When Obama was elected, my first fear was the gutting of NASA. So far every democratic president since JFK ( quite the enigma that one ) has gotten into office, take one look at NASA and said, screw space and proceeded to gut their budget. Bill Clinton devestated NASA, mind you George Bush senior didn't do much to help them either. By the time Dubya was in office, NASA was a pale shadow of its former self. But, one of the few things that no one even brings up about Dubya was that he really really loved NASA. He put forth one of the most challenging initiatives in space exploration since the apollo program. They called it constellation.
It was to be the beginnings of our exploration beyond low earth orbit. We were going to go back to the moon. Beyond to asteroids, and eventually... to Mars. We were aiming for our first manned mission to another planet. And to get us there, and replace the aging shuttle program we began work on the ARES I and ARES V rockets. Progress on those programs has continued fairly on track for years now. The ARES I has been test launched several times and the ARES V is nearing test capability.
But, Obama wanders into budgeting for NASA and sees Constellation and immediately says "Fuck no" to that. He guts constellation entirely along with a bunch of other programs and basically tells NASA to send more probes and stop trying to send men into space. AKA, fuck space exploration. He then proceeds to tell NASA to drop ARES I and ARES V and go with private ventures for heavy lift capability. Which would make sense if NASA hadn't already developed a heavy lift system that was partially compatible with a regular leo lift system and was nearing completion, while every commercial provider outside russia is still far behind them.
In short, Obama basically said... fuck space travel entirely, we'll wait for those random yokels in the desert to come up with something then we'll buy tickets to space. Until then let's just ask russia to send us to space.
The best part is, he's not even saving money doing this. We're going to lose capability, money, and waste 10 billion already spent on ARES R&D.
Now, I was wondering why no one was calling him on this, and saying basically "Hey moron, stop being a fucking moron." Turns out I was wrong on that one. Buzz Aldrin was, but he's a giant ham and hard to care what he says. But you know... when Neil Armstrong and Jim Lovell write you a letter to call you stupid it's probably time to pay attention.
Which is pretty much what happened.
http://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregiste … ng_letter/
Anyways, this alone would drive me very close to voting for ANYONE BUT Obama come next election. Even that crazy alaskan chick is starting to look appealing.
It was to be the beginnings of our exploration beyond low earth orbit. We were going to go back to the moon. Beyond to asteroids, and eventually... to Mars. We were aiming for our first manned mission to another planet. And to get us there, and replace the aging shuttle program we began work on the ARES I and ARES V rockets. Progress on those programs has continued fairly on track for years now. The ARES I has been test launched several times and the ARES V is nearing test capability.
But, Obama wanders into budgeting for NASA and sees Constellation and immediately says "Fuck no" to that. He guts constellation entirely along with a bunch of other programs and basically tells NASA to send more probes and stop trying to send men into space. AKA, fuck space exploration. He then proceeds to tell NASA to drop ARES I and ARES V and go with private ventures for heavy lift capability. Which would make sense if NASA hadn't already developed a heavy lift system that was partially compatible with a regular leo lift system and was nearing completion, while every commercial provider outside russia is still far behind them.
In short, Obama basically said... fuck space travel entirely, we'll wait for those random yokels in the desert to come up with something then we'll buy tickets to space. Until then let's just ask russia to send us to space.
The best part is, he's not even saving money doing this. We're going to lose capability, money, and waste 10 billion already spent on ARES R&D.
Now, I was wondering why no one was calling him on this, and saying basically "Hey moron, stop being a fucking moron." Turns out I was wrong on that one. Buzz Aldrin was, but he's a giant ham and hard to care what he says. But you know... when Neil Armstrong and Jim Lovell write you a letter to call you stupid it's probably time to pay attention.
Which is pretty much what happened.
http://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregiste … ng_letter/
Anyways, this alone would drive me very close to voting for ANYONE BUT Obama come next election. Even that crazy alaskan chick is starting to look appealing.
> The best part is, he's not even saving money doing this. We're going to lose capability, money, and waste 10 billion already spent on ARES R&D.
http://www.skepdic.com/sunkcost.html
NASA and NSF are a huge waste of money. However, I do think that they generate some beneficial knowledge.
http://www.skepdic.com/sunkcost.html
NASA and NSF are a huge waste of money. However, I do think that they generate some beneficial knowledge.
I wouldn't consider "unlocking the cosmos" a waste. I mean just because there hasn't been a huge pay off yet ( though there have been some pay offs ), doesn't mean we should discount the potential gains from successfully opening up any celestial body to human development. In fact, we should be looking toward that. And I am all for private research across the board in space research, and NASA certainly is too. They do everything in their power to encourage it. But, at the end of the day NASA is the one that should be forging the path.
nasa's budget is a joke. everything's budget is basically a joke compared to the defense budget.
> I mean just because there hasn't been a huge pay off yet ( though there have been some pay offs ), doesn't mean we should discount the potential gains from successfully opening up any celestial body to human development.
of course we should. discounting is an essential part of any good cost-benefit analysis. (this is an honest reply with a bit of a pun.)
> But, at the end of the day NASA is the one that should be forging the path.
why?
i agree that public finance of research is important. but nasa is largely a novelty when people are in pain (hunger, disease, violence) around the world. privatize nasa, make a foundation, and i'll let you contribute $10,000 to it. i'd rather have my government do other things with its money, especially when the government has a deficit.
of course we should. discounting is an essential part of any good cost-benefit analysis. (this is an honest reply with a bit of a pun.)
> But, at the end of the day NASA is the one that should be forging the path.
why?
i agree that public finance of research is important. but nasa is largely a novelty when people are in pain (hunger, disease, violence) around the world. privatize nasa, make a foundation, and i'll let you contribute $10,000 to it. i'd rather have my government do other things with its money, especially when the government has a deficit.
Nasa is a bunch of fail anyways.
> everything's budget is basically a joke compared to the defense budget.
agree with what lr is saying, but this is pretty much it.
agree with what lr is saying, but this is pretty much it.
i agree with asemi, too. but, frankly, we need defense at the moment. if we would stop giving israel money, then we could probably cut our defense budget in half.
the need for defense is manufactured. I don't buy the "they hate freedom" argument in any form.
they (mostly) don't hate freedom. but they do hate israel and its supporters. i do, too. that bulldozing shit is horse manure.
"i agree that public finance of research is important. but nasa is largely a novelty when people are in pain (hunger, disease, violence) around the world. privatize nasa, make a foundation, and i'll let you contribute $10,000 to it. i'd rather have my government do other things with its money, especially when the government has a deficit. "
I mean really? Could you be more wrong?
NASA, National Air and Space Administration.
Let's think about the novelty of that...
Satellites, which provide most of our telecommunications infrastructure globally.
Atmospheric and Planetary research, which is pretty much essential to any scientific study relating to global warming and a host of other serious concerns. Not the least of which is related DIRECTLY to farming. NOAA gets a lot of it's weather info from NASA resources. Hurricane hunters for instance of NASA / USAFA vehicles.
Debris tracking, because those satellites are pretty much essential to a whole host of technologies and engineering that are considered to be mission critical to our societies functioning. Making sure they don't wink out of existence at the wrong moment is somewhat important.
NASA is responsible or plays a large role in most of the advanced research done in air travel, robotics, autonomous vehicles, and a host of other fairly important technologies that save lives and make the operating of our planets economy possible. Oh, and much more. They aren't just tang and velcro man.
Inspiration and good will... One of the greatest things our nation has EVER accomplished is unequivocally putting men on the moon. The entire planet saw that not as an American success but as a success for our entire species. They serve to inspire us and make us stop thinking about ourselves as different... but as one group of people capable of amazing stuff. And that's not a novelty, it's essential to preventing war and genocide and lord knows what else.
And beyond that... There are planets... BIG FUCKING PLANETS full of resources... SOME THAT DON'T EVEN EXIST ON EARTH!!! The potential benefits from mining and exploring these planets are astounding. It could change the way we approach engineering across the board. And that's just a low ball estimate on benefits. The potential gains from unlocking a dustball such as mars are staggering. This is why everyone and their mother who is an engineer gets a hard on just thinking about space elevators. It would be the new world all over again. And the only country that might provide even remotely egalitarian use of such a resource is the US.
I mean, NASA isn't a novelty. They are an essential part of many parts of our economy today... but more than that, they are the future. And achieving some of their bigger engineering goals... such has heavy lift capability is not a quarterly project. It's 15-20.... 30... 50 year engineering projects. NASA scales projects looking that far ahead... because they have to. Sure you can't always see what the benefit of every project is, and some end up failed experiments... but this is the forefront of science and engineering of course it's not going to be perfect. It can't be.
God dude, I hate when people say shit like this. It's like "well my kid needs food." that stupid selfish view of the world hurts people.
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I mean really? Could you be more wrong?
NASA, National Air and Space Administration.
Let's think about the novelty of that...
Satellites, which provide most of our telecommunications infrastructure globally.
Atmospheric and Planetary research, which is pretty much essential to any scientific study relating to global warming and a host of other serious concerns. Not the least of which is related DIRECTLY to farming. NOAA gets a lot of it's weather info from NASA resources. Hurricane hunters for instance of NASA / USAFA vehicles.
Debris tracking, because those satellites are pretty much essential to a whole host of technologies and engineering that are considered to be mission critical to our societies functioning. Making sure they don't wink out of existence at the wrong moment is somewhat important.
NASA is responsible or plays a large role in most of the advanced research done in air travel, robotics, autonomous vehicles, and a host of other fairly important technologies that save lives and make the operating of our planets economy possible. Oh, and much more. They aren't just tang and velcro man.
Inspiration and good will... One of the greatest things our nation has EVER accomplished is unequivocally putting men on the moon. The entire planet saw that not as an American success but as a success for our entire species. They serve to inspire us and make us stop thinking about ourselves as different... but as one group of people capable of amazing stuff. And that's not a novelty, it's essential to preventing war and genocide and lord knows what else.
And beyond that... There are planets... BIG FUCKING PLANETS full of resources... SOME THAT DON'T EVEN EXIST ON EARTH!!! The potential benefits from mining and exploring these planets are astounding. It could change the way we approach engineering across the board. And that's just a low ball estimate on benefits. The potential gains from unlocking a dustball such as mars are staggering. This is why everyone and their mother who is an engineer gets a hard on just thinking about space elevators. It would be the new world all over again. And the only country that might provide even remotely egalitarian use of such a resource is the US.
I mean, NASA isn't a novelty. They are an essential part of many parts of our economy today... but more than that, they are the future. And achieving some of their bigger engineering goals... such has heavy lift capability is not a quarterly project. It's 15-20.... 30... 50 year engineering projects. NASA scales projects looking that far ahead... because they have to. Sure you can't always see what the benefit of every project is, and some end up failed experiments... but this is the forefront of science and engineering of course it's not going to be perfect. It can't be.
God dude, I hate when people say shit like this. It's like "well my kid needs food." that stupid selfish view of the world hurts people.
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Man imagine if we could terraform the moon or mars... and start sending food back to the earth from there. Gosh that'd be nice for those starving folks.