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NASA's long-running 'Cover Story' Comes to an End!
"Brian Gaff" wrote in message om... Well, I'm not optimistic. This sounds almost as romantic as a science fiction story to me. The one salient fact about humans is there is no real reason to go out there and explore. Nobody seems to know why we want to do it. Because its there, as many say about mountains, but I think, much like the so called arts, exploration is something humans need to do. I don't know why, and if its all boiled down to money then nobody would invent anything unless it was salable. I think there's plenty of reasons to explore the solar system, but I'm impatient. I know that if you put a human explorer and robotic one side by side the human wins hands down. But that isn't worth the extra time. Robots get there much faster and cheaper, and their abilities are ...good enough given the rapid march of electronics. So, lets just say, we have evolved in the way we have, and are still doing so. For whatever reason, we have succeeded by going to new places. We have no idea if the strategy is still useful when applied to off planet, but at the very least, lets remove the bean counting aspect and go do it. I agree, it needs to be the world which does it. We really do not want to create the divisive borders and territories we have here on earth again. Maybe this is the reason we are driven, is it to get away from it all, or to cooperate in a new society? One thing to me is certain though. We need a better less energy wasteful and dangerous way to get off planet. Maybe the physicists can actually find the source of gravity and let us harness the force instead of fighting it. They have, it's called lift! Lift can get a ship out of the bulk of the atmosphere anyways. I wouldn't be surprised if some sort of air dropped launching ends up being the cheapest and easiet way. Brian -- Brian Gaff....Note, this account does not accept Bcc: email. graphics are great, but the blind can't hear them Email: __________________________________________________ __________________________________________________ __________ "Jonathan" wrote in message ... President Obama ends NASA's Moon missions. Leaving the US manned space program in limbo. I believe this decision signals the end of an significant fifty year long era in space policy. Unfortunately, the notion this Space-Era was about exploring, or colonizing or various forms of pure research are the result of looking at the US Space Program through nebula-colored glasses. The 'Hank-ian' view, as in Tom. Grow up please! The manned space program is, and always has been, a military oriented program. The civilian cover stories of the early rocket days became institutionalized. The finish line in the cold-war race with the Soviets was unabashedly on the Moon. And it would be again, but this time a missile defense race to the Moon with the Chinese. This decision brings hope that the next fifty years will NOT be defined by the incredibly wasteful and dangerous military spending spree between the two richest nations of the world. A cold-war that helped generate a world full of negative-sum games, or one ..horror.. after another. Now we have an opportunity to not just change the focus of space policy. But to entirely change the nature of superpower competition. From military to economic, to positive-sum games. The difference between positive and negative sum interactions between the superpowers is nothing less that the difference between ....Barbaric and Civilized. Thank God this era is over! Our space policy now has the opportunity to turn itself towards the needs of the many, instead of the military. Such as creating a new energy future. Thank God for the 'new' era. It cannot help but be better than the last one...now! Jonathan s |
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NASA's long-running 'Cover Story' Comes to an End!
One thing to me is certain though. We need a better less energy wasteful and dangerous way to get off planet. Maybe the physicists can actually find the source of gravity and let us harness the force instead of fighting it. They have, it's called lift! �Lift can get a ship out of the bulk of the atmosphere anyways. I wouldn't be surprised if some sort of air dropped launching ends up being the cheapest and easiet way. YES YES YES, a air launched gigantic airplane air dropping a mini shuttle at the very top of the atmosphere minimizes taking fuel tanks and infrastructure 90% of the way to orbit.. refuel the airplane repeatedly on the way up, to launch release altitude. military can use the same system, and a airliner that could hold a few thousand, or jumbo cargo hauling has advantages too. mean bomber to level a miss behaving country. nice replacement for B52s cruising at 70,000 feet would make shoot downs hard, with precesion guidance to target destrruction. say 5 or 6 times the size of that largest russian plane. only thing is it would rquire dedicated airports for operation |
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NASA's long-running 'Cover Story' Comes to an End!
On Thu, 11 Feb 2010 20:12:58 -0500, "Jonathan" wrote:
wrote in message ... One thing to me is certain though. We need a better less energy wasteful and dangerous way to get off planet. Maybe the physicists can actually find the source of gravity and let us harness the force instead of fighting it. Let the private corporations figure it out. They're already developing a "rent a shuttle" program for the future. |
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NASA's long-running 'Cover Story' Comes to an End!
Let the private corporations figure it out. They're already developing a "rent a shuttle" program for the future. I doubt anyone will build another shuttle system in any of our lifetimes. Things designed by comitees tend to do nothing really well |
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NASA's long-running 'Cover Story' Comes to an End!
wrote in message ... One thing to me is certain though. We need a better less energy wasteful and dangerous way to get off planet. Maybe the physicists can actually find the source of gravity and let us harness the force instead of fighting it. They have, it's called lift! ?Lift can get a ship out of the bulk of the atmosphere anyways. I wouldn't be surprised if some sort of air dropped launching ends up being the cheapest and easiet way. YES YES YES, a air launched gigantic airplane air dropping a mini shuttle at the very top of the atmosphere minimizes taking fuel tanks and infrastructure 90% of the way to orbit.. These guys seem to be getting the hang of it. At least for small payloads. http://www.scaled.com/ |
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