NASA May Drop Ares I-Y Test Flight 203
Matt_dk writes "Just one week after the first test launch of the Ares I-X rocket, NASA says it may decide to cancel a follow-up launch called Ares 1-Y, which wasn't scheduled until 2014. Reportedly, program managers recommended dropping the flight because, currently, there isn't funding to get an upper stage engine ready in time. Depending on whether the Obama administration decides to continue the Ares I program, this decision may be moot. Earlier this week Sen. Bill Nelson said Obama may make a decision on NASA's future path, based on the report by the Augustine Commission, by the end of November."
Internal Interest (Score:5, Insightful)
I wonder if NASA is going to be able to keep up internal interest on these projects with the way their budget keeps getting cleaved. Hell, I wonder how they managed to keep people onboard, what with a 5 year delay between test flights.
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Because there's still plenty of work to do in the meantime. Just because a test flight isn't going to be scheduled doesn't mean the vehicle development will stop. The same thing happened with the Shuttle in the 70's. Ultimately, NASA decided to have the first test flight be manned/crewed (considered by many to be the single most hazardous test flight ever conducted -- John Young and Robert Crippen are studs forever).
We might see the first "real" test of the Ares-I happen during the first crewed flight.
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If you are just running a jobs program its actually better to do as little as possible. Hardware and launches cost money reducing funds available for salaries. As long as Congress and the President let's them get away with it, and keeps sending them a few billion each year, it would be ideal to schedule the next launch in the 2040 time frame, which is practically what they are already doing.
If you've watched NASA over the years, especially when they are doing new launch vehicles they ALWAYS produce awesom
Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:5, Insightful)
Too bad we spend a trillion dollars invading the wrong country based on obvious lies and fabrications. I think we would have been better off spending that money on cool space toys or at least getting Afghanistan right the first time.
We will be paying for the George W Bush's disastrous presidency for a very long time.
Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:5, Informative)
Don't worry, we aren't paying for it. Our putative children (and their children) will be paying for it. We just put in on the big VISA card in the sky.
Ka-Ching!
To be fair, W and reagan's (Score:5, Interesting)
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Too bad we spend a trillion dollars invading the wrong country based on obvious lies and fabrications.
Over what, eight years?
We just spent almost a trillion in one year as a "stimulus" that has apparently helped nothing...
... and you conveniently overlook that it was the Bush administration that encouraged and started the stimulus spending before Obama took office.
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The unfunded liabilities of universal health care will make Medicare part D look like pocket change.
I know the US is spending too much money, but for stories like this it pisses me off because the US government couldn't be farther from funding the things I'd like to see it fund or not fund for that matter.
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Well, lucky for us there aren't any unfunded universal health care bills on the table. Perhaps you should inform yourself on what health care bills are currently under consideration.
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That is a true statement. Now how likely do you think that what the government is trying to do will in any way "clean up" the health care system? The plan most likely to pass forces the entire population to buy the insurance companies' product! Compared with plans that actually attempt to solve the problem [denninger.net] it is clear that the only thing that congress will pass is corporate welfare fo
Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:4, Insightful)
We just spent almost a trillion in one year as a "stimulus" that has apparently helped nothing... and if it has, very little and it's really hard to tell and it appears that a lot of it is being wasted.
So, wait, let me get this straight... it's "really hard to tell" if the stimulus has done anything. But, despite that admission, in the very same sentence, you claim it has "apparently helped nothing... and if it has, very little".
Uhuh.
Yup, definitely a clear, unbiased, level-headed analysis, there...
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Because there is always evidence for anyone's point, these days, and you can find economists that say the stimulus hurt and the stimulus helped the economy.
But I haven't read any that said it helped very significantly.
If you asked me what I actually thought - in my non-economist and "my macro-econ class boiled down to really complex terms for really simple ideas"-mindset opinion - I would tell you that I think it did nothing good and, if anything, some amount of bad. All it seemed to do to me is put the US
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when the economy gets better while unemployment rises. It means the wealthy are earning much more than when only one of those conditions are true.
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clearly. ;)
But if the economy improved with unemployment going down, what would we have to complain about? We can't be happy without something to complain about, regardless of what side of the fence is stuck up our behind.
Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:5, Informative)
Our national debt went from 4 trillion to over 8 trillion during Bush's tenure in what was supposedly very good economic times. The economic policies pursued during that same administration led to the greatest economic meltdown the country has seen in 80 years. The stimulus package planning was begun under the Bush administration, and finalized in the early months under Obama in order to partially mitigate the poor choices made by our banks and Wall Street.
A number of recent economic markers are pointing to the economy starting to be on the way up again -- I would say that 12-18 months turnaround on this depression is fairly quick compared to recessions of the past. FDR's economic policies in the 30s may have been shocking back then, but Americans expect far more "socialist" programs out of their government nowadays. Not spending any money certainly wouldn't lead to less unemployment, and very likely would cause the depression to last longer as the banks are still hesitant to do any sort of major lending -- which leads to companies hesitant to do new hiring.
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thankfully, the grownups have taken over running this country
Ah yes. Reid and Pelosi, Axelrod, Gibbs, and even Obama at times, definitely act like grownups. Especially when they cry about Republicans not being bipartisan and then - for the first time in the history of the rule, I believe - push a bill out of committee without the quorum of two minority group members.
Actually, IMO, it seems most Senators - on both sides - act more like three year olds than what "grownups" are supposed to act like.
I guess the 70s was the conservatives' fault and the 80s and 90s were
Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:5, Insightful)
Ah yes. Reid and Pelosi, Axelrod, Gibbs, and even Obama at times, definitely act like grownups. Especially when they cry about Republicans not being bipartisan and then - for the first time in the history of the rule, I believe - push a bill out of committee without the quorum of two minority group members.
Just on this topic, ignoring the bailouts and all that, the Republicans have taken on a very simple strategy in the last six months or so: Block *all* proposals coming from Democrats. Period. How the hell can you possibly expect the Democrats to fulfill their promises of bipartisanship if the Republicans do everything they possibly can to hijack the democratic process?
Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:5, Insightful)
How the hell can you possibly expect the Democrats to fulfill their promises of bipartisanship if the Republicans do everything they possibly can to hijack the democratic process?
But the Democrats won't listen to or accept a single change to bills from Republicans, apparently, unless it is one that the Democrats all approve of in the first place.
In other words, the bipartisan effort in the Obama administration/current Senate goes something like this: Hey, why don't you just agree with us and be bipartisan?.
And if they don't agree, they are being "partisan." Or racist, for that matter.
Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:4, Informative)
But the Democrats won't listen to or accept a single change to bills from Republicans
The Republicans aren't proposing simple changes. Once again, their approach is simple: our way or the highway. That's it. Meanwhile, the Democrats have been folding on some of their core proposals in order to get things moving (a public healthcare option being the most glaring). There has been *no* attempt from the right to work toward a bipartisan solution. NONE. The Democrats can hardly be faulted for that kind of uncooperative, even childish behaviour.
Worse, in cases like healthcare, the Republicans are actively blocking measures that over *60%* of the US population supports. If that isn't pure, unadulterated political brinksmanship, I don't know what is.
Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:5, Interesting)
So, Republicans can only propose minor details, not large changes? If Republicans want, say, investigation into nuclear energy but Democrats don't, they aren't allowed to suggest it - it's too big of a change? Or too complex? Or whatever?
It seems that most of the current bills are very ideologically Democrat centered. Public healthcare and climate change stuff (but not nuclear, it seems). As I recall, House Republicans/conservatives submitted a lot of proposals from the so-called tort reform to abortion to making sure illegal immigrants don't get the public healthcare insurance option. None of them - and those are not "major" in comparison with the bill - were accepted.
Meanwhile, the Democrats have been folding on some of their core proposals in order to get things moving (a public healthcare option being the most glaring).
They folded on that? It's still in almost all of their bills, if not all of them, and it is one of the major things that many people don't want. As you mention, "60%" of the US population supports ... what? Supports healthcare reform or supports the current bills, as they are, in the House, including the public option? There's a huge difference there.
The Democrats have not folded on a public healthcare "option." Actually, I can't really find anything they have folded on, at the moment. Pelosi and Reid have repeatedly said they refuse to have a bill without a "public option" though.
The American public is a lot more split than you think on healthcare, according to Gallup [gallup.com].
Saying one party or the other, at the moment, is at fault and doing "pure, unadulterated political brinksmanship" appears to be dependent on who you read/listen to. I try to stay out of the finger pointing, and blameshifting, as that appears to get nowhere - and Republicans and Democrats are very at fault for doing that. Right now, it seems to me that we have some very libecal Senators/House Reps that are trying to push a certain ideology.
Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:4, Insightful)
As an aside, I happen to think this whole idea of bipartisanship is, at this point, completely absurd. Since the last election, the Republicans have clearly chosen to swing even further to the right (one need only see the NY-23 election to see that), latching on to the extreme right-wingers like Sarah Palin. As such, I simply don't think there *can* be any kind of bipartisan effort between the Democrats and the Republicans, simply because they're so distant ideologically. Meanwhile, the Republicans are really interested in one thing at this stage: tearing the Democrats from power. And if that means blocking any and all attempts and meaningful reform, then so be it.
In fact, I would go so far as to say they've concluded that it's in the Republicans' best interests to ensure that *nothing* the Democrats want gets passed, as if the Dems can show any success on the issues that people actually care about (healthcare, the economy, etc), it'll only solidify their hold on the political ground they've gained during the last 4 years. Much like our good friend Rush Limbaugh, I really believe the Republicans hope Obama and the Democrats fail and fail miserably, regardless of the consequences it may have for America.
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As an aside, I happen to think this whole idea of bipartisanship is, at this point, completely absurd.
I'm really ok with non-bipartisanship, to some extent. But at least say you're not interested in it, don't try to say one thing and do another (not talking to you... talking to Washington. Who isn't reading. hehe.)
I simply don't think there *can* be any kind of bipartisan effort between the Democrats and the Republicans, simply because they're so distant ideologically.
I would tend to agree.
tearing the Democrats from power. And if that means blocking any and all attempts and meaningful reform, then so be it.
And again, I agree. Same that Democrats wanted to do. Power-struggle, pretty much, on both sides. However, I think that the current "meaningful reform" is actually bad, not good, so I'll side with Republicans at the moment.
Much like our good friend Rush Limbaugh, I really believe the Republicans hope Obama and the Democrats fail and fail miserably, regardless of the consequences it may have for America.
Limbaugh, IMO, is very smart, very arrogant, and
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In other words, the bipartisan effort in the Obama administration/current Senate goes something like this: Hey, why don't you just agree with us and be bipartisan?.
I think that distinction deserves more than just a slash. Obama has made a significant effort to reach out to Republicans and incorporate their ideas. It's the Democrats in both houses of Congress that don't want to play along. They're the ones that are riding high on their majorities and same-party president (apparently just having a majority
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In general, I would tend to actually agree. I disagree very strongly with Obama, but I also strongly disagree with many Republicans and conservatives in the very disrespectful way they treat him - the same disagreement I had with the many Democrats and liberals that treated Bush with the same disrespect. And hatred (on both sides/both Presidents). Obama appears to be pretty decent in his own personal actions, but I think he chooses to align himself with people that are much less dignified than he is.
And
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How the hell can you possibly expect the Democrats to fulfill their promises of bipartisanship if the Republicans do everything they possibly can to hijack the democratic process?
I personally don't care. The junk coming from the Democrats is extremely harmful to the future of the US and unworthy of bipartisan compromise. The Democrats have majorities in both branches of Congress. If they can't get their own members to vote for these bills, then why should they expect Republicans to vote for them?
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"How the hell can you possibly expect the Democrats to fulfill their promises of bipartisanship if the Republicans do everything they possibly can to hijack the democratic process?"
How did the Republican's manage to ram through nearly their entire, fairly extreme, legislative agenda for six years, if not more, with a smaller majority in the Senate than the Dems have now? There are at least some Democrats to blame here, for either voting with them then, or not having the guts to fillibuster when they could
Re:Blew Your Wad Too Early (Score:4, Insightful)
Too be fair that particular criticism applies to a lot more than just one country. The list of nations that are not guilty of that now or in the recent past is quite small.
Government Fail. (Score:3, Interesting)
So Bush initiates Project Constellation, and at a time when it's barely started, after lots of time and resources have been plown into structuring the project, it's on the verge of being shut down?
Well, if it's shut down, at least we saw some cool flames at the back of a rocket!111 Durr...
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Sunk costs don't matter for deciding future policy, only costs to complete it matter. When analyzing whether or not something should be done, you have to consider whether or not the remaining cost is worthwhile.
The Augustine Report, on which any policy decision is likely to be based lays out the options and considers the completion costs on a 'stay the course' direction. And the only place where significant sunk costs may be wasted is on Ares 1. Ares V hasn't been significantly developed, and all options
5 years? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:5 years? (Score:5, Insightful)
Now, if you could somehow link landing on Mars to beating the terrorists, we could get all the money we need to get this thing done quickly. Until then, though, they can only do things as fast as their ever-shrinking budget will let them.
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--Now, if you could somehow link landing on Mars to beating the terrorists, we could get all the money we need to get this thing done quickly. Until then, though, they can only do things as fast as their ever-shrinking budget will let them.--
You gotta watch out, those terrorists will be on Mars any time now. We gotta get there first so they don't pull any suicide attacks there.
Re:5 years? (Score:4, Funny)
Woulda worked better back in the commie days. "Beating the reds to the red planet" would have had so much good marketing in it.
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Yeah, too bad, hugh.
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Wait a minute.... I want to be clear of the linkage you are drawing here... ...you want the people responsible for bringing us the "K" car in charge of manned spaceflight?
I mean, that'll make spaceflight cheap and all, and I'm all for that, but roadside service centers in space are mighty scarce. And you know what they say about vacuum - it sucks.
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That's what the urban legend would have you believe, but as usual, the reality is much different.
In reality, NASA's peak funding (during the Moon race) was in 1965 - and was slashed dramatically in '66/'67. (Before the Saturn V even flew, it's pr
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Yup, and even at the peak of funding, it only comes about to about 2x the current budget, adjusted for inflation.
NASA never had a *monster* budget, they found ways to do a lot with a little, and cut a lot of corners in the process.
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NASA never had a *monster* budget, they found ways to do a lot with a little, and cut a lot of corners in the process.
You mean like faking the moon landings entirely? ;)
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You mean like faking the moon landings entirely? ;)
Not that. They went all out on that set.
Ares should be funded and continued. (Score:2)
Cancelling Ares I in my opinion would be pretty foolish, especially after so many resources have been invested into it. Its like, they barely funded the project, so that it struggled to produce, and then after they produced a working system, they decide to kill it off. I know conservatives babble on about private space and so on but I am doubtful that those would be as capable as Ares or that they would be any cheaper. More likely, the American tax payer would likely end up spending millions on some wealthy
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The Dems and the Reps are both equally corrupt, and amazingly so.
Single-payer health care sounds like a good idea, but what Obama is trying to pass isn't the answer. He wants to socialize the costs of everyone's health care across the entire taxpayer base, but he doesn't want to do anything to actually fix the reason that healthcare costs SO much. Healthcare has gotten expensive because of malpractice, malpractice insurance, and litigation. Obama doesn't want to fix any of that, because that's not good f
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We do want to control malpractice insurance costs. I agree with you there! The system is just far too litigation happy and we have lawyers who make a living off frivoulous lawsuits. But Part of the problem though is insurance companies with have 30% overhead compared to 4% for medicare. If we got rid of the insurance companies and replace it with medicare for all, we would save enough money to cover everyone in the country. Just by getting rid of private insurance and their $120 million dollar salary execut
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The biggest cost (both in terms of dollars and time) in rocket development is the design and testing of new engines. This
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Are you kidding me? The Democrats first got control in 2006 (first time since 1994). By that time the problem was already well underway. The loan policies have questionable influence on what happened. It is the fact that we had rampant real estate speculation (drove up prices and led to bad mortgages due to too high prices) and there were no regulation on derivatives that caused the systemic collapse. Unless we regulate the banks, it will happen all over again. THe republican control house gutted out the Gl
Obama might also increase the funds, no? (Score:5, Interesting)
Change you can believe and stuff? What better than a daring scientific project of national proportions to catalyze the United States, to unite the minds and the hearts of all the people, to inspire them, to give them hope and a vision?
During the Apollo missions America had a dream larger than life, a vision that propelled her forward for decades to come. The creativity, genius and overpowering enthusiasm that this country showed was what, I think, eventually broke the USSR - the Star Wars "threat" was so much more frightening to the Soviets, because they (the old gard, anyway) still had in mind the Apollo missions and thought that these crazy yankees might just pull this off!
America is now just a shell of its former self - a gigantic trade and budget deficit, a country wholly subservient to foreign (mostly arab) oil, and almost bought out by the Chinese government.
You want a stimulus, one that will really stimulate all the people, all their endevours, all their emotions? Give NASA more, much more money, and tell them to dream big!
Better (Score:3, Insightful)
How about a project of national proportions to get us off of fossil fuels, or at least completely energy-independent, today, and for a fraction of the cost of whatever you have in mind?
How about a project of national proportions to beef up our computing and telecommunications infrastructure so that every Ameri
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How about a project of national proportions to get us off of fossil fuels, or at least completely energy-independent, today, and for a fraction of the cost of whatever you have in mind?
Why would we want to do that, when it'll occur naturally as a result of market forces? I say let it happen when we're ready for it to happen.
How about a project of national proportions to beef up our computing and telecommunications infrastructure so that every American has pretty much instant, real-time access to, well, pretty much everything?
Most people have that right now. You're just speaking of coverage for a few rural communities. I don't think that's a good use of government funds.
Or for that matter, how about a massive funding effort of national in medical research, with the end goal of something like a cancer vaccine, maybe even a cure, or other goals such as extending the quality and quantity of life in general? That would certainly captivate me.
We're already spending billions a year on R&D and tens of billions a year on treatments. Plenty of incentive for anyone who wants to develop a cureall.
I love sci-fi, I love sci-reality, I've been a space junkie since I was a kid, and if I had the chance to go to Mars, I'd sign up tomorrow. But I'm also practical, and I realize that there are a lot better things that we could spend a lot of money on than the space program.
Such as? You haven't mentioned one yet. All those other are stuff tha
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You've answered your own question about why America will not return to her glory days. More NASA funding would be nice, but the country is still embroiled in Iraq and the economy is still reeling. The government owns General Motors. The shining beacon of individual liberty and "can-do" capitalism has been forever tarn
Making Hay (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:More proof... (Score:4, Funny)
Future Leader: Let's use science to process people into Soylent Green!
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Re:More proof... (Score:4, Insightful)
...that Obama is really a conservative, not a liberal.
I hope you're joking...
I suppose in some very liberal circles, Obama is conservative ... if you use "conservative" as a "relative" term. But you usually don't use it in a relative term without stating what it is relative to. A conservative democrat? A conservative republican? Conservative conservative?
Anyway, Obama seems to be more "populist" than anything. He won based on his popularity and charisma, not so much his liberal or conservative policies. From my viewpoint, Obama is very liberal. But then, I'm very conservative. So there you have it.
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Yes, since when did 'conservative' start to mean 'dedicated to spending as much as possible on massive military buildup and wars of world domination', anyway?
And when did 'spreading the wealth' become un-democratic?
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Yes, since when did 'conservative' start to mean 'dedicated to spending as much as possible on massive military buildup and wars of world domination', anyway?
After World War Two, the Old Right that was anti-war (World War One and Two) began moving in a more interventionist direction.
The Democrats of the era were already in favor in foreign intervention. Before Pearl Harbor, FDR was waging pretty much an undeclared naval war on Germany to help the Allies. Wilson before FDR engaged America in WWI. Truman jumped into Korea, and Kennedy in Vietnam (though it was in the planning stages, IIRC, in the Eisenhowever administration).
The rise of the neo-conservatives provi
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A liberal, as defined in this era, would not want to spend the money because it doesn't do anything to further their socialist agenda and spread the wealth.
The problem is that "liberal" and "conservative" as defined in the US have no substantive policy differences, just different talking points that the American media sells to American consumers as profound and fundamental differences in policy, to the extent that when members of your two nominally different poltical parties do exactly the same thing those
Sad, but kind of Accurate (Score:2)
Re:Sad, but kind of Accurate (Score:5, Insightful)
Well NASA sure as heck isn't raking in the funding under Obama either. And don't go saying he'll be giving more funding to have NASA do Earth Science either because of his stance on Global Warming, because he isn't doing that either.
All I see right now is liberal special interest groups getting waaaayyyy more money than NASA is even asking for showered on them and NASA continuing to get the shaft from this administration just like they did from the last one.
I am sick of hearing how science can now breathe a sigh of relief because Obama's in the White House. They won't be doing anything at all unless they get some real funding pretty soon.
Bullshit. Total Bullshit (Score:5, Informative)
It remains to be seen what Obama/Dems will do with it. When it comes to ppl screaming that they do not live in their budget, I see nothing by idiots. The president SETS NASA'S DIRECTION. W set it to be massive new undertaking, but then grossly underfunded it (just like everything he did).
Right now, everybody is screaming for NASA to push THEIR idea of what should happen, and few want to provide proper funding for any of it. Personally, I hope that the dems get the clue that the neo-cons did not; Space is near to being able to survive on its own and grew RAPIDLY. This is the time for the dems to pour a BIT of money into it and get this set up. It is NOT hard to do. What is amazing is that with less than and increase of 3 billion next year, 2 billion the year there after, and then 1 extra billion for the next few years thereafter, they can create in space what the Internet did; massive jobs and new frontiers.
Space program != science (Score:3, Insightful)
Have you seen his energy initiatives? You can pursue science and "the future of our species" without spending billions on pie-in-the-sky space projects.
Don't get me wrong, I'm a space junkie. I like Battlestar Galactica just like any other red-blooded American geek. And if we were overflowing in riches right now, I'd say let's go for it.
But the practical fact of the situation is that space exploration i
For example... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm going to break Slashdot etiquette by replying to my own reply, but this is the kind of thing I'm talking about.
If you were president, and you had the choice to, say, send a manned mission to Mars to collect some dirt and maybe begin the steps it would take to, if we're lucky and very, very good, colonize the planet a century or two from now, or roll out a national energy infrastructure that will get us off of fossil fuels today, thus keeping our own planet from boiling away (and most likely discovering a lot of very useful stuff that would make such a manned Mars mission much cheaper, safer, and more practical when we DO do it), which would you choose?
Some people are still under the misguided notion that we don't have to make such choices, that we can just do both. That's one of our problems with science initiatives today. We're trying to do everything, and we end up half-assing it all and nothing gets done.
Personally, I'd rather just not have a space program (well, nothing much more than putting satellites in orbit now and then) than spending billions on the white elephant of one that we have today.
Re:For example... (Score:5, Insightful)
We're going to get the worst of both worlds: no manned space exploration program and a white elephant "green" energy infrastructure that won't be good for much except making the investors who started the Chicago Climate Exchange richer.
Re:For example... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:For example... (Score:5, Insightful)
As the price of fossil fuels rise the market will fund alternative energy sources. [Moving to non-fossil energy sources] will happen in spite of what anyone does.
Of course they will, but the question is will this funding be soon enough and large enough to sufficiently replace fossil fuels at a pace that matches the rise in oil prices?
Our entire economy is dependent on fossil fuels. If the price goes up, and there isn't enough alternative sources available so that we need to continue paying this increasing cost, it will put a severe drag on our economy. If the price of oil rises to quickly, and the alternative energy sources are not ready, it could drive us into a depression far worse than the mere recession we're still struggling with now. Where, then, will the money come from to continue developing alternative energy? And what good will it do when it takes years and years to build up?
We are facing a severe problem with fossil fuels if we don't do something about it well in advance. If "the market" is going to wait until the price of oil is prohibitively expensive, then it's going to be too late.
Funding alternative energy means getting the free market to do something it normally doesn't very well, which is respond to obvious problems before they materially hurt the market's bottom line.
Personally I think we can fund NASA too, but that's me.
Re:For example... (Score:4, Insightful)
Extinction.
Kill our excess children.
Expand out into the rest of the solar system and beyond
The only thing really up for argument is how long we have until we have to make the choice. The thing about that third choice however is that if we don't start it soon enough there won't be time before we have to choose between the other two.
That being said.. Let the market push green technology. Have you been watching the price of oil? There are fortunes to be made! There are many fortunes to be lost before we colonize space. There is too much technology to be developed yet so the market isn't going to do it. We need a money source which isn't required to justify itself by earning a profit to develop space travel technology. We need it to be cheap enough that corporations start shipping people off world to look for resources they can turn into money. The only source I know of is tax dollars.
Re:For example... (Score:5, Insightful)
Our population rises exponentially. No matter how green our technology gets we ultimately have 3 choices. Extinction. Kill our excess children. Expand out into the rest of the solar system and beyond
Well that's a false trichotomy if I've ever heard one.
We can also slow our population growth to 0 by using birth control.
Re:For example... (Score:4, Interesting)
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Or we can skip the pointless speculation and use birth control which has been shown to work well in the developed world.
Developed world already has negative population growth, thanks not only to birth control but primarily to extreme costs and liabilities of raising children in their countries.
The other world, OTOH, couldn't care less about birth control because a) people want children, culturally b) people need children to prosper, and c) children are affordable there. So in the end the "developed wor
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The other world, OTOH, couldn't care less about birth control because a) people want children, culturally b) people need children to prosper, and c) children are affordable there. So in the end the "developed world" will be a drop in the ocean of other nations.
The "other world" is becoming the developed world. The same dynamics that created the developed world are at work everywhere in the world. Remember a mere century ago, the developed world was the other world.
Re:For example... (Score:4, Interesting)
Birthrates drop as people become more wealthy and some of the poorest areas of the world have the highest birth rates. The notion that the solution to excessive population growth is to put the "excess" bodies on space ships and send them to live somewhere else is absurd - the cost of the launch alone likely exceeds the total cost of caring for the kid here on earth for the rest of their lives.
The supply of humans, like rabbits, is nearly unlimited - only the resources to provide for them are limited. It might make sense for some reason to send a few prime "breeding pairs" (human and/or non-human) to populate other celestial bodies - for example, if one believes that forms of life on Earth are unique enough in the universe and superior in some way to other life in the universe that it's important for some moral, ethical, or religious reason to preserve and propagate Earthly species even after the Earth is uninhabitable (having been baked to a crisp by our sun for example). But, doing so won't have a measurable impact on Earth's human population.
Re:For example... (Score:4, Interesting)
Our population rises exponentially.
No, premise is wrong. Some parts of "our" population have exponential growth rates and some have exponential decay rates. And projections are that the global population will start to decline around 2050.
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Re:For example... (Score:5, Insightful)
Kill our excess children.,br> Expand out into the rest of the solar system and beyond
Expanding into Space doesn't help. Imagine a sphere centered on Earth, and expanding outwards over time. That sphere will grow geometrically, eg t^3. As you've posited, our population rises exponentially n^t. Eventually, we will overpopulate space. Expansion is not an option.
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Um, if _I_ were President, I would immediately put a stop to the Treasury handing out any more TARP money and fully fund NASA's budget.
There that wasn't so hard.
And yes, it is what I would really do if I were President. I believe completely that the TARP program was one of the worst things my Government has ever done.
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".. billions on the white elephant..."
If you knew what the hell you were talking about with regard to what the U.S. Budget ACTUALLY spends its money on, you would have a heart attack right now,and save /. the time of reading your banalities.
You know what happens if we drop NASA and keep space exploration strictly private? You and I lose, the Corporations win ( and probably at 3x the actual cost), and China surpasses the US technologically.
Yes. We SHOULD completely drop all government funded space endeavors.
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I partially agree with what you're saying.
One one hand, we could get more scientific value out of launching 5 or 6 Mars Science Laboratory type projects (or 12+ MER-type projects) per year than a few Shuttle or Ares missions. The human spaceflight program does produce useful science, but it's very, very expensive compared to unmanned missions.
Note that I said science, not engineering. The human spaceflight program does far more for developing our ability to build and survive in space than an unmanned progra
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Some people are still under the misguided notion that we don't have to make such choices, that we can just do both. That's one of our problems with science initiatives today. We're trying to do everything, and we end up half-assing it all and nothing gets done.
Can't we, though? NASA's 2008 budget was about $17 billion -- less than we spent in three weeks in Iraq the same year.
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I would place the energy problem far ahead of the one regarding space travel. Lets face it, this idea that we can totally %$%$ up this planet and then just fly off to another one is absurd. Lets focus on fixing things here. Too often here on slashdot, I see people both promoting insane things like space travel, which will never be feasible for more than a few people adn who wouldnt survive well on these other planets, and destructive technologies like GMOs which are literally causing a global ecological col
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Lets face it, this idea that we can totally %$%$ up this planet and then just fly off to another one is absurd.
My view is simply that successful space development grows our economy, cultures, and knowledge in ways that mere ecological damage control cannot. Space development is not about escaping our problems, it's about growing up. Someone is going to live in space. It might as well be us.
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Pretty much the only thing a trip to mars is that space travel is totally impractical and extremely expensive. it is also likely that anyone who does go to mars will die of cancer prematurely due to the exposure to cosmic rays. The think would basically be a pointless stunt that would waste billions on something that will be pretty useless and pointless as far as human welfare.
As a moral issue, and as an issue of saving the only planet we have, we need to make sure our planet is a healthy place to live into
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Cause frankly, we need thinking "out of box", and fresh ideas
Re:For example... (Score:4, Interesting)
If you were president, and you had the choice to, say, send a manned mission to Mars to collect some dirt and maybe begin the steps it would take to, if we're lucky and very, very good, colonize the planet a century or two from now, or roll out a national energy infrastructure that will get us off of fossil fuels today, thus keeping our own planet from boiling away (and most likely discovering a lot of very useful stuff that would make such a manned Mars mission much cheaper, safer, and more practical when we DO do it), which would you choose?
I'd weigh the cost/benefit of each. Odds are really good that I would do neither. The Mars program would probably take place in the absence of any economic launch infrastructure to space and hence, be hideously expensive. The national energy infrastructure would most likely be a boondoggle and a bad choice. It's better to allow the market to chose a energy infrastructure rather than impose a bad idea (especially one chosen on the basis of what selfish special interest groups are most powerful).
Instead, I would probably focus on spending reduction, not just of expensive, delusionally misguided military projects, but everything including entitlements.
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I'm going to break Slashdot etiquette by replying to my own reply, but this is the kind of thing I'm talking about.
If you were president, and you had the choice to, say, send a manned mission to Mars to collect some dirt and maybe begin the steps it would take to, if we're lucky and very, very good, colonize the planet a century or two from now, or roll out a national energy infrastructure that will get us off of fossil fuels today, thus keeping our own planet from boiling away (and most likely discovering a lot of very useful stuff that would make such a manned Mars mission much cheaper, safer, and more practical when we DO do it), which would you choose?
Some people are still under the misguided notion that we don't have to make such choices, that we can just do both. That's one of our problems with science initiatives today. We're trying to do everything, and we end up half-assing it all and nothing gets done.
Personally, I'd rather just not have a space program (well, nothing much more than putting satellites in orbit now and then) than spending billions on the white elephant of one that we have today.
I really don't see why you had to answer your own post - you could have just included this stuff in your original post, where it belonged.
That said... just pouring money into Obama's energy initiatives (which, by the way, don't impress me all that much - nothing really courageous, groundbreaking... really quite bland) won't necessarily create the best results. What you're forgetting is the human element. What is going to transform money into results? People. Motivated people. Creative, thinking and dedicate
Re:Space program != science (Score:5, Insightful)
If you take an hour out of your day (really, you have plenty of time left in your life, you can survive 1 hour) to do some poking around over at USASpending.gov [usaspending.gov] you will see figures pop up like the fact that the top five federal contractors this year were:
1 LOCKHEED MARTIN CORPORATION ... $29.748500571 Billion ... $18.231538802 Billion ... $12.318737574 Billion ... $11.900713440 Billion ... $11.156782353 Billion
2 THE BOEING COMPANY
3 GENERAL DYNAMICS CORPORATION
4 NORTHROP GRUMMAN CORPORATION
5 RAYTHEON COMPANY
Now you may already know this, but if not, another hour of research won't kill you, but each of those companies is very diversified in the types of products the provide to their customers. They work on everything from appliances, to housing, to spacecraft. However, a little more research and a little intuition will show you that these companies are, above all else, arms developers. And the majority of their contracts coming from the federal government are those dedicated to developing the new, powerful, absurdly capable weapons that would have been useful in the Cold War, which ended ~20 years ago. If you add up the total monetary value of the contracts provided to these five companies for FY 2009, you see that, together, $88.356272740 Billion (with a B) was awarded to companies that are essentially developing technology to fight a war that fizzled out 20 years ago. Now of course, neither economics or politics are as simple as I am making this out to be, but it does illustrate a point. While these companies probably are also getting plenty of money for advancing science and engineering in general, the mass majority of the spending by the federal government is spent ramping up what is already the most powerful and capable military in the world right now.
Suppose, for a second, that the war-machine lobby groups could be quelled long enough that the exorbitant level of funds being diverted to arms development and obscure wars on ideas (terrorism, drugs, etc.) could, instead, be cut significantly and diverted instead to, as you put it, meaningful science pursuits. We could, quite easily, save money on a federal level AND fund space exploration (manned and unmanned) AND fund alternative energy AND fund stem cell research AND fund computer infrastructure development etc. Instead, however, we have allowed our federal government to be infiltrated and overtaken by corrupt, greedy, selfish corporate interests. Thus, rather than funding valuable, civil science and tech, we have a government whose spending levels are out of control. A good amount of that spending goes towards funding wars that are sketchy at best, and a dormant lion of a military that needs nothing more than a twitchy trigger finger on its leash to free an unholy uproar of annihilation and chaos.
In short, our current priorities are the only thing that keep our country from properly funding the sciences that both you, and I, find valuable simultaneously
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As long as the US is The Superpower, their money will hold value no matter how much debt they go into.
Divert the funds into what you describe sure, but if it doesn't yield marketable results quickly, the US would end up in trouble.
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And if we were overflowing in riches right now, I'd say let's go for it.
But the practical fact of the situation is that space exploration is only one miniscule part of science, and it is very, very expensive.
The correct statement is "space exploration is only one miniscule part of science, and it is ridiculously cheap."
At the moment, the whole NASA budget-- research, robotic exploration, human exploration, aeronautics, all of it-- is less than half of a percent of the federal budget. Too small to even see on the pie charts. That's cheap cheap cheap.
Here's my proposal. Let's fund NASA with five percent of the US military budget [wikipedia.org]-- that is, for every dollar the military gets, a nickel goes to NASA. This will
Re:More proof... (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm not sure not spending money on space flight in a conservative philosophy as I at least would consider space abilities to be very much in line with providing for the national defense. There's a lot of overlapping technology and abilities in that realm and most conservatives don't have a problem with the government spending money on programs that are huge boons to our technology/industry/defense sectors. I've lived in both New York and conservative North Carolina and I've never heard any backwoods Conservatives down there complaining about spending money on NASA. But I have heard a lot of saved the world through government programs liberals complain about spending money on space flight when we could be feeding people instead. In reality I think there are people on both sides of the fence that support it and people on both sides of the fence that don't
Either way the one thing we POSITIVELY want to avoid is anyone managing to label supporting space exploration as a "liberal" or "conservative" policy and having party lines drawn on the issue as that way we'll never get it done. Space Exploration isn't something we can accomplish during the time span that one party is in power, it has to be a common endeavor supported by the entire nation.
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I wonder if thats not part of the problem. Currently everything Washington does is spelled out in US/THEM terms. NASA is not well defined in those terms, so it gets left in the cold while those in power fund only the things that are ideologically theirs....
Which, by the way, is a horseshit way to run a country....
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Um, no. A true liberal wouldn't "waste" money on anything that could promote the economy (by creating new technologies and new businesses), and would instead want to spend that money on social programs to help "disadvantaged" people who would then use that money to buy booze, drugs, or have more kids to get more benefits, who would all then need free lunches at schools.
What Obama is, I'm not exactly sure. I think he's more of a statist/leftist who wants to create a giant government to build more power for
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Agree, especially your second line. The point of manned space flight isn't the science, the point of manned space flight is to get us out into space, where infinite resources are available for the patient race. Science will be done in service to this goal. The goal itself is
Re:The whole program should be scrapped (Score:5, Interesting)
The saddest part is the test launch of the Falcon 9 has been sitting on the pad since JANUARY. It's been tied up in paperwork ever since. If I had my tinfoil hat handy, I'd say it was tied up solely to make sure the Ares launch happened first. SpaceX has demonstrated their competence with a successful payload delivery to orbit on board a Falcon 1. Not giving the go-ahead for the Falcon 9 smells of excuses, to me. Canaveral is built to handle rockets that size, and the Canaveral range officers have a fine understanding of rockets that size. They know how to use an abort button if necessary. There isn't any danger to anybody, anywhere, whether it works or not. The hazards are to Elon Musk's wallet and to certain pork barrel charity-for-engineers NASA programs. Playing politics has crippled space efforts more than any launch fatalities, anywhere.
What does NASA have against the Falcon 9? (Score:2)
Ares status: Years from flight.
Falcon 9 payload: 29,610 kg.
Falcon 9 status: Countdown on hold pending paperwork.
Re:The whole program should be scrapped (Score:4, Interesting)
The first stage was sent back for more testing. Then they did second stage engine tests without the engine nozzle. Second stage mechanical tests. They should still need to make a second stage engine test with the nozzle on, an integrated second stage fire test, vehicle hold down firing tests. Pad work probably isn't 100% finished either.