CNN poll: Is space travel safe enough for the general public yet?

"Alan Erskine" wrote in message news:9ed8d.14186


PLONK

Little Lott , Tn Joe

YEP YEP

"Tamas Feher" wrote in message ...
http://www.cnn.com/POLLSERVER/result...8.exclude.html

Is space travel safe enough for the general public yet?

No: 74%
Yes: 26%

as of now (with 2200 votes in total)

Well, I'm not sure if automotive travel is safe enough for the
general public yet.

Is space travel safe enough for a legally sane adult, informed
as well as possible about the risks involved, to make a decision
to go? Yes.

Is it safe enough that I would decide to go? Probably.

Safe enough to take people who haven't given their explicit
consent, the way we sometimes transport infants, unconscious
patients, and persons under arrest via road or air travel? No.

Can I encapsulate those ideas into a meaningful Yes/No answer
to that CNN poll? No.

--Rich

"Richard Cochran" wrote in message
om...
"Tamas Feher" wrote in message
...
http://www.cnn.com/POLLSERVER/result...8.exclude.html

Is space travel safe enough for the general public yet?

No: 74%
Yes: 26%

as of now (with 2200 votes in total)

Well, I'm not sure if automotive travel is safe enough for the
general public yet.

No kidding.


Can I encapsulate those ideas into a meaningful Yes/No answer
to that CNN poll? No.

Agreed. I also seriously doubt if CNN polled people who could actually
afford to pay for a flight. Even suborbital is projected to cost about
$200k for a single person on a single flight.

Jeff
--
Remove icky phrase from email address to get a valid address.

h (Rand Simberg) wrote in message .. .
On Mon, 4 Oct 2004 15:05:17 +0200, in a place far, far away, "Tamas
Feher" made the phosphor on my monitor glow in
such a way as to indicate that:

http://www.cnn.com/POLLSERVER/result...8.exclude.html

Is space travel safe enough for the general public yet?

No: 74%
Yes: 26%

as of now (with 2200 votes in total)

On line polls are meaningless.

I haven't finished reading it yet, real life getting in the way
(sorry), but that was a conclusion I drew from glancing at Futron -
they fudged the question of safety and, in particular, the perception
of what is and isn't safe.

I could be wrong on that, but I'll post to my blog when I've finished
- don't think I'll bother doing it here.

Dave

Jeff Findley wrote:

"Richard Cochran" wrote in message
om...
"Tamas Feher" wrote in message
...
http://www.cnn.com/POLLSERVER/result...8.exclude.html

Is space travel safe enough for the general public yet?

No: 74%
Yes: 26%

as of now (with 2200 votes in total)

Well, I'm not sure if automotive travel is safe enough for the
general public yet.

No kidding.

On a per mile basis, space travel is one of the safest modes of
transportation yet invented, certainly safer than cars.

"Bill Bonde ( ``This is the Battle of Epping Forest '' )"
wrote in message
...

Jeff Findley wrote:

"Richard Cochran" wrote in message
om...
Well, I'm not sure if automotive travel is safe enough for the
general public yet.

No kidding.

On a per mile basis, space travel is one of the safest modes of
transportation yet invented, certainly safer than cars.

Sure, if you're "miles traveled" as miles along a path which includes going
round and round the earth for months at a time (the path that the ISS
astronauts follow during their stay in space). However, if you count your
"miles traveled" as a straight line from the launch pad to the landing strip
at KSC or Edwards AFB, you'd certainly get a different answer. Either way,
it isn't a very useful metric for space travel.

If you count the travels of an astronaut from launch and landing as one trip
and compare that with a trip in a car (from entry into the car until exit
out of the car), you'd get a better metric.

Only NASA PR types would use "miles traveled" in the way you imply, as it
makes NASA's safety record look good.

Jeff
--
Remove icky phrase from email address to get a valid address.

--
Wow! Those grubs at the Golden Horseshoe Saloon are a good deal!
"Jon Berndt" wrote in message
...
"Tamas Feher" wrote in message

http://www.cnn.com/POLLSERVER/result...8.exclude.html

Is space travel safe enough for the general public yet?

No: 74%
Yes: 26%

as of now (with 2200 votes in total)

The question is: would they go, regardless?

Or when will the costs drop to the point that the average person can go?

Jeff Findley wrote:

"Bill Bonde ( ``This is the Battle of Epping Forest '' )"
wrote in message
...

Jeff Findley wrote:

"Richard Cochran" wrote in message
om...
Well, I'm not sure if automotive travel is safe enough for the
general public yet.

No kidding.

On a per mile basis, space travel is one of the safest modes of
transportation yet invented, certainly safer than cars.

Sure, if you're "miles traveled" as miles along a path which includes going
round and round the earth for months at a time (the path that the ISS
astronauts follow during their stay in space). However, if you count your
"miles traveled" as a straight line from the launch pad to the landing strip
at KSC or Edwards AFB, you'd certainly get a different answer. Either way,
it isn't a very useful metric for space travel.

Isn't it used to claim that air travel is safer than cars?


If you count the travels of an astronaut from launch and landing as one trip
and compare that with a trip in a car (from entry into the car until exit
out of the car), you'd get a better metric.

Number of safe person trips? I would think safe person days would be
more fair. In any case, we still have a world wide perfect record of no
one ever dying while living in Space, all deaths have been while going
to or leaving.



Only NASA PR types would use "miles traveled" in the way you imply, as it
makes NASA's safety record look good.

It was intended as a bit of a joke but it does use the measurement most
widely used for other forms of transport.



--
"And he did bring them. It took a number of years, but one by one he
brought them here. Except for his father, that old man died where he was
born." -+ "Elia Kazan, "America, America"