VP Pence Talks Moon Return and Mars Mission at NASA 146
Vice President Mike Pence spoke at NASA's Johnson Space Center on Thursday about the agency's plans to send humans back to the moon for the first time in almost half a century and eventually on to Mars. He said: The next Americans who set foot on the Moon will start their journey by stepping through the NASA's Orion hatch. And this extraordinary spacecraft will one day bridge the gap between our planet and the next.
The International Space Station has been an unqualified success. Soon and very soon American astronauts will return to space on American rockets launched from American soil. America will not ever abandon the critical domain of space, we will open the way for innovators and development and we will lead once again in human exploration. Our administration is working tirelessly to put an American crew aboard the lunar orbital platform before the end of 2024. In a prepared statement, Pence added, "We're renewing our national commitment to discovery and exploration and write the next great chapter of our nation's journey into space. It's now the official policy of the US that we'll return to the Moon, put Americans on Mars and once again explore the farthest depths of outer space."
The International Space Station has been an unqualified success. Soon and very soon American astronauts will return to space on American rockets launched from American soil. America will not ever abandon the critical domain of space, we will open the way for innovators and development and we will lead once again in human exploration. Our administration is working tirelessly to put an American crew aboard the lunar orbital platform before the end of 2024. In a prepared statement, Pence added, "We're renewing our national commitment to discovery and exploration and write the next great chapter of our nation's journey into space. It's now the official policy of the US that we'll return to the Moon, put Americans on Mars and once again explore the farthest depths of outer space."
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Into the sun, hopefully?
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I propose we send them first to see if it's safe.
I'm trying to figure out how to work Stormy Daniels into this, and I just can't do it.
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I propose we send them first to see if it's safe.
I'm trying to figure out how to work Stormy Daniels into this, and I just can't do it.
Oh looky, triggered a Russian with mod points.
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I propose we send them first to see if it's safe.
I'm trying to figure out how to work Stormy Daniels into this, and I just can't do it.
Oh looky, triggered a Russian with mod points.
Ivan, you make me sick.
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Oh looky, triggered a Russian with mod points.
Slashdot might as well be The_Donald considering the concentration of MAGA racist neckbeards and russians.
This has not been a good week for the treasonous orange cunt. Noose is tightening. Womp womp..!
Just need to make sure the Russiapublican party goes down with him. Don't worry, Bob's on it.
Screw the Moon and Mars...build a Real Space Ship (Score:3, Interesting)
Then go to the Moon or Mars at your leisure.
1. Non-chemical propulsion
2. Nuclear powered
3. Rotating working/living quarters
4. Descent and ascent vehicles
5. Completely closed, long term life support
6. Magnetic Shielding against solar and other radiation
7. Whatever else is necessary so that it can just hang out in orbit and then be driven somewhere when you want.
Shooting people across the solar system in a tin can is stupid.
Evolutionnary (Score:4, Interesting)
The technology does not exist to do such a thing.
The technology is basically just keeping the slow pace of incremental innovation that up to now has given us things like the ISS.
The main problem is that eventually reaching the point mentioned by the above poster is going to take at least several decades of progressive innovations and require multiple year to build each successive station, and that slowness doesn't fit into the short-term needed for a publicity stunt within the 1 or 2 cycles of 4 years each that your US politics has.
Meanwhile, shooting people in (single use) tin cans is somethings that can be done quickly enough to be a somewhat viable publicity stunt (despite being completely useless from the technological and scientific point of view)
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"The technology is basically just keeping the slow pace of incremental innovation"
As in "real soon now"
Or, more accurately, "nope".
So we keep on keepin on. I can deal with that, since I won't be paying the bills. But I'll miss the glory.
Re:Evolutionnary (Score:4, Insightful)
We have the technology base to handle almost every item on the above list. The scientific concepts are well understood and can jump from the white board to the real world IF someone is willing to commit the resources. The resources committed to the first Moon landings were limitless because the US wanted to one up the USSR and score a major propaganda win during the cold war. The USSR put the first satellite and man in orbit so the US needed something dramatic to show the world to make the USSR accomplishments look like something you would find a elementary school science fair.
Can you imagine how long the list of non-existing technologies NASA had to overcome to get people to the Moon and back? Of course during that era the US public wasn't a bunch of risk adverse pussies unwillingly to leave their safe spaces because they can't deal with a world that is neither safe or fair and growth requires risk and risk means there will be failures and setbacks as we move forward. Every man and women who has traveled to orbit knew going in the risks they would face. Every single man or women who has died while attempting to challenge the gravity well would be appalled if their deaths were used by a weak willed public and the politicians that pander to the cowards to curtail space exploration because it is dangerous.
What we don't have is a workable plan to actually build a real space craft. The ISS should have been the first step in creating an orbital platform on which to build and service space vehicles. Going to the Moon again or going to Mars should not be the top priorities. They are dead worlds that have little to offer other than planting a flag, making some footprints, and taking some selfies. A real honest to god space station would be a solid step in furthering any space exploration.
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It seems ridiculous to say that moon landings were faked..... but at the same time about equally ridiculous to say that it didn't make A LOT OF SENSE or have HUGE INCENTIVE for US to fake them at the time... I'm kind of torn between the two here.
Was NASA and people really THAT brave back then (or as you put it the opposite of "a bunch of risk averse pussies") ? Did they really "overcome the long list of non-existing technologies"? These are big challenges. Challenges that for some reason we cannot overcom
Re:Evolutionnary (Score:5, Interesting)
This is the one reason that I feel that any moon landing conspiracy theory is ridiculous and absurd:
1. The USSR had radar capable of tracking the Apollo flights. If we didn't go, they would have been more than happy to let the entire world know in order to reverse the propaganda effect of faking it.
Plus, there's also mountains of physical evidence, including retroreflectors on the lander descent stages that you (for various well equipped values of "you") can bounce a laser off of.
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"What we don't have is a workable plan to actually build a real space craft."
Gee, unless you're looking for the massive leap from tin cans to clever devices, we don't in fact, have a workable plan. We have at least two.
All you need is tin cans. And systems, propulsion, resources, and daring. If you want a trip to the Moon to be as comfortable and risk free as your LA commute in a Tesla, you'll need a lot more, yes. But need? Nope.
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Yap. Despite what some people say, not only we went to the Moon, we went to the Moon half a dozen times, collecting more and more samples each time and doing more and more experiments. Other than possibly looking for He-3 (for some reason, that factors in a bunch of hard SF stories), we have no more reason to go to the Moon.
Manned mission to Mars could be interesting, especially if logistics were worked out for a round-trip journey, since it is probably the first place to get colonized outside of Earth, if
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He-3 + hydrogen fuses easier than hydrogen alone. Which is why it appeared in a lot of scifi once upon a time. It was thought to be "realistic" early fusion....
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You can't explore a body with a quarter of Earth's total land area with 12 people, mostly non-specialists, working for a few days. There's plenty of research left to be done on the moon.
That research is the main reason to go there, though. It's not a stepping stone into the solar system, the orbital mechanics don't work out...a craft that can just barely go there has nearly enough performance to blow right past it and go to Mars. It's not enough like Mars or asteroids to be useful for learning how to work w
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It's as though you know nothing about observational astronomy. We already have the Kepler telescope [wikipedia.org].
Again, no reason to go to the Moon.
Small steps (Score:2)
"The technology is basically just keeping the slow pace of incremental innovation"
As in "real soon now"
Actually, like I said in the next sentence, not *real soon*, but "soonish after a couple of decades of lots of small incremental steps of innovation*.
But given the circus show that is your politics in the US, nobody is interested in starting a half-century long slow development project, because they won't be around anymore to reap the glory.
(And for the record, here around in Europe, we probably won't be able to pull it off neither :
We *would* be pretty capable to vote for a half-century budget for such res
Re:Screw the Moon and Mars...build a Real Space Sh (Score:4, Informative)
That's the point.
For instance...this is being worked on [spaceflightinsider.com]
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Re: Screw the Moon and Mars...build a Real Space S (Score:2)
Re: Screw the Moon and Mars...build a Real Space (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: Screw the Moon and Mars...build a Real Space (Score:2)
No we can rebuild the Saturn V. What you're saying is we can't build one easily or cheaply or quickly. Given enough money and time, I guarantee you that NASA could build a Saturn V. But my point is what good would that do for any future space missions? Off the top of my head here are all the major retrofits that a Saturn V will need:
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President Kennedy really had no interest in space and thought the project was a big waste of money. He only proposed it to one-up the Soviets.
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In any case, he did start the countdown to a successful audacious project that nearly all can agree paid off great dividends for the entire world. Many useful new technologies that were perfected to achieve that goal were invented.
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But that was enough reason to get congress to open up the purse strings.
Every president this millennium has said that they want to go to Mars, but not one of them has been able to get the funds available to do this. Talk without money will go absolutely nowhere.
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But that was enough reason to get congress to open up the purse strings.
Every president this millennium has said that they want to go to Mars, but not one of them has been able to get the funds available to do this. Talk without money will go absolutely nowhere.
A president could tell congress that going to Mars will defeat isis and al-queda, because they can't get there, and therefore we will be safe. And reasons. : (
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A president could tell congress that going to Mars will defeat isis and al-queda, because they can't get there, and therefore we will be safe. And reasons. : (
Or that Mars has oil. Or that Mars has WMDs.
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The technology does not exist to do such a thing.
Given enough money I bet we could figure it out. I don't think most people would be willing to pay the bill to get that flying though.
Re:Screw the Moon and Mars...build a Real Space Sh (Score:4, Informative)
It could've existed if not for irrational fear of everything "atomic".
Guys who built them bombs in Manhattan Project were planning to personally cruise solar system in actual spaceships (size of a, well, ocean ship), propelled by detonation of small bombs behind, once a second. Physics and engineering actually worked!
Look up "Project Orion", or read George Dyson's book (his dad Freeman was one of the leaders).
Paul B.
Re: Screw the Moon and Mars...build a Real Space S (Score:1)
There are better ways to get thrust using nuclear power than what Project Orion wanted to do, and the US was actually pursuing some of them. Project Rover took place at Los Alamos for about 2 decades starting in the 50s, and showed that nuclear thermal rockets were possible and had a lot of potential.
The other option would be Ion Propulsion using a nuclear reactor as the power source. While acceleration would be slow it would also be the most propellant-efficient method we currently have, and would be gre
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There are better ways to get thrust using nuclear power than what Project Orion wanted to do, and the US was actually pursuing some of them. Project Rover took place at Los Alamos for about 2 decades starting in the 50s, and showed that nuclear thermal rockets were possible and had a lot of potential.
Nuclear thermal is useful, but only around double the specific impulse of chemical. Not revolutionary, but would be handy for getting to Mars and back.
It was considered for Apollo third stage, but not worth the effort back then.
Orion's nuclear pulse drive on the other hand, is game-changing, with an order of magnitude better specific impulse, and massive thrust.
You could send sci-fi sized spaceships with hundreds of crew to the outer planets and back. And we could have started building it in the 1960s.
Re: Screw the Moon and Mars...build a Real Space (Score:2)
Stop it, you're giving me a woody.
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Nuclear saltwater rockets solve the mass production issue. All your critical masses of fissile material go in one big tank stuffed full of neutron absorbing structures. (Check thoroughly for leaks.)
And you don't need nearly as much shock absorption, since your exhaust is a continuous blast of dissociated water and decaying fission products.
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like this:
https://www.buildtheenterprise... [buildtheenterprise.org]
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The overall concept is good. Not sure of hitching it to Star Trek is a hindrance or not.
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I think Obomba doesn't get quite enough blame. Everyone loved him by default for one thing : not being Bush. He failed at this simple task and got away with it.
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I blame Obama for a hangnail I got today. It stings!
This is a real space ship (Score:3)
Non-chemical propulsion
Like what? There is no alternative to chemical propulsion for a huge ship like this nor for the ascent and descent vehicles and those vehicles are generally designed with a specific planet in mind because it is very expensive to move large masses of fuel around that you do not need.
Shooting people across the solar system in a tin can is stupid.
Not as stupid as sending them to an unknown solar system in a tin can which will not be technologically equipped to deal with it after taking millennia to get there. The problem is that by "real spaceship" you really mean "fict
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Then go to the Moon or Mars at your leisure.
1. Non-chemical propulsion
2. Nuclear powered
So what kind of drive system is this? Ion drive? 'Cause those don't go fast, and will never provide enough propulsion to get you off of the planet.
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I think quantum matter displacement drives and aborting the psychopaths who want the world to focus on their genitals, would probably be enough. Turn the space rescue farce, into something more reasonable, like the space guard much like the coast guard, where the central focus would be rescue.
Re: Screw the Moon and Mars...build a Real Space S (Score:2)
So what kind of drive system is this? Ion drive? 'Cause those don't go fast, and will never provide enough propulsion to get you off of the planet.
Either a nuclear thermal rocket, or something like Project Orion where you literally blow up hundreds of (small) nukes behind your spaceships.
Ion propulsion would work too, but would only really be useful for really long distances.
Of the three, only a nuclear thermal rocket could really be used inside earths atmosphere (Orion could have been also, back when we didnt think twice about testing nukes all over the place. But people are a little more picky about radiation these days).
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(Orion could have been also, back when we didnt think twice about testing nukes all over the place..
It is actually not as bad as you'd think,
wikipedia: "From many smaller detonations combined the fallout for the entire launch of a 6,000 short ton (5,500 metric ton) Orion is equal to the detonation of a typical 10 megaton (40 petajoule) nuclear weapon as an airburst, therefore most of its fallout would be the comparatively dilute delayed fallout. Assuming the use of nuclear explosives with a high portion of total yield from fission, it would produce a combined fallout total similar to the surface burst yie
Re: Screw the Moon and Mars...build a Real Space (Score:2)
It is actually not as bad as you'd think
I'm aware of the numbers, but you know that facts don't really matter much when the word "nuclear" comes up. Realistically, yes, the environmental harm from launching a couple dozen of these would probably be far less than the environmental harm caused by launching the thousands of conventional rockets required to lift the same load. But the harm from nuclear reactors is likewise a lot less than the alternatives we've been using for decades, yet nuclear power is still stigmatized and opposed by the genera
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#3 and #4 already exist. There are nuclear powered satellites, and everything that ever got up there and back again happened on ascent and descent vehicles.
Re:Screw the Moon and Mars...build a Real Space Sh (Score:4, Informative)
Most of those capabilities are unnecessary for either the moon or Mars, and aren't likely to ever be developed without active manned space exploration to drive the need for them.
What we really need is greatly reduced cost and deployed transportation infrastructure capable of frequent deliveries of large payloads, and people actually getting out there, discovering the problems that need to be solved, and working out solutions for them. Make it easy to get mass into orbit, and people will research stuff like magnetic shielding and advanced propulsion. Meanwhile, what we have is enough to start going to the moon and Mars. If SpaceX achieves their goals with BFR, the BFS will go straight from LEO to the surface of Mars with 150 t of payload and with a trip time short enough that simulated gravity, exotic radiation shielding, etc are unnecessary; then refuel and launch from Mars to land back on Earth. This isn't a tin can that can barely get a few humans there, it's a serious transport craft capable of supporting well-equipped research expeditions and colonization efforts. Blue Origin has similar ambitions focused around the moon.
The Lunar Orbiting Platform (or whatever they're calling it today), though...yeah, it's embarrassingly lacking in ambition and potential for meaningful progress. It can't even be occupied full time, and any reasonable lunar or Mars mission would blow right past it without wasting delta-v on rendezvous.
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What we really need is greatly reduced cost and deployed transportation infrastructure capable of frequent deliveries of large payloads, and people actually getting out there
So you're saying Uber?
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Ambitions and an active development program. They're at least working on something that could be useful for economically launching large amounts of mass, instead of screwing around with air launch or barely-physically-plausible SSTO spaceplanes or pretending there's no economic case for reuse.
I doubt they'll find developing their first orbital launch vehicle as smooth going as some of their fans believe (New Glenn's first launch has likely already been pushed back to 2021), but they're far ahead of everyone
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8. Mandatory steam punk [cgtrader.com] attire.
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Screw the Moon and Mars...build a Real Space Ship
Then go to the Moon or Mars at your leisure.
1. Non-chemical propulsion
2. Nuclear powered
3. Rotating working/living quarters
4. Descent and ascent vehicles
5. Completely closed, long term life support
6. Magnetic Shielding against solar and other radiation
7. Whatever else is necessary so that it can just hang out in orbit and then be driven somewhere when you want.
I wouldn't insist on non-chemical propulsion. Other than that, it sounds exactly like the research NASA should be doing and funding, rather than the ridiculously useless Lunar Orbital Platform-Gateway. And by "research", I mean "specify, design, engineer, build, launch, try it out," not just produce a pile of paper.
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A nuke spacecraft still requires reaction mass.
And ice on Luna is a wonderful source of reaction mass for a nerva-type drive. Especially since it is an order of magnitude or so easier to get to, say, L5 (or LEO) from Luna than from Earth.
Hell, it would be easier to get reaction mass from Mars to L5 (or LEO) than to get the same reaction mass from Earth....
IOW, yes, we still want bases on the Moon and probably Mars, even with a proper spaceship....
In the long term, it may be easier to get reaction mass
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1. Such as? You need a lot of thrust to make orbit, which means chemicals are about the only option. Once you're up, ion drive gives bugger-all thrust - it's great for keeping satellites where they belong, but it's not going to move a multi-hundred-ton manned ship anywhere fast. The only other possible option is 2.
2. The barely-tested technology of hydrogen propellant directly heated by a fission reactor? Good luck getting the influential governments of the world to permit launching that accident waiting to
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The USA had everything it needed back then. States who needed new jobs, workers willing to learn advanced new German engineering methods.
German quality control and design for large projects.
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I agree. The only reason to look for habitable planets is to discover whether or not life has evolved elsewhere. As far as living off of planet Earth goes, it will be in a "spaceship" and it will likely travel from nebula to nebula picking up basic atoms and molecules for "fuel" or expansion of the spaceship. There is no reason at all to live on planets once we are fully space faring.
My only sadness is that I will not be participating in the space faring civilization. *sob*
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He's been a pretty big orifice for quite some time now...
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Yep He Signed A Policy Memo - We're Almost There! (Score:4, Funny)
On 11 December 2017 Donald Trump signed Space Policy Directive 1 [whitehouse.gov], the operative part of which is:
The paragraph beginning “Set far-reaching exploration milestones” is deleted and replaced with the following:
“Lead an innovative and sustainable program of exploration with commercial and international partners to enable human expansion across the solar system and to bring back to Earth new knowledge and opportunities. Beginning with missions beyond low-Earth orbit, the United States will lead the return of humans to the Moon for long-term exploration and utilization, followed by human missions to Mars and other destinations;”.
Now that Trump has done all the heavy lifting, signing a policy declaration, his work is done.
All of the stuff about having an actual program with funding and such are just minor details.
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You know that funding comes from the Congress, right?
Yes, the President has some sway there, but if Congress doesn't go for it, all the policy statements in the world don't add up to an ounce of rocket fuel.
I don't see what the rush is. (Score:3, Funny)
According to this guy, the moon (plus the sun and stars) were made in one day (the Earth took a bit longer) and are only a few thousand years old; what's the rush??
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" the moon (plus the sun and stars) were made in one day"
And yet, amazingly, it's still there, waiting to be explored.
And you, well, you're still there...
Policy means NOTHING (Score:1)
Just talk. (Score:1)
If he were serious about any of this then he would be telling us how they are going to boost NASA's budget. However, after increasing expenditures (a massive military budget expansion) and undercutting revenue (cutting taxes on corporations and the rich), the nation is running up a massive deficit.
What this all means is that this is just nice flowery talk and they are going to leave a financial train wreck for Democrats to clean up (again).
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eh, NASA's budget is so very puny it doesn't make much difference one way or the other for deficit
The Hatch (Score:4, Funny)
"start their journey by stepping through the NASA's Orion hatch."
The code for the keypad is 4, 8, 15, 16, 23 and 42
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Huh.... (Score:1)
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People still start screaming about the big orange cheeto moon next time it they see it rise near the horizon.
Pence can talk? (Score:1)
What do you know... he's smarter than I gave him credit.
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I like how he subtly slipped in "before the end of 2024".. you can't say he's not optimistic about the 2020 election.
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Mike Pence is an intelligent man. His problem is that he's a religious nut with reprehensible values. I'd rather have a Dan Quayle.
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You can be intelligent and decent. Then you're not religious.
You can be decent and religious. Then you're not intelligent.
You can be religious and intelligent. Then you're not decent.
wikipedia link (Score:2)
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Wikipedia article on the Lunar Orbital Platform: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ [wikipedia.org]... [Do check out #Critisisms section]
First I'd read all the details for the latest version. I tend to agree with the criticisms. What a ridiculous boondoggle. This smells like Boeing and their terror of anything new. It's like somebody asked the question, "What can we build successfully?" and the answer was, "Something we've built before," and the response was, "OK, let's do that."
And look at all those timelines, all of which are completely fictional, and everyone knows it. That must be really demotivating, knowing you're going to spend t
So much for hoping he can write at college level. (Score:1)
The International Space Station has been an unqualified success.
While many might argue that it has been unqualified, I'm fairly certain he meant unmitigated here.
Behold the power of faith. (Score:2)
The power of faith is a really big deal here, it means the astronauts can go with half the fuel and the missing thrust can be made up by the Hand of God.
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that's what gravity assist orbits do.
god or momentum from coalescing gasses that formed system, whatever.
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Right, now the Hand of God only needs to make up for the missing air. Have faith.
One reason why it might not work (Score:2)
As long as people like this can even get their foot in the door, the project is in serious trouble. P.S. Homer Hickam rules.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sci... [dailymail.co.uk]
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Please don't link to the Daily Mail. It's a scandal sheet and deserves no respect or recognition. The name "Kardashian" appears ten times on the page you linked, and the current headline is a story about Ben Affleck being dropped off at rehab by his ex-wife.
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Irrelevant. The same story is all over the place.
will laugh in 3 years (Score:2)
Assuming these idiots are still in office, Pence will have a difficult time explaining why we continue to throw money away.
Critical issue (Score:2)
Because when the space force starts destroying other stuff in space, it's going to be kinda difficult to get through. Some pretty simple BDR's with some pretty simple shrapnel boomers - think space grenades - sent up near geosynchronous orbits will make GPS a thing of the past, and lower orbit space shrapnel is the gift that keeps on giving. Every orbiting device destroyed m
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Weather satellites and communication satellites live at geosynchronous orbits.
GPS satellites orbit much lower, 10k to 17k kilometers.
My bad - I reversed the satellites. Its still easy to take them all out.
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Conservatives: Stupid liberals, all your ideas sound lovely but then YOU RUN OUT OF OTHER PEOPLE'S MONEY!
Also conservatives: WOO! SPACEFORCE! Our dicks extend into space now!
You're joking (Score:2)
One more thing (Score:3)
There's a saying about telling a lie. If a lie's big enough folks can't beli