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NASA formally unveils lunar exploration architecture



 
 
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  #21  
Old September 20th 05, 01:10 AM
dasun
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Science is not the reason for going up - that is philosophical -
science is what you do when you are there, along with all the house
keeping chores. Colonisation, if it happens at all, is generally not
what you do when you first arrive on a new world, as the history of
earth exploration will attest, first you look around and then you
decide where to stay and why and that may take decades or centuries.
In short science is a very useful activity to perform if you have
decided to go to new worlds in the first place. Besides, find a
politician that understands science!


Rand Simberg wrote:
On 19 Sep 2005 16:40:45 -0700, in a place far, far away, "dasun"
made the phosphor on my monitor glow in
such a way as to indicate that:

Science and lots of it, skip the political baloney and stick to the
subject!


Science will never justify the vast amounts of money being spent on
human spaceflight, for good reason.


  #22  
Old September 20th 05, 01:34 AM
dasun
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Not being a geologist you would not see anything special about "orange"
soil (regolith on planetary bodies)! But to a geologist that could
mean regolith of volcanic origin and there was quite a "hot" debate
about possible lunar volcanism in the 1960's and 70's and that is what
made that observation so important. Take my word for it, for a
geologist there is nothing like being there and being able to get a
feel for the landscape and the forces that have acted upon it and no
high quality data link is ever going to be an effective substitute for
that feeling. Deep-sea geology is a good example, use robots to do
general surveying but send manned submersibles down to look at
interesting features.

Moore's law is great, but can it go on forever? How long before we
can build artificial intelligence as good as our own? What about the
reasons for heading up, after all planetary disasters do happen and
colonising other worlds is the best long-term bet for our species. Do
not let your faith in technology blind you to much as the future seldom
turns out as one expects - just ask the Apollo guys of the 1960's (one
of whom was a geologist - namely Jack Schmidt (spelling?) - and the
rest did extensive geological training and mostly functioned quite
well).

  #23  
Old September 20th 05, 01:53 AM
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Why geology is so different from other sciences, say, astronomy? You
don't have to climb to the observation dome and spend a cold night
there anymore. You rely on the data collected automatically.

There is number factor as well. Compare a 1000 geologists investigating
phenomenon remotely, versus one of the spot. Given adequate quality of
remote observation, it is more likely that some of those 1000
geologists would find something interesting, that would escape the guy
on the spot.

dasun wrote:
Moore's law is great, but can it go on forever? How long before we
can build artificial intelligence as good as our own? What about the


Given the average intelligence of the average Usenet poster, I bet that
within 10 years we'll have Usenet bots indistingusheable of humans.

What about the
reasons for heading up, after all planetary disasters do happen and
colonising other worlds is the best long-term bet for our species.


Yes, but you have to approach it with rational thinking. How much a
trip to mars costs? It will be such for a long time, if we continue
rely on chemical propulsion engines. Wasting $100B on reincarnated moon
landing problem solves nothing.

  #24  
Old September 20th 05, 01:53 AM
Rand Simberg
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On 19 Sep 2005 14:47:27 -0700, in a place far, far away, "Alex
Terrell" made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:

NASA today unveiled an ambitious blueprint


Well, I guess opinions on that may vary.

I thought I was seeing the history channel - except there was no
Kennedy to say by the end of decade - rather, we'll put some men on the
moon, when we get round to it.

With no plans for a moonbase, I'm struggling to see the point of all
this. And the architecture is about 50% more expensive than it ought to
be.


OK, is anyone other than NASA fanboys here actually excited about this
plan?
  #26  
Old September 20th 05, 02:14 AM
Rand Simberg
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On 19 Sep 2005 15:08:09 -0700, in a place far, far away, "Ed Kyle"
made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such a
way as to indicate that:

OK, is anyone other than NASA fanboys here actually excited about this
plan?


I think it provides a good roadmap for NASA to follow for
the next how-ever-many years. It is a great improvement
to the space shuttle era NASA framework.

This is a plan that could very well, over time, lead to a
smaller, more focused NASA.


More focused, certainly, but with the increasing budget, and the
predilection to do more in house and less contracting, how is it
smaller?

It is a plan that produces
something useful in the near-term - the CEV and CLV tools
that will replace shuttle and could by themselves, in
concert with commercial launch services and international
space station partners, serve as the framework for a long-
term human space program.


For exactly the same (or more) cost as the Shuttle program.

http://www.transterrestrial.com/arch...29.html#005729
  #28  
Old September 20th 05, 02:26 AM
jonathan
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wrote in message
oups.com...
Maybe we could do a commercial Skylab ?

Since the launcher exists, why not a single module, 100-ton class
commercial station.. ?

No costly assembly and with a 100 mass maybe you can keep the
consumable servicing to a minimum. Maybe build with ample design
margins and simple construction techniques.

Well : question, with the 125-t class launcher, assuming the Govt
builds two a year for its Moon missions, what else could be done ?




I'd like to see 'em launching things that will help us down
here on earth. Things like this.

Space Solar Power home.
http://spacesolarpower.nasa.gov/


We'd need the stick and heavy lift, and a large space station
if not several. It's conceivable that the US could someday
become the world's largest energy ....supplier....instead of
the largest importer. Not to mention the positive effects
on global warming that solar power brings. And wars
over oil? Isn't the dependence of fossil fuels the greatest
single threat to our future???

If not now.

Nasa's long term goals should revolve around the most acute
problems on earth. And since energy certainly qualifies ...and...
has it's ultimate solution in space, it's tragic that Nasa decides
that collecting more Moon rocks is the best they can do.

Nasa could do so much more if they only had some 'vision'.
They have a lotta nerve assigning that term to their new
space policy.


Jonathan

s












  #29  
Old September 20th 05, 02:31 AM
John Doe
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Rand Simberg wrote:
More focused, certainly, but with the increasing budget, and the
predilection to do more in house and less contracting, how is it
smaller?



More focused is the keyword here. NASA will be an organisation whose
sole capability will be to go to the moon, pick up a few rocks and come
back to the earth. No real advancement in space exploration, and a net
decrease in versatility of manned space programme.

In this announcement, has NASA announced automated docking development ?
Without a shuttle or automated docking, NASA will not be able to build
any structures in space anymore. And to build anything meaningful, they
will want docking ports as big as CBMs. So either automated bertthing
with existing CBMs or develop a docakble CBM size port.
 




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