The Case for the Moon 641
apsmith writes "Continuing the flurry of recent hearings on the future of humans in space, a Senate committee on Thursday heard testimony in favor of a return to the Moon. Former senator and moon-walker Harrison Schmitt and physicist David Criswell see the lunar surface as an immense energy resource, just waiting to be tapped. Astronomer Roger Angel sees the lunar south pole as the ideal astronomical observatory, with locations for telescopes 100 times better than anything we've done so far. And geologist Paul Spudis sees a lot of unfinished business on the Moon, to develop it as the "feedstock of an industrial space infrastructure." TransOrbital also sent written testimony."
Why? (Score:4, Insightful)
Because it's there. (Score:4, Insightful)
Each in due time. Start with the Moon and Mars. Eventually we'll (personally) explore the whole galaxy...
This Is Most Awesome (Score:0, Insightful)
Fuck Iraq, the Moon is the Future. . .
Re:Why? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Because it's there. (Score:2, Insightful)
Eventually we'll (personally) explore the whole galaxy...
If by eventually, you mean 100,000 years, and by personally, you mean people living 100,000 years from now.
And that's only if we manage to travel at the speed of light!
Berlin wall falling... (Score:5, Insightful)
Send a chinese in space, and all of a sudden, space is interesting.
Can americans be rulled without an official enemy ?
NOW it's time to go to the moon? (Score:5, Insightful)
Next Step (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:The moon (Score:3, Insightful)
Definitely need a moonbase... (Score:4, Insightful)
Not to mention, a moonbase is better than a space station because a space station has to correct it's orbit every so often, there's so much garbage in the space close to Earth, etc. At least the moon is a stable platform where we can build stuff on. Hell, perhaps we can find a cave or something and build laboratories inside that. That way, even if a rogue object hits the moon, the labs will be relatively safe.
We can also build better telescopes. Imagine a telescope on the moon. A scope on Earth has to contend with the irregularities of the atmosphere, etc. But a moon telescope, forget it. Clear view all the way to Andromeda.
What happened to all the dreams back in the 1970's? Wasn't there all sorts of notions about how soon man was going to have massive bases on the moon, etc? Now fast forward to 2003, oops sorry, no go.
Re:Why? (Score:4, Insightful)
Bingo, insta-moon purpose for today!
Enlighten me. (Score:4, Insightful)
When we talk about going to the Moon, we're talking about Billions of dollars. That being said, I'm a _HUGE_ space and astronomy nut, but I do not see how going there will improve anything other than our nationalism. Perhaps it may help open the way for future cost effective space travel, BUT we are by no means anywhere near the point where we can justify the govt subsidizing such expenditures because the gains are VERY far away.
Yes, space gave us Tang and Velcro but putting Shuttles into orbit and people on the Moon have not cured _any_ diseases. I would *love* to see Americans on the Moon again and I'd even be willing to help front the bill, BUT the Country does not consider this important.
87 Billion? (Score:2, Insightful)
I wish we had leaders that are looking up and beyond and not try to right personal vendettes at the expense or our future.
And BTW If deficits are o.k., which is what I have been hearing lately, why not go into hock for something for something with vision and with real lasting value.
sheeps, americans and europians (Score:4, Insightful)
Nope. That's the major difference between americans and sheeps:
- Sheeps need the leader;
- Americans need the leader AND the enemy.
If you don't like it then come to live in Europe - somehow they manage to live without an enemy AND without a leader too.Re:Definitely need a moonbase... (Score:3, Insightful)
I think they were tempered by double digit inflation and interest rates, grafitti, and the overall destruction of our cities. Those were the dark days.
Space elevator makes *everything* easier... (Score:4, Insightful)
IMHO, throwing some money at nanotube research is a very good investment, considering the myriad applications. However, designing your entire space program around a technology that may never be possible seems overly risky.
Undercutting lack of concensus (Score:3, Insightful)
NO! NO! Mars is a much better place to go. The Moon is a pile of dead rock!
We need SSTO.
NO! NO! SSTO is too difficult and expensive! Expendables can do the job more cheaply until we've developed better technology.
Capsules are stupid, you have little control over your landing area.
Winged spacecraft are stupid! Wings are dead weight on the way up.
Coming down on rockets (Delta Clipper) is stupid. You have to carry your landing fuel up, and then down, again.
No concensus whatsoever. As a result, we either do NOTHING, or we do things halfway, and then change direction, which is WORSE.
IMHO, one thing the space station has taught us is that building and running a space station is HARD. If there's ONE piece of value we should get out of the ISS, it's how the heck we can do it BETTER, if we can just get a Next Time.
Mars is far and as inhabitable as Moon (Score:2, Insightful)
Mars may be cool but if you don't want to tranform the whole planet into second Earth there are almost no advantages of having Mars colonies compared to Moon colonies and there are many disadvantages caused by its distance [nasa.gov] from Earth. On average opositions it is 202 times farther from Earth than Moon and light travels a few minutes from it. It takes months [nasa.gov] for spaceprobes to travel to Mars during most favorable conditions.
It is important to explore Mars but its colonization is a completely different story.
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camping trips (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not enough to do camping trips. It's not enough to have an outpost that is continually restocked from home. It's not enough to have a self-supporting village out there. What is needed is a colony out there with the ability to build more colonies. Once we have a that, we can fill the space between the planets in the solar system. The reason to do that is to have more grandchildren.
We don't have the technology to build a self-supporting village, much less a colony that can build new colonies. The moon can give us raw materials, but I doubt that its gravity is enough to prevent long-term bone loss and muscle atrophy in humans. We should look into rotating structures for how to live in space. And we need to work on closed biosystems. We've made good progress on solar cells, computers, and robots in recent decades, which definitely helps.
china will construct the moon station (Score:3, Insightful)
China has an efficient, working space program. They've cloned, and modernized the Soyuez, which is a much more cost-effective space vehicle than the space shuttle. And China has a national spirit for science. Its not like the US and Europe when leftists endlessly whine about hazards of progress and diversion of funds from social needs. And the US in a new Vietnam, an interminable war in Iraq and sinkhole for any economic surplus for science.
"Ruguo nimen yao fangwen yuhuan, bixu xuexi Zhongwen!"
What about the Space Elevator? (Score:2, Insightful)
Heads, the Moon. Tails, we go to Iraq. (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Mars is far and as inhabitable as Moon (Score:3, Insightful)
There's no point waiting for warp drives to make the distance shorter because there's no telling if they will ever happen. Ask any physics professor and they'll say probably not.
Terraforming the Moon is basicaly impossible from what I've read. Mars however has most of the raw materials to do it. The timescale is long from landing on Mars in a tin can to playing frizbee in a Martian prarie but there is no better time to start than now.
The point is that if NASA and the nation have a focused goal, the payoff won't just be a Settlement on Mars or the Moon but new tech developed to get us there and millions of new engineers and scientists.
Re:sheeps, americans and europians (Score:2, Insightful)
They only American's who knew what Facism was prior to WWII when they saw it went to fight Franco.
Bush is a Facist in every way and so the Europeans were right to condem and attack his policies and ideologys.
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Re:sheeps, americans and europians (Score:1, Insightful)
SHOW ME the Salem Witches, Japanese-American sabotuers, Commie Pinko Sabotuers, or Fanatic Islamic Sabo---i mean Terrorists, and I will show you a psychotically paranoid country.
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Re:Why? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, but that would mean replacing inbred/ingrown paper-pushers with real doers and those that put their cojones on the line.
Ain't gonna happen due to existing politics and aversion to risk. The American population (it seems/we are told) values gain without loss these days. No surprise, really, everyone is living off what was done in WW2, the "greatest generation".
telescopes on lunar south pole? (Score:2, Insightful)
what? (Score:2, Insightful)
What if? That's not a good argument.
We already possess the core technologies - they won't be perfect, but they're there. Developing better/new tools should be emphasized, but not to the point of halting the development of applications that use these existing tools. Many times the two create a development cycle (developing a computer component on a computer, and then using that component on your next computer to develop better components which you'll use on your next...), in which case you can't ignore work in one area.
Those fancy applications are helpful by inpiring others to get involved in the develop of better methods and tools. Popular Science magazine is a good example.
Re:sheeps, americans and europians (Score:2, Insightful)
Europeans have HAD war and enemies, however America NEEDS war and enemies. Read Orwell's 1984 for the seed of that idea.
Because America's culture is almost entirely manufactured, it is difficult to use normal methods of control such as morality, history and tradition. Propaganda and media help American's see themselves in a constant battle, but interestingly its often social : against terrorism, against drugs, against starvation, against poverty, against crime, against anything... doesnt matter.. as long as its war, it is good. Keeps the people scared.. buying stuff and watching TV.
Now beyond the control aspect of war and fear is the economic. Understand that the American Military-Industrial complex is the equivilant of the European aristocratic elite. They have their hands in every honey pot, including the government. Wars like Iraq Redux dont merely sell consumer products, they sell ten million dollar missles and billion dollar oil infrastructure systems.
Who would own the moon? (Score:3, Insightful)
I wonder who would own the moon in the case that scientist actually found a strong resource that would be invaluable here on Earth, or something along those lines. Every country that has a space program would head on up there and try to stake their claim at the moon, and even countries that didn't previously have a space program would probably develop one if there was a valuable resource on the moon to be gathered.
Which brings me back to my original question, who would own the moon?
bizarre mental disconnect (Score:3, Insightful)
Why is solar power good if it is a light second away but bad if it is in much more accessible places like the Sahara desert? Why not first deploy solar power stations in the Sahara and then figure out how to do it on the moon?
And how do you think people are going to manage to live on the moon, where everything needs to be recycled, when we can't even manage to even keep our resource needs from growing disproportionately, let alone live in balance, here on earth?
I think manned space exploration is a waste of money and time. But perhaps there is one good thing that would come out of it: a lot of people would finally begin to understand what environmentalists have been saying all along.
Re:Why? (Score:2, Insightful)
Have you heard of supply and demand? As immigrants flood in, the labor pool increases thereby increasing supply without immediately increasing demand. In order for employment to stay constant, wages have to drop. If wages drop enough to employ the increased labor pool then everyones purchasing power is decreased. This results in a condition where employment is the same as before but wages have sagged. How does this have a positive impact on poverty?
This is just a simplified view without consideration of the fact that most illegal immigrants to the US are from Mexico and know very little english and are predominantly unskilled. This forces them into certain kinds of very low wage employment without any benefits. Because they are employed illegally, they pay no income taxes. They benefit from American society without fully contributing to it (sales tax is about the only way that they contribute back into the system). Because they flood jobs in agribusiness, food production and other menial labor employment, they have severly depressed wages in those sectors to the advantage of their employer while at the same time displacing Americans from those industries.
Please crack some books on the subject.