30 Years Since Last Man on the Moon 422
Honeydipper Dan writes "December 14 marks the 30th anniversary of the last man on the Moon . I haven't noticed any hoopla about this. Perhaps this event raises the subtext of why we haven't been back a little more than the first Moon landing's 30th anniversary did over 3 years ago. The Apollo 17 mission was a great success, however, and deserves to be remembered. It marked the first (and last) time a geologist was on the surface of the Moon. Meanwhile, NASA is commemorating the Wright brothers' flight of December 17, 1903, getting ready for next year's Centennial of Flight."
Wasted chances (Score:5, Interesting)
Ugh. It burns me up every time I think about it.
Wasn't Nixon responsible? (Score:3, Interesting)
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Wasn't Nixon responsible? (Score:2, Flamebait)
While I won't argue the historical facts, all I want to point out is this:
That was right around the time of the height of 'Nam. Our money was NEEDED elsewhere.
Re:Wasn't Nixon responsible? (Score:4, Insightful)
Gee, that sure was a good use of money. Propping up the corrupt South Vietnamese government, thousands more Americans and tens of thousands more Asians dead, and the US backing the Khmer Rouge. Much better than some stupid space program.
Re:Wasn't Nixon responsible? (Score:3, Insightful)
Ask somebody from South Vietname how they feel about communists. We where there for a damn good reason.
Re:Wasn't Nixon responsible? (Score:3, Insightful)
In other words, LBJ and Nixon both "had control" of the conflict for 5 years. Approx halfway throught that time period, Nixon began to pull back.
Don't make it seem like Nixon was just some war monger that took a dying conflict and made it worse. He was handed a hornets nest. Not that Nixon was a perfect guy, but he was arguably better than LBJ.
Details on the timing of things (and where I double check my facts) are here:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/vietnam/time/timelin
Re:Wasn't Nixon responsible? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Wasn't Nixon responsible? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Wasn't Nixon responsible? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Wasn't Nixon responsible? (Score:2)
I'm just reading Atlas Shrugged for the first time, and it's amazing that this novel was written in 1957. It's like Rand planned the next 40 years of history.
Re:Wasn't Nixon responsible? (Score:3, Insightful)
Resulting in the term "Proxmired" being applied... (Score:5, Interesting)
... to these kinds of short-sighted actions. He was going after NASA, trimming a 100K here and a 100K there, while other programs were blowing millions of dollars.
It also didn't help that the space program didn't directly benefit dairy farmers. (Proxmire was a senator for Wisconsin, IIRC.) Anything not directly giving money to dairy subsidies got attacked or otherwise "investigated" by Proxmire.
Re:Wasted chances (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.ad-astra.net/cgi-bin/BBS/SpacePolicy
"The worse thing about Mondale is his unrelenting, unbending opposition to the exploration of space. This opposition was dramatized in the wonderful HBO series on the Apollo Program when Mondale pops up as a charector making political hay after the Apollo Fire. While he did not openly oppose the Apollo Program, it being a done deal by the time he entered the Senate, Mondale's views on human space flight were no secret, even then. After Apollo 11 he helped to lead fights against any and all efforts to expand human presence in space. The crippling of the human space program can in part be laid at his door."
"'A Webb aid remembers him (Webb) asking Mondale, "In all due humility, Senator, what have we done wrong? Why are you so down on us?" Webb wanted to know why Mondale was upset and what he could do to rectify the situation. He and other visitors from NASA were standing in front of Mondale's desk. The Senator leaned back in his chair and instructed Webb, "I intend to ride this for every nickle's worth of political power I can get out of it. I don't give a hoot in hell about the space program or your future," a NASA official with Webb recalls Mondale saying.'"
We can blame Vietnam and Nixon for cuts to NASA, but remeber that the Senate and House are both under the control of the Democratic Party, and Senate and House Approprations are controlled by some New-Deal and Great Society Democrats who see the Space Race as a Republican persuit, even though the Moon Race was pushed by JFK. Mercury and the unmanned programs were from the previous Republican Administration.
Tax revenues were dropping in 70-71, Vietnam was expensive, but it was drawing men and money away from developing new systems for the big show, Europe. A Cobra replacement was killed in the AH-56 Cheyenne, the M-60 replacement MBT-70 was canned, and a follow-on to B-52 was killed again. Vietnam was a slight draw, but development of heavy-lift like Saturn was very important to USAF so you can't really point to the war for a failure of continued moon shots.
The Space Shuttle (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The Space Shuttle (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:The Space Shuttle (Score:5, Insightful)
In other words, the reason we haven't gone to the moon since 72 is because our interests have changed. Instead of trying to one-up feats of the Soviet Union (insert obligatory In Soviet Russia joke here) we're trying to establish a presence that will serve as a platform for further research.
Honestly, though, I don't see a credible moon presence until we either come up with a more efficient launch vehicle or we engineer a skyhook of some sort. Until then, expect NASA to focus entirely on putting things into orbit, especially geosynchonous orbit.
Re:The Space Shuttle (Score:5, Insightful)
Jaysyn
Re:The Space Shuttle (Score:2)
Think I'll go watch 1968's 2001, and then maybe some Babylon 5...
Uh? (Score:3, Informative)
You can "reproduce" gravity by spinning the spaceship: while it would be more confortable for humans, one of the goal of being up there is to lear what happen to people and material in 0G environement..
Beside on the moon there is gravity, just 1/6 of Earth's gravity, so the effect on the bone/muscle should be much lower.
Have To Disagree: Shuttle Takes Us Nowhere (Score:5, Insightful)
While scientific research is a major and obvious component of space exploration, it is not and should not be the major motivation. Space exploration and exploitation should be driven by familiar human drives of wealth, power, greed, curiosity, freedom, etc., that have always sustained human expansion.
The greatest contribution the scientific and engineering community could make to space exploration right now is the development of propulsion technology that provides at least an order of magnitude increase in lift and speed capability. We aren't going anywhere as long as we're dependent on wimpy chemical rockets.
Re:The Space Shuttle (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:The Space Shuttle (Score:2)
Gold isn't like the speed of light, you know. Its value does actually change based on context.
What if you had a source of gold on earth, and a bunch of belt miners in space? What if the asteroid belt turns out to contain mind-boggling amounts of nifty materials that are rare or nonexistent on earth? And what if gold-plated sprockets were a vital component in belt-mining operations?
Might not your terrestrial gold be traded for enough Wheatonium (named after legendary space nerd Wil Wheaton, of course) to pay for your mining and lift costs, and buy you yet another house in the Bahamas (or what's left of them, or whatever)?
Far-fetched? Maybe. But the value of gold is worth no more and no less than whatever value someone is willing to give you for it. If there's someone in space who's willing to make it worth your while, then the Golden Rocket could be the most profitable endeavor ever, instead of the loss-leader you confidently claim it would be.
Re:The Space Shuttle (Score:2)
Re:The Space Shuttle (Score:4, Interesting)
The problem is, nobody would want to pay for such a project. Do you think a presidential candidate would win if he announced that he wanted to raise taxes for a huge space program?
Re:The Space Shuttle (Score:3, Insightful)
Exactly. The only motivation for getting back into space is economic, since practially all the science that can be done can be done remotely. That means mineral extraction, manufacturing that can benefit from low gravity and plenty of vaccuum, and space tourism. It's high time that the governments and scientists got out of the way and let commercial interests take over space exploration.
Re:The Space Shuttle (Score:4, Interesting)
They approach STS from the angle of a hypersonic research vehicle, and in that reguard with over a hundred launches and recoveries, it's very succesful in gathering data.
It goes from Mach 24 to 200 kts and from orbit to a gliding landing with no power, that's pretty neat.
"What Shuttle has done for aerothermal design and verification is greater than the controbution it has made to the space program, which at best has been a disappointment to some and a digression for many. The legacy of countless simulated landings, more than 100 safe Shuttle touchdowns without a serious malfunction and countless data points across 21 years of Mach 25 atomospheric penetration, has provided an opportunity for safe and efficient aerospace transportation up to and including orbital velocity. That, and not its service as a cargo freighter, is the greatest gift to the future - one embedded in winged flight and not in weightless orbit." - Page 328 Air International Nov 2002
Civils on the Moon (Score:2, Interesting)
I find this interesting, but perhaps I'm wrong, so please correct me.
Re:Civils on the Moon (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Civils on the Moon (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Civils on the Moon (Score:2)
As someone has already pointed out, Neil Armstrong was a Naval officer.
The last man on the moon was Gene Cernan [nasa.gov], who was also a Naval officer.
They do have one thing in common though, they both graduated from Purdue University, and only one year apart (Armstrong '55, Cernan '56).
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
IN SOVIET RUSSIA (Score:5, Funny)
Re:IN SOVIET RUSSIA (Score:4, Funny)
Ants will be next! ;) (Score:2)
Re:IN SOVIET RUSSIA (Score:2, Interesting)
(simplistic but readable discussion thereof) [spacetoday.org]
Competition Breeds Innovation (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Competition Breeds Innovation (Score:2)
The only thing China or the EU could do is threaten us in the business world with new innovations... but they already do that earth-bound.
Re:Competition Breeds Innovation (Score:4, Insightful)
Hell, in 100 years, the Apollo missions will be a short prologue to the real story of Moon exploration.
Makes Me Wonder (Score:5, Insightful)
That's arguable... (Score:5, Interesting)
Basically, his argument is that the conditions on the Moon are so different from those on Mars that you may as well train on Earth. The Moon, for instance, has no atmosphere at all, while Mars has a thin carbon dioxide one. The daytime temperature on the Moon is around 100 Celsius, whereas on Mars it's somewhere between -50 and +10. The geological history of Mars and the Moon are totally different. The way you'd experiment with resource extraction from the local environment are completely different. The trip to the moon takes a couple of days. Using conventional rockets, the trip to Mars will take six months. All in all, the Moon and Mars are so different you may as well do your training and dry runs on Earth. It's a heck of a lot cheaper to build a large airtight building, fill it with the equivalent of the Martian atmosphere, and try your equipment there than it is to try it on the Moon.
About the only thing the Moon does offer you is the experience of partial gravity, but if you really want to simulate that it might still be cheaper to put a spinning spacecraft in orbit - and you could simulate actual Mars gravity that way instead of the Moon's.
The Moon and Mars (Score:5, Informative)
As I see it, it;s not really the Moon vs. Mars, but a question of where to first. I'm familiar with Zubrin's arguments, but I think he dismisses the Moon too readily.
Mars is more romantic, but the moon has a lot to offer that we have only begun to appreciate.
here is what the moon has that we know about:
There are a lot of question marks about how to proceed, but I really don't think we'll answer those questions with paper studies - we have to go there and try a few things.
When I say "we" I despair that this can not include NASA in their present form. Or should I despair? Perhaps it's for the best.
Re:The Moon and Mars (Score:3, Informative)
Of course not. Pushing these materials up through Earth's atmosphere and gravity well vs. using them or launching them from the Moon is what I had in mind. I guess I shouldn't have assumed that this was obvious.
I've heard of those laws a few times, but of course, they're no relevant here. If you need fuel for a chemical rocket, you need something you can take with you, and you don't particularly care how much energy it takes to separate it out before it flies. It takes far MORE energy to lift it off the Earth's surface and punch it through the atmosphere at high Mach numbers.
Speaking of the second law of thermodynamics, there's another thing about the moon I forgot to mention: almost all the cold sinks we want thanks to the lack of atmosphere. Doing cryo shouldn't be too hard if we can learn to exploit that.
Re:That's arguable... (Score:3, Interesting)
On the other hand, conditions on the Moon are remarkably similar to conditions for the trip to/from Mars (surrounded by hard vacuum, radiation, et al... the only real difference is the gravity). And, considering the constant "No nukes in space!" protests, preparing for the trip to/from Mars is more important than staying on Mars because you'll be on the journey for twice as long.
That, and it's likely the best choice for launching future interplanetary missions. Low surface gravity (a V-2 could reach escape velocity), a stable orbit (no need to constantly fine-tune it), handy local resources, the advantages of being able to build the craft in a gravity well (easier than microgravity)...
"Using conventional rockets, the trip to Mars will take six months."
I could be wrong, but I thought the latest numbers were 15 months. Each way.
"but if you really want to simulate that it might still be cheaper to put a spinning spacecraft in orbit"
If we had the resources to make a space station with "spin gravity" that's has a large enough diameter to keep the occupants from getting nauseatingly dizzy, we wouldn't be talking about the "last man on the moon."
Re:That's arguable... (Score:4, Insightful)
The reason for going to the Moon first is not that it is a perfect replica of Mars but that it is much easier to get to. Look, we haven't sent people further than LEO in 30 years. By the time we are ready to do so again (probably after 2010), all the people who knew how to do it will have retired and probably died.
So you want, as our generation's first attempt at leaving Earth orbit, to go to Mars? That's certainly... ambitious. Don't you think that it might be wise to test our technology on something a little closer to home? If we have another Apollo 13 where the crew have about 3 days of life support left, where would you prefer them to be? About 3 days away from Earth or 6 months away? I'm not trying to say that we should wait until it is absolutely safe but for fuck's sake, it is damn hard to simply send people to the Moon. The Apollo astronauts risked their lives and it is amazing that none died on the way.
Robert Zubrin seems to claim that there is nothing to learn by going to the Moon that would help us when we go to Mars. That's BS, pure and simple. Hell, why not make our first mission a trip to Europa? It seems to have a higher prospect for life. Or what about Alpha Centuari? What could we possible learn by going to Mars that would help us get to the stars? The environments are totally different! </sarcasm>
Baby steps people, please, or we'll end up killing someone.
Re:Why we won't go back (Score:2)
Of course (Score:5, Funny)
Now to spread the message to the rest of the world before the black hel!@#!@$()@!*$()W*DAWDWAOIFHWAOIFJWEDOIKAW
NO CARRIER
the really Big Lie (Score:4, Funny)
- Meanwhile, NASA is commemorating the Wright brothers' flight of December 17, 1903, getting ready for next year's Centennial of Flight."
Ha! Do you really believe in this stuff? If you look at the photos of the Wright Brothers' flight, you can see that they've obviously been faked with Adobe Photoshop. The shadows point in the wrong direction, and there are numerous other inconsistencies.Re:the really Big Lie (Score:2)
I mean, really, we accept all the works ever published being stored on magnetic tape that fits into the palm of your hand and we can't see shooting rockets at the moon? Really big fucking rockets? Conspiracy theorists are barking up the wrong tree...
(Note to tired moderators, I recognize that all above posts are humor, as is this one.)
~Chazzf
You got it wrong (Score:3, Funny)
Not only have the Americans bee nto the moon, but they also made us believe that the Apollo program was cancelled to make us feel it was worthless to go there. That way they can continue the construction of their military space station* on the dark side of the moon.
*Why did you think NASA cuts budget for ISS? They don't want to spend too much money to help a toy project that may compete with their military space base but they couldn't refuse to participate, so they went in and tried to sabotage the project from inside, making it look like the incompetence that they have been faking since the 70's**. They even bribed the Russian space agency, now that they also are capitalist pigs, so that people wouldn't put all the blame on them.
**Why do you think that so many Mars missions failed in the last few decades? It's because they wanted to get ultra secret gear there and if people believe that what they sent there was destroyed it won't be suspicious like if they had sent something without a cover story and every astronomer would have asked what it was.
Note: It's supposed to be funny but it's 5.20 AM, I didn't sleep yet and I'm French, so if it isn't funny I got some excuses, so give me a break, okay?
It's obvious why we haven't been back (Score:5, Funny)
In return for all of these great gifts the aliens gave us excellent insight into the mysterious and powerful microprocessor. While it has taken all of this time just to fully understand and develop from those early examples.
However, it seems to be time to renew the contracts being as the aliens added the Moores Law clause. Damned tricky devils.
Don't worry though, with our next encounter, we are a great deal more advanced now with regards to patent and contract law.
The scorn of the universe really is the lawyer!
Last? I hope not! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Last? I hope not! (Score:2, Informative)
"3. Just past; most recent: last year; the last time I checked."
Not:
"1. Being, coming, or placed after all others; final: the last game of the season."
dictionary.com [reference.com]
Not much to show = no hoopla ! (Score:5, Insightful)
Related Book (Score:2)
It is a shame but... (Score:5, Insightful)
The only people who might want to prove something, are nations like Japan, China, India and perhaps the ESA. They haven't been to the moon, and they want to prove to the world that they are at a sufficiently advanced technological level that they can do it. Plus they have the bright minds to think of a brilliant and probably cost effective plan.
As for America, I think that our generation (children of the boomers) is lost. We emerged from the greed-filled, "me-only" days of the late 20th century, but our attitudes have not changed. We still like our SUVs, our fast food, but at the same time we like to have our government "lean and cost-efficient". Perhaps our children will awake with a new sense of wonder and will realize the dream of returning to the moon, and perhaps of going beyond to Mars, etc.
Re:It is a shame but... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:It is a shame but... (Score:3, Insightful)
Of course, I would differ with you... I argue that the baby-boomer generation is the "lost" one (who is it with the mid-life crisis buying those SUVs), and it is up to us to dream our way out of this nanny-state security blanket that they put us in, and get back to taking some risks & facing the future. It's not going to happen by giving up & pushing it off for another 30 years...
Re:It is a shame but... (Score:2, Interesting)
"the human adventure is only beginning..."
I think space will always be able to inspire humanity, on different levels as our understanding of the universe has evolved along with our technology. Powerful political and economic incentives that favor the grossly inefficient military spending worldwide are powerful to be sure (and it's not just in wealthy industrialized nations that military spending siphons off resources from other potential uses.)
Cornell economist Robert Frank [cornell.edu] draws an excellent analogy between military buildup and the prisoner's dilemma: it's better to for both countries to have low levels of armament than for both countries to have high levels of armament, but both countries would also prefer to be highly armed while their neighbor weakly armed. The outcome ends up in the worst possible situation, with resources being wasted by all parties --- both countries would be better off with a binding, enforcable arms treaty.
The key point is that we always face a choice between guns & butter (or guns & space stations, or guns and health care, etc.) If space exploration is going to inspire a new generation, it needs to be more than an extension of the arms race between countries.
annmariabell.com [annmariabell.com]
Well, what's the point? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Well, what's the point? (Score:5, Funny)
1) As a backup society in case someone "presses the button" and destroys all life on Earth.
2) If the earthlings kept it all a perfect secret, possibly by committing hari-kari, after a few generations we could re-enact H.G. Wells' "War of the Worlds" and scare the shit out of everybody. That would put Orson Wells infamous reading of it to shame.
3) Future geek race would be the closest thing to an alien civilization we can make, it's a good substitute since we can't seem to find the real aliens. (they all got shot entering Texas?)
4) Dumping ground for Slashdot trolls.
So how do we convince them to go ? Many geeks lack any sort of attachment to society, so they may want to go. Or we could just tell them that the whole "man in the moon" thing was a mistake, it's actually a "woman in the moon" and she's aweful lonely. I don't know if anyone will buy that last one, but it's worth a shot.
Re:Well, what's the point? (Score:4, Funny)
Won't somebody think of the children? (Score:2)
Hell yeah! Geeks and supermodels!
*shudder* I have this vision of a race of Lunatics with the brains of the average supermodel and the looks and charm of the average geek...
2003 should see at least a robotic return (Score:5, Informative)
Apollo could only scratch the surface: they had to be very careful about safe landing spots which favored the relatively rare Mare regions, they couldn't dig more than a couple of meters into the surface, they didn't go anywhere near the poles or the far side, which have quite different terrain and likely mineral deposits, etc. Despite some evidence of volcanic activity only Apollo 14 landed in one of the regions of volcanic interest, and the crew there were the least geologically educated of the lot so the samples taken were not terribly useful. etc. etc.
We have more high-resolution pictures of Mars than we do of the Moon - the only really high-res shots (1 meter or better) were from the Apollo command modules as they circled, and those cover just narrow strips of the Moon's surface.
Missions since Apollo amounted to a handful of Russian Luna missions through 1974, then a long gap, a Japanese experimental flight (HITEN) in the 1980's, and Clementine and Lunar Prospector in the 1990's. Clementine was run by the Dept. of Defense, not NASA, and Lunar Prospector was Alan Binder's baby at Lockheed Martin, done on the cheap for $60 million. That's basically the total NASA spending on the Moon since Apollo - less than 2% of the cost of the Mars missions that have failed!
NASA's negelect of the Moon seems to be continuing, but scheduled for next year we have at least 1 government (ESA's SMART-1 [esa.int]) and 1 private (TransOrbital's TrailBlazer [transorbital.net]
) mission on track. The Japanese space agency also plans a Lunar-A mission that may launch next year. So things are starting to look up!
And for those interested in a exploration and development of the Moon, why not join the Moon Society [moonsociety.org]!
NASA is like a little boy (Score:2, Insightful)
Remember people space still is a race, just not as hotly contested as before.
Re:NASA is like a little boy (Score:2)
So it's not really NASA's fault; it's really the government that slashed funding. But NASA has signed up for a mephistopholean pact for funding, that isn't doing it any good at all.
For example, Challenger blew up because they built the SRBs in sections, but they would have been cheaper and more reliable built in one piece if supplied from a particular state; but they weren't because then they would have lost funding from one of the other states...
i was on the moon once (Score:4, Funny)
If we can afford war, we can afford space (Score:4, Insightful)
But we can't spend that same $200 BILLION to open up space. You want to distract folks from the shitty assed economy? Spend that money on a space program. "We'll colonise the Moon!"
Pumping that much green into a space program and supporting programs (like EDUCATION) can fuel a renaissance in science and buck up the economy, realise orbital microwave power stations, and will spawn countless spin-off technologies.
Isn't that something to get patriotic about? Something to unify the country about? Something that will make our neighbors look upon us as friends rather than some dillhole bully that's going to whack them and steal their stuff?
Re:If we can afford war, we can afford space (Score:5, Insightful)
This is a false dichotomy often used against a government's involvement in war. Unfortunately government spending is not an either-or proposition - if we decided not to go to war with Iraq, it doesn't automatically mean that we have $200 billion to spend on education or the space race.
The U.S. government, for instance, allocates a certain amount of yearly resources to defense spending, regardless of the current political climate. During war or wannabe-war years, that spending increases, and is often deficit spending to address a perceived need. The government usually isn't willing to deficit spend on education or technology, unless absolutely necessary.
Furthermore, you neglected to mention that the United States citizens themselves, not our elected officials, usually vote down spending for social issues (regardless of party affiliation, I might add). So even if it were an either-or dichotomy, we'd still have ourselves to blame.
Re:If we can afford war, we can afford space (Score:2, Insightful)
Plus, I want to know where you got the "hundreds of thousands" figures. Man, we must've dropped some really neat bombs to kill that many people! We didn't drop anywhere near enough munitions to kill that many people unless they were all just clustered somewhere in the middle of the desert. Of course, you have proof of this, right? Who am I kidding, this is Slashdot, the land of making grandiose, unsupportable, unsubstantiated claims.
Now, next I shall enlighten you a bit on how government budgets work. You simply can't take the entire defense spending of a nation and spend it elsewhere without some pretty severe effects. For example, you would immediately create a few million unemployed military people. And then all the industries that depend on military spending, from Boeing on down to the dry cleaners on military bases, would rapidly go out of business and lay off even more millions. Then their suppliers would tank, and so on and so forth. Anyone with the slightest understanding of economics would know that what you propose is folly of the highest possible order. And, let's not forget, with no military we would be defenseless, as well as having no further say-so at all in world events. Do you want folks like Saddam running the show? Didn't think so.
You're missing the point (Score:4, Insightful)
We're not safe. We'll never be "safe".
You cannot prevent another 9/11 type attack. You cannot make America "safe" no matter how many jackbooted thugs you put on the street, no matter how many unconstitutional patriotic-sounding acts you pass, no matter how many citizens you spy on, and no matter how many informants you recruit.
9/11 is a direct result of American foreign policy. The United States funded, armed, and trained the asswipes that planned that attack.
The best way to ensure that something like 9/11 never happens again is to (drum-roll) turn American foreign policy on its ear. Stop invading other countries, stop overthrowing other countries governments, stop murdering their leaders, stop stealing their natural resources.
I'm all for rooting out the ones responsible for 9/11 and seeing them receive a fair trial and just punishment, whether they lurk in a cushy Washington D.C. office or in a dank Afghani cave.
Re:You're missing the point (Score:3, Insightful)
To a large degree I happen to agree with you. America is fairly well insulated from the conflicts in the world and if we withdrew from them we would much safer. We would probably have even have more influence (though less power) as an example rather than as a meddling power.
HOWEVER, It is not America or it's foreign policy or colonialism, capitalism, communism, fascism or any other "ism" that causes human conflict, hate or cruelty. It is humans and human nature. While some "isms" may exacerbate and some may mitigate against those human traits none are the cause of, nor the panacea against, them.
That being the case even with a safer and more reserved (and more sane) foreign policy we would still need a few "jackbooted thugs" (to use your term) and to spy on people (even on occasion citizens) It is unfortunately not the case that meaning no one else harm is proof against someone meaning YOU harm.
There is even a strong case to be made that withdrawing our (invading, overthrowing, murdering and stealing) presense from the stage of world events would lead to MORE of all the those bad things happening. In historical terms the USA has been remarkably underachieving in all those activities considering it's economic, technological and military dominance. Most nations in our position have been far more efficient and effective at them. Also, the result of a power vaccuum is often far worse than even the most cruel of empires. Of course such vaccuums are only temporary, they last only as until one of the invading-overthrowing-murdering-stealing contestants ends up on top. Any attempt on our part to prevent someone else from invading-overthrowing-murdering-stealing (as they inevitably will) leads us right back to where we are now, forced by the situation to do such things ourselves if only to prevent those that would likely be better at it than we are.
Still, that is not an argument to pursue power to prevent it's abuse by others (even if we had such pure motives). We should content ourselves to secure our own safety and ours alone - we should be "the friends of liberty everywhere but the guardians only of our own" any course more ambitious leads us to the inevitable moral comprimises and involvement in other's conflicts that tempt them (more than they normally would be) to fly jumbo jets into our office buildings.
Re:I have news for you (Score:2, Insightful)
Regards,
John, once again lamenting the human condition
Falling You [mp3.com] -- exploring the beauty of voice and sound
Obligatory Luddite Post (Score:2)
On the other hand, I don't believe that's entirely right thinking. It might do us good to expand on other fronts a little and do some multitasking.
Been there, done that, got the moonrocks. (Score:2)
The point of the original "space race" was a competition between the USA and Russia for "control of space". In that, to say, in a war between the superpower the moon would have been a dangerous site if one side were able to place milliles on it. For that reason, it was essential we demonstrate our ability to reach the moon whenever we want to. Now, if anybody attempts to "take over" the moon, we are confident we have the ability to send up people to shut down that operation if need be.
In its modern form, the reason why the US Government funds NASA is because in solving the problems faced by space missions, solutions are developed that have practical earth-bound operations. NASA's doesn't just do research for research's sake, they're doing research to hopefully discover things that improve the American way of life. Experiments that require microgravity can be done in earth orbit, why do we need to go back to the moon?
While going to the moon is a cool idea, the idea turning the moon into a Disney-like tourist trap for the common man is something many earthlings find repulsive. Let's leave the moon alone and not mess with it when we don't need to.
Re:Been there, done that, got the moonrocks. (Score:2)
Try searching google.com for Interferometer and come back when you are ready.
Discovering other planets is very important, as it helps us understand if our solar system is familiar. We don't even know all we can about our moon, so how are we supposed to tell what is OUT THERE?
much cooler (Score:5, Interesting)
That's probably also how we should explore Mars: keep a control crew in orbit and only land mobile robots, controlled via telepresence from orbit.
Did anyone else see NACA above? (Score:5, Interesting)
-Shuttle ages, replacement is where?
-budget goes to zero as perpetual war "against terrorism" kicks off and nation becomes more "secure"
-Centinial of flight!
Welcome back National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics! The future is much where you left it.
Last man on the moon? (Score:3, Funny)
Why return? Science, energy, tourism... (Score:3, Interesting)
Second, for science, is the potential of the Moon as a platform for observation of the rest of the universe. A lunar telescope has the same lack-of-atmosphere advantages of Hubble, but could be constructed much larger than is possible for a free-space telescope (with current technology) with use of in-situ materials. This is particularly important for infrared and ultraviolet/x-ray astronomy, for which much of the spectrum is almost completely attenuated in the Earth's atmosphere and space is the only real option. It makes a lot of sense to base the next generation of space telescopes on the Moon, though I have not seen much movement in this direction, other than some early-stage proposals.
Space solar power is considered by many [sciencemag.org] to be the only long-term solution to Earth's energy needs that meets both global energy and environmental requirements over the next 50 years. Making use of lunar materials, possibly even generating the power on the Moon [aip.org], is the only realistic option for building these things on the scale needed. If this globe could ever manage to get its act together and move beyond carbon-based fuels to invest in the future [kuro5hin.org], the Moon has a major role to play.
Finally, space tourism has been in the news, and private companies are starting to look at orbiting hotels [bigelowaerospace.com] and lunar excursions - for those who can pay of course. With the right price, demand can be expected to be huge
So the Moon has a bright future - if we could just pay it a bit of attention with all the other distractions the world has to offer these days!
We need to go back! (Score:5, Interesting)
I find it really annoying to read about these chicken-shit science experiments they conduct on the Shuttle or ISS about things like plant reproduction in zero gravity. Whoop-dee-do. If we had made a concerted effort to build and maintain a moon base over the past 30 years, I bet we'd have learned way more than we have so far.
The moon is there. It's an island in the sky. It's a natural satellite of our planet. It's begging to be populated.
I will be very excited the day I see another man step foot on the moon. I hope I live that long.
Moon-Whiz (Score:3, Funny)
The 1953 development of Cheez-Whiz sparked an explosion in industrial demand for malleable cheese. Due to the perceived economic cheesemine in orbit, the space program was accelerated, principally by the ironically un-cheesy JFK.
By 1973, malleable cheese was reaching its zenith. Fondue pots outsold crockpots for the first--and last--time in US history.
Unfortunately, even with a trained geologist aboard and a specially-designed slightly cheesy vehicle at their disposal, the Apollo 17 mission was unable to find any sufficiently malleable cheese to justify future missions.
In a moderately successful effort to recoup their immense investment in cheese research, NASA leaked a derivative food-preparation technology to the market, leading to that year's introduction of the Cuisinart.
Subsequent experiments in using the Cuisinart to process traditional cheese have proven relatively disappointing.
Why do you want to climb a mountain (Score:2)
Well, what would be the answer to the question "why do you want to climb a mountain again"? Because it's still there?
The simple fact is that the Moon isn't all that interesting a place. We can do all the science we need with satellites and robotic probes. The idea of a 'moonbase' is preposterous if you think about it a bit. Why spend the enormous amounts of energy to escape the Earth's gravity well only to drop your payload into another one? Earth orbit is a much better place for a 'base' to stage missions to other parts of the solar system.
Which really only leaves one reason to go to the moon: to prove that you can. Well, we did that already.
Now Mars, thats a different story. There is good science to do there that we can't realistically do with today's robotic probes. While implausible, the idea of a permanent human settlement is at least a lot more likely than one on the Moon. And perhaps the best reason to go to Mars: because we've never been.
Trouble is, we probably don't quite have the technology yet. But now would be a damn good time to start developing it.
Space is (mostly) a vacuum... (Score:3, Interesting)
The reason for dropping in on the Moon is because the Moon has an enormous mass of material that is in a much shallower gravity well than Earth's (and twice as shallow as Mars' as well). The only reason for using lunar resources is to provide the materials needed for long-term habitation of deep space. That means mining, and industrial activity, on the Moon. It'll happen, count on it!
And join the Moon Society [moonsociety.org] if you want to be a part of it
Re:Space is (mostly) a vacuum... (Score:2)
Hydrogen makes an excellent radiation shield, that is why research is being done into the shielding properties of polyethyelene. More mass, means more nuclei to bombard, and more danger to the astronauts.
You need thick, low mass material to work as a shield.
Link to NASA mission, and my opinion of the moon: (Score:2)
I noticed this anniversary was comming up because I just wrote a report about human based exploration. From what I found on the web, it seems radiation is what is stopping us from going to Mars. Near Earth we are protected by a magnetic feild, however the Moon, and Mars don't produce this field, so we need to take shielding with us. [A new movie is based on the molten metal core of Earth; I noticed it in the theater today before ST X] Polyethyelene is a very good radiation shield, because it has so much Hydrogen in it.
I expect the next missions to the moon to be robotic. However we will go back and set up a lab there. It makes much more sense, than shooting for a 2 year mission to Mars with untested technology and ground crews.
Technological aberration (Score:5, Insightful)
Its because Technical Advances (Score:2, Interesting)
It's like the Star Wars remakes. Technology has advanced so much that watching the two side-by-side the new ones, though cooler looking are still more unbelievable.
Flame bait? Sure, but with on ounce of truth included.
Something Happened to America (Score:2, Troll)
Geologist on moon (Score:5, Funny)
Tell that to the US Geological survey... (Score:3, Interesting)
Journal of Geophysical Research-Planets is a major journal on the study of the composition and geological history of the Moon and planets in our solar system.
So geology hasn't been restricted to study of the earth for quite a long time now
Oh puuuuuuhlease (Score:2)
-psy
What are you talking about? (Score:2)
Moontruth [moontruth.com]
Moon Landing Hoax [a1.nu]
Moon Landings Faked [geocities.com]
About risks (Score:3, Insightful)
The dream is clearly a mixture of things that have happened recently. The fall of a few big meteorites, specially one that many people already remind as a second Tungusca event. The tragedy of Carmoddon Valley, Caucasus, where a glacier broke up and wiped out things and people in hours, to the extent that nearly nothing remains of them. This all added to tons of other things.
The dream came up with news channels speaking about people viewing a huge object falling down, somewhere in Europe. Then TV starts to talk about some region in Germany where communications completely went off. Some hours after that, I and some other people were picked out and sent urgently to that place. It was a vision of Hell. A mix of fires, smoke, muddy hot water running through the streets of some medieval city. The locals seemed like being burned by radiation. I and one colleague go up a hill. There in the middle of broken pine trees and remains of a tourist center we look at the horizon. A huge flat hill lays over the sunset. A large piece of dark land, where, in certain spots one could see flames bursting up and smoke raising. My colleague says: "well we have been retreating from Space all this time, we left everything we could just because it was too risky to send people there. Now we see the price of saving us from that risk... How many people died now? How can you compare that for the small group of people that could have died for the sake of saving us from this shit?"
Sincerly, in the morning, this thing made me think seriously about one fact: are we so sure that the risks we see, by sending people to outer Space, are justifiable enough? Aren't we risking the fact that something may take us by suprise and make a major tragedy? Well, we know about the dinossaurs and Tungusca. They look far in time and remote in place. But what about an event that happened in Central Asia in the late XVIII Century? There, a meteorite fell down near populated regions and cooked a whole piece of land. In the late 40's of the XXth Century another meteorite fell just a few kilometers from Shikote village, creating several craters of a few meters diameter. I wonder when lottery will come up into a city like Paris, New-York or Moscow (btw, according to certain analysis, Moscow partially lays inside a very ancient crater). We all see the risks of sending people and equipment to Space. But how far we are saving people and equipment and restricting the development of our knowledge about Space?
It's time to fess up... (Score:3, Funny)
Night launch of a Saturn V (Score:5, Interesting)
Apollo 17 was the first (and I believe only) night launch of a Saturn V - it went up just after midnight Florida time. There have been many Shuttle night launches, but that's not the same - the Shuttle has roughly the same thrust as the first stage of a Saturn V, but weighs much less, so by comparison it jumps off the pad.
When Apollo 17 fired up, it was like an instant sunrise, and it stayed that way while the rocket slowly clambered up the tower. It must have confused wildlife for fifty miles around.
Re:Why... (Score:2)
Discover water for fuel and life.
Geology.
And the thrill. Why?
Why not?
Grow up (Score:2)
Why are you posting to slashdot when you could sell your computer and donate to a single mother? Clearly, you need to stop spending money on computers period and start spending it on HUMANS.
Get a clue. Not one person is poorer because the US went to the moon. Certainly not one person is dumber because the US went to the moon. Those who would argue that we should "solve problems here first" would have us live in a slate-grey, dead-eyed worker's paradise where nobody ever did anything inspiring or monumental for fear of wasting money. Nothing in the world galvanizes or inspires people like space flight. The Apollo program stands today and will stand for centuries alongside the greatest accomplishments of humanity, to inspire us and remind us that we can do amazing things if we put our minds to it. For however much was spent, that's a bargain.
Moon 'hoax' debunked (Score:5, Informative)
If you listen to these people, Human Space Travel is impossible on account of astronauts getting microwaved in the Very Deadly Van Allen Belts.
Further, the lunar laser ranging reflectors placed on the lunar surface by astronauts on the six manned landings are fictious (albeit used every day by astronomers (no doubt "in on it") gauging the Earth-Moon distance), and the returned moon rocks from the same missions, studied in universities and research institutions all over the world (Including former adversaries China and the Soviet Union and East Bloc countries during the cold war) - are fake.
You getting the picture? According to the Art Bell people with tinfoil hats, all those research institutions, observatories and science labs worldwide are "In On It", and have for thirty years been faithfully colluding with the United States gubmink, to flawlessly stage and engineer this grand deception. Not to mention that the hundreds of thousands of people who built the Apollo project and the giant moon vehicles in the 1960s are all no doubt gubermink stooges.
Please visit this site for a solid debunking of all such speculation:
http://www.clavius.org/
More good stuff to unclutter minds:
http://www.badastronomy.com/
http://www.randi.
http://www.nasastooge.fsnet.co.uk/
Regds.
Re: First flight (Score:2)
Pease appears to have left the ground, but he conceded it was uncontrolled and ended in a crash. He did not later pursue the "first flight" trophy, and it was one hotly desired. The flight is described as "undocumented" with widely varying estimates as to distance and such. Undocumented history means unreliable history, and of further suspicion is that his aircraft did not prove itself in the long run, either.
A question that interests me more than who was first is whose airplane led to productive development in aviation. That would be the Wright Flyer, though Europeans soon pulled far ahead. An odd bit of deja-vu is that engineers are looking again at Wright-style wing-warping [nasa.gov] (Java applet) as a method of controlling modern fighter jets [sae.org]. Also intriguing is the habit we all -- not just Americans -- have in taking nationalistic pride in the accomplishments of people we not only have never met, but who are quite dead.
Now, if you really want some baloney, it is NASA somehow taking credit for the first flight by celebrating it. When was NASA, or even NACA formed anyway? 1915?