Cost of launch and laws of physics

"John Ordover" wrote ...
"Greg D. Moore \(Strider\)" wrote ...
Sorry, you failed Logic 101. Just because something CAN exist does not mean
it has to.

Only way to prove that something can exist is to show it existing.

What a load of rubbish.

There is currently some number that is the highest prime known to the human race.
IIRC, it has been shown that there is no (absolute) highest prime.

Therefore although a higher prime number is not currently recorded as such in
any recording media on this planet is it known that a recording of a higher prime
number can exist - and will do as soon as somebody feeds the right algorithm
through a super-computer sufficient time.

"Greg D. Moore \(Strider\)" wrote in message
. ..
"John Ordover" wrote in message
om...

How about the blatantly false statement that affordable space travel
can exist? If it's not false, could you please point to it in
operation?

Sorry, you failed Logic 101. Just because something CAN exist does not mean
it has to.

(John Ordover) wrote:
Only way to prove that something can exist is to show it existing.

You keep arguing the reverse, saying that because it does not exist it
will not, and indeed can not, without a significant change in our
understanding of the laws of nature.

Some people accept rational arguments showing that things which are not
yet seen are possible. Others repeat mantras as if that will increase
their truth content. Since it is abundantly clear that no amount of logic
will convince you that your position is not as tenable as you insist it
is, I cheerfully return you to my killfile.

In article ,
(John Ordover) wrote:

...The goal is cheap
spaceflight, and if that requires an expensive vehicle, then an expensive
vehicle is what we must build.

Which means, per force, that it's not cheap.

A cheap vehicle is not necessary in order to have cheap transportation, if
you use the vehicle enough times. Amortization is an important tool.

We *do* know how to achieve affordable spaceflight. The way to do it is
to fly a reusable spacecraft often. It is not a physics problem.

But why fly often? To what money-making purpose?

Why should be obvious. Fly often to minimize the time the vehicle is not
doing useful work. Fly often to maximize the number of paying passengers
and the amount of cargo being delivered in a given interval.

...Unfortunately, with so
many people believing the NASA party line of "technology isn't advanced
enough", funding to explore the promises is discouraged.

Nothing to do with NASA. Everything to do with no investors seeing a
bird-in-the-hand way to make money off space travel.

NASA *is* a large reason investors don't think there's a guaranteed
market. When the perceived experts say something's too hard, risk-averse
people tend to accept the claim as true. The other large reason is that
NASA has a demonstrated tendency to pull the rug out from under commercial
space ventures, and the market uncertainty that goes along with that
behavior has a very chilling effect on the viability of business plans.

ghe
No, the latter claim is not defensible. Even by the investment
community just looking at its own track record.

There are myriad examples of things which someone shopped
around for years or decades before finally getting it started,
and then making a mint. There are whole business models and
fields which were soundly rejected by investors for what they
thought were clearly self evident technical and economic
factors which were, in retrospect, as wrong as wrong can be.

There are far more examples of things roundly rejected by the
investment community that turned out to be foolish, impractical, and a
waste of money. We don't hear about them because they never went
anywhere. There are also examples of investors pouring billions into
projects like WebVan, and losing their shirts. That once in a while
something that most people rejected turns out to be a profitable idea
does not mean that one should chase after ideas that appear to be
unprofitable in order to make money.

Everyone who supports an idea claims that it's the one exception to
the "if it's not clearly moneymaking, don't invest in it" rule.



"Nobody will invest ergo it won't work" is mind-numbingly
stupid for a professional investor. "I won't invest because
I don't think it will work" is doing your job; generalizing
is gross hubris.

Not at all - it's how you have to think, because if something you pass
on works out, you'll have to defend -why- you passed on it to your
boss. So you better hope that everything you reject is rejected by
others.


The technical side question is best rebutted by simply
asking how many projects from each category of aerospace
vendor have failed because of technical reasons, and how
many have failed due to running out of money. Further
subdivide the latter into "didn't get the money we knew
we initially needed" and "initial budget turned out
to be not enough" with some spectrum in between.

Uh-huh - mostly because that's what -everyone- claims happened. "We
didn't fail, we ran out of money" is a common cry of those who failed.
Engineers rarely say "our concept turned out to be flawed." Heck,
if they knew they didn't have enough money going in, why did they
start?


This is not to say that the statement "CATS must be possible
because it has not been disproven" is credible, either.
We really don't know for sure that any of the ideas put
forwards and not tested yet will work. But a large
number of them are extremely promising, in ways that
wonks like Ordover are terminally ignorant of,
and really do need to get tested one of these years.
Presuming that *none* of them is or can be made to
work is a conceit unsupported by physics, economics,
or engineering analysis.

All the previous ideas were promoted as promising to exactly the same
extent. At some point, one wises up that the current crop aren't as
promising as claimed either.

Mary Shafer wrote:

You know, I really, really want Rand's version to be correct, but I'm
sure not very confident it is. In fact, I haven't seen diddly to
convince me that it might be.

And, historically, there have been all sorts apparently serious
projections (some also apparently honest) about the future of space
activities that have proved to be highly overoptimistic. Rand needs
to explain why that's not the case here.

Paul

John Ordover wrote:
"Greg D. Moore \(Strider\)" wrote in message . ..
"John Ordover" wrote in message
om...
h (Rand Simberg) wrote in message
...

How about the blatantly false statement that affordable space travel
can exist? If it's not false, could you please point to it in
operation?

Sorry, you failed Logic 101. Just because something CAN exist does not mean
it has to.

Only way to prove that something can exist is to show it existing.

Hmm.. let me see ... if this is true then the next processor after Pentium 4
that intel is going to release can not exist as it doesn't yet, despite the
factthat intel has a long track record of relasing increasingly faster
processors.

--
Sander

+++ Out of cheese error +++

In article ,
Rand Simberg wrote:
Mary, I'm a little surprised at you.

Surely you understand the difference between extrapolations based on
analysis, and simple repetition of nonsense.

I think that that's exactly what Mary Shafer understands. After all,
she was NASA's flying qualities lead engineer of a real supersonic jet,
the SR-71 Blackbird. Which is not to say that she's necessarily right.
What I do mean is that she's not just a pundit, nor is she is sidelined
by a lack of funds or "FAA regulations". Her resume has legs.

What I think is ironic is that when one pundit accuses another of lacking
engineering authority, the Mary Shafers of the world aren't even part
of the discussion.
--
/\ Greg Kuperberg (UC Davis)
/ \
\ / Visit the Math ArXiv Front at http://front.math.ucdavis.edu/
\/ * All the math that's fit to e-print *

Mary Shafer wrote:

On Sun, 10 Aug 2003 16:19:13 +0100, Ian Woollard
wrote:

Rand Simberg wrote:
Yes, he always confuses his own ignorance with the knowledge of people
who actually know what they're talking about.

Rand please! You're being unfair. Him being a nudist and a fantasy
editor makes him uniquely placed to comment sensibly on space cost
engineering.

Well, if he's so wrong, where the hell is our affordable private space
program and where's my reasonably-priced flight into orbit?

Rand keeps telling me it's just around the corner and there are no big
technical or economic problems, but the supposedly-affordable supply
doesn't seem to be around to match the demand.

Where's my joy ride?

Thank you Mary. I thought I was about the only skeptic of Rand's
smokescreen.

Don't get me wrong, I hope Rand's right, but I am not swayed by his
arguments.

D.
--
The STS-107 Columbia Loss FAQ can be found
at the following URLs:

Text-Only Version:
http://www.io.com/~o_m/columbia_loss_faq.html

Enhanced HTML Version:
http://www.io.com/~o_m/columbia_loss_faq_x.html

Corrections, comments, and additions should be
e-mailed to , as well as posted to
sci.space.history and sci.space.shuttle for
discussion.

On Mon, 11 Aug 2003 18:24:43 GMT, in a place far, far away,
(Derek Lyons) made the phosphor on my monitor
glow in such a way as to indicate that:

(Rand Simberg) wrote:
There is no way to tell for sure whether or not low-cost launch
systems can't be built unless a serious attempt is made to build them.
Certainly there's plenty of good analysis that says they can be built.

There's been many cases where analysis shows a thing to be buildable,
but doing so affordably or practically turns out to be problematic.
Analysis is an inexact art, not a predictive science.

Of course, but the only way to know, ultimately, is to build it and
see.

My point is that one cannot credibly declare, a priori, as Ordover
does repeatedly, that it cannot be done.

John's claim that the market recognizes a loser is certainly
defensible, and it can be defended in ways that are not obnoxious, but
probably not by him. What's not defensible is his making the
continuous claim that it's technically impossible, as though it's an
iron-clad law of physics, rather than simply his uninformed opinion,
with no actual knowledgable defense of the claim--simply rote
repetition.

And that's different from your rote repetition how? You have yet to
provide a defense for your claim other than to refer to piles of
studies and never ending handwaving.

What else can one refer to other than piles of studies, until the
funding comes forth to bear them out? Where are Mr. Ordover's piles
of studies?

Besides, when pinned down, I'm perfectly willing to admit that I may
be wrong, and my claim is much weaker than his. I only state that if
adequately funded, analysis indicates that such things can be built.
As noted above, sometimes analysis is wrong.

On the other hand, Ordover states his igorant opinions as though
they're indisputable fact, and he doesn't even provide "hand waving,"
as you call it. He simply repeats his ignorant statements, providing
no basis whatsoever for them, other than "It can't happen because it
hasn't happened."

--
simberg.interglobal.org * 310 372-7963 (CA) 307 739-1296 (Jackson Hole)
interglobal space lines * 307 733-1715 (Fax) http://www.interglobal.org

"Extraordinary launch vehicles require extraordinary markets..."
Swap the first . and @ and throw out the ".trash" to email me.
Here's my email address for autospammers:

On Mon, 11 Aug 2003 18:40:33 GMT, in a place far, far away,
(Derek Lyons) made the phosphor on my monitor
glow in such a way as to indicate that:

(George William Herbert) wrote:
There are myriad examples of things which someone shopped
around for years or decades before finally getting it started,
and then making a mint. There are whole business models and
fields which were soundly rejected by investors for what they
thought were clearly self evident technical and economic
factors which were, in retrospect, as wrong as wrong can be.

There are also myriad examples of concepts that folks invested in, and
lost a mint.

What's your point? Who's saying that everything invested in is a
success? Looks full of straw to me, Derek.

--
simberg.interglobal.org * 310 372-7963 (CA) 307 739-1296 (Jackson Hole)
interglobal space lines * 307 733-1715 (Fax) http://www.interglobal.org

"Extraordinary launch vehicles require extraordinary markets..."
Swap the first . and @ and throw out the ".trash" to email me.
Here's my email address for autospammers: