Griffin Remarks for AIAA Space 2005 Conference, 31 August 2005

Jim Oberg wrote:
Griffin Remarks for AIAA Space 2005 Conference, 31 August 2005
courtesy K. Cowing, http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewnews.html?id=1059

Eighteen months ago, President Bush committed this nation to a new direction
in space, and set forth a fresh, clear mission for NASA. The President's
directive gave all of us who are privileged to work in this business a
challenge bold enough to last a lifetime. Indeed, it is a challenge big
enough to last several lifetimes.

The Exploration Vision commits our nation to the exploration of the Solar
System, beginning with a return of humans to the Moon by the end of the next
decade, and from there to subsequent voyages to Mars. I'm here today to
discuss something of how we plan to reach these goals. But let me start by
discussing our progress in returning the Space Shuttle to flight.

etc

For a down-to-Earth-rocket-scientist-self-admitted-Spock, Dr. Griffin
sure does talk much about feelings. Humanity's destiny, and the
ancient Chinese and Portuguese. Oh, my. The SDHLV mention was
cleverly inserted in passing like. Surely, we need it now to fullfil
the humanity's destiny. Brought a tear to my eye, it did. The cash
for this heroic effort will surely be forthcoming... On -- to Mars!

(methinks the new NASA admin has read Zubrin a bit too much)

wrote:

(methinks the new NASA admin has read Zubrin a bit too much)


If so, I suggest a face-to-face meeting between the two. That'll set ol'
Mike straight.


--
"The only thing that galls me about someone burning the American flag is how unoriginal it is. I mean if you're going to pull the Freedom-of-speech card, don't be a hack, come up with something interesting. Fashion Old Glory into a wisecracking puppet and blister the system with a scathing ventriloquism act, or better yet, drape the flag over your head and desecrate it with a large caliber bullet hole." Dennis Miller

"Paul F. Dietz" wrote in news:99adnd0FyJ2HCojeRVn-
:

kert wrote:

http://www.bealaerospace.com/spacenews.htm
" We correctly targeted the alive and well geo-stationary market and
additionally hoped for some space station resupply missions. We were
naively lured into business by NASA's constant remarks about wanting
to encourage privatization and new launch service providers.

When Congress and NASA targeted $10 billion to fund competing launch
systems, we threw in the towel. We simply could not compete with such
government funded boondoggles."

Emphasis on "NASA's constant remarks about wanting to encourage
privatization"

Doesn't seem to be stopping SpaceX, now does it?

I think a more plausible theory is that Beal screwed up somewhere
(in technology or marketing).

Or both. What's interesting to me is that he decided to make NASA's SLI the
sole scapegoat, when the DOD's EELV was by far the more immediate threat
(at the time) to the markets Beal was targeting. Even at the time, SLI was
pie-in-the-sky.

Methinks Beal decided there were bridges there he couldn't afford to burn,
but he felt comfortable doing it to NASA.

--
JRF

Reply-to address spam-proofed - to reply by E-mail,
check "Organization" (I am not assimilated) and
think one step ahead of IBM.

In article ,
"Paul F. Dietz" wrote:

Joe Strout wrote:

There's good reason to think that space stumbling will be more
productive at developing space (*) than stumbling around on the Earth.

I disagree. To date, stumbling around in space has produced
very little in the way of developing space.

Very little indeed, but even less is produced by stumbling around on the
ground. To disagree with my statement (in a supportable way), you have
to argue that work on the ground do *more* for developing space than
work in space. You have to view both sides of the comparison to
evaluate how true it is.

Best,
- Joe

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| Joseph J. Strout Check out the Mac Web Directory: |
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Joe Strout wrote:

When? Not in 200 years (so says my crystal ball)

It'll be hard to say exactly when "self sufficiency" is achieved.
Certainly within 200 years I would expect that any reasonable definition
of it would be satisfied, but then we'll always have people like Derek
who adopt unreasonable definitions to support their views (such as
claiming that SS1 didn't actually reach space, for example).

And we'll always have fanboys who prefer to cast aspersions rather
than have to actually think - thinking is way harder than simply
repeating wishful dreams.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.

-Resolved: To be more temperate in my postings.
Oct 5th, 2004 JDL

Joe Strout wrote:

Unless you're talking about some limited timeframe, this is complete
nonsense. Humanity *will* live with self-sufficiency beyond Earth
someday; the only question is when and who that will be.

Now *that* is romantic. Nothing wrong with that, but it still is. You
may have a hard time selling projects based on romanticism, unless that
romanticism is shared with a majority.

It's not romanticism; it's population dynamics. Any population of
reproducing organisms will expand to fill all available niches. As
human technology progresses, space becomes an available niche. Ergo, we
will expand into it.

Except that there are many locations on Earth that we currently have
the technology to settle - and by and large we mostly haven't. What
we *do* find is that we have tended to settle in places of economic or
military importance.

Ergo - expansion into space will be based on commercial or military
need, not population dynamics.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.

-Resolved: To be more temperate in my postings.
Oct 5th, 2004 JDL

Joe Strout wrote:

Unless you're talking about some limited timeframe, this is complete
nonsense. Humanity *will* live with self-sufficiency beyond Earth
someday; the only question is when and who that will be.

Now *that* is romantic. Nothing wrong with that, but it still is. You
may have a hard time selling projects based on romanticism, unless that
romanticism is shared with a majority.

It's not romanticism; it's population dynamics. Any population of
reproducing organisms will expand to fill all available niches. As
human technology progresses, space becomes an available niche. Ergo, we
will expand into it.

Except that there are many locations on Earth that we currently have
the technology to settle - and by and large we mostly haven't. What
we *do* find is that we have tended to settle in places of economic or
military importance. (Even more, we tend to hang onto those places
long after they pass out of importance. Humans tend to be creatures
of habit, familiarity, and routine.)

Ergo - expansion into space will be based on commercial or military
need, not population dynamics.

People who argue against this point, I think need to go back and study
some basic principles of biology.

People who argue for this point need to study the fields that are
actually applicable - history, and economics. Biology is utterly
irrelevant.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.

-Resolved: To be more temperate in my postings.
Oct 5th, 2004 JDL

Joe Strout wrote:

In article ,
"Paul F. Dietz" wrote:

Joe Strout wrote:

There's good reason to think that space stumbling will be more
productive at developing space (*) than stumbling around on the Earth.

I disagree. To date, stumbling around in space has produced
very little in the way of developing space.

Very little indeed, but even less is produced by stumbling around on the
ground. To disagree with my statement (in a supportable way), you have
to argue that work on the ground do *more* for developing space than
work in space.

To date, that's arguably true.

You have to view both sides of the comparison to evaluate how true it is.

ROTFLMAO.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.

-Resolved: To be more temperate in my postings.
Oct 5th, 2004 JDL

In article ,
(Derek Lyons) wrote:

Except that there are many locations on Earth that we currently have
the technology to settle - and by and large we mostly haven't.

But we will, in time. (Small sub-niches may be protected against
large-scale habitation, but such areas are still under direct control,
and this doesn't apply to niches much larger than the Earth itself.)

What we *do* find is that we have tended to settle in places of
economic or military importance. (Even more, we tend to hang onto
those places long after they pass out of importance. Humans tend to
be creatures of habit, familiarity, and routine.)

Certainly we settle those places first, just as tropical climates were
settled before temperate (or colder) climates. But eventually we settle
the other places too.

Ergo - expansion into space will be based on commercial or military
need, not population dynamics.

I suppose in a sense we're both right; commercial or military need would
cause space to be settled sooner. But eventually, in the absence of
those, population dynamics would cause it to happen anyway. Humans
reproduce and vary; this variation causes some individuals to arise with
the desire (however logical or illogical this may be) to move off world.
Technology will eventually make it possible for at least some of those
(the wealthier of them, perhaps) to do so. So they will, and they'll
continue to reproduce and vary, and selection pressure will favor those
who multiply and spread (successfully). Centuries later, you'll have
trillions of such folks spread throughout the solar system (and
eventually, elsewhere), greatly outnumbering the stay-at-homes on Earth.

People who argue for this point need to study the fields that are
actually applicable - history, and economics. Biology is utterly
irrelevant.

Utter nonsense.

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| Joseph J. Strout Check out the Mac Web Directory: |
| http://www.macwebdir.com |
`------------------------------------------------------------------'

Indeed, we will issue this fall a request for proposal for such
capabilities, with the development to be done on a commercial basis,
much like that in the commercial communications satellite market.

His schedule is slipping.

In June or so Griffin gave a more detailed speech on this plan, saying
he hoped to have more in 60 or 90 days (I forget which). Granted, he
didn't give it as a firm date or anything, but still, it is worth
noting.

If someone has handy the URL to that speech, or knows where to find
it, I'd find it interesting to re-read it. I'm not really sure
where to look....