Space travel by humans is not possible now

Human space travel is a big source of profits for aerospace companies.

The advantages are that the scientific returns are very low or zero, so
there is no need to spend money paying scientists to gather and
understand data, all the profits go in building hardware that is
used for a few days/weeks and the thrown away.

In the ISS, for instance, billions have been paid to aerospace
industries for hardware that has produced not a single intersting
scientific result, and that has dwarfed the budget of science within
NASA.

Take for instance a mission like the Mars Rovers. After four years in
Mars, those machines are still working perfectly, returning scientific
data and allowing the exploration of Mars in an unprecedented scale.

The total budget of the Mars rovers was around 900 million, and it has
returned gigabytes of data, measurements, photographs, etc.

This is more or less what a single trip of the space shuttle costs.

In this group, one of the most vocal advocates of this "humans
into space and to hell with science" is Mr McCall, that will not
hesitate to insult anyone disagreeing with his views.

Mostly his arguments are just at the level of

"bull ****"

or

"stupid".

Personally I do not care, but facts are stubborn. Human presence
in space is unnecessary, even more so in the moon. The basic
groundwork is not there, in terms of working life support
systems that can stay in space for 4 years without any failure.

It can be argued that astronauts can "fix" a life support system,
and this is partially true, but it depends heavily on the type
of failu to repair a life support system you need a life support
system that keeps you alive.

There is an emergency escape frm the ISS. That choice is not available
halfway from the distance to Mars.

This is a basic UNSOLVED problem.

Space radiation is another, completely unsolved one. The experience
of the ISS is of no use since the earth magnetic field protects the
ISS, a protection that people in the way to Mars will not have.

This is another UNSOLVED problem.

Gravity effects (or rather its absence) is another problem. We just
do not know since we have no data about the long term effects on
the body of 2 years without gravity. It is a fact that exercise
and countermeasures do NOT work, and there is a continuous bone
mass loss in space.

This is another UNSOLVED problem.

You can say that "artificial gravity" etc, but the problems to solve to
put that to work are quite big.

Another unsolved problem is how to land in Mars, what is a very
difficult problem that is very complex to solve for small
mass vehicles and completely unknown for huge mass vehicles
like a spaceship with 4 people and its life support, supposing the
2-3 years supplies are previously sent to Mars by robots.

This host of problems (all of them unsolved) makes any proposition for
manned Mars missions just a waste of money.

All of this problems CAN be solved, and (I am sure) they WILL be solved,
but not before this century has finished.

A new society is needed to give the drive to go into space. A society
that cares about exploration and that is ready to pay make the effort
it will take to develop a life-support system that can take us to the
stars.

Before that life support system is there, all the things being
done here are just pipe dreams.

--
jacob navia
jacob at jacob point remcomp point fr
logiciels/informatique
http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~lcc-win32

On Jan 19, 5:35*pm, jacob navia wrote:
Human space travel is a big source of profits for aerospace companies.

The advantages are that the scientific returns are very low or zero, so
there is no need to spend money paying scientists to gather and
understand data, all the profits go in building hardware that is
used for a few days/weeks and the thrown away.

In the ISS, for instance, billions have been paid to aerospace
industries for hardware that has produced not a single intersting
scientific result, and that has dwarfed the budget of science within
NASA.

Take for instance a mission like the Mars Rovers. After four years in
Mars, those machines are still working perfectly, returning scientific
data and allowing the exploration of Mars in an unprecedented scale.

The total budget of the Mars rovers was around 900 million, and it has
returned gigabytes of data, measurements, photographs, etc.

This is more or less what a single trip of the space shuttle costs.

In this group, one of the most vocal advocates of this "humans
into space and to hell with science" is Mr McCall, that will not
hesitate to insult anyone disagreeing with his views.

Mostly his arguments are just at the level of

"bull ****"

or

"stupid".

Personally I do not care, but facts are stubborn. Human presence
in space is unnecessary, even more so in the moon. The basic
groundwork is not there, in terms of *working life support
systems that can stay in space for 4 years without any failure.

It can be argued that astronauts can "fix" a life support system,
and this is partially true, but it depends heavily on the type
of failu to repair a life support system you need a life support
system that keeps you alive.

There is an emergency escape frm the ISS. That choice is not available
halfway from the distance to Mars.

This is a basic UNSOLVED problem.

Space radiation is another, completely unsolved one. The experience
of the ISS is of no use since the earth magnetic field protects the
ISS, a protection that people in the way to Mars will not have.

This is another UNSOLVED problem.

Gravity effects (or rather its absence) is another problem. We just
do not know since we have no data about the long term effects on
the body of 2 years without gravity. It is a fact that exercise
and countermeasures do NOT work, and there is a continuous bone
mass loss in space.

This is another UNSOLVED problem.

You can say that "artificial gravity" etc, but the problems to solve to
put that to work are quite big.

Another unsolved problem is how to land in Mars, what is a very
difficult problem *that is very complex to solve for small
mass vehicles and completely unknown for huge mass vehicles
like a spaceship with 4 people and its life support, supposing the
2-3 years supplies are previously sent to Mars by robots.

This host of problems (all of them unsolved) makes any proposition for
manned Mars missions just a waste of money.

All of this problems CAN be solved, and (I am sure) they WILL be solved,
but not before this century has finished.

A new society is needed to give the drive to go into space. A society
that cares about exploration and that is ready to pay make the effort
it will take to develop a life-support system that can take us to the
stars.

Before that life support system is there, all the things being
done here are just pipe dreams.

--
jacob navia
jacob at jacob point remcomp point fr
logiciels/informatiquehttp://www.cs.virginia.edu/~lcc-win32

Balony. A Human mission to Mars is just a presidents command away.
That command is only one phone call, one fax, or one email from you
away.

www.actionforspace.com is the new place on the internet with a direct
pipeline to the candidates. Go to www.actionforspace.com to email,
fax, and call ALL of the candidates and get space on the national
agenda!

www.actionforspace.com

wrote:

Balony. A Human mission to Mars is just a presidents command away.
That command is only one phone call, one fax, or one email from you
away.

Not this president. Not this lame duck.

Of course, a human mission to Mars is possible. Unless of course
insurmountable obstacles are encountered along the way, and there's no
way of knowing that in a advance. Would probably take decades. Would
certainly cost a staggering amount of taxpayer's money.

First, we've got to pay off the Iraq war debt.

The whole endeavor could easily end in disaster, just like a couple of
shuttle flights have. It's risky enough sending people into low earth
orbit, something we've been doing since the 60s.

The Apollo missions were a great success. Part of that was luck. Most
of it was due to the proximity of the moon. And probably the only
reason it was funded was Cold War rivalry with the Russkies.

jacob navia wrote:

:Human space travel is a big source of profits for aerospace companies.
:
:The advantages are that the scientific returns are very low or zero, so
:there is no need to spend money paying scientists to gather and
:understand data, all the profits go in building hardware that is
:used for a few days/weeks and the thrown away.
:

This is the silliest remark I've seen in some time, and Usenet is
known for loons making silly remarks.

:
:In this group, one of the most vocal advocates of this "humans
:into space and to hell with science" is Mr McCall, ...
:

You are, of course, a liar. I merely note the facts which you persist
in ignoring.

Mr Navia is, of course, the foremost proponent of "everything but what
I want is impossible, so give me what I want".

:
:... that will not
:hesitate to insult anyone disagreeing with his views.
:
:Mostly his arguments are just at the level of
:
:"bull ****"
:
r
:
:"stupid".
:

Neither of which is an insult when it comes to the tripe you spew.
Rather, they are somewhat mild characterizations of the quality of
your 'views'.

:
:Personally I do not care, but facts are stubborn. Human presence
:in space is unnecessary, even more so in the moon. The basic
:groundwork is not there, in terms of working life support
:systems that can stay in space for 4 years without any failure.
:

Merely engineering. Not even rocket science, really.

Hint: ISS has had continuous occupation for over 7 years now.

:
:It can be argued that astronauts can "fix" a life support system,
:and this is partially true, but it depends heavily on the type
f failu to repair a life support system you need a life support
:system that keeps you alive.
:
:There is an emergency escape frm the ISS. That choice is not available
:halfway from the distance to Mars.
:

It's also never been needed for ISS. One more time...


Hint: ISS has had continuous occupation for over 7 years now.

:
:This is a basic UNSOLVED problem.
:
:Space radiation is another, completely unsolved one. The experience
f the ISS is of no use since the earth magnetic field protects the
:ISS, a protection that people in the way to Mars will not have.
:
:This is another UNSOLVED problem.
:

A 300 ton mission with 30 tons or less of shielding lowers radiation
exposure on a 30 month mission to allowable levels. Some of the new
materials being looked at lower the shielding requirement to only 5
tons.

:
:Gravity effects (or rather its absence) is another problem. We just
:do not know since we have no data about the long term effects on
:the body of 2 years without gravity. It is a fact that exercise
:and countermeasures do NOT work, and there is a continuous bone
:mass loss in space.
:
:This is another UNSOLVED problem.
:
:You can say that "artificial gravity" etc, but the problems to solve to
ut that to work are quite big.
:

Not especially, no. This is, in point of fact, one of the easier
problems to solve.

:
:Another unsolved problem is how to land in Mars, what is a very
:difficult problem that is very complex to solve for small
:mass vehicles and completely unknown for huge mass vehicles
:like a spaceship with 4 people and its life support, supposing the
:2-3 years supplies are previously sent to Mars by robots.
:
:This host of problems (all of them unsolved) makes any proposition for
:manned Mars missions just a waste of money.
:

Yeah, heaven forfend that we actually try to SOLVE problems.

:
:All of this problems CAN be solved, and (I am sure) they WILL be solved,
:but not before this century has finished.
:

The same sort of list of 'problems' can be put together for your
robots. Guess we should stop trying to do that, too.

:
:A new society is needed to give the drive to go into space. A society
:that cares about exploration and that is ready to pay make the effort
:it will take to develop a life-support system that can take us to the
:stars.
:
:Before that life support system is there, all the things being
:done here are just pipe dreams.
:

To you. But then, you are obviously a man of very small talent,
limited intellect, and tiny imagination.


--
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable
man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore,
all progress depends on the unreasonable man."
--George Bernard Shaw

On 20 Jan, 01:35, jacob navia wrote:
Human space travel is a big source of profits for aerospace companies.

The advantages are that the scientific returns are very low or zero, so
there is no need to spend money paying scientists to gather and
understand data, all the profits go in building hardware that is
used for a few days/weeks and the thrown away.

In the ISS, for instance, billions have been paid to aerospace
industries for hardware that has produced not a single intersting
scientific result, and that has dwarfed the budget of science within
NASA.

The ISS is I think a very profound point. Its proponents say that a
great deal can be learned by working in microgravity etc. The point is
however that automatic technology has developed far faster than the
concepts of the ISS. All the experiments could be done much more
cheaply using automation, or at least telepresence.

Take for instance a mission like the Mars Rovers. After four years in
Mars, those machines are still working perfectly, returning scientific
data and allowing the exploration of Mars in an unprecedented scale.

The total budget of the Mars rovers was around 900 million, and it has
returned gigabytes of data, measurements, photographs, etc.

This is more or less what a single trip of the space shuttle costs.

To find out more about Mars what we need is an agile rover that can
drill. We would want faster travel than the present rovers and we
would expect a large number of locations on Mars to be examined.

BTW - A manned Mars expedition would in point of fact be confined to
one location. There would be immovable living accommodation and
exploration would be fitted round that.

Personally I do not care, but facts are stubborn. Human presence
in space is unnecessary, even more so in the moon. The basic
groundwork is not there, in terms of *working life support
systems that can stay in space for 4 years without any failure.

It can be argued that astronauts can "fix" a life support system,
and this is partially true, but it depends heavily on the type
of failu to repair a life support system you need a life support
system that keeps you alive.

What you should do if you really want to avoid failure is send a swarm
to Mars. A "swarm" means that you have a number of identical robotic
systems with a full range of spare parts. This avoids one small
failure scuppering a mission.

There is an emergency escape frm the ISS. That choice is not available
halfway from the distance to Mars.

This is a basic UNSOLVED problem.

Space radiation is another, completely unsolved one. The experience
of the ISS is of no use since the earth magnetic field protects the
ISS, a protection that people in the way to Mars will not have.

This is another UNSOLVED problem.

Gravity effects (or rather its absence) is another problem. We just
do not know since we have no data about the long term effects on
the body of 2 years without gravity. It is a fact that exercise
and countermeasures do NOT work, and there is a continuous bone
mass loss in space.

This is another UNSOLVED problem.

You can say that "artificial gravity" etc, but the problems to solve to
put that to work are quite big.

Another unsolved problem is how to land in Mars, what is a very
difficult problem *that is very complex to solve for small
mass vehicles and completely unknown for huge mass vehicles
like a spaceship with 4 people and its life support, supposing the
2-3 years supplies are previously sent to Mars by robots.

This host of problems (all of them unsolved) makes any proposition for
manned Mars missions just a waste of money.

All of this problems CAN be solved, and (I am sure) they WILL be solved,
but not before this century has finished.

You can always solve problems by throwing money at them. One idea for
articial gravity is to take the last stage of the rocket, attach it by
a cable to the spacecraft and spin the assemblage.

A new society is needed to give the drive to go into space. A society
that cares about exploration and that is ready to pay make the effort
it will take to develop a life-support system that can take us to the
stars.

Before that life support system is there, all the things being
done here are just pipe dreams.

I have read some correspondence to your post, a lot of it critical. I
think we need to sk a number of questions.

1) What is the best way of exploring Mars in the scientific sense? I
think the answer to that question is fairly obvious to anyone who
thinks about it in an unbiased way.

2) What is the best way to inspire our young people? The answer to
that is not quite so self evident. People often say it is manned
exploration. I wonder. I tend to feel that perhaps the best way to
inspire might well be a competition. There have been a number of
competitions. The 200km "race" round Las Vegas followed by the "Urban
Challenge". There has also been a competition for automatic Arabic
translation.

I notice that you are French. I am British, just the other side of the
sleeve (La Manche). I have always felt that a scientific effort of any
sort should be international. I also feel that any large scale
commercial project should have international backing and support. "The
president should give his approval" indicates that the belief is that
the US should go it alone. This to me is very dangerous.


- Ian Parker

Ian Parker wrote

1) What is the best way of exploring Mars in the scientific sense? I
think the answer to that question is fairly obvious to anyone who
thinks about it in an unbiased way.

2) What is the best way to inspire our young people? The answer to
that is not quite so self evident. People often say it is manned
exploration. I wonder.

Ah, but the proposed mission to Mars really isn't about scientific
exporation, any more than the Apollo project was. It's about national
prestige. Science is mere window dressing, an attempt to rationalize an
essentially irrational endeavor.

And what is this irrational endeavor, at heart? It's an attempt to
invoke "the spirit of Columbus". That is, since mankind has tradionally
conducted exploration by sending men in vessels, we should continue to
do it that way. Even though we now have a better way, a cheaper, safer,
more effective way. The manned space program isn't forward-looking, but
quite the opposite. It is nostalgic. Nostalgia for Columbus, nostalgia
for Buck Rogers and the pulp heroes of the 1950s.

Paulf Foley wrote:


Ian Parker wrote

1) What is the best way of exploring Mars in the scientific sense? I
think the answer to that question is fairly obvious to anyone who
thinks about it in an unbiased way.

2) What is the best way to inspire our young people? The answer to
that is not quite so self evident. People often say it is manned
exploration. I wonder.
Ah, but the proposed mission to Mars really isn't about scientific
exporation, any more than the Apollo project was. It's about national
prestige. Science is mere window dressing, an attempt to rationalize an
essentially irrational endeavor.

And what is this irrational endeavor, at heart? It's an attempt to
invoke "the spirit of Columbus". That is, since mankind has tradionally
conducted exploration by sending men in vessels, we should continue to
do it that way. Even though we now have a better way, a cheaper, safer,
more effective way. The manned space program isn't forward-looking, but
quite the opposite. It is nostalgic. Nostalgia for Columbus, nostalgia
for Buck Rogers and the pulp heroes of the 1950s.

This is normal. People just do not realize how different the vast
space ocean is from all other oceans that we crossed in the past.

Many people think it is essentially the same. Science fiction stories
told them that it is the same, the moon landings told them it is the
same.

And now many believe that is the same.

But it is not. Space is completely different from all we know,
from all we have experienced so far. The old schemes do not work any
more because there wasn't EVER a living being that went into space.

Robots, and later symbionts of humans and robots will go there. The life
support system will evolve and become perfect, like the life support
system we have now.

We come from water.

We stayed there for almost 2 BILLION years. Until we developed slowly
a life support that allowed us to live in the land. We carried the ocean
with us.

We developed a resistant skin, and a way of using the air instead of
water to breathe.

We will carry the air with us, and we will have to develop a way of
living from the sun's energy in space directly, using a 100% recyclable
thin "atmosphere" that we will carry with us.

This will need progress in genetics and progress in a science that
hasn't even started today: the science of modifications to the body
at the molecular level to make it withstand radiation and vacuum.

Now, we need to carry our oxygen supply, our water supply, etc. In
the next century we will be able to withstand radiation with no damage
since we will modify our gene-repairing mechanism to work more
efficiently and let us survive in space.

Symbiosis with plants can allow us to use solar energy to produce
oxygen from energy of solar radiation, using the CO2 of breathing as
fuel.

A closed circuit "skin" that will integrate completely the life support.

All of this is possible, but it is too far away into the future.
Exploration NOW means realizing that we can't go into space until we
have that kind of system.

So we will send sensors first. We will explore through our machines,
actually we always did that. Explorer used their machines of the time
(ships, planes, whatever) to explore, they weren't naked.

This will be even more true in space. Machines will be absolutely
necessary to survive in an extremely hostile environment.

There are always people that will be entangled in the past, and repeat
again and again the old mantra of "exploring must be done by humans".

Poor guys, they will be very disappointed when they see that exploration
is completely different. Space is not like the earth. It is completely
different.


--
jacob navia
jacob at jacob point remcomp point fr
logiciels/informatique
http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~lcc-win32

jacob navia wrote:
Paulf Foley wrote:


Ian Parker wrote

1) What is the best way of exploring Mars in the scientific sense? I
think the answer to that question is fairly obvious to anyone who
thinks about it in an unbiased way.

2) What is the best way to inspire our young people? The answer to
that is not quite so self evident. People often say it is manned
exploration. I wonder.
Ah, but the proposed mission to Mars really isn't about scientific
exporation, any more than the Apollo project was. It's about national
prestige. Science is mere window dressing, an attempt to rationalize
an essentially irrational endeavor.

And what is this irrational endeavor, at heart? It's an attempt to
invoke "the spirit of Columbus". That is, since mankind has
tradionally conducted exploration by sending men in vessels, we should
continue to do it that way. Even though we now have a better way, a
cheaper, safer, more effective way. The manned space program isn't
forward-looking, but quite the opposite. It is nostalgic. Nostalgia
for Columbus, nostalgia for Buck Rogers and the pulp heroes of the 1950s.

This is normal. People just do not realize how different the vast
space ocean is from all other oceans that we crossed in the past.

Many people think it is essentially the same. Science fiction stories
told them that it is the same, the moon landings told them it is the
same.

And now many believe that is the same.

But it is not. Space is completely different from all we know,
from all we have experienced so far. The old schemes do not work any
more because there wasn't EVER a living being that went into space.

Robots, and later symbionts of humans and robots will go there. The life
support system will evolve and become perfect, like the life support
system we have now.

We come from water.

We stayed there for almost 2 BILLION years. Until we developed slowly
a life support that allowed us to live in the land. We carried the ocean
with us.

We developed a resistant skin, and a way of using the air instead of
water to breathe.

We will carry the air with us, and we will have to develop a way of
living from the sun's energy in space directly, using a 100% recyclable
thin "atmosphere" that we will carry with us.

This will need progress in genetics and progress in a science that
hasn't even started today: the science of modifications to the body
at the molecular level to make it withstand radiation and vacuum.

Now, we need to carry our oxygen supply, our water supply, etc. In
the next century we will be able to withstand radiation with no damage
since we will modify our gene-repairing mechanism to work more
efficiently and let us survive in space.

Symbiosis with plants can allow us to use solar energy to produce
oxygen from energy of solar radiation, using the CO2 of breathing as
fuel.

A closed circuit "skin" that will integrate completely the life support.

All of this is possible, but it is too far away into the future.
Exploration NOW means realizing that we can't go into space until we
have that kind of system.

So we will send sensors first. We will explore through our machines,
actually we always did that. Explorer used their machines of the time
(ships, planes, whatever) to explore, they weren't naked.

This will be even more true in space. Machines will be absolutely
necessary to survive in an extremely hostile environment.

There are always people that will be entangled in the past, and repeat
again and again the old mantra of "exploring must be done by humans".

Poor guys, they will be very disappointed when they see that exploration
is completely different. Space is not like the earth. It is completely
different.

You're right, in the near term, until we fully understand what we are
doing, and why we are doing it, space is for flying, not exploring.

Robots can do the exploring, and mostly they aren't exploring space,
they are exploring objects that happen to reside in space.

For humans flying in space in the near term, low earth orbit and
geosynchronous orbit are adequate, LEO for radiation protection, and GEO
for 24 hour sunlight, and getting some radiation protection experience.

The whole 'humans exploring space' mantra is remarkably naive.

On Jan 20, 4:56 pm, kT wrote:

Robots can do the exploring, and mostly they aren't exploring space,
they are exploring objects that happen to reside in space.

For humans flying in space in the near term, low earth orbit and
geosynchronous orbit are adequate, LEO for radiation protection, and GEO
for 24 hour sunlight, and getting some radiation protection experience.

The whole 'humans exploring space' mantra is remarkably naive.

Hmm, I think humans need to get out there in the long run. However,
the emphasis ought to be on cost effective robotic crafts in the
nearterm. There is no reason for humans themselves to go beyond the
Earth/Moon system, for the next few decates.

Basigly, we need technological improvements as well as improved
reliability. As a result, I´m an advocate of going back to the Moon,
as it´s nearby and also because it´s hostile enough being there for
technological fixes applied there being applicaple once we begin to
emerge into deepspace from the Earth/Moon system.

In the meantime actual manned travel ought to be brief, and only done
when actually useful to do so. Eventually, going to Mars will be
useful...but not till many more robotic mission have been sent there.

There are things that humans can do that robots can´t. However, there
is yet so much untapped potential for these robotic missions that it´s
much more sensible to focus on them in the near term.

It´s really mainly once something really interesting has been found by
a robotic mission, that a reason for sending humans might arise.

Einar

On Sun, 20 Jan 2008 22:42:44 +0100, in a place far, far away, jacob
navia made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such
a way as to indicate that:

This is normal. People just do not realize how different the vast
space ocean is from all other oceans that we crossed in the past.

Of course they do. Certainly people in this newsgroup do.

Many people think it is essentially the same. Science fiction stories
told them that it is the same, the moon landings told them it is the
same.

They told us no such thing.

Please provide a single example of someone who "thinks it is the
same," or abandon your latest foolish straw man.