Armed Polite Society
Main Forums => Politics => Topic started by: AZRedhawk44 on January 27, 2010, 10:28:16 AM
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http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/space/os-no-moon-for-nasa-20100126,0,2770904.story
NASA's plans to return astronauts to the moon are dead. So are the rockets being designed to take them there — that is, if President Barack Obama gets his way.
When the White House releases his budget proposal Monday, there will be no money for the Constellation program that was supposed to return humans to the moon by 2020. The troubled and expensive Ares I rocket that was to replace the space shuttle to ferry humans to space will be gone, along with money for its bigger brother, the Ares V cargo rocket that was to launch the fuel and supplies needed to take humans back to the moon.
There will be no lunar landers, no moon bases, no Constellation program at all.
In their place, according to White House insiders, agency officials, industry executives and congressional sources familiar with Obama's long-awaited plans for the space agency, NASA will look at developing a new "heavy-lift" rocket that one day will take humans and robots to explore beyond low Earth orbit. But that day will be years — possibly even a decade or more — away.
In the meantime, the White House will direct NASA to concentrate on Earth-science projects — principally, researching and monitoring climate change — and on a new technology research and development program that will one day make human exploration of asteroids and the inner solar system possible.
There will also be funding for private companies to develop capsules and rockets that can be used as space taxis to take astronauts on fixed-price contracts to and from the International Space Station — a major change in the way the agency has done business for the past 50 years.
The White House budget request, which is certain to meet fierce resistance in Congress, scraps the Bush administration's Vision for Space Exploration and signals a major reorientation of NASA, especially in the area of human spaceflight.
"We certainly don't need to go back to the moon," said one administration official.
Everyone interviewed for this article spoke on condition of anonymity, either because they are not authorized to talk for the White House or because they fear for their jobs. All are familiar with the broad sweep of Obama's budget proposal, but none would talk about specific numbers because these are being tightly held by the White House until the release of the budget.
But senior administration officials say the spending freeze for some federal agencies is not going to apply to the space agency in this budget proposal. Officials said NASA was expected to see some "modest" increase in its current $18.7 billion annual budget — possibly $200 million to $300 million more but far less than the $1 billion boost agency officials had hoped for.
They also said that the White House plans to extend the life of the International Space Station to at least 2020. One insider said there would be an "attractive sum" of money — to be spent over several years — for private companies to make rockets to carry astronauts there.
But Obama's budget freeze is likely to hamstring NASA in coming years as the spending clampdown will eventually shackle the agency and its ambitions. And this year's funding request to develop both commercial rockets and a new NASA spaceship will be less than what was recommended by a White House panel of experts last year.
That panel, led by former Lockheed Martin CEO Norm Augustine, concluded that to have a "viable" human space-exploration program, NASA needed a $3 billion annual budget hike, and that it would take as much as $5 billion distributed over five years to develop commercial rockets that could carry astronauts safely to and from the space station.
Last year, lawmakers prohibited NASA from canceling any Constellation programs and starting new ones in their place unless the cuts were approved by Congress. The provision sends a "direct message that the Congress believes Constellation is, and should remain, the future of America's human space flight program," wrote U.S. Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., last month.
Nevertheless, NASA contractors have been quietly planning on the end of Ares I, which is years behind schedule and millions of dollars over budget. NASA has already spent more than $3 billion on Ares I and more than $5 billion on the rest of Constellation.
In recent days, NASA has been soliciting concepts for a new heavy-lift rocket from major contractors, including Boeing Co., Lockheed Martin Corp. and Pratt & Whitney. Last week, a group of moonlighting NASA engineers and rocket hobbyists proposed variations on old agency designs that use the shuttle's main engines and fuel tank to launch a capsule into space. According to officials and industry executives familiar with the presentations, some of the contractor designs are very similar to the one pressed by the hobbyists.
Officially, companies such as Boeing still support Constellation and its millions of dollars of contracts. Some believe that in a battle with Congress, Ares may survive.
"I would not say Ares is dead yet," said an executive with one major NASA contractor. "It's probably more accurate to say it's on life support. We have to wait to see how the coming battle ends."
Few doubt that a fight is looming. In order to finance new science and technology programs and find money for commercial rockets, Obama will be killing off programs that have created jobs in some powerful constituencies, including the Marshall Space Flight Center in Shelby's Alabama. But the White House is said to be ready for a fight.
The end of the shuttle program this year is already going to slash 7,000 jobs at Kennedy Space Center.
One administration official said the budget will send a message that it's time members of Congress recognize that NASA can't design space programs to create jobs in their districts. "That's the view of the president," the official said.
My initial gut reaction to Obama doing anything with NASA was "OMG, the marxist is stealing money from NASA to fund some looney socialist tripe."
I read the article and agreed with most of it, though.
NASA doesn't need to be in the space-taxi business. Outsourcing this to build private space enterprise is a good move.
I disagree with abandoning the moon, though. It's the ultimate sustainable high-ground from a military perspective, and an EXCELLENT choice for a place to build larger spacecraft. I don't have visions of NCC-1701 in my lifetime, but I would like to see the Moon serve as a lighthouse of sorts, or perhaps an offshore oil platform that provides H2/O2 fuel and oxygen resupply.
Regardless, NASA needs to focus more on space, rather than low earth orbit. LEO is now old-hat and can be serviced by private industry.
As far as the protectionism of congressional space-pork... A lot of this money will get shifted to California and Nevada businesses (Pelosi and Reid). Just money moving from Republi-pork to Demi-swine.
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Yes, why reach for the stars when there is so much community organizing left to do? =D
"Social justice" = mediocrity.
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Every time I think about whether the Feds should cut NASA loose, I remember that the amount of money at stake is pitifully small compared to all the real wasteful programs out there. Leave it alone until all the other spending is brought under control.
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My initial gut reaction to Obama doing anything with NASA was "OMG, the marxist is stealing money from NASA to fund some looney socialist tripe."
Like this part?
In the meantime, the White House will direct NASA to concentrate on Earth-science projects — principally, researching and monitoring climate change
Granted, I think that private enterprise can handle the NEO load better than a government project could. I don't know whether private enterprise has the ability to absorb the up-front cost of a mission to the moon or beyond. That's a heck of a monetary outlay, and there'd have to be tangible commercial returns on such a thing before anyone in the commercial realm would back it.
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The conservative in me is glad to see budgets cut from areas they are not necessarily needed.
However, I think to all the technological advances the space program encouraged, and wonder if the money is indeed better spent on these programs, due to the fringe benefits alone.
I would like to see deep sea projects. We understand more about the surface of mars, than we do the surface of the deepest oceans. If we could build subs that could take people to those pressures, that could result in a leap in technological progress.
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I want to see us return to those projects once the economy starts to come around. It's right to cut these things when we're in the bind we're in.
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NASA's budget for 2009 was 17.2 billion dollars. At this level, the currently UNSPENT money from BHO's stimulus plan would fund NASA for about 30 years. Or the budget could be doubled through 2025.
In the meantime, the White House will direct NASA to concentrate on Earth-science projects — principally, researching and monitoring climate change
This amounts to criminal misuse of a valuable resource even worse than previous administrations allowing the agency to be taken over by political brown-noses. =(
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Fine with me. There's basically no point to going back. There was a point at one time when we had a space race on, but that's over. There's really nothing there but a bunch of rocks; I don't see what the attraction is anyway.
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NASA's budget for 2009 was 17.2 billion dollars. At this level, the currently UNSPENT money from BHO's stimulus plan would fund NASA for about 30 years. Or the budget could be doubled through 2025.
My thoughts exactly. When you start making a list of all the spending to start cutting in the federal govt, NASA is way way down on the list. To even mention it just means the Democrats are not at all serious about cutting spending.
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My thoughts exactly. When you start making a list of all the spending to start cutting in the federal govt, NASA is way way down on the list. To even mention it just means the Democrats are not at all serious about cutting spending.
To my knowledge, most programs are of similar relevance to the budget trimming process.
Aside from Social Security, Medicare and Defense, everything else in the budget is thousands upon thousands of $100 million, $10 million, $1.2 billion and similar small agency budgets.
Part of the tedium of actually balancing the budget is that it requires an audit of all of those little programs to find out HOW to cut their budgets in a manner consistent with their mission statements and goals for the next year.
And that's what protects them from budget reform entirely: the difficulty and man-hours involved to accomplish that.
...Which is why we need to start slashing entire programs from the federal budget, rather than micromanaging each line item on the budget.
NASA is one of the largest of the small agency budgets, though. As such, it gets targeted before the feces-as-art programs since those only get a paltry $500,000 budget.
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It sounds less like "slashing spending" and more like "slashing semi-useful spending to fund more faked research into AGW."
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Well, no wonder LockMart hasn't decided who to interview for that position that was starting to look good for me in Denver. It would be working on the Orion crew capsule, and integral part of the Constellation program.
A senior administration official told Fox News that rather than space programs, the president plans to use the address to renew his focus on jobs
Hey Barry - Funding that program will produce jobs! Namely one for me! And one that'll produce plenty of tax revenue for you!
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To my knowledge, most programs are of similar relevance to the budget trimming process.
Aside from Social Security, Medicare and Defense, everything else in the budget is thousands upon thousands of $100 million, $10 million, $1.2 billion and similar small agency budgets.
Part of the tedium of actually balancing the budget is that it requires an audit of all of those little programs to find out HOW to cut their budgets in a manner consistent with their mission statements and goals for the next year.
And that's what protects them from budget reform entirely: the difficulty and man-hours involved to accomplish that.
...Which is why we need to start slashing entire programs from the federal budget, rather than micromanaging each line item on the budget.
NASA is one of the largest of the small agency budgets, though. As such, it gets targeted before the feces-as-art programs since those only get a paltry $500,000 budget.
That is at least part of what I mean. Those big programs like SS and Medicare and other entitlements get ignored because they are more difficult to touch than the annual appropriation items. There are a lot of little items that shouldn't be there at all, but the big budget hitters are carried over automatically every year. No one wants to do anything like freeze the funding levels on those programs or suggest some of the hundreds of SS executives or other administration be cut loose.
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Close the department of education.
Close health and human servaces.
Close TSA and let airlines be responsible for their security.
Close the DEA. Legalize it all. TAx it and control through USDA.
Move the food stamp program out in the open away from the USDA for all to see. Make it stand alone as a budget item.
Close military bases in places where we don't need them.
Cut everything, including government jobs by twenty five percent.
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I would like to see deep sea projects. We understand more about the surface of mars, than we do the surface of the deepest oceans. If we could build subs that could take people to those pressures, that could result in a leap in technological progress.
Perhaps instead of an NCC-1701, we can have a Seaquest DSV? :laugh:
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Without NIH funding, my job would disappear. If all the "shared sacrifice" rhetoric weren't just wind and cuts were meaningful in reducing the debt and drag on the economy, I'd say so be it.
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"In the meantime, the White House will direct NASA to concentrate on Earth-science projects — principally, researching and monitoring climate change." <> National Aeronautics and Space Administration
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"In the meantime, the White House will direct NASA to concentrate on Earth-science projects — principally, researching and monitoring climate change." <> National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Yeah, that's NOAA, really.
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I guess we'll be hitching rides with Russia, China and India from now on.
Fine with me. There's basically no point to going back. There was a point at one time when we had a space race on, but that's over. There's really nothing there but a bunch of rocks; I don't see what the attraction is anyway.
Eventually, survival of the human race is going to depnd on us getting off this rock. The pioneering has to start now.
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Cripple, divide, subvert. Repeat until mission accomplished.
NASA is just a symbol to this President of an overweening America that needs humbling.
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Eventually, survival of the human race is going to depnd on us getting off this rock. The pioneering has to start now.
Or at least we need to be able to project power off this rock. Tunguska was tiny . . . the rock that made Barringer Crater was maybe a bit more signifcant . . . but there's another Chicxulub-type event in Earth's future; maybe next week, maybe not for millenia . . . but it IS coming.
And if we can't do anything about it because we wasted effort on global warming scams or midnight basketball instead, we deserve what we get.
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"In the meantime, the White House will direct NASA to concentrate on Earth-science projects — principally, researching and monitoring climate change." <> National Aeronautics and Space Administration
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.
If. [tinfoil]
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I guess we'll be hitching rides with Russia, China and India from now on.
Eventually, survival of the human race is going to depnd on us getting off this rock. The pioneering has to start now.
This. Very MUCH this. Sooner or later, via onplanet or offplanet natural events, to say nothing of the possibility of manmade accidental ("zOMGGlobularWarmCooling" - thanks for the tag, AZRH44! :lol: ) or hostile actions ("Global Thermonuclear War"), something WILL happen to make this world quite unpleasant for advanced life as we know it. If humanity is still locked onto the surface of Sol III when that happens, that's all she wrote for us, goodbye everyone and last one out turn off the lights before you freeze or starve to death, please.
I think humanity, as a species, can do better than being killed by a big fast rock. Luna is a BIG stepping stone on the way to getting all our eggs out of the single basket they're in now, and a nice close practice arena to gain experience in, as well.
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Which is why we need to start slashing entire programs departments from the federal budget, rather than micromanaging each line item on the budget.
FIFY.... ;)
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Eventually, survival of the human race is going to depend on us getting off this rock.
We are screwed, then. The nearest livable exoplanet hasn't been discovered yet, and when it does, it will certainly be too many light-years away to be more than a curiosity. We cannot live on mars or the moon. So it might be claustrophobic to think that we are stuck on earth, but we are stuck on earth, and going to the moon to prance around on the regolith is not doing anything to help us. It's a waste of money that could be used for something better (like preventing the fiscal collapse of our country).
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We are screwed, then. The nearest livable exoplanet continent hasn't been discovered yet, and when it does, it will certainly be too many light-years miles away to be more than a curiosity.
Common sentiment about 500-1000 or so years ago. Now we're living on that mysterious continent on the other side of the vast uncrossable ocean.
It may be another thousand years. It may even be more. But when you look at how far we've come, from living in thatch huts thinking there was no world outside our tiny plot of land in Mesopotamia and believing the world was flat, to living all over that world and having even left the planet just because we felt like it; I think saying we will NEVER live on another planet is just not possible to predict.
Every major scientific advance humankind has ever made was IMPOSSIBLE....until someone did it.
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We are screwed, then. The nearest livable exoplanet hasn't been discovered yet, and when it does, it will certainly be too many light-years away to be more than a curiosity. We cannot live on mars or the moon. So it might be claustrophobic to think that we are stuck on earth, but we are stuck on earth, and going to the moon to prance around on the regolith is not doing anything to help us. It's a waste of money that could be used for something better (like preventing the fiscal collapse of our country).
It's a good first step. We didn't go from dugout canoes to the aircraft carrier in one fell swoop. We didn't go from the Wright Flyer to the F-22 in one fell swoop. We won't go from Earth bound to expanding to another viable planet in one fell swoop either.
Start at the Moon, and then Mars to get the settlement technology developed. Work on terraforming while on Mars. Meanwhile search for potential viable planets and develop our technology to get there in at a speed that makes the journey tolerable.
Plus there's the not inconsequential side benefit of me having a job.
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The space shuttle and ISS are the equivalent of space dug-out canoes.
Well, to be fair, Mercury capsules were canoes.
ISS might be something as refined as a primitive barge, and the space shuttle is perhaps akin to a longboat.
We need to build triremes, schooners, steamships and such before we can dream of the Reagan-class nuclear aircraft carrier space equivalent with 5000 souls aboard.
And we need to learn how to use those to "fish" in the deep waters in our solar system. Go "whaling" for minerals in the asteroid belt. Or build the equivalent of oil platforms where we can refuel ships from mined resources. You know those floating fish processing plants in Alaska, or the Japanese lumber processing plants off the Washington coast? We need those, in space.
Maybe we don't need more planets. At least for a while.
Maybe our next step is to learn how to terraform Mars or some of Jupiter's moons. Or partial-terraform, along the lines of giant enclosed sports domes.
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We need to build triremes, schooners, steamships and such before we can dream of the Reagan-class nuclear aircraft carrier space equivalent with 5000 souls aboard.
And we need to learn how to use those to "fish" in the deep waters in our solar system. Go "whaling" for minerals in the asteroid belt. Or build the equivalent of oil platforms where we can refuel ships from mined resources. You know those floating fish processing plants in Alaska, or the Japanese lumber processing plants off the Washington coast? We need those, in space.
Maybe we don't need more planets. At least for a while.
Maybe our next step is to learn how to terraform Mars or some of Jupiter's moons. Or partial-terraform, along the lines of giant enclosed sports domes.
All of this. We just have to realize it won't be America doing it. The folks that accomplish this, English will not be their primary language.
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Why not?
We still have the technological lead, NASA's slashed budget notwithstanding.
Unless you think the language of our planetary exploring descendants will be speaking a dialect that's a mix of Chinese and English (Engrish?) in deference to the Global Economic Merger/War of 2020?
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As someone who admires your space program from afar, I have the following points to make:
i) there is no American achievement, policy or programme in history that managed to boost the image of the US worldwide more than Apollo. No amount of dollars sent in foriegn "aid" has ever, or would ever, manage(d) to have the same effect.
ii) as Bruce H, scout, MechAg and AzRedhawk state, there are a whole load of things that should / must be cut before going after NASA
iii) every time I hear the "there is no benefit in space travel" argument, I think of this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hSELOCMmw4A
iv) if you dont go into space, someone else - probably the Chinese, after all they will be able to afford it given all the interest you will be paying them - will.
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Why not?
Privately or sponsored by .gov, either way, if we do not get our economic house in order, and soon, we will not have the means to do so. And I just don't see that happening.
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We are screwed, then. The nearest livable exoplanet hasn't been discovered yet, and when it does, it will certainly be too many light-years away to be more than a curiosity. We cannot live on mars or the moon. So it might be claustrophobic to think that we are stuck on earth, but we are stuck on earth, and going to the moon to prance around on the regolith is not doing anything to help us. It's a waste of money that could be used for something better (like preventing the fiscal collapse of our country).
Then why do anything? If you are right, we are already dead as a species. Taking to the stars, colonizing the universe and maintaining our continued expansion by the barrel of a gun or the movement of the slide ruler, or death. Those are our two ONLY options for humanity.
Yanno, of all the movies I've seen in my life, one scene has made the largest impact. One was Apollo 13, when they dumped a carton of space junk on a desk, ordered the geeken to make it work and by the gods, they did. I think I was 14 or 15 at the time when I saw the film. That is what made me proud of humanity and want to be a geek.
May every NASA desk jockey administrator that has done his or her part to kill the best part of our humanity burn in whatever version of hell is especially appealing for all time.
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Amen to all that has been said. NASA in it's prime was driving many great things beyond the obvious direct technical advances. The moon landings and launch of the space shuttle inspired lots of folks to go into engineering and math causing a rise in the US's technical ability overall. What was the last really inspiring thing NASA did? The Mars rovers come to mind and that is about it. What do we have to look forward to? We have launching satellites down to a fairly routine matter. BFD. What are we doing that is pushing the envelope? What would a high school graduate have to look forward to right now that would inspire them to take up engineering in college?
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What was the last really inspiring thing NASA did? The Mars rovers come to mind and that is about it.
(https://armedpolitesociety.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.revdisk.net%2Flogos%2Fspirit.png&hash=c66e8fdd655662dadd9c587dd393024f2a07e62f)
http://www.xkcd.com/695/ (http://www.xkcd.com/695/)
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Yanno, of all the movies I've seen in my life, one scene has made the largest impact. One was Apollo 13, when they dumped a carton of space junk on a desk, ordered the geeken to make it work and by the gods, they did. I think I was 14 or 15 at the time when I shttp://www.armedpolitesociety.com/index.php?action=post;quote=437811;topic=22790.25;num_replies=34;sesc=42b507563e1dd636f0787448a4d4cb35aw the film. That is what made me proud of humanity and want to be a geek.
That scene/event was the REAL "Revenge of the Nerds." Freaking inspiring.
A little b-ground:
http://www.octanecreative.com/ducttape/NASA/index.html
(search on "Apollo 13 CO2 Filter Modification")
More:
the square carbon dioxide filters from Apollo 13's failed command module had to be modified to fit round receptacles in the lunar module, which was being used as a lifeboat after an explosion en route to the moon. A workaround was made using duct tape and other items on board Apollo 13, with the ground crew relaying directions to the spacecraft and its crew. The lunar module CO2 scrubbers started working again, saving the lives of the three astronauts on board.
Ed Smylie, who designed the scrubber modification in just two days, said later that he knew the problem was solvable when it was confirmed that duct tape was on the spacecraft: "I felt like we were home free", he said in 2005. "One thing a Southern boy will never say is, 'I don't think duct tape will fix it.'"
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NASA doesn't need to be in the space-taxi business. Outsourcing this to build private space enterprise is a good move.
I disagree with abandoning the moon, though. It's the ultimate sustainable high-ground from a military perspective, and an EXCELLENT choice for a place to build larger spacecraft. I don't have visions of NCC-1701 in my lifetime, but I would like to see the Moon serve as a lighthouse of sorts, or perhaps an offshore oil platform that provides H2/O2 fuel and oxygen resupply.
Regardless, NASA needs to focus more on space, rather than low earth orbit. LEO is now old-hat and can be serviced by private industry.
More to the point, what IS the point of "re-tasking" NASA to study Earth-based climate issues? We already have NOAA for that. NASA stands for National Aeronautics and Space Administration. What part of "space" does our fearless leader not understand? Basically, if we don't need NASA to be doing space syuff, then we don't need NASA at all and it should be disbanded, dismantled, and otherwise scrapped.
On the other hand, if we need NASA, then NASA needs to be doing space stuff.
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We cannot live on mars or the moon.
Why can't we?
We can build Island 3 colonies, and we can terraform the hell out of Mars when we are wealthy and smart enough to do so.
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Anyone else find it ironic that some here are saying scientific breakthroughs enabling multi-lightyear travel and terraforming planets is inevitable, but consider scientific breakthroughs allowing indefinite life on Sol impossible?
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Anyone else find it ironic that some here are saying scientific breakthroughs enabling multi-lightyear travel and terraforming planets is inevitable, but consider scientific breakthroughs allowing indefinite life on Sol impossible?
At some point, something is going to happen that will make living on earth very, very difficult. Whether it's an impact from an asteroid, an extreme volcanic event (something akin to the one that wiped out a large percentage of life 200 or so billion years ago), or our sun running out of hydrogen gas to burn and switching to heavier elements instead (which will cause it to swell, pushing it's outer edges past the orbit of Venus and turning our planet into a cinder), our existence on this planet is not likely to be indefinite. We need a presence in space in order to survive as a species, period.
Looking at the most likely threat (an asteroid impact), we either need to have colonies elsewhere to repopulate the earth after the impact, or we need the ability to find and destroy or relocate asteroids that threaten the Earth. Both of which require a robust space program. Then there are other ways that a presence in space can protect us, such as countering other nation's efforts to militarize space (either by preventing them from doing it all together, or simply not letting them do it without competition).
NASA is quite frankly as necessary to this nation (and perhaps the planet) as the military is. It's a shame it doesn't get equal attention, and only a fraction of the funding.
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Why is it assumed that human civilization cannot survive on the earth?
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Anyone else find it ironic that some here are saying scientific breakthroughs enabling multi-lightyear travel and terraforming planets is inevitable, but consider scientific breakthroughs allowing indefinite life on Sol impossible?
Eventually our Sun will go nova, and our planet will be within the actual body of the sun as it expands or will be destroyed as the Sun explodes. Hard to think of a scientific breakthrough that will enable the planet to survive that. Unless we develop the spindizzy and fly the planet away, as conceptualized by James Blish.
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deleted due to double post
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Why is it assumed that human civilization cannot survive on the earth?
...or that we'll be allowed to settle anywhere else? Maybe the aliens want to keep us Earth-bound....kinda like keeping all the problem children in one playpen......
[tinfoil]
=D
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When is the sun predicted to go nova? Few billion years? You really think us funding NASA now is going to have a material impact? Such hubris...
That being said, I'm all for funding NASA. Lots of things we need to do in space. But all the "ZOMG we're all gonna DIE!!!!!!!1!!1!11!eleventyonezomgwtfbbq!11!!1!" talk makes me :laugh:
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When is the sun predicted to go nova? Few billion years?
At best estimate, but that's not the point. There's a few million different things, any one of which means we are outa here.
Then again as far as I'm concerned when the time for humans is up it's up, and it doesn't matter if we are on one world or one million worlds IMO. So for now funding NASA is fine because it's cool and the same reason I keep SD weapons. Who am I to ignore the tools the good Lord has seen fit to provide me with.
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When is the sun predicted to go nova? Few billion years? You really think us funding NASA now is going to have a material impact? Such hubris...
That being said, I'm all for funding NASA. Lots of things we need to do in space. But all the "ZOMG we're all gonna DIE!!!!!!!1!!1!11!eleventyonezomgwtfbbq!11!!1!" talk makes me :laugh:
Sigh.
The sun going wonky (not necessarily nova) is one of several dozen scenarios I could think up off the top of my head. Dude, the P–Tr event only occurred 251.4 million years ago and we have no clue what caused it. It wiped out 96% of marine species, 70% of terrestrial vertebrates, 57% of all families and 83% of all genera.
If you think humanity is immune to space rocks, improved Spanish flu, solar activity, plant evolution, flood basalt, gamma ray burst from other stars, etc for... whatever reason, that is your business. The rest of us subscribe to the statistical certainty that on a long enough timescale... stuff happens. Maybe tomorrow, maybe next year, maybe a thousand or million years from now. But sooner or later, statistics win again. Having all of our eggs in one basket means if any one of the above happens again, we're screwed. If we diversify our eggs in to many baskets, we're statistically significantly less likely to die as a species.
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Travel to other planets is such a practical scientific impossibility that nasa is completely irrelevant. 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.
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.
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Travel to other planets is such a practical scientific impossibility that nasa is completely irrelevant. 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.
Bad analogy. By going to the moon/Mars you are developing technology that will enable human habitation in a variety of challanging environments. You are developing technology to enable survival and comfort for relatively lenghty times en-route to the destination. You are developing technology to shorten that travel time. All of that will inspire lots of people to go into science and engineering and will eventually result in that critical person being in the chalk room or lab to make the breakthrough discoveries necessary to such achievement.
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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.
Earth is flat, and is the center of the universe. And human beings will never fly. To think otherwise is heresy.
We've been wrong about things that we KNEW were true before.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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And I'm probably going to get flamed for posting a YTMND here, but I'll do it anyway:
http://thefutureofourworld.ytmnd.com/
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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Eh? On average my head would be way too hot, and my hands way to cold. Not particularly applicable to our discussion here.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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. [tinfoil]
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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.
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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.
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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.
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Why is human civilization unlikely to live for 500 million years?
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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.
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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.
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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.
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Why is human civilization unlikely to live for 500 million years?
Personally, I am a strong believer in evangelical Christianity (though I'm terrible at practicing it). I'm not ashamed to admit I think He will end this form of the world long before we are off fighting the Dominion in the Beta Quadrant. But I still think scientific progress in space is something the be sought after. Just because I think it's unlikely we'll ever full achieve it doesn't mean it's not worth trying. That's like me saying I know I'm not going to be alive in 2100, so I might as well kill myself now.
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My talk radio host in the morning (Barry Young on KFYI) explained what I was feeling, perfectly.
We're having a BIRTHRIGHT as Americans taken from us.
We're the nation that put men on the moon. We're the leaders in space. The Russians are such a distant second it's not even funny. "We are number 1. All others are number 2." >:D
I almost feel like my country is being completely and utterly destroyed, deliberately. By a thousand pricks, the biggest of which is in the White House and directing the rest of the pricks.
Obama is WAY too chummy with China. Look at all the campaign money that came from anonymous donors whose phone numbers trace to various Chinatowns across the US. Then there's the deliberate run-up of the national deficit. China is making mock protestations but I think they're actually happy with the situation: They'll destroy us with their banking hold over us and it will be cheaper than a war.
He's screwing up these terror trials deliberately, too. Holder's guarantees of a conviction WILL result in a mistrial and every single one of these bastards will be acquitted. To add insult to injury, we'll probably get sued and the bastards will get damages from us, then use that money to orchestrate new attacks.
Then there's health care.
Now the space program? The EU and Japan are the only sophisticated players in the game right now; Russia is like a space-trucker - unsophisticated but reliable. No goals, but they'll go from point A to point B if someone else pays for it. China and India are racing to catch up, and frankly I'm rooting for India to stay ahead of China. But it ain't gonna happen.
Taking my space program and turning it into a place to institutionalize AGW into a bureaucracy takes the current crowning achievement of our nation and of MANKIND and makes a mockery of it.
If NOTHING drives you to act to save the country... can't this?
NASA was created with a military and defensive purpose during the cold war, true... but in its heyday it embodied everything finest in man's exploratory nature.
If it is dismantled... the talent of the entire space/aerospace industry will disperse. All that generational knowledge, institutional teamwork, the art of spacecraft design, the courage to step into a craft, the trust and faith between ground support and astronaut staff... it will evaporate and disappear. The technological cost alone will be terrible. The psychological blow...worse.
And: if the laws of statistics don't protect us and something comes hurtling towards us in the next decade? With a mothballed shuttle system and its support structure completely dismantled, no Ares/Constellation, and the aerospace infrastructure LEGACY that is our birthright destroyed: we'll be doomed. Such a challenge is currently outside of the scope of NASA... even 1970's NASA (which was greater than today's agency). With no NASA at all, we'd be so far behind the curve as to be without hope.
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Uh. Guys?
You're not 'dismantling' the shuttle. You're funding SEVERAL working alternates.
On NASA's advice, millions of millions of dollars are given to companies like Bigelow Aerospace (which is developing a private habitable space station and has two fully-functional prototype habitats already in space), Space X (intended to replace the Shuttle and working on the private moon probe), and so on, and so forh. It's not enough, sure. But it's probably more effective than what you were doing previously.
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Uh. Guys?
You're not 'dismantling' the shuttle. You're funding SEVERAL working alternates.
On NASA's advice, millions of millions of dollars are given to companies like Bigelow Aerospace (which is developing a private habitable space station and has two fully-functional prototype habitats already in space), Space X (intended to replace the Shuttle and working on the private moon probe), and so on, and so forh. It's not enough, sure. But it's probably more effective than what you were doing previously.
There are no working alternates. Let's not kid ourselves.
SpaceX cannot even achieve LEO yet, let alone dock with the ISS or a similar construct.
Bigelow's structure up there is a giant inflated tube with about 10 watts of electrical consumption. It might be a proof of concept... but it is a long ways from anything useful.
By "millions of millions" (literally trillions) I suppose you actually meant "millions and millions." Even 50 million or 250 million is a far cry from a 20 billion dollar budget. 250 million doesn't get you launch and lift facilities, nor does it get you the ability to dock with the ISS.
It's not the right time to step back. Private industry has not matured to a point where it has proven compatibility with existing goals.
It kills me to see the ISS thrown aside, too. It just got finished.
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SpaceX cannot even achieve LEO yet, let alone dock with the ISS or a similar construct.
Space X has been getting commercial payloads to orbit since July 2009.
Bigelow's structure up there is a giant inflated tube with about 10 watts of electrical consumption. It might be a proof of concept... but it is a long ways from anything useful.
It is habitable (if only by mice), and they're launching a complete, human-habitable, space-station next year.
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Space X has been getting commercial payloads to orbit since July 2009.
And THAT is the ticket. Turn what they do into a product. Success (barring govt intervention) can only follow.
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I'll just say that whatever your reason for wanting it, funding NASA to do actual space stuff is a good idea. Killing the Shuttle would also be a good idea, but that's more a policy thing.
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MB: Sorry, in my excitement I got SpaceX confused with SpaceShip1.
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Don't worry, we're not giving up on manned space exploration just yet. It just means we'll have to run in the back of the bus, and the bus will be driven by Russians or Chinese or Indians...