NASA Astronaut on Columbia Repair (and others)

On Sat, 09 Dec 2006 10:44:58 GMT, in a place far, far away, Dave
Michelson made the phosphor on my monitor glow in
such a way as to indicate that:

Rand Simberg wrote:

But I still find Eric too entertaining in his stupidity to killfile
him. Unless I can come up with two more people who will declare him
the s.s.* village idiot. I'm true to my word.

I concur.

(Eric has his good moments and his bad moments but his exchanges with
you fall mostly into the latter category.)

When are his good moments? I must have missed them.

On Sat, 09 Dec 2006 00:32:36 -0600, in a place far, far away, "Jorge
R. Frank" made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:

What's the other one?

Soyuz 1, the parachute failure.

Unless you don't consider that an in-flight failure since it occurred at
impact.

"It's not the fall that kills you, it's that sudden stop at the end."

Sorry, I consider that an in-flight failure, regardless of what you might
think.

It is. I'd simply forgotten it.

On Sat, 09 Dec 2006 00:21:52 -0600, in a place far, far away, "Jorge
R. Frank" made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:

(Rand Simberg) wrote in
:

And whether or not NASA's record is the same as the Russians, or
better, or worse, depends on how you keep the books. They've only
lost crew on one flight, and never on ascent.

The way I keep the books, both Soyuz 1 and 11 count as in-flight
fatalities. That's two fatal accidents on two flights. Which one of those
two did *you* forget?

Soyuz 1.

On Sat, 09 Dec 2006 00:26:33 -0600, in a place far, far away, "Jorge
R. Frank" made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:

and is a basis for
preferring NASA, when in fact the private sector hasn't yet even made
the attempt. There's in fact no reason to think they couldn't do it
better than NASA, if funded, given that NASA is hardly perfect.

I'm just pointing out the illogic of the basis of his preference.

Do not confuse his logic for mine.

I'm not.

I would like to give the private sector
a shot. But do not for one second assume that I believe that the private
sector has a better safety record than NASA.

I didn't claim they did. I just said that it was absurd to claim that
NASA had a better safety record than the private sector, since the
private sector has none at all. And it's even more absurd to claim
that therefore we should trust NASA more than the private sector,
which was George's weird position.

Rand Simberg wrote:
On Sat, 09 Dec 2006 00:26:33 -0600, in a place far, far away, "Jorge
R. Frank" made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:

and is a basis for
preferring NASA, when in fact the private sector hasn't yet even made
the attempt. There's in fact no reason to think they couldn't do it
better than NASA, if funded, given that NASA is hardly perfect.

I'm just pointing out the illogic of the basis of his preference.

Do not confuse his logic for mine.

I'm not.

I would like to give the private sector
a shot. But do not for one second assume that I believe that the private
sector has a better safety record than NASA.

I didn't claim they did. I just said that it was absurd to claim that
NASA had a better safety record than the private sector, since the
private sector has none at all. And it's even more absurd to claim
that therefore we should trust NASA more than the private sector,
which was George's weird position.

Than you would say nasa has more experience performing safe and
successfull manned space flight than the private sector, and therefore
the same safety regulations such as independent safety oversight from
the asap should apply to private launchers.

tom.

in article , Rand Simberg at
h wrote on 12/8/06 7:14 AM:

On Fri, 08 Dec 2006 09:05:35 -0600, in a place far, far away, "Jorge
R. Frank" made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:

snip

The point is, that's no reason to prefer NASA over the private sector.

Other than the private sector's lack of track record.

If you follow the thread back, he said that "no one does it better." That
implies that the private sector does it worse, and is a basis for preferring
NASA, when in fact the private sector hasn't yet even made the attempt.
There's in fact no reason to think they couldn't do it better than NASA, if
funded, given that NASA is hardly perfect.

I'm just pointing out the illogic of the basis of his preference.

No one does it better, is a logical conclusion. It is illogical to infer
that I'm saying the private sector does it worse. I'm saying that, for the
time being, I would feel less like a crash test dummy on ISS if NASA
continued to handle rendezvous and docking and private industry just
concentrated on insertion.

George Evans

In sci.space.history message ,
Fri, 8 Dec 2006 14:36:30, Rand Simberg
wrote:

Much of my income over the past few years has come from NASA, you
moron.

Indeed, US Government departments, agencies, etc. do have a considerable
reputation foe wasting money.

--
(c) John Stockton, Surrey, UK. Turnpike v6.05 MIME.
Web URL:http://www.merlyn.demon.co.uk/ - FAQqish topics, acronyms & links;
Astro stuff via astron-1.htm, gravity0.htm ; quotings.htm, pascal.htm, etc.
No Encoding. Quotes before replies. Snip well. Write clearly. Don't Mail News.

On Sat, 09 Dec 2006 17:01:53 GMT, in a place far, far away, George
Evans made the phosphor on my monitor glow in
such a way as to indicate that:

If you follow the thread back, he said that "no one does it better." That
implies that the private sector does it worse, and is a basis for preferring
NASA, when in fact the private sector hasn't yet even made the attempt.
There's in fact no reason to think they couldn't do it better than NASA, if
funded, given that NASA is hardly perfect.

I'm just pointing out the illogic of the basis of his preference.

No one does it better, is a logical conclusion.

It is not. "No one has done it better, given that no one else had
attempted it," is the only logical conclusion. That doesn't mean that
no one can do it better, or as well.

I'm saying that, for the
time being, I would feel less like a crash test dummy on ISS if NASA
continued to handle rendezvous and docking and private industry just
concentrated on insertion.

Yes, we know you're saying that. There continues to be zero basis for
your "feelings." Whoever does AR&D, it will be using techniques and
systems developed by someone like Boeing, a private corporation.

in article ,
columbiaaccidentinvestigation at
wrote on 12/8/06 7:25 AM:

George Evans wrote:

in article , Rand Simberg at
h wrote on 12/8/06 4:28 AM:

On Fri, 08 Dec 2006 04:39:51 GMT, in a place far, far away, George
Evans made the phosphor on my monitor glow in
such a way as to indicate that:

snip

Because no one does it better, as can be seen by tonight's scrub.

What an absurd and illogical argument.

Nobody's been given money to attempt to do it better. And in fact, the
Russians do it better.

As Jorge just pointed out, the safety records are the same and NASA has done
far more in human space exploration. Putting that in the mix, there is no
comparison. NASA wins.

So george how do you rank on the caution scale? You see posting stuff, and
not taking responsibility for your own words is somewhat belligerent, but that
is if you choose not to answer.

I don't understand your responsibility point. Is it that I don't append long
quotes with long footnotes, like you do?

But I will answer your question. I am generally in awe of NASA's commitment
to launch criterion. I have never known another organization that is so
self-controlled. I think Thursday night I would have gone for it since the
cloud deck was hovering around 500 feet.

I also think I detected some irritation in NTD's voice which I accounted
frustration over the scrub. And I noticed the guys in the STA going to
heroic efforts to find a "hole in the clouds".

500 feet is obviously not a result of calculations. It's obviously an
estimate. It may be based on a calculation, in which case I would be
interested in the statistical analysis.

George Evans


George Evans

On Sat, 09 Dec 2006 17:21:57 GMT, in a place far, far away, George
Evans made the phosphor on my monitor glow in
such a way as to indicate that:

in article ,
columbiaaccidentinvestigation at
wrote on 12/8/06 7:25 AM:

As Jorge just pointed out, the safety records are the same and NASA has done
far more in human space exploration. Putting that in the mix, there is no
comparison. NASA wins.

So george how do you rank on the caution scale? You see posting stuff, and
not taking responsibility for your own words is somewhat belligerent, but that
is if you choose not to answer.

I don't understand your responsibility point. Is it that I don't append long
quotes with long footnotes, like you do?

He's nuts. Don't feed the troll.