The Age of Space Exploration 160
An anonymous reader writes "Wired describes over ten different probes launched (and about to be launched) within the decade."
What is algebra, exactly? Is it one of those three-cornered things? -- J.M. Barrie
I, for one, would prefer... (Score:4, Interesting)
Incomplete and out of date. (Score:5, Interesting)
The list only includes NASA, ESA and JAXA. Completely missing are the upcoming probes from China [interfax.com] and India [newindpress.com]. Oddly, Russia doesn't seem to have anything planned.
Here's hoping for JIMO (Score:4, Interesting)
Space... (Score:5, Interesting)
I certainly hope that, despite the article's point that manned exploration takes away from true exploration, eventually this trend of new probes leads to more of a human presence beyond the pale blue dot. I want my kids / descendants to look across a huge expanse of space back at their home and think how strange it must have been to be limited to a single planet.
Re:why we need space-exploration (Score:2, Interesting)
Solid State Age (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:I, for one, would prefer... (Score:4, Interesting)
And I, for one, would prefer to see more the money spent - or some of it at least - on deep sea exploration. Perhaps we could compromise and have the depths probed by giant robot squid?
Probes certinally make more sense.....but (Score:5, Interesting)
They did not get a man to the moon but they did get thier explorer there, learnt that there was nothing much to learn there, and left it to the US to go and play golf.
Now the US and ESA are into probes, learning more at low cost, but not able to send anybody into space.
Ironically the russians, whilst lagging behind NASA and ESA in probes, are now the only ones able to reliably transport people.
There is a lot more collaboration nowdays of course, but I still think a lot more is needed to get the right contrast between men and probes. Perhaps different agencies should take up different specialities.
We now have a constant shower of probes on mars.....but whenever they **may** have found something interesting we are told that only a **manned** mission can really confirm the facts.
Dare I say that perhaps the quickest and cheapest way to get a man to mars would be to pay the russians to do it?
No Europa missions ? (Score:5, Interesting)
Also it is nice to see a Venus mission, I personally think Venus is a much more interesting planet than mars. It would be cool for mars to attempt a venus rover despite the obvious challenges.
Re:Physics (Score:1, Interesting)
Let's face it, the use of rockets and pressure-based engines is why we can't really get to deep space yet.
What is deep space? Outside the solar system? We can get there, it just takes a while
Until we find a really safe method for infinite travel (mass transfer)
I say again: what the hell?!?!? What is infinite travel? Does it have something to do with perpetual motion machines? Or travelling at the speed of light? Both of which, BTW, are impossible unless you're, like, a photon or something.
And what the hell is mass transfer? I did a google search on it, and got the following definition:
"Absorption, Distillation, Stripping, Drying, Extraction are mass transfer operations."
So we can travel in to deep space by...
Re:Probes certinally make more sense.....but (Score:5, Interesting)
They are also able to shuttle people back and forth between the ISS.
NASA has managed to lose the plans to Saturn V, and has a space shuttle that is semi-retired long before a sccessor will be available.
Meanwhile, back in Europe, they can launch lots of little payloads but have never been anywhere near manned mission like payload, and don't appear to have any interest in developing for manned missions.
That's how I see it.....but I live in a country that has never made it's own spacerocket and has no national pride.
Re:A bit optimistic (Score:3, Interesting)
"Long term rover" seems do-able today. Use the currentrover's platform and convert it to nuclear power.
(The thing that continually impresses me about the rover missions is that, regardless of how much great science the current rovers are doing, NASA seems to finally have a good system for getting probes to Mars. If I ran the world NASA would have Mars-Rovers coming out of factories and firing those things over to Mars twice a month. Every state university in the country would have its own rover it could order around.)
Re:Probes certinally make more sense.....but (Score:5, Interesting)
I just got done reading The Big Splat by Dana Andrews. The book is a history of human knowledge about the moon with a focus on the impact theory of the moon's origins. It highlights the fact that we really did not know much about what the moon was made of, until the Apollo missions recovered geologic specimens. What we learned from Apollo was a necessary prerequisite for all of the planetary science that followed.
Re:Incomplete and out of date. (Score:4, Interesting)
why is it necessary (Score:1, Interesting)