Lunar mission to get the axe...

Highbury · 01-29-10, 12:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lionclaw

http://www.natural-environment.com/b...in-space-junk/

The numbers are bad but the planet/junk size ratio in those pics is more then a bit misleading.. it would obscure the sun!

And I am not a fan of this either. In the Sixties a goal was set that seemed unreachable, but it was reached. No goals have been set since and we have just been spinnin around taking pics and leaving space junk.. time to move on!

FIREWALL · 01-29-10, 12:17 AM

The Sky is Falling.

Task Force · 01-29-10, 12:30 AM

hmm... yep, would have been nice to see a moon landing with modern stuff... (ex modern cameras, image quality, ect.)

This new president was a bad idea... like the old one... and probably the next... (they seem to just get dumber and dumber...)

Skybird · 01-29-10, 11:52 AM

Colonising space, somebody said. Wowh, that are very big words. Think again.

I love Science Fiction. I am fascinated by stellar conquest. And desoite my sympathy for that, I still know the difference between fiction, and reality.

If a nation and an economy and state finances and a society are in a condition like the American example, or the West in general, then going to the moon simply is nothing more than a feel-good project that is close to the principle of panem et circenses. Always wanting new toys to play around with, is one thing. Being able to finance them, is something different. And NASA - belongs to the biggest debtor on Earth.

To my surprise, ten days or two weeks ago I stumbled into a TV documentary on the ISS, and what stunned me is that now that it is almost ready and finished in construction - they have difficulties to get customers booking time onboard of it to conduct their experimental designs. From the perspective of ESA it is not sure that NASA even has any long-termed interest in keeping the station alive, even more so with the Shuttle approaching it's decommission date, and all solutions thought about to supply the station in prinicple are little more than provisional arrangements. There are more important things to think about than the moon. Getting a succeeding system for the shuttle, for example.

Hopping around on the moon may deliver nice pics to please the crowds at home and make them waving flags and voting for you - but it does little more than just that. And sending half a dozen people, or even a hundred people, to the moon, or Mars, hardly is "colonising space". You do not become a sailor by dipping your toe in the sand at the beach. It's religion for some people to believe we could solve our problems on Earth in space, but trying to do so would only mean to continue thinking we must not change, and would result in us bringing the same mental attitude that made us creating our problems on Earth to a small space camp out there. And then our problems sooner or later would beging again. Because we have not learned anything.

First we bring our house in order, if that is still possible. Then we start thinking about colonising space, if we are bored then. If we cannot bring our house in order, and cannot change our messy behaviours, then the questions must be asked whether we really deserve to reach the stars one day, and whether we really deserve to survive in the evolutionary process. The latter usually is taken for granted - but I reject the claimed naturalness of that assumption. And in the end the judge of that problem with our design will not be man, or man-made ethics and morals and imagined deities, but ol' mother nature who let's us live.

Or not.

FIREWALL · 01-29-10, 12:33 PM

@ Skybird

Very good points you made.

Neptunus Rex · 01-29-10, 05:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FIREWALL

@ Skybird

Very good points you made.

The same points have been raised since the manned space program was first announced. I'm sure there were similar views in Europe in the 15th century as well regarding sailing west across the Atlantic and the search for the Northwest Passage once the Americas were reached.

It has to be the next horizon. It's human nature to push.

Oberon · 02-01-10, 07:43 PM

Well, it's officially dead but the ISS has been extended to beyond 2016 so that's one glimmer of hope in this bleak news.
This is going to haunt Obama in the southern states, particularly the launcher states, Florida and the like, they're not exactly keen on him at the moment.
However, on the other hand it's not as if the west has money to throw around at the moment. Moving a lot of the work over into the private sectors and giving them greater backing could well pay off in more designs like Spaceship One and an increase in space traffic, although sadly the costs of said endeavors measured against the current financial problems means that not many companies would be willing to take the risk unless a financial reward was guaranteed.
I can see where this is coming from, but I don't like it, no more than I like the idea of the Shuttle fleet going out of service before a replacement has been created. This is something that should have been sorted a decade ago, but I guess budget cuts and the like have always put NASA on the back burner.
I personally think that we need the ability to travel within the solar system, because I can't see things getting any better on this planet and so for the continued survival of the human race in some shape or form, we need a group of people not to be here when it eventually all goes wrong. Of course, you have the problem that if that same group of people make the same mistakes all over again then what's the blooming point, but at the very least they should have the option to make those mistakes, at the very least we should have them there. If they make the same mistakes and kill themselves off, well then, nothing ventured nothing gained. The clock is ticking but people don't seem to be listening to it!

goldorak · 02-01-10, 09:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Neptunus Rex

The same points have been raised since the manned space program was first announced. I'm sure there were similar views in Europe in the 15th century as well regarding sailing west across the Atlantic and the search for the Northwest Passage once the Americas were reached.

It has to be the next horizon. It's human nature to push.

Yes its human nature to push the boundaries, but in the end you have to capitalize on that drive. After Columbus discovered the new world, he and his men didn't just go home and leave it at that.
The american space program was always politically driven, first to beat the soviets and then to keep happy the aerospace industry with a broken hardware design, the Space Shuttle.

Colonizing space has never been a target for Nasa notwithstanding what the PR say, only few people really had the vision that was necessary to achieve such a lofty goal and they understood that it was an endevour what would have taken decades.
Von Braun was one of them. He always advocated that the US space program procede by baby steps. First putting orbital space stations around earth. Then creating a moonbase. And then putting in place the infrastructure to go back and forth betwwen the earth and the moon. And in the future on to Mars and beyond. Those ideas were scrapped by POLITICIANS whose only drive was to beat the soviets. And what was gained in the long run ?

The decomissioning of the Apollo program and its hardware (at least some of it was used for the Skylab missions). The investment in a broken design of the Space Shuttle that should have been able to do the real SHUTTLE missions between earth and leo instead of 2 flights per year at astronomical costs at the best ? The impossibility of having a permanent human prescence in space. And so on.
Human colonization of space is a process, its not a goal. When you design a program around a goalpost, then once it is achieved, almost always the program will be scraped. It did what it was supposed to do and thats it. No more funding. Thats a pretty short vision to have, and it has plagued the american space program since its inception.

Everything (the manned space program) was sacrified on the altar of "beating the soviets". Great you did it, unfortunately 50 years after we are still at the same point. With hindsight this whole process was a FAILURE. Historians will see it as that. A FAILURE that cost at the time hundred billion dollars to put 12 men on the moon. And for what exactly ?

01-29-10, 12:17 AM	#2
FIREWALL Eternal Patrol Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: CATALINA IS. SO . CAL USA Posts: 10,108 Downloads: 511 Uploads: 0	The Sky is Falling. __________________ RIP FIREWALL I Play GWX. Silent Hunter Who ???

01-29-10, 12:30 AM	#3
Task Force Rear Admiral Join Date: Jul 2008 Location: SPACE!!!! Posts: 10,142 Downloads: 85 Uploads: 0	hmm... yep, would have been nice to see a moon landing with modern stuff... (ex modern cameras, image quality, ect.) This new president was a bad idea... like the old one... and probably the next... (they seem to just get dumber and dumber...) __________________ Task Force industries "Taking control of the world, one mind at a time"

01-29-10, 11:52 AM	#4
Skybird Soaring Join Date: Sep 2001 Location: the mental asylum named Germany Posts: 42,721 Downloads: 10 Uploads: 0	Colonising space, somebody said. Wowh, that are very big words. Think again. I love Science Fiction. I am fascinated by stellar conquest. And desoite my sympathy for that, I still know the difference between fiction, and reality. If a nation and an economy and state finances and a society are in a condition like the American example, or the West in general, then going to the moon simply is nothing more than a feel-good project that is close to the principle of panem et circenses. Always wanting new toys to play around with, is one thing. Being able to finance them, is something different. And NASA - belongs to the biggest debtor on Earth. To my surprise, ten days or two weeks ago I stumbled into a TV documentary on the ISS, and what stunned me is that now that it is almost ready and finished in construction - they have difficulties to get customers booking time onboard of it to conduct their experimental designs. From the perspective of ESA it is not sure that NASA even has any long-termed interest in keeping the station alive, even more so with the Shuttle approaching it's decommission date, and all solutions thought about to supply the station in prinicple are little more than provisional arrangements. There are more important things to think about than the moon. Getting a succeeding system for the shuttle, for example. Hopping around on the moon may deliver nice pics to please the crowds at home and make them waving flags and voting for you - but it does little more than just that. And sending half a dozen people, or even a hundred people, to the moon, or Mars, hardly is "colonising space". You do not become a sailor by dipping your toe in the sand at the beach. It's religion for some people to believe we could solve our problems on Earth in space, but trying to do so would only mean to continue thinking we must not change, and would result in us bringing the same mental attitude that made us creating our problems on Earth to a small space camp out there. And then our problems sooner or later would beging again. Because we have not learned anything. First we bring our house in order, if that is still possible. Then we start thinking about colonising space, if we are bored then. If we cannot bring our house in order, and cannot change our messy behaviours, then the questions must be asked whether we really deserve to reach the stars one day, and whether we really deserve to survive in the evolutionary process. The latter usually is taken for granted - but I reject the claimed naturalness of that assumption. And in the end the judge of that problem with our design will not be man, or man-made ethics and morals and imagined deities, but ol' mother nature who let's us live. Or not. __________________ If you feel nuts, consult an expert.

01-29-10, 12:33 PM	#5
FIREWALL Eternal Patrol Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: CATALINA IS. SO . CAL USA Posts: 10,108 Downloads: 511 Uploads: 0	@ Skybird Very good points you made. __________________ RIP FIREWALL I Play GWX. Silent Hunter Who ???

02-01-10, 07:43 PM	#7
Oberon Lucky Jack Join Date: Jul 2002 Posts: 25,976 Downloads: 61 Uploads: 20	Well, it's officially dead but the ISS has been extended to beyond 2016 so that's one glimmer of hope in this bleak news. This is going to haunt Obama in the southern states, particularly the launcher states, Florida and the like, they're not exactly keen on him at the moment. However, on the other hand it's not as if the west has money to throw around at the moment. Moving a lot of the work over into the private sectors and giving them greater backing could well pay off in more designs like Spaceship One and an increase in space traffic, although sadly the costs of said endeavors measured against the current financial problems means that not many companies would be willing to take the risk unless a financial reward was guaranteed. I can see where this is coming from, but I don't like it, no more than I like the idea of the Shuttle fleet going out of service before a replacement has been created. This is something that should have been sorted a decade ago, but I guess budget cuts and the like have always put NASA on the back burner. I personally think that we need the ability to travel within the solar system, because I can't see things getting any better on this planet and so for the continued survival of the human race in some shape or form, we need a group of people not to be here when it eventually all goes wrong. Of course, you have the problem that if that same group of people make the same mistakes all over again then what's the blooming point, but at the very least they should have the option to make those mistakes, at the very least we should have them there. If they make the same mistakes and kill themselves off, well then, nothing ventured nothing gained. The clock is ticking but people don't seem to be listening to it!