Once and for all...are humans or robots better for Mars?

Jeff Findley wrote:

But the humans would do more than the unmanned rovers. Assuming the
manned mission will return the people to earth, it's undoubtedly going
to return Mars samples to earth. Unmanned missions have yet to
accomplish sample return to earth.

Compare the total unmanned sample return from the Moon to the total
manned sample return and you'll get the point.

To be fair, comparing the Lunar unmanned program to the Martian
unmanned program is a bit of apples and oranges. The Lunar program of
the 60's was a fairly unsophisticated one aimed primarily at
engineering goals with science being a distinctly and distant
secondary goal. An unmanned Lunar program with a primarily science
goal to any level even remotely resembling that of the Martian
programs has never (to my knowledge) been seriously proposed, let
alone planned.

Heck, it was over fifteen years between the last visit (Luna 24) and
the next visit (Hiten) to the moon in any form. For the US it was
longer than that between Apollo 17 and Clementine.

One could construct a reasonable arguement that, with regards to the
US, that the end of the Apollo program essentially ended Lunar
exploration. The existence of the samples from the manned program,
plus the "been there, done that" attitude simply shut down any serious
thought of unmanned exploration of the places that humans hadn't been.
(Roughly 99.9999999999% of the Lunar surface.)

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

http://derekl1963.livejournal.com/

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

On Jan 20, 12:29*pm, Jeff Findley wrote:
In article 9198b1ed-59da-4c22-bb2e-8cbedd6d3cf7
@p38g2000vbn.googlegroups.com, says...



artifical intelligence is coming, did you hear it appears a computer
won jeopardy playing against 2 champs including ken jennings........

That's not artificial intelligence, not even close. *That's a computer
program designed to do a single, specific task. *Yes its database is
necessarily large, but the program is extremely simple compared to what
most people envision artificial intelligence to be. *

a mars geo sync sat computer with downlinks could run a large number
of rovers on the surface, with near no time delay, and multiple rovers
could help one another out if one gets stuck.

If wishes were fishes...

why knock robotic exploration? the US has no ability to send astronauts

If we're never going to send humans, what's the point of exploring Mars
in detail? *We already know most of the basics, so where's the
motivation for a huge network of unmanned probes, if not to provide
detailed data for an eventual manned mission?

Jeff
why send a probe to venus? or pluto? Obviously we wouldnt be visiting
or landing at either location.....

On Jan 20, 1:54*pm, Fred J. McCall wrote:
" wrote:
better to do something affordable that explores, might have some
scientific payoff, doesnt risk human life, remember the chilling after
effects of apollo 13?

If people aren't going, what's to explore? And no, I DON'T remember
said "chilling".

the near disaster of a dead crew, is the root cause of the cancelation
of the final lanings.

What utter hogwash! *Explain, then, why there were another five
flights over the next two and a half years?

--
"Ordinarily he is insane. But he has lucid moments when he is
*only stupid."
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * -- Heinrich Heine

They cancelled the later flights, not wanting to have had a close call
end the program. but nasa management was very concerned, and of course
the blackhole shuttle was sucking up money bad

the near disaster of a dead crew, is the root cause of the cancelation
of the final lanings.

What utter hogwash! *Explain, then, why there were another five
flights over the next two and a half years?

Just 4 flights after apollo 13........

14,15,16,17....

the really good science flights were the ones cancelled. 18,19, and
20.

In article 459a9b89-03e7-43d5-985c-
, says...

On Jan 20, 12:29*pm, Jeff Findley wrote:
In article 9198b1ed-59da-4c22-bb2e-8cbedd6d3cf7
@p38g2000vbn.googlegroups.com, says...



artifical intelligence is coming, did you hear it appears a computer
won jeopardy playing against 2 champs including ken jennings........

That's not artificial intelligence, not even close. *That's a computer
program designed to do a single, specific task. *Yes its database is
necessarily large, but the program is extremely simple compared to what
most people envision artificial intelligence to be. *

a mars geo sync sat computer with downlinks could run a large number
of rovers on the surface, with near no time delay, and multiple rovers
could help one another out if one gets stuck.

If wishes were fishes...

why knock robotic exploration? the US has no ability to send astronauts

If we're never going to send humans, what's the point of exploring Mars
in detail? *We already know most of the basics, so where's the
motivation for a huge network of unmanned probes, if not to provide
detailed data for an eventual manned mission?

why send a probe to venus? or pluto? Obviously we wouldnt be visiting
or landing at either location.....

You were talking about a "large number of rovers" coordinated by a
satellite in Mars orbit. We're not likely to send "large numbers of
rovers" to a place where humans can't ever hope to live, unless
something *really* interesting is found by an earlier probe.

Jeff
--
"Had Constellation actually been focused on building an Earth-Moon
transportation system, it might have survived. The decision to have it
first build a costly and superfluous Earth-to-orbit transportation
system (Ares I) was a fatal mistake.", Henry Spencer 1/2/2011

Jonathan wrote:
I see some NASA talking heads are out pushing a manned trip
to Mars yet again.

This debate isn't even close.

Loosely speaking, putting men on Mars is a Forty year long
$Trillion dollar (or)deal. And succeeds in putting a dozen
or so eyes on the surface for exploration.

Losely speaking, rovers take Four years or so, and cost a
$Billion dollars. And succeeds in putting ...how many eyes
on the surface of Mars?

"NASA recorded 109 million hits on its home page and related
Web sites during the 24-hour period coinciding with the late
Saturday landing of Spirit on Mars. Nearly 17 hours after the
successful landing, that figure had more than doubled.."
http://www.redorbit.com/news/space/4...w_web_traffic/

Rovers put ....MILLIONS of eyes on the planet for exploration
all sharing a /common experience/ and as if they were ...there.

If you want humanity to care, NASA needs to bring everyone
along for the ride. Not just six or so. A manned mission to Mars
only benefits Lockheed et all. Rovers benefit the ...public.

We can place the notion of a manned mission to Mars along with
the other Great Scientific Scams of all time.Scams like a super
collider or gravity wave detectors or neutrino tanks or fusion.

While the United States cancelled its super collider, the European CERN
collaboration built one. They will be the ones making new experimental
discoveries, leaving the American physicists to stand on the sidelines and
watch. If that is your goal, cool.

Gravity wave detectors and neutrino detectors are doing real science and
have made/will make many fundamental discoveries. Do they give Nobel Prizes
in Physics for scams?

The ITER fusion project is coming along. Getting useful energy out of these
processes turns out to be more difficult than once expected, but by
comparison to other sorts of projects relatively little is being spent on
this ultimate solution to the energy crisis.


Scams which have as their sole purpose to create a project
that absolutely maximizes the amount of time and money
wasted. While absolutely minimizing the potential
accomplishments.

What a great (corrupt) business plan that would~

At least NASA still dares, daring to go for
the ultimate con-job.


Jonathan


s

--
Mike Dworetsky

(Remove pants sp*mbl*ck to reply)

In article ,
says...

Jeff Findley wrote:

But the humans would do more than the unmanned rovers. Assuming the
manned mission will return the people to earth, it's undoubtedly going
to return Mars samples to earth. Unmanned missions have yet to
accomplish sample return to earth.

Compare the total unmanned sample return from the Moon to the total
manned sample return and you'll get the point.

To be fair, comparing the Lunar unmanned program to the Martian
unmanned program is a bit of apples and oranges. The Lunar program of
the 60's was a fairly unsophisticated one aimed primarily at
engineering goals with science being a distinctly and distant
secondary goal. An unmanned Lunar program with a primarily science
goal to any level even remotely resembling that of the Martian
programs has never (to my knowledge) been seriously proposed, let
alone planned.

Heck, it was over fifteen years between the last visit (Luna 24) and
the next visit (Hiten) to the moon in any form. For the US it was
longer than that between Apollo 17 and Clementine.

One could construct a reasonable arguement that, with regards to the
US, that the end of the Apollo program essentially ended Lunar
exploration. The existence of the samples from the manned program,
plus the "been there, done that" attitude simply shut down any serious
thought of unmanned exploration of the places that humans hadn't been.
(Roughly 99.9999999999% of the Lunar surface.)

True. The Apollo program was the overwhelming driving force behind the
numerous unmanned lunar missions which preceeded the first manned lunar
landing. Absent the manned lunar landing goal, we see unmanned lunar
missions disapper for quite some time.

Jeff
--
"Had Constellation actually been focused on building an Earth-Moon
transportation system, it might have survived. The decision to have it
first build a costly and superfluous Earth-to-orbit transportation
system (Ares I) was a fatal mistake.", Henry Spencer 1/2/2011

In article ,
says...

In article , Jeff Findley writes:
In article , says...

ISTR, about a year into their mission(s), Steven Squires (head honcho
of the rover program) being quoted as saying that a human geologist
could do what either rover had done in a year - in thirty days.

True, but it gets better than that. A human in a suit has a better
reach (longer arms) and more power than the tiny little robotic arm and
grinder on the rovers. A human in a suit with the appropriate hand
tools could gather samples that the rovers couldn't possibly gather.

Are you sure that Squires wasn't taking those into account?

He said a human could have done everything the rovers did in much less
time. He never said that the rovers did everything a human could do.
My assertion is that humans in suits could do far more than the rovers
ever did.

Jeff
--
"Had Constellation actually been focused on building an Earth-Moon
transportation system, it might have survived. The decision to have it
first build a costly and superfluous Earth-to-orbit transportation
system (Ares I) was a fatal mistake.", Henry Spencer 1/2/2011

On Jan 19, 4:59*pm, "Jonathan" wrote:
I see some NASA talking heads are out pushing a manned trip
to Mars yet again.

This debate isn't even close.

Loosely speaking, putting men on Mars is a Forty year long
$Trillion dollar (or)deal. And succeeds in putting a dozen
or so eyes on the surface for exploration.

Losely speaking, rovers take Four years or so, and cost a
$Billion dollars. And succeeds in putting ...how many eyes
on the surface of Mars?

"NASA recorded 109 million hits on its home page and related
Web sites during the 24-hour period coinciding with the late
Saturday landing of Spirit on Mars. Nearly 17 hours after the
successful landing, that figure had more than doubled.."http://www.redorbit.com/news/space/41212/nasa_rover_mars_photos_draw_...

Rovers put ....MILLIONS of eyes on the planet for exploration
all sharing a /common experience/ and as if they were ...there.

If you want humanity to care, NASA needs to bring everyone
along for the ride. Not just six or so. A manned mission to Mars
only benefits Lockheed et all. Rovers benefit the ...public.

We can place the notion of a *manned mission to Mars along with
the other Great Scientific Scams of all time.Scams like a super collider
or gravity wave detectors or neutrino tanks or fusion.

Scams which have as their sole purpose to create a project
that absolutely maximizes the amount of time and money
wasted. While absolutely minimizing the potential
accomplishments.

What a great (corrupt) business plan that would~

At least NASA still dares, daring to go for
the ultimate con-job.

Jonathan

s

Exactly, our NASA has always been way better at the con or ruse of
snookering and dumbfounding us at the same time. Why do we pay these
guys?

~ BG

On Jan 20, 7:54*am, ZX wrote:
On 1/19/2011 7:59 PM, Jonathan wrote:

This debate isn't even close.

Possibly because the sense of purpose, THE reason why, has become fuzzy
if not lost.

To show up the Russians? Yes it has.