ESA and NASA Establish a Joint Mars Exploration Initiative 95
Matt_dk sends in a Spacefellowship article: "The ESA Director of Science and Robotic Exploration, David Southwood, met NASA's Associate Administrator for Science, Ed Weiler, in Plymouth, UK, to establish a way for a progressive programme for exploration of the Red Planet. The outcome of the bilateral meeting was an agreement to create a Mars Exploration Joint Initiative (MEJI) that will provide a framework for the two agencies to define and implement their scientific, programmatic and technological goals at Mars."
I don't get it (Score:1, Funny)
Can someone just put this into a car analogy for me? I'm not really sure what this MEJI is supposed to do. What is it used for?
Re:I don't get it (Score:5, Funny)
Imagine that ESA is a small fleet of more gas efficient but boring compact cars - say, a Saab representing Sweden, a Volvo representing Germany, a Fiat representing Italy... you get the idea. Let's say there's about 11 cars, plus a bicycle from Canada I guess.
Now, somehow stuff all those cars into the Hummer, put a rocket on it, and launch it to Mars.
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Note: I had to write this as "My mum's Audi was..." as opposed to "My mum was rear-ended..."
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Basically, imagine that NASA is an inefficient huge gas guzzler - say, a Hummer. Imagine that ESA is a small fleet of more gas efficient but boring compact cars
I see your hummer and raise you the Daimler Unimog Brabus Black Edition [autocult.com.au]. We, too, know how to build absolutely ludicrous gas guzzlers.
Canada! (Score:2)
Hey bro, what is a bicycle?? We use canoes here please get your facts straight!
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Why is Germany to be represented with Ford-owned Swedish car manufacturer? :-)
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... a Volvo representing Germany ...
Nitpick:
Volvo is swedish as well. German makers are Audi, BMW, Mercedes, Opel, Porsche, Volkswagen.
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Basically, imagine that NASA is an inefficient huge gas guzzler - say, a Hummer. Imagine that ESA is a small fleet of more gas efficient but boring compact cars - say, a Saab representing Sweden, a Volvo representing Germany, a Fiat representing Italy... you get the idea. Let's say there's about 11 cars, plus a bicycle from Canada I guess. Now, somehow stuff all those cars into the Hummer, put a rocket on it, and launch it to Mars.
You forgot to mention that Canada is also sending the cool robotic arm that drives the rocket.
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What happened? (Score:2)
So how'd we go from "zomg! we've got 8 years to get to the moon. Go Go Go!" 40 years ago but today we're just launching probes and taking walks in space outside of an orbiting station occasionally. What have we been doing? Where would we have been if we'd kept up the pace from the moon landing?
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Out of money and probably still no further than the moon.
Re:What happened? (Score:4, Interesting)
so you are right to say we would have been out of money if things had continued as they were. Now we have the opportunity to do something really amazing. The price of the technology to do a particular task is down. The size of the tax base this will be spread across is up (if you consider the ESA and possibly other international involvement). I don't know if this is the attempt that will put us on mars, but I do believe I will see it in my lifetime. I also believe that these things bring a society together. I have heard the stories of my parents generation gathering around their televisions to watch the moon landing, perhaps I can tell my children about everyone pulling out their smart phone and watching the mars landing. I hope so. We do very little that is positive for the future generations, this is one way to change that.
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Now if you consider the fact that we have no TRUE enemies among the countries capable of a useful mars mission, you will realize that COOPERATION is what will drive the next great exploration of the solar system.
I might find that a little more credible if that wasn't the same song and dance we heard when we got sold the ISS as an alternative to exploring space autonomously. So far, cooperation has done for space exploration what icebergs did for the Titanic.
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So far, cooperation has done for space exploration what icebergs did for the Titanic.
Made it famous? The Titanic would just be a footnote, a big ocean liner, had it not been for that iceberg. Here's hoping the ISS doesn't become a household name many decades from now for similar reasons!
But you know, I can't wait for the movie starring Leonardo DiCaprio as a stowaway on a Soyuz capsule. I might even sit through the thing for the dramatic scene at the end where his lifeless body slips into the blackness o
Re:What happened? (Score:5, Interesting)
Contrary to what Amiga Trombone suggests below, I for one was part of the Cassini-Huygens mission to Saturn and Titan (which was an agreement NASA/ESA, Esa providing the Huygens probe), and my impression was *definitely* that the association was extremely beneficial, not only to share costs, but to respect the schedule.
In this kind of NASA/ESA association, none of the two agencies would dare being the first one announcing a delay, so everyone worked like mad.
And while at the present time there seems to be a lot of fuss on the actual details of the Mars mission(s), I'm sure that once actually signed the same will happen. OK Cassini/Huygens was years ago (its development at least*), but mentalities have not evolved here, and I just cant' see any european announcing "I had you investing 500 M$ on that mission, but now I back off" -nor the contrary.
Maybe (to Amiga) the different evolution of the ISS was due to too large a range of cooperating countries and entities. for Cassini/H it was just two, resulting in exactly two teams cooperating. Which I hope is what'll happen on Mars.
. ;-)
(*)and now don't start calling me a fossil
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Contrary to what Amiga Trombone suggests below, I for one was part of the Cassini-Huygens mission to Saturn and Titan (which was an agreement NASA/ESA, Esa providing the Huygens probe), and my impression was *definitely* that the association was extremely beneficial, not only to share costs, but to respect the schedule. In this kind of NASA/ESA association, none of the two agencies would dare being the first one announcing a delay, so everyone worked like mad.
So how do you get missions like Cassini and not like the ISS?
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So how do you get missions like Cassini and not like the ISS?
I think a big part of the cost problem was that the ISS put the Space Shuttle on its critical path: many of the modules had to be launched on the Shuttle, otherwise they wouldn't be launched at all. This became particularly problematic due to all the cost overruns the Shuttle had. It it had been designed so that (perhaps MIR-size) modules could be launched on whatever launch vehicle was most cost-effective at the time (whether it was a Soyuz, EELV, or Ariane) that would've trimmed costs considerably.
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Now if you consider the fact that we have no TRUE enemies among the countries capable of a useful mars mission, you will realize that COOPERATION is what will drive the next great exploration of the solar system.
Yeah, because one global UN space program would get sooo much done. One of the biggest problems with doing something unique is estimating efficiency. How much "should" it cost to send a probe to Neptune nad do X? Who knows, but if you have multiple space agencys doing their own things sooner or later someone will ask "Hey, why are those guys spening half the money and get twice the results?"
You don't have to be a space program to experience this, how often on slashdot haven't we heard of the IT wiz keeping
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Simple, sometimes cooperation either enables things to be done easier, or even allows the accomplishment of things that wouldn't otherwise be possible (e.g. for practical limitations like lack of resources).
Ok, but what's the driver for the cooperators to follow through?
In some cases this is true, in others it is not. For over two hundered years rural North Americains would commonly hold barn raisings and similar social gatherings to accomplish large projects. Now each farmer and their families could build a barn seperately, but it would take much longer than the one-to-two days. Therefore, while technically each farmer could be in competition with each-other to sell what they produced, it became a custom to cooperate because the community would help every farmer.
Ok, this is a great example of how cooperation can succeed. But my view is that the barn raisings occurred not because a bunch of people considered cooperation to be a good thing in itself, but because it filled a great common need. That great common need doesn't appear in current cooperative efforts in space.
As I see it, if there was suddenly a greatly increased interest in space, then virtually every country that has launch capability coul
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Re:What happened? (Score:5, Interesting)
Where would we have been if we'd kept up the pace from the moon landing?
All over the Solar System, probably. Believe me, the engineers were planning it. (My Dad was one of them, so I have this on pretty good authority.) But once we Beat! The! Commies! To! The! Moon!, the national will disappeared, and with it the money.
So the answer to your first question is pretty much financial. Look at how much we spent on just Apollo, as a percentage of GDP, compared to how much we spend on all of NASA now ... and consider that the space budget has been a convenient target for Senators and Representatives who want to be able to tell their constituents that they're reining in wasteful government spending for, well, forty years or so. It's bullshit, of course, since NASA spending has never, even at the most expensive point in the Apollo program, been more than a tiny fraction of what we spend on many other programs with a far lower rate of return. But it's bullshit that plays well to ignorant audiences.
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I see your anger and I agree. However, I don't believe the space program, particularly Mars exploration is bullshit that won't play to "ignorant audiences". Look how excited the nation got after the Apollo, Gemini and other projects. And I don't think people back then were much more enlightened than they are now.
Yes, I know we were competing with the Soviets and were trying to one-up them, but national humiliation can't be the only motivation, can it? There just needs to be a new national motivation. I
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Well, sorry to be a party pooper, and it would indeed have been great if the drive from Apollo could have continued, but I think we have to consider a likely outcome of even just continuing the moon landings would have been a fatal accident. There were serious failings on pretty much all Apollo moon flights, the worst being Apollo 13 of course.
Maybe the really amazing thing NASA did was not just land a man on the moon, but the "returning him safely to earth" - there was no death in space after all.
But imagi
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Given that three astronauts died when Apollo 1 caught fire even on the ground, I'm not sure that more deaths back then would have stopped things.
Challenger and especially Columbia were much later - when the national desire to go into space had already diminished, and I'd argue that the lack of desire was the cause of the reaction to these deaths, not the other way round.
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Well, I think this graphic explains it very well. [radiantempire.com]
Re:What happened? (Score:5, Interesting)
The last time Congress asked NASA how much it would cost to go to Mars they came up with a proposal that involved building giant ships in LEO to travel 2.5 years to Mars, stay there a month, and come back. The price tag was trillions. When asked why they should pay so much, NASA basically said "I dunno, it was your idea" and that was that. Lately, though, they've been talking about much more sensible things. 6 months there, 500 days on the ground, 6 months back. The purpose of the mission being to do all the nifty science those little robots have been doing, only at 1000x the scale. Not to mention doing some biological search that isn't retarded.. finding life in the most desolate places on Earth is hard and robots can't do it, and when we send robots to Mars to look for life we ignore any results that say they have found it (all the instruments on Viking said they had found life).
Re:What happened? (Score:5, Insightful)
In the meantime, we spent those trillions chasing the Taliban over hill and dale, and propping up ponzie schemes of banks.
But thank god it wasn't wasted!
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I think a better question to ask is what the proponents of that public spending project did to convince Congress it was worth the money, or how they got Congress to keep paying the money long after it should have been canceled, and asking if you would like the proponents of your public spending project to do the same. If not, then why sit around wondering how it is that your rivals get more funding?
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Maybe because he's worried the answer involves kneepads?
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40 years ago they had a lot of joint initiatives, if ya know what I mean.
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shooting up probes from the moon?
Basically, the cost benefit was not there. We had to finish the Vietnam war. Then we had to satisfy all of the social programs. Then we had another two or three wars, interspersed with social programs.
Social programs waste the first derivative of Government spending. No good or service is produced. Mouths are simply fed. (Some will surely suggest this is good in and of itself).
But jobs are eventually created, and money trickles up from the poor to the grocer, the baker
Yes, but look at the bureaucracy (Score:1)
So did they finally decide... (Score:4, Funny)
...on cm vs inches?
MEASUREMENTS (Score:1)
Please tell me that there going to define a standerd first, i don't want my tax dollers to fund a 10 billion bullet that hits mars dead square at 12000 mph, or misses it by 3 million miles.
"*Boom* uuh we have a problem, was that perigee in Miles or Kilomoters?"
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Before you critizise, please learn to spell. It hurts reading your post.
there ---> they're
standerd ---> standard
dollers ---> dollars
kilomoters ---> kilometers
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the French ESA (Score:1)
Re:MEASUREMENTS (Score:5, Funny)
Before you critizise, please learn to spell.
I think I'm going to leave that line sitting there by itself for a while, in all its lonely glory.
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Kilometre!
Re:All I forsee is confusion. (Score:5, Informative)
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All the fault of the Stonecutters...
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Yes, but you have to admit that the Europeans act as a single country when it comes to spaceflight. ESA has institutes all over Europe, and they are all cooperating, and have researchers from all over Europe.
Besides, the British are part of the EU too, and they insist on using the imperial system too... Even worse, their imperial system might differ from the other imperial system(s?). Pity that Napoleon never invaded the UK :D
(Napoleon is said to have spread the Metric system to other countries)
Re:All I forsee is confusion. (Score:4, Informative)
Besides, the British are part of the EU too, and they insist on using the imperial system too...
This has not been true for science and engineering for many many years.
Please don't assume that, because the bulk of the population exhibits the natural human characteristics of unwillingness to change when the current system 'works', and are encouraged by the more rabid press (who have such a distrust of 'Johnny Foreigner' and his evil doings) that we don't do real work in metric.
BTW there was a parliamentary select committee (in 1862) recommending a switch to metric units so this is not a new thing -- we just don't like to rush into things too quickly :-)
Indeed a lot of our shopping is done in kilogrammes, litres... and legal work uses hectares rather than acres.
It's just some older measures are retained - partly for nostalgia [beer in pints], partly because pandering to sentiment / distrust of the new is [sadly] seen as a vote winner.
There is also the psychological issue that comparative measures tend to be slightly bigger in metric units (eg 500g is approximately 10% bigger than 1 lb) so shops selling packaged items had a 'perceived' price hike when switching over to metric - again another resentment easily stoked up as a price increase soundbite (without the compensating increase in delivery being mentioned) is always a winner in newspaper circulation.
A lot of people (me included) work quite happily with both systems - sometimes even mixing them in creative ways (eg fuel consumption in miles/litre). For practical purposes I use metric - for domestic use then either metric or imperial or both
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There is also the psychological issue that comparative measures tend to be slightly bigger in metric units
Except, thank God, for the mighty pint!!! mmm, continental lager....
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And feet, for height. :-( We're retarded.
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the brits switched to Metric ages ago for all things technical, it is still only used for drink measurements in bars and in the local food market (although they have to display the weight, etc in mettric as well)
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Besides, the British are part of the EU too, and they insist on using the imperial system too...
Only for beer, it means that we get 13% more than the 500ml glasses used elsewhere.
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What other imperial systems ? It's called the "Imperial" system because it was ours, we were the empire that "Imperial" refers to !
Inches, yards, furlongs, acres, quarts, grains, ounces, rods, chains, pecks, bushels and hundredweight. The US uses some of the names, but it is not the Imperial system.
Besides which, there is not a fa
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Actually, in this age of computers, I don't see any intrinsic advantage to metric, but I see lots of intrinsic advantages for the Imperial system.
Who can visualize something divided by ten or even worse four tenths? I can easily visualize something half or a third of any given length. Furthermore English units are related to something immediately tangible: I can walk out a floor measurement in feet. Yards are also ultimately related to the length of an arm. But millionths of the arc distance from the po
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Thanks for the info, next time I'll look for the Californian embassy if I need a visum.
Not a federal state, a supranational association (Score:2)
The European Parliament is powerless, the Commission has some powers.
And the EU only has 27 member countries out of 47 European countries! The EU is in NO way synonymous with Europe.
This is a common mistake that many Americans make nowadays, assuming that the EU is some kind of federal government of Europe. It is most certai
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And the United States of America consists of 50 independent sovereign states and 3 territories out of the 91 states in North America (US, Canada, Mexico, apologies to the smaller Caribbean and Central American states). Or at least, the states started as sovereign until a certain president violated the constitution to wage war against the Confederacy over their legal and rightful succession.
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The EU and Europe are not the same entities. And the ESA is something else entirely.
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Even more so; The US uses Imperial while most of the world uses Metric, not just another country.
Actually, it's not just "most of the world". The US appears to be just about the only country not transitioning away from imperial units (cf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_customary_units [wikipedia.org] and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_units [wikipedia.org]).
I looked into it at some time ago for a web site that had product sizes in cm. I had to implement an exception for visitors from just one country. If you're from the US, I've officially hated you since that day.
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Not so with the general public, which sometimes caused problems with NASA get
MEJI? (Score:1)