NASA Back to Moon by 2018 - But WHY ?

On 19 Sep 2005 15:46:52 -0700, "Crash" wrote:


Actually,

The Hubble telescope recently spotted the Titlelist that Buzz Aldrin
was was whacking around.

Ahem. You misspelled "Alan Shepard".

Brian

"B1ackwater" wrote in message
...
(CNN) -- NASA Administrator Michael Griffin rolled out NASA's plan for
the future Monday, including new details about the spaceship intended
to replace the shuttle and a timeline for returning astronauts to the
moon in 2018.



OK - the question is "WHY ?". A few people for a few days at
a time ... it's just not worth doing (except to enrich certain
aerospace companies).

While doing the 'final frontier' thing is appealing, there just
HAS to be a little cost/benifit thinking done first. Describing
this particular endeavour as "Apollo on steroids" is quite apt -
because it doesn't seem to accomplish much beyond what Apollo
accomplished, just a little more of it for a lot more money.

IMHO, we should not return people to the moon until they're
in a position to STAY there, with plenty of company. This
means a whole different sort of program - with the first
phases being entirely robotic. First of all, a supply of
water MUST be found and exploited. Secondly, habitats and
equipment for a growing colony MUST be in place. Only then
should people start arriving.

I know they found at least one decent water supply in a crater filled with
ice on the dark side.
One decent fiction book I read had humans terraforming Mars by crashing
comets into the planet's surface - comets rich in frozen nitrogen, oxygen,
water, etc. Are there enough asteroids in the belt with water that it might
be worth fetching some to put on Mars or the moon?

Robots can explore, robots can drill and mine, robots can
construct habitats from imported and natural materials,
robots can assemble equipment - and do it cheaply, safely
and well. Any moon colony should be set up from the get-go
to be perpetually self-sustaining ... because financing it
from earth would be a perpetual and heavy drain on cash and
resources.

Agreed. I'd hate to be colonists on the moon depending on one party staying
in power.

In any event, it never hurts to put our eggs in more than
one planetary basket, but the next step is to MAKE the
damned basket rather than just shuttle veritible tourists
to the moon and back and watch them do pretty much exactly
what their predecessors did before. The 'next step' isn't
one of volume, doing more of the same old crap, but a whole
different paradigm - colonization. THAT will be worth the
money and effort.

The USA will fall, as all empires fall, but what a legacy to leave behind -
a colonized Moon, Mars or colonies in the asteroid belts.
Sadly I don't think the current administration is serious about space, and
the Democrats can't seem to get excited about it either. My fear is that
it'll be the Muslims or Chinese who actually get around to colonizing space
while the USA twiddles it's thumbs. What a waste.

abracadabra wrote:
"B1ackwater" wrote in message
...
(CNN) -- NASA Administrator Michael Griffin rolled out NASA's plan for
the future Monday, including new details about the spaceship intended
to replace the shuttle and a timeline for returning astronauts to the
moon in 2018.



OK - the question is "WHY ?". A few people for a few days at
a time ... it's just not worth doing (except to enrich certain
aerospace companies).

While doing the 'final frontier' thing is appealing, there just
HAS to be a little cost/benifit thinking done first. Describing
this particular endeavour as "Apollo on steroids" is quite apt -
because it doesn't seem to accomplish much beyond what Apollo
accomplished, just a little more of it for a lot more money.

IMHO, we should not return people to the moon until they're
in a position to STAY there, with plenty of company. This
means a whole different sort of program - with the first
phases being entirely robotic. First of all, a supply of
water MUST be found and exploited. Secondly, habitats and
equipment for a growing colony MUST be in place. Only then
should people start arriving.

I know they found at least one decent water supply in a crater filled with
ice on the dark side.

Not precisely, They think water is there, but not absolutely proven.


One decent fiction book I read had humans terraforming Mars by crashing
comets into the planet's surface - comets rich in frozen nitrogen, oxygen,
water, etc. Are there enough asteroids in the belt with water that it might
be worth fetching some to put on Mars or the moon?

Asteroid belt, no. Try Kuiper belt and Oort Cloud. Also, moons,
starting with Jupiter outwards, are rich with H20 and other necessary
volatiles. Robotic vehicles could being back all that would be needed
to support a Moon and Mars habitat.



Robots can explore, robots can drill and mine, robots can
construct habitats from imported and natural materials,
robots can assemble equipment - and do it cheaply, safely
and well. Any moon colony should be set up from the get-go
to be perpetually self-sustaining ... because financing it
from earth would be a perpetual and heavy drain on cash and
resources.

Agreed. I'd hate to be colonists on the moon depending on one party staying
in power.

In any event, it never hurts to put our eggs in more than
one planetary basket, but the next step is to MAKE the
damned basket rather than just shuttle veritible tourists
to the moon and back and watch them do pretty much exactly
what their predecessors did before. The 'next step' isn't
one of volume, doing more of the same old crap, but a whole
different paradigm - colonization. THAT will be worth the
money and effort.

The USA will fall, as all empires fall, but what a legacy to leave behind -
a colonized Moon, Mars or colonies in the asteroid belts.
Sadly I don't think the current administration is serious about space, and
the Democrats can't seem to get excited about it either. My fear is that
it'll be the Muslims or Chinese who actually get around to colonizing space
while the USA twiddles it's thumbs. What a waste.

On 19 Sep 2005 17:48:18 -0700, wrote:


abracadabra wrote:
"B1ackwater" wrote in message
...
(CNN) -- NASA Administrator Michael Griffin rolled out NASA's plan for
the future Monday, including new details about the spaceship intended
to replace the shuttle and a timeline for returning astronauts to the
moon in 2018.



OK - the question is "WHY ?". A few people for a few days at
a time ... it's just not worth doing (except to enrich certain
aerospace companies).

While doing the 'final frontier' thing is appealing, there just
HAS to be a little cost/benifit thinking done first. Describing
this particular endeavour as "Apollo on steroids" is quite apt -
because it doesn't seem to accomplish much beyond what Apollo
accomplished, just a little more of it for a lot more money.

IMHO, we should not return people to the moon until they're
in a position to STAY there, with plenty of company. This
means a whole different sort of program - with the first
phases being entirely robotic. First of all, a supply of
water MUST be found and exploited. Secondly, habitats and
equipment for a growing colony MUST be in place. Only then
should people start arriving.

I know they found at least one decent water supply in a crater filled with
ice on the dark side.

Not precisely, They think water is there, but not absolutely proven.

There is no dark side of the moon really ...

There are a few perpetually-dark PLACES however, a few
craters near the poles. If there's any surface ice, those
would be the spots. Sub-surface ice, probably still near
the poles, but it would have to be pretty deep lest it
sublime out into space. Hydrated minerals ... better
chance of finding them, although the H20 extraction
becomes more energy-intensive.

One decent fiction book I read had humans terraforming Mars by crashing
comets into the planet's surface - comets rich in frozen nitrogen, oxygen,
water, etc. Are there enough asteroids in the belt with water that it might
be worth fetching some to put on Mars or the moon?

I once advocated smashing-up europa and directing some
of the ice towards a gentle collision with mars. You'd
want a few comets too - for the nitrogen compounds.

Asteroid belt, no. Try Kuiper belt and Oort Cloud. Also, moons,
starting with Jupiter outwards, are rich with H20 and other necessary
volatiles. Robotic vehicles could being back all that would be needed
to support a Moon and Mars habitat.

'Habitat' yes ... but what about a CITY, or ten ?

Unless substantial SCALE is in the picture here, the moon
would be a perpetual, severe, money loser.

Robots can explore, robots can drill and mine, robots can
construct habitats from imported and natural materials,
robots can assemble equipment - and do it cheaply, safely
and well. Any moon colony should be set up from the get-go
to be perpetually self-sustaining ... because financing it
from earth would be a perpetual and heavy drain on cash and
resources.

Agreed. I'd hate to be colonists on the moon depending on one
party staying in power.

Aw ... they could apply for WELFARE if the Dems took charge :-)

In any event, it never hurts to put our eggs in more than
one planetary basket, but the next step is to MAKE the
damned basket rather than just shuttle veritible tourists
to the moon and back and watch them do pretty much exactly
what their predecessors did before. The 'next step' isn't
one of volume, doing more of the same old crap, but a whole
different paradigm - colonization. THAT will be worth the
money and effort.

The USA will fall, as all empires fall, but what a legacy to leave behind -
a colonized Moon, Mars or colonies in the asteroid belts.

The USA isn't an 'empire' in the traditional sense. It
is just a LARGE commercial bloc constantly fiddling with
things to improve its supply and trade position. More of
a "money empire" than a hands-on empire like those of old.

But it WILL fall, or at least seriously mutate, sooner or
later. All civilizations seem accumulate errors as they
go along and eventually the cumulative burden drags them
down or shatters them. Most of the olde tyme empires did
not recognize the fallacy of empire - that conquest skims
the most cherry assets from a territory right away, but
from there on you must administer and defend that territory
even though it's no longer 'rich'. Defense is expensive
and administration, well, errors accumulate.

Sadly I don't think the current administration is serious about space,

It's more of a distraction. They aren't even really DOING
anything about their alleged plans ... any of the gigabuck
contracts for rockets and other equipment would take many
years to even make it onto paper.

and
the Democrats can't seem to get excited about it either.

They want to spend it on midnight basketball or something.
Of course you can ALWAYS find a "more worthy cause" here
at home. The Dems sometimes don't seem to understand that
by investing in new frontiers you can make MORE money and
opportunity. That can pay for all the social programs and
much more.

My fear is that
it'll be the Muslims or Chinese who actually get around to colonizing space
while the USA twiddles it's thumbs. What a waste.

I'd bet on the Chinese. Already they're buddying-up with
the Russians and India will eventually join that little
club as well. Looks as if we're going to be left out in
the cold. Hmmm ... maybe that will be motivational ? Still,
I don't know if you can properly calculate orbits using
'bible math' and 'bible science' ... :-)

B1ackwater wrote:
abracadabra wrote:

My fear is that
it'll be the Muslims or Chinese who actually get around to colonizing space
while the USA twiddles it's thumbs. What a waste.

I'd bet on the Chinese. Already they're buddying-up with
the Russians and India will eventually join that little
club as well.

I'd bet on the coming world depression bursting the
Chinese bubble to a large extent, the way it did for
the five tigers. Sure they recover; but it takes
time and distracts from toys (which such a project
would be).

I also don't see India and China getting together
except in opposition to the US and the EU. Brazil
and India feels a better fit. I go with Orson Scott
Card in that sense (Shadow series).

Looks as if we're going to be left out in
the cold. Hmmm ... maybe that will be motivational ? Still,
I don't know if you can properly calculate orbits using
'bible math' and 'bible science' ... :-)

Perhaps they could compromise on epicycles.


--


http://homepages.cs.ncl.ac.uk/chris.holt

B1ackwater wrote:
On 19 Sep 2005 17:48:18 -0700, wrote:


abracadabra wrote:
"B1ackwater" wrote in message
...
(CNN) -- NASA Administrator Michael Griffin rolled out NASA's plan for
the future Monday, including new details about the spaceship intended
to replace the shuttle and a timeline for returning astronauts to the
moon in 2018.



OK - the question is "WHY ?". A few people for a few days at
a time ... it's just not worth doing (except to enrich certain
aerospace companies).

While doing the 'final frontier' thing is appealing, there just
HAS to be a little cost/benifit thinking done first. Describing
this particular endeavour as "Apollo on steroids" is quite apt -
because it doesn't seem to accomplish much beyond what Apollo
accomplished, just a little more of it for a lot more money.

IMHO, we should not return people to the moon until they're
in a position to STAY there, with plenty of company. This
means a whole different sort of program - with the first
phases being entirely robotic. First of all, a supply of
water MUST be found and exploited. Secondly, habitats and
equipment for a growing colony MUST be in place. Only then
should people start arriving.

I know they found at least one decent water supply in a crater filled with
ice on the dark side.

Not precisely, They think water is there, but not absolutely proven.

There is no dark side of the moon really ...

Which I am well aware of. I screwed up my post and lost several
paragraphs. I have a Gateway Athlon 64 laptop and the keyboard somehow
mixes up keys and weird things begin happening. Tech support gave me a
set of keystrokes to reset the keyboard (FN+ScrollLock; there is a FN
key on their laptop). I can't touch type (don't have enough sensivitity
in my fingers to detect the ridges on the F & J keys) so I'm not
looking at the screen and I end up missing errors. I sometimes "send"
before spotting all my mistakes.

After explaining the Farside is illuminated by the Sun during the New
Moon phase, I added that the craters he was referring to were at the
poles and the crater walls shade the interior of the craters, forming a
"coldtrap" which may have captured water. As I understand it, protons
in the solor wind pop off an oxygen in the lunar crust and combine to
form water.

Somehow those paragraphs when away. Sorry.



There are a few perpetually-dark PLACES however, a few
craters near the poles. If there's any surface ice, those
would be the spots. Sub-surface ice, probably still near
the poles, but it would have to be pretty deep lest it
sublime out into space. Hydrated minerals ... better
chance of finding them, although the H20 extraction
becomes more energy-intensive.

One decent fiction book I read had humans terraforming Mars by crashing
comets into the planet's surface - comets rich in frozen nitrogen, oxygen,
water, etc. Are there enough asteroids in the belt with water that it might
be worth fetching some to put on Mars or the moon?

I once advocated smashing-up europa and directing some
of the ice towards a gentle collision with mars. You'd
want a few comets too - for the nitrogen compounds.

Asteroid belt, no. Try Kuiper belt and Oort Cloud. Also, moons,
starting with Jupiter outwards, are rich with H20 and other necessary
volatiles. Robotic vehicles could being back all that would be needed
to support a Moon and Mars habitat.

'Habitat' yes ... but what about a CITY, or ten ?

The word "habitat" doesn't preclude "a city". OTOH, "a city"? Without a
dome or something? Oh, you meant a habitat too.


Unless substantial SCALE is in the picture here, the moon
would be a perpetual, severe, money loser.

Hogwash. By the time NASA gets back to the Moon, a large mining and
manufacturing facility may well be totally automated. Zubrin's Mars
Mission scenario depends on highly automated processing equipment be
landed first to manufacture fuel and set up a habitat prior to humans
getting there. True, his concept isn't as autonomous as I envision, but
the premise is there.



Robots can explore, robots can drill and mine, robots can
construct habitats from imported and natural materials,
robots can assemble equipment - and do it cheaply, safely
and well. Any moon colony should be set up from the get-go
to be perpetually self-sustaining ... because financing it
from earth would be a perpetual and heavy drain on cash and
resources.

Agreed. I'd hate to be colonists on the moon depending on one
party staying in power.

Aw ... they could apply for WELFARE if the Dems took charge :-)

But would have to depend on prayer and subsequent miracles if rethugs
get back in power. (Hopeless ASS!, despite the smiley)



In any event, it never hurts to put our eggs in more than
one planetary basket, but the next step is to MAKE the
damned basket rather than just shuttle veritible tourists
to the moon and back and watch them do pretty much exactly
what their predecessors did before. The 'next step' isn't
one of volume, doing more of the same old crap, but a whole
different paradigm - colonization. THAT will be worth the
money and effort.

The USA will fall, as all empires fall, but what a legacy to leave behind -
a colonized Moon, Mars or colonies in the asteroid belts.

The USA isn't an 'empire' in the traditional sense. It
is just a LARGE commercial bloc constantly fiddling with
things to improve its supply and trade position. More of
a "money empire" than a hands-on empire like those of old.

But it WILL fall, or at least seriously mutate, sooner or
later. All civilizations seem accumulate errors as they
go along and eventually the cumulative burden drags them
down or shatters them. Most of the olde tyme empires did
not recognize the fallacy of empire - that conquest skims
the most cherry assets from a territory right away, but
from there on you must administer and defend that territory
even though it's no longer 'rich'. Defense is expensive
and administration, well, errors accumulate.

Sadly I don't think the current administration is serious about space,

It's more of a distraction. They aren't even really DOING
anything about their alleged plans ... any of the gigabuck
contracts for rockets and other equipment would take many
years to even make it onto paper.

and
the Democrats can't seem to get excited about it either.

They want to spend it on midnight basketball or something.
Of course you can ALWAYS find a "more worthy cause" here
at home. The Dems sometimes don't seem to understand that
by investing in new frontiers you can make MORE money and
opportunity. That can pay for all the social programs and
much more.

My fear is that
it'll be the Muslims or Chinese who actually get around to colonizing space
while the USA twiddles it's thumbs. What a waste.

I'd bet on the Chinese. Already they're buddying-up with
the Russians and India will eventually join that little
club as well. Looks as if we're going to be left out in
the cold. Hmmm ... maybe that will be motivational ? Still,
I don't know if you can properly calculate orbits using
'bible math' and 'bible science' ... :-)

"abracadabra" wrote:

I know they found at least one decent water supply in a crater filled with
ice on the dark side.

"It's not what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you
know that ain't so."

Alan Anderson wrote:

"abracadabra" wrote:

I know they found at least one decent water supply in a crater filled with
ice on the dark side.

"It's not what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you
know that ain't so."

Maybe the dark side of his brain needs the sunshine of a bright day.


--
So they are even more frightened than we are, he thought. Why, is this
all that's meant by heroism? And did I do it for the sake of my country?
And was he to blame with his dimple and his blue eyes? How frightened he
was! He thought I was going to kill him. Why should I kill him? My hand
trembled. And they have given me the St. George's Cross. I can't make it
out, I can't make it out! +-Leo Tolstoy, "War and Peace"

"Alan Anderson" wrote in message
...
"abracadabra" wrote:

I know they found at least one decent water supply in a crater filled
with
ice on the dark side.

"It's not what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you
know that ain't so."

Hey, I heard it on the radio about 8 years ago. Sorry if my memory is
sketchy about the particulars.

Alan Anderson wrote in
:

"abracadabra" wrote:

I know they found at least one decent water supply in a crater filled
with ice on the dark side.

"It's not what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what
you know that ain't so."

There is no dark side of the moon. Matter of fact, it's all dark.

--
JRF

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