|
|
|
Thread Tools | Display Modes |
#2
|
|||
|
|||
Cassini Discovers Strong Evidence for Lakes on Titan
"zonker" wrote in
oups.com: And for some bizzare reason it seems that NASA has no plans for going back to Titan. The reasons are anything but bizar a probe to Titan would be expensive enough that there's no realistic prospect it would be funded in the near- term. -- JRF Reply-to address spam-proofed - to reply by E-mail, check "Organization" (I am not assimilated) and think one step ahead of IBM. |
#3
|
|||
|
|||
Cassini Discovers Strong Evidence for Lakes on Titan
In article ,
Jorge R. Frank wrote: "zonker" wrote in roups.com: And for some bizzare reason it seems that NASA has no plans for going back to Titan. The reasons are anything but bizar a probe to Titan would be expensive enough that there's no realistic prospect it would be funded in the near- term. I know this is a wild idea but 3/4ths of the world economy is outside the US. Why can't some suitable nation/collection of nations do it instead, leaving the US to focus on its core competency? -- http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/immigrate/ http://www.livejournal.com/users/james_nicoll http://www.cafepress.com/jdnicoll (For all your "The problem with defending the English language [...]" T-shirt, cup and tote-bag needs) |
#4
|
|||
|
|||
Cassini Discovers Strong Evidence for Lakes on Titan
|
#5
|
|||
|
|||
Cassini Discovers Strong Evidence for Lakes on Titan
In article .com,
zonker wrote: And for some bizzare reason it seems that NASA has no plans for going back to Titan. Why would you expect such plans? What you have to understand is that with the borderline exception of Mars, and the possible future exception of the Moon, NASA has no planetary-exploration *program*. It has a random grab-bag of missions, each one chosen based on who wrote the best proposal and/or which community was screaming the loudest at the time. Of course there are no planned follow-ons, because there *is* no planning at a level higher than the individual missions. In the case of Titan, there are additional difficulties because it's far away, difficult to reach, and requires nuclear power -- all things that drive up mission cost. Cassini was the last of NASA's "battlestar" class planetary missions -- huge spacecraft with huge price tags -- and only narrowly escaped cancellation. There is no prospect of future planetary missions (to anywhere) on that scale, which adds to the difficulties of getting a Titan follow-on funded. -- spsystems.net is temporarily off the air; | Henry Spencer mail to henry at zoo.utoronto.ca instead. | |
#6
|
|||
|
|||
Cassini Discovers Strong Evidence for Lakes on Titan
In article ,
Jorge R. Frank wrote: I know this is a wild idea but 3/4ths of the world economy is outside the US. Why can't some suitable nation/collection of nations do it instead, leaving the US to focus on its core competency? Good point. ESA had enough money to finance Huygens by itself; surely they could team with other countries to fund a follow-up. ESA's science program has been on short rations for some years now, and has the same random-grab-bag approach to program planning. And ESA has no current plans to do Titan again, and is no better at sudden changes of direction than NASA is. It would be a decade, I'd guess, before ESA could commit serious funding to a Huygens followup... and there would be many other missions competing for that money. Remember, ESA didn't even really *decide* to do Titan. It was invited to team up with the US on Cassini, and selected the Titan descent probe -- already penciled into the mission by JPL -- as its main contribution. It's quite rare for ESA to decide to do an ambitious planetary mission all by itself. -- spsystems.net is temporarily off the air; | Henry Spencer mail to henry at zoo.utoronto.ca instead. | |
#7
|
|||
|
|||
Cassini Discovers Strong Evidence for Lakes on Titan
"James Nicoll" wrote in message ... In article , Jorge R. Frank wrote: "zonker" wrote in groups.com: And for some bizzare reason it seems that NASA has no plans for going back to Titan. The reasons are anything but bizar a probe to Titan would be expensive enough that there's no realistic prospect it would be funded in the near- term. I know this is a wild idea but 3/4ths of the world economy is outside the US. Why can't some suitable nation/collection of nations do it instead, leaving the US to focus on its core competency? We have a core competency? What would that be? Jeff -- "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety" - B. Franklin, Bartlett's Familiar Quotations (1919) |
#8
|
|||
|
|||
Cassini Discovers Strong Evidence for Lakes on Titan
|
#9
|
|||
|
|||
Cassini Discovers Strong Evidence for Lakes on Titan
The Commodore unto Henry: greetings.
The Commodore is reminded of T. A. Heppenheimer's "The REAL Futu Tomorrow's Technology Today," written 1982. It has long since gone out of print, but much the same problems are still with us, a quarter-century later. Planetary missions, Dr. Heppenheimer (PhD, CalTech) wrote, are funded out of the National Budget, and the needs (or the whines) of the domestic interests have a greater pull on Capitol Hill. The same is true of missions with human crews. Since "Challenger" exploded with all aboard, & "Columbia" burned up on re-entry, killing all on board, a reluctance has been expressed against risking people to the vacuum of Space; this reluctance has been expressed on Capitol Hill, NASA, ESA, and other activities. What will have to happen is either an asteroid on a killer trajectory with Planet Earth in its crosshairs, or SETI is proven correct, and ETI found "out there in the vastness of space". (Alternate: private industry and the Space Hilton.) Until then, all Space Agencies are haphazard bureaucracies, at the whim of a legislative body which sees monies spent on Space which could be spent better on the poor who have votes. "Henry Spencer" wrote in message ... In article .com, zonker wrote: And for some bizzare reason it seems that NASA has no plans for going back to Titan. Why would you expect such plans? What you have to understand is that with the borderline exception of Mars, and the possible future exception of the Moon, NASA has no planetary-exploration *program*. It has a random grab-bag of missions, each one chosen based on who wrote the best proposal and/or which community was screaming the loudest at the time. Of course there are no planned follow-ons, because there *is* no planning at a level higher than the individual missions. In the case of Titan, there are additional difficulties because it's far away, difficult to reach, and requires nuclear power -- all things that drive up mission cost. Cassini was the last of NASA's "battlestar" class planetary missions -- huge spacecraft with huge price tags -- and only narrowly escaped cancellation. There is no prospect of future planetary missions (to anywhere) on that scale, which adds to the difficulties of getting a Titan follow-on funded. -- spsystems.net is temporarily off the air; | Henry Spencer mail to henry at zoo.utoronto.ca instead. | |
#10
|
|||
|
|||
Cassini Discovers Strong Evidence for Lakes on Titan
Henry Spencer wrote: In article .com, zonker wrote: And for some bizzare reason it seems that NASA has no plans for going back to Titan. Why would you expect such plans? What you have to understand is that with the borderline exception of Mars, and the possible future exception of the Moon, NASA has no planetary-exploration *program*. It has a random grab-bag of missions, each one chosen based on who wrote the best proposal and/or which community was screaming the loudest at the time. Of course there are no planned follow-ons, because there *is* no planning at a level higher than the individual missions. How depressing. Peace Zonker http://2000ah.blogspot.com |
|
Thread Tools | |
Display Modes | |
|
|
Similar Threads | ||||
Thread | Thread Starter | Forum | Replies | Last Post |
Space Calendar - March 23, 2006 | [email protected] | Astronomy Misc | 0 | March 23rd 06 04:18 PM |
Space Calendar - March 23, 2006 | [email protected] | News | 0 | March 23rd 06 04:17 PM |
Space Calendar - February 22, 2006 | [email protected] | News | 0 | February 22nd 06 05:20 PM |
Space Calendar - October 27, 2005 | [email protected] | History | 0 | October 27th 05 05:02 PM |
Space Calendar - July 27, 2005 | [email protected] | Astronomy Misc | 0 | July 27th 05 05:13 PM |