it.

Do you have smoke detectors or fire extinguishers in your home? Do you wear seatbelts? Do you carry a firearm for self-protection? Do you wear a helmet while riding a bicycle?  Are you saving for retirement?

If so, why?  Aren't the odds of any such event occurring to you so small as to be effectively zero for your purposes?  Isn't there a significant chance that you will be dead and forgotten before any of these events come to pass?  

For some of us, our personal risk management model is to make prudent preparations for events of high potential impact and low incidence of occurrence, when such preparations can be made without undue burden on the rest of our lives.  Your mileage, obviously, may differ.

PS: I should mention that I stack the odds in my favor by doing all of the actions mentioned in my first paragraph.  I am, after all, a risk manager by profession.   

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

The odds of my house catching fire or of getting into a car wreck are considerably more probable than a mass extinction event.

Numbers are not just pretty squiggles, ya know.

[MicroBalrog]

The odds of my house catching fire or of getting into a car wreck are considerably more probable than a mass extinction event.

Numbers are not just pretty squiggles, ya know.

Uh? About 4500 Americans die each year in fires. Making your chance to die in a fire this year being only one per 66,666. Doesn't seem like much, now.

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

I've been in car wrecks before.  So have most people I know.  They're not particularly unusual.

No human being has ever experienced a mass extinction event.  Ever.  They are so unusual as to be nonexistent in terms of human experience.

If human civilization is likely to live for 500,000,000 years, or even some significant fraction thereof, then 500,000,000 year average events might be a little more interesting to me.   It isn't, so they aren't.

If y'all wanna fret about something that has never happened to us, and never will for all practical purposes, then knock yourselves out.  It doesn't seem all that productive to me.

[MicroBalrog]

Why is human civilization unlikely to live for 500 million years?

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

Why is human civilization unlikely to live for 500 million years?

Skynet.

Mutant cockroaches.

Suicide cults.

Boredom.

Chuck Norris turning antisocial.

Who knows?  Personally, my money is on Skynet.

 

Actually, if you accept the evolution theories, how long does it take species like ours to evolve and go obsolete again?  Aren't neanderthals a mere 100,000 years old or so?  Odds are we won't even be human any more by the time the next Big Scary Astronomical Event occurs, even if we are lucky enough to still around to witness it.

The time scales we're talking about here are a really, really, really long time.

[MicroBalrog]

Meanwhile, in Arizona:

Paragon Space Development Corp., an Arizona-based company that specializes in life support systems for spacecraft, would get $1.4 million. One of the company's many projects is to build a "Lunar Oasis" mini-greenhouse that would be sent to the moon aboard a privately funded lunar lander.

[AZRedhawk44]

Meanwhile, in Arizona:

Paragon Space Development Corp., an Arizona-based company that specializes in life support systems for spacecraft, would get $1.4 million. One of the company's many projects is to build a "Lunar Oasis" mini-greenhouse that would be sent to the moon aboard a privately funded lunar lander.

Dood.  So. Want. To. Work. There.

Completely unqualified, though.

They even celebrate "talk like a pirate day."  Grr.  Argh.