Will China Beat the United States Back to the Moon? 482
MarkWhittington writes "During an address on the space economy to coincide with the fiftieth anniversary of the start of the space age, NASA Administrator Michael Griffin made the assertion that China would beat the United States back to the Moon. 'Americans will not like it, but they will just have to not like it. I think we will see, as we have seen with China's introductory manned space flights so far, we will see again that nations look up to other nations that appear to be at the top of the technical pyramid, and they want to do deals with those nations. It's one of the things that made us the world's greatest economic power. So I think we'll be reinstructed in that lesson in the coming years and I hope that Americans will take that instruction positively and react to it by investing in those things that are the leading edge of what's possible."'"
Private space flight (Score:5, Interesting)
If a private company tries, they could get to the Moon in 10-15 years, by my estimate, which could easily beat the various government projects (even assuming they stay on schedule, which we all know won't happen). The big question is whether or not any company will see the point in trying. I hope they do...
That's alright (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Does it really matter? (Score:2, Interesting)
(Yes, I know China is not a terrorist organisation, but it's close enough for the US government to use it as an excuse when convenient - just look at Iraq.)
Who's the daddy? (Score:3, Interesting)
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/99b42156-683a-11dc-b475-0000779fd2ac,dwp_uuid=9c33700c-4c86-11da-89df-0000779e2340,Authorised=false.html?_i_location=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ft.com%2Fcms%2Fs%2F99b42156-683a-11dc-b475-0000779fd2ac%2Cdwp_uuid%3D9c33700c-4c86-11da-89df-0000779e2340.html [ft.com]
So... Who needs who more?
Yeah, China will be on the moon before the USA.
*back* to the moon? (Score:2, Interesting)
By my calculation, by the time the Chinese make it to the moon for the first time, we'll have already been back to the moon five times. Been there, done that, brought back rocks.
Of course, it's a question who will be the first to get back the sixth time.
Shallow money grub, but, I'm sold... (Score:5, Interesting)
So here's all they have to do... (Score:3, Interesting)
Then if they tell their own people they were the first ones on the moon, who could prove otherwise?
he is probably correct, if talking about the feds (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:What will the Chinese find on the moon? Rocks. (Score:3, Interesting)
We've been there, done that.
It's time for some other country to take their turn at coughing up the money and effort to do some outer space exploration and research for the "benefit of all".
Re:Who Cares? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:There's one major difference... (Score:2, Interesting)
Great if they or the US does.
Hopefully some other new technology will come out of it again.
Just Share it! like Open Source.
Re:What will the Chinese find on the moon? Rocks. (Score:1, Interesting)
Wasteland? Nah, it's a gas station on your way to Mars silly!
Or if you prefer - think Pluto Nash - with hookers, gambling, smuggling and frozen chiwawa's.
Re:Richard the Rocket Engine (Score:3, Interesting)
Come to think of it, that's the space race we should be considering here. Never mind the Moon; who'll be first to Europa?
Re:Private space flight (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Does it really matter? (Score:3, Interesting)
How did a communally funded waste of money like the space project (apollo, etc) help fight communism?
So lets rephrase this. Taxes are forcefully appropriated fractions of a man or woman's property or just remuneration (payment) for services or products. Communists say that your labor is not your own, but the state's, and the state can use it to build, spend, destroy, dispose of it in any way it so desires, so long as they can pretend it is "for the good of the people", and the people are the state, and the state's desire is what the people desire (if you object, a "reeducation" team will escort you to your nearest gulag "resort").
Now, lets see, so in America, they taxed people, thus forcefully stealing the products of their labor (basically their labor itself!) and they used it to fund a feel good public project. They gave it a fancy Greek name. Eventually when it was done, it was done not to reimburse those it robbed, nor to produce anything of importance (except perhaps, Tom Hanks movies), but "for the greatness of the nation" or "to beat the Communists into space".
I don't see how "beating the communists at their own game" is "defeating communism"... did we succeed merely by "being more communist than the communists"???
It's China's century (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:They SHOULD... (Score:3, Interesting)
The Chinese artificially peg the Yuan to the Dollar. Dollar goes up, yuan goes up, so on.
This is one of the big contentions in US/Chinese economic relations.
Also, if the US defaulted on its debt, a worldwide economic collapse would occur. All of a sudden, the trillions of us T-Bills on the books of investors large and small become significantly less valuable, or even worthless. So, if you have a net worth of $50,000,000, what do you think you'll do if you wake up the next day and only have $25,000,000. Chances are, you're going to pull-back a large chunk of at-risk assets, such as any stocks and bonds, back into more concrete securities (like the Euro, for example).
This would cause a massive drop in worldwide markets, precipitating more pullback, and so on.
It's not really something that we could EVER let happen. The government will (have to) cut social security and medicare before they could stop servicing the debt.
Some say this is exactly what the GOP is after by running up these huge deficits.
Ok, here you go. (Score:4, Interesting)
- In 1959, we had no real knowledge of rocketry. The billions that were spent was about learning what worked and more importantly, what did not work.
- In 1959, and in fact, in 1969, there was no market for commercial rocketry. All the sats that we had put up in the sky by 1970, is less than how may go up every year, currently. Now, there are not enough rockets to take on the load.
- Spacex has done 2 shots; the first was a major failure (it went boom). The second was a lot more interesting. The first stage registered an issue prior to launch, so the team drained and refuelded with warmer fuel (and in 20 minutes). They launched. The first stage was a total success. The second stage lost is fuel just at the end due to lack of baffles in the tank. All in all, they are fixing it and expect (hope?) the next flight to have no more issues.
- Spacex will be profitable by 2010 if the next flight works as well as falcon 9. They will have paid off ALL of their development cost by then.
- Bigelow has already launched 2 space stations. Yes, nobody is on them (nor will ever be). By 2009 or 2010, they will launch a 3 man space station. By 2011, they will launch a 6 person space station. By 2013, they will have multiple space stations in orbit. There goal is not to provide for hotels (but they will), but to provide space stations to nations. I expect that they probably extend the ISS with their 3 person unit and then later with the 6 person unit. Why? Because nations will want to take advantage of a an orbiting station. That means that EU, Japan, Brazil, India, Russia, USA, and private enterprise will be able to test equipment and get their launch system perfected.
- Spacex is looking at building a BFR by 2014. If they do, they will have re-invented roughly the same capability that USA had in the 1970 time frame, though this time it should be quite a bit cheaper.
No, this will be easy for companies to be profitable from the git-go.Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
As Chinese, I'm happy because of those replies. (Score:2, Interesting)