Manned Space Travel? [Archive]

Acleron

18th July 2008, 05:39 AM

I was watching Dawkin's latest video conversation with Stephen Weinberg, and was dissappointed with what he had to say on manned space travel. He declared that he regarded a Manned Mars Mission or another Moon mission as pointless, seeing hundreds of robots as the future.

I've always like DeGrasse Tyson's reply to those who do not approve of manned space travel, which is this: 'We don't name highschools after space robots'.

How do you feel about manned space exploration?

Lovely question.

If science was the only aim of space exploration and finding the finance was no object then robots are the best way.

But I feel there are two reasons for manned space travel. Sooner or later the human race will have to expand into space as the resources on this planet are depleted. Funding of space exploration is not easy. It has to have the support of the public. This support is more easily engendered by publicity about manned space travel than by robots. It's sexier.

The latter point is the pragmatic one. To get the funding for people and robots in space, the manned space program is better advertising.

The former point will become more and more important and in 1969 I was young enough to think that by now people in space would be commonplace. Hopefully with the new initiatives it will become so in the next 40 years.

plumjam

18th July 2008, 06:38 AM

Cuddles

18th July 2008, 07:26 AM

Basically what Freethinker said. A lot of the time a robot can do everything you need and will generally be much cheaper and easier. On the other hand, sometimes you really want a human on hand. At the moment, there doesn't seem much point sending humans any further than the Moon, if that, but I have no doubt that in the future we will want to travel at least as far as Mars, and if we can get there, why not further?

Loss Leader

18th July 2008, 07:49 AM

I'm in favor of mandatory manned space mansions.

BenBurch

18th July 2008, 08:00 AM

We will always need some manned component UNTIL we have true AI. After that we meat-machines become a liability and not an asset.

99% of all appropriate manned activity is going to be repair in Earth orbit. We will be able to design all satellites with manned repair in mind, and develop capabilities to operate as far out as geosynchronous orbit. Sending engineer-astronauts aloft on repair jobs is a much better idea than any sort of automated repair, because repairs sometimes do not go as planned and you need the flexibility of a human mind to see a way around the problems.

I also think there is a low-earth-orbit tourism industry that will absolutely form, but that will always be for the ultra-rich and will be quite small in scope.

shemp

18th July 2008, 08:04 AM

Why not strike a happy medium?
The solution is dwarf astronauts.

(Though meant as a joke, the more I think about it the more I realise what a stroke of genius this is... now.. just gonna google for NASA's phone number ;) )

I'm looking forward to zero-G midget lesbian astronaut porn. The pays for this would more than pay for the mission.

BenBurch

18th July 2008, 08:11 AM

Why not strike a happy medium?
The solution is dwarf astronauts.

(Though meant as a joke, the more I think about it the more I realise what a stroke of genius this is... now.. just gonna google for NASA's phone number ;) )

Been thought of back at the dawn of space travel. However, very few (if any) dwarfs with the right qualifications exist, and also many dwarfs have related major medical problems. Double leg amputees have also been considered, but the same issues pertain. However they did set a size limit of 5'10" on Project Mercury astronauts because they just could not cram anybody larger in that tin can. (If you have ever seen an actual Mercury spacecraft up close, you'd wonder how anybody even that tall could get into it.)

Piscivore

18th July 2008, 10:05 AM

I've always like DeGrasse Tyson's reply to those who do not approve of manned space travel, which is this: 'We don't name highschools after space robots'.

How do you feel about manned space exploration?

Space robots don't drive 900 miles to kidnap the girlfriends of fellow space robots. Space robots also don't need diapers.

bokonon

18th July 2008, 11:17 AM

I don't see any reason we should be required to move to other planets because of resource depletion; it seems to me that technology to slurp resources out of the mantle should be more cost-effective than trying to haul space rocks back. Sure, the sun will burn us out at some point, but I say cross that bridge if we get to it. There doesn't seem to be another planet in this solar system that would be a suitable home in that case anyway. Interstellar exploration is going to require some fundamental breakthroughs if it's even possible at all, and it's not certain that putt-putting our way to Mars under rocket power would take us any closer to such breakthroughs.

I say, manned presence in earth orbit, but beyond that robots only for the foreseeable future.

Earthborn

18th July 2008, 11:37 AM

But I feel there are two reasons for manned space travel. Sooner or later the human race will have to expand into space as the resources on this planet are depleted.If/when that happens, it probably will be more economical to have spacerobots bring us the resources from space, then to bring people to the resources.

Funding of space exploration is not easy. It has to have the support of the public. This support is more easily engendered by publicity about manned space travel than by robots. It's sexier.It may be sexier to some people, but a lot of other people will think (probably justifiably so) that sending people is just a gigantic waste of money. Many people thought so of the Apollo missions, many people think so when it comes to the International Space Station. Without the Cold War fear that "the enemy may get there first" I really doubt getting public support for manned missions is easier than getting it for unmanned missions.

Perpetual Seeker

18th July 2008, 11:38 AM

Robots can probably go farther. A manned mission to mars sounds nice and all, but from what I've heard, that'd potentially be quite taxing on one's psychological state (being confined in a craft literally in the middle of nowhere hurdling towards an unknown world, for 8 months?) Robots don't go insane.

At least last I heard it would take 8 months, but not sure if they've made any speed improvements since I last heard that a few years ago.

If we ever find a way to travel at the speed of light or faster (not probable, I think), then we can reconsider.

jadebox

18th July 2008, 11:46 AM

RecoveringYuppy

18th July 2008, 11:52 AM

A manned space program that is only used when it is needed (Experiments on Mars etc)

I disagree that experiments on Mars would be an example of "needed" but otherwise agree with this option, so I voted Planet X.

A manned mission to Mars is going to be an unsustainable tour de force. IMO the big bucks need to be devoted towards lowering the cost of access to space.

Mark6

18th July 2008, 11:55 AM

I've always like DeGrasse Tyson's reply to those who do not approve of manned space travel, which is this: 'We don't name highschools after space robots'.

Whoever names highschools has their priorities screwed up. There is no Wernher von Braun high school.

Actually, there is -- in Friedberg, Germany. But US should have one too.

Loss Leader

18th July 2008, 12:10 PM

At least last I heard it would take 8 months, but not sure if they've made any speed improvements since I last heard that a few years ago.

It's not how fast you can get there, it's how fast you can stop.

Tsukasa Buddha

18th July 2008, 12:25 PM

Bah, you humans and your silly pride.

Robots will rule the world!

Also, robots would not require the life support technology, etc. that humans need. It could save a lot of resources.

Of course, when things go wrong it would be better to have a human.

Jimbo07

18th July 2008, 12:47 PM

A manned mission to Mars is going to be an unsustainable tour de force. IMO the big bucks need to be devoted towards lowering the cost of access to space.

I actually agree. When access to LEO is routine (still a distant dream), all the rest will fall in line.

Space elevators, baby...

Perpetual Seeker

18th July 2008, 12:52 PM

It's not how fast you can get there, it's how fast you can stop.

I don't quite understand. :confused:

pastime

18th July 2008, 01:18 PM

"Invest in robots, not human travel." :D

I wasn't going to participate in the poll until I saw that one and guffawed while simultaneously muttering a bad word. I'm almost postive that was the first time in my life I've guffawed.

Mark6

18th July 2008, 01:29 PM

I don't quite understand. :confused:
The faster you go, the more energy you need to expend in order to stop at the end. Which is why New Horizons, the fastest probe ever to leave Earth, will fly by Pluto in 2015 instead of going into orbit or landing.

Mark6

18th July 2008, 01:31 PM

Jimbo07

18th July 2008, 01:58 PM

The faster you go, the more energy you need to expend in order to stop at the end. Which is why New Horizons, the fastest probe ever to leave Earth, will fly by Pluto in 2015 instead of going into orbit or landing.

Interestingly, while fastest to leave Earth, it will not be the fastest to leave the solar system, nor the fastest man-made object, due to only picking up one gravity boost at Jupiter.

ksbluesfan

18th July 2008, 02:02 PM

I've been heavily influenced by Bob Parks on this matter. Robots are the way to go. At some point in the future, it may be necessary or practical to send humans into space, but now is not the time.

bokonon

18th July 2008, 02:14 PM

Of course, when things go wrong it would be better to have a human.
Or not. All things considered, it might have been nice if Columbia had been a robot mission.

thesyntaxera

18th July 2008, 05:32 PM

I was watching Dawkin's latest video conversation with Stephen Weinberg, and was dissappointed with what he had to say on manned space travel. He declared that he regarded a Manned Mars Mission or another Moon mission as pointless, seeing hundreds of robots as the future.

I've always like DeGrasse Tyson's reply to those who do not approve of manned space travel, which is this: 'We don't name highschools after space robots'.

How do you feel about manned space exploration?

Personally speaking, and this is my sometimes overly active scifi imagination talking...I am all in favor of manned space missions. I think they should be international efforts to alleviate some of the cost. I also think private enterprise should get involved as they have already with the X-Prize, but more so. I think that sending robots is useful here and now for reaching distant places, and it will be in the future. However robots only tell us so much, and despite the monumental intellectual achievements that rovers on different planets represent it is not the same as being there in person. Full exploration of our solar system is totally possible, but unfortunately it takes a world working together to achieve such goals.

I know we can't imagine it now, but lets say in 100 years deep space travel is possible and we are able to explore "strange new worlds"...I think it would be far more fitting for a human to be there than a robot lander.

Piscivore

18th July 2008, 06:11 PM

I know we can't imagine it now, but lets say in 100 years deep space travel is possible and we are able to explore "strange new worlds"...I think it would be far more fitting for a human to be there than a robot lander.

Unless we can build Daleks.

JJM

18th July 2008, 08:29 PM

http://www.bobpark.org/ for this week, apparently there is not a permanent link yet SPACE STATION: "SEND IT SOMEWHERE SPECIAL."

I have a place in mind. Space-science writer Michael Benson used this title in The Outlook section of Sunday's Washington Post. Benson asks whether the International Space Station, at a cost approaching $100 billion, is being finished just so we can drop it in the ocean? It is; so what's his alternative? Attach engines and send it, with its crew, off to explore other planets. Three days later the Post carried a rebuttal by NASA contractor Jeff Volosin. The ISS, he argued is needed to prepare crews to travel to Mars and back. He didn't say for what. As James Van Allen would have said of both ideas: "How old-fashioned." Wake up: Voyager 2 just entered interstellar space, Messenger revisited Mercury, Phoenix found water on Mars. Somebody, anybody, tell me what humans can do in space as well as the robots?

SezMe

18th July 2008, 08:48 PM

I too find Bob Parks to be persuasive. An emphasis on robots could have all sorts of by-way benefits for humans and the planet.

But I feel there are two reasons for manned space travel. Sooner or later the human race will have to expand into space as the resources on this planet are depleted.
If resources are becoming limited, then going into space, which demands huge resources just to get a few people out of our gravity well, is the very last option to consider. Better uses of such resources would be to figure out how to live sustainably here at home on Earth....starting with an effective world-wide population reduction plan.

Freethinker

18th July 2008, 09:35 PM

Whoever names highschools has their priorities screwed up. There is no Wernher von Braun high school.

Actually, there is -- in Friedberg, Germany. But US should have one too.

I think von Braun carried a little too much baggage regarding concentration camp forced labor to be palatable as a choice for a school name.

Piscivore

18th July 2008, 09:37 PM

I too find Bob Parks to be persuasive. An emphasis on robots could have all sorts of by-way benefits for humans and the planet.

If resources are becoming limited, then going into space, which demands huge resources just to get a few people out of our gravity well, is the very last option to consider. Better uses of such resources would be to figure out how to live sustainably here at home on Earth....starting with an effective world-wide population reduction plan.

We could combine the two- tell a bunch of people that aren't contributing much that there is a global disaster coming and get them to all leave on a spaceship.

SezMe

18th July 2008, 09:44 PM

We could combine the two- tell a bunch of people that aren't contributing much that there is a global disaster coming and get them to all leave on a spaceship.
Sounds fishy to me.

sorry, couldn't help myself.

Complexity

18th July 2008, 09:50 PM

Undesired Walrus

19th July 2008, 07:42 AM

However robots only tell us so much

Indeed, nor can they tell us how it feels to walk in the methane rain of Titan or look back at the Earth through the rings of Saturn.

Developing on Tyson's point, motivational speakers in inner-city areas are not typically going to be the electrical beebs of the pheonix probe, nor will any child aspire to be such a thing.

Acleron

19th July 2008, 08:00 AM

I too find Bob Parks to be persuasive. An emphasis on robots could have all sorts of by-way benefits for humans and the planet.

If resources are becoming limited, then going into space, which demands huge resources just to get a few people out of our gravity well, is the very last option to consider. Better uses of such resources would be to figure out how to live sustainably here at home on Earth....starting with an effective world-wide population reduction plan.

In a perfect world, all you say is true. You've already figured out how to live sustainably, unfortunately, I'm not optimistic anything will be done.

Expansion into space, appears to me, to be the only way the human race will survive at a reasonable level of existence.

quarky

19th July 2008, 08:07 AM

How about a manned mission into the Anarctic ice cap? That would be cool.
Nobody has ever stood on the ground under that deep ice. There might be some interesting stuff down there.

Undesired Walrus

19th July 2008, 11:48 AM

Expansion into space, appears to me, to be the only way the human race will survive at a reasonable level of existence.

Can you expand on that a bit?

bokonon

19th July 2008, 12:58 PM

Indeed, nor can they tell us how it feels to walk in the methane rain of Titan or look back at the Earth through the rings of Saturn.
Robots have shown us what it's like to look back at the Earth through the rings of Saturn, and we probably have a few million years of evolution (or some very creative genetic engineering) before there will be organisms capable of both surviving a walk in the methane rain of Titan and communicating how it feels. Unless you're talking about "feeling" the rain on your pressure suit, in which case, put on a raincoat and a motorcycle helmet and jump in the sprinkler, and you'll probably get a pretty good idea.

Developing on Tyson's point, motivational speakers in inner-city areas are not typically going to be the electrical beebs of the pheonix probe, nor will any child aspire to be such a thing.
Maybe they'll aspire to be the engineers and scientists who design the probes and interpret their beeps. I would argue that society has more need of such scientists and engineers than "new frontier" poets standing in the rain on Titan.

I'm gratified by the results of this poll. In a similar "manned mission to Mars" poll, the advocates of robot exploration were hopelessly outnumbered. It looks like maybe attitudes aren't nearly as one-sided as that poll led me to believe.

I Ratant

19th July 2008, 01:03 PM

I am of two minds, if its a private enterprise, have at it. If it is government funded it should be as conservative as possible while obtaining good scientific information so probably robots.
.
And be certain that -all- the contractors use Frog yards for computations!

I Ratant

19th July 2008, 01:09 PM

Whoever names highschools has their priorities screwed up. There is no Wernher von Braun high school.

Actually, there is -- in Friedberg, Germany. But US should have one too.

Sturmbahnnfuehrer...
"One of the most notable recipients of the title was Dr. Wernher von Braun,"
Makes him invalid for any memorials, in my book.

shadron

19th July 2008, 08:07 PM

The sensible thing to do is to build the robots to do it. No doubt about it.

But...

What is this place going to be like in another thousand years if there is no possibility of moving beyond our finite, spherical surface here? We've got a prison, and the lack of even the possibility of going beyond it, I believe, will stifle the human spirit more than religion has. Where can you go today to get away form other people? to enjoy an experience unique to yourself? Nowhere, and it will just be more no where in such a future. You'll have even proved that imagining it, as science fiction does, is just bunk - not because it can't be done but because we will have refused to do it.

I think if we don't develop the capacity, at least, then it will be the beginning of the end here.

At some point in the future, it may be necessary or practical to send humans into space, but now is not the time.

No, I don't think it will. It will happen for no eminent reason; robots are too good now and will only become better. It will be done for reasons of spirit, or it won't. Asimov wrote (in Caves of Steel) about a human civilization too afraid of space to enjoy being out of doors, who never freely lived in the sunlight. That seems to me where we'll be headed.

Thanks for he bummer downer, people. :|

shadron

19th July 2008, 08:09 PM

How about a manned mission into the Anarctic ice cap? That would be cool.
Nobody has ever stood on the ground under that deep ice. There might be some interesting stuff down there.

While it lasts.

bokonon

19th July 2008, 08:51 PM

What is this place going to be like in another thousand years if there is no possibility of moving beyond our finite, spherical surface here?
Even nicer than it is today, unless people get the idea that it's okay to trash the place because we can always go somewhere else.

We've got a prison, and the lack of even the possibility of going beyond it, I believe, will stifle the human spirit more than religion has.
Why would it? There is an infinite number of outlets for the human spirit which don't require flinging ourselves away from the earth.

Where can you go today to get away form other people? to enjoy an experience unique to yourself? Nowhere, and it will just be more no where in such a future. You'll have even proved that imagining it, as science fiction does, is just bunk - not because it can't be done but because we will have refused to do it.
There are so many more creative ways to occupy one's time than "getting away from other people" that I don't think this is an issue. In addition, I can get away from other people any time I want, by going into an empty room and closing the door behind me. Everyone's life is a unique experience, and the future will only provide more variety. In 1000 years, there will be another thousand years of good books to read, good films to watch, good music to listen to, new cuisine to try, new areas of research to investigate... the idea that coasting into emptiness is the only way to expand the human spirit is a non-starter with me.

NewtonTrino

19th July 2008, 09:00 PM

The terrorists don't want us going to space. That's all the reason we should need.

SezMe

19th July 2008, 09:13 PM

What is this place going to be like in another thousand years if there is no possibility of moving beyond our finite, spherical surface here? We've got a prison, and the lack of even the possibility of going beyond it, I believe, will stifle the human spirit more than religion has. Where can you go today to get away form other people? to enjoy an experience unique to yourself? Nowhere, and it will just be more no where in such a future.
But you've just described space travel as we now know it. A metal container. Constant atmosphere. No grass. No sunsets. No mighty redwood trees. No ants. No surprises. Damn poor ability to be alone. Zero ability to be alone by a babbling brook.

As I stated upthread, a superior scenario is to keep Earth a wonderful place and explore the universe because it is there and wonders are to found and the magical discoveries can be brought back (in the most general sense) to Earth for all Earthlings to enjoy.

shadron

19th July 2008, 10:31 PM

There are so many more creative ways to occupy one's time than "getting away from other people" that I don't think this is an issue. In addition, I can get away from other people any time I want, by going into an empty room and closing the door behind me. Everyone's life is a unique experience, and the future will only provide more variety. In 1000 years, there will be another thousand years of good books to read, good films to watch, good music to listen to, new cuisine to try, new areas of research to investigate... the idea that coasting into emptiness is the only way to expand the human spirit is a non-starter with me.

You know, in a way I can go with that. For example, living in a moon colony would be just like living in a highrise in Manhattan all the time, and I personally, could do that. Perhaps you can do that as well. I don't think a lot of humanity can, and yet they'll have to. The only thing that allows me to enjoy my retirement location (in the middle of miles of cow pasture) is the existence of resources which come from the tremendous expansion and wealth that characterizes the world at this point in time. It won't always be true; in particular, hise miles of cow pasture will be suburbs at some point.

Aw, well, perhaps it is true that humanity can get along on less and be happy. Won't need novelty in their lives in the future. Perhaps. I have mine; I just hope my great, great grandkids have their too.

Soapy Sam

20th July 2008, 12:55 AM

When our distant ancestors crawled out of the ocean onto the mudflats, they did not send a robot.
Many animals are, in essence, robots; hard wired, limited response range automatons.
Some of these are very successful indeed, but they are still fish.

We have no choice in this matter. We never had. We go, or we fail. It may be that failure is the only option, but let's at least try.

SezMe

20th July 2008, 02:47 AM

Corsair 115

20th July 2008, 03:15 AM

We stay and clean up the mess and use this as a base of operations or we fail.

IOW, if we turn Earth into a cesspool and leave, we fail.Why is it either-or? Why can't we do both—clean up the mess we've made and go out and explore new territories?

Blackadder

20th July 2008, 03:27 AM

Father Dagon

20th July 2008, 03:43 AM

Rocketry and heavier-than-air flight was pioneered by enthusiasts as Goddard, Whitehead and the Wilburs on their spare time, spending their own money. Then the military sees the potential for destruction and monopolizes it. At least the space flight. Just like a schoolyard bully who first cries "sour grapes" over the soccer ball, and then grabs it when he see how fun everyone else have with it.

Latest news is that Christer Fuglesang wants a european space shuttle. Oh dear gods, spare us europeans from the chimaera made of fail and compromise!

To this day only 12 persons, no more than I could theoretically host in my small appartment, has walked on the moons surface. It's a travesty. A frakking travesty.

SezMe

20th July 2008, 04:52 AM

Why is it either-or? Why can't we do both—clean up the mess we've made and go out and explore new territories?
See my second paragraph of #47. I advocated that very scenario.

Perpetual Seeker

20th July 2008, 05:16 AM

Indeed, if we don't clean up first, we'll make the same out of any other planet. We have to learn to live within the confines of the environment first.

The thing is, I don't know how much space travel there will be. Science seems to be mostly about what is profitable anymore, and not just for discovery. Maybe I'm wrong, but it's not seemed that, at least in the US, we've made much discovery just for the sake of research. Going into space isn't profitable, so I don't see the government endorsing it.

Hopefully I'm wrong.

Soapy Sam

20th July 2008, 06:11 AM

As I've suggested upthread, Soapy, I have the exact opposite view. We stay and clean up the mess and use this as a base of operations or we fail.

IOW, if we turn Earth into a cesspool and leave, we fail.

My rationale is evolution. This is the only environment we're suited for. Now, one might argue that future genetic manipulation may allow us to artifically create a different species that can well live in space and I would not disagree. But I'll feel little, if any, connection to that species. In fact, since it won't be "use" why not go the robot route from the get go because that is what they will be.

Barring some radical new transport technology, this planet will remain the home of the bulk of mankind, probably for ever.
Except there is no forever. Sooner or later, some planetary disaster will occur, manmade or not.
Having some eggs in at least one more basket is a reasonable strategy. Mars and the Moon are the obvious targets.

There is no excuse for turning Earth into a cesspit and we won't. But we have a potentially narrow window for getting off this rock. We need to drop our population and conserve our resources and we need to do it soon. But that's not the subject of this thread.

Adapting our genes to space, or other worlds strikes me as a dead end road.
We adapt the planet to our needs, not the other way around.

All this is wildly speculative though.
What we need NOW is the ability to get humans to Mars and the Moon and to let them establish permanent settlements. That is not beyond us, but it may be in 50 years if we have another 10billion mouths to feed and no oil to make fertiliser. Now may be the only time we have.

bokonon

20th July 2008, 07:09 AM

Aw, well, perhaps it is true that humanity can get along on less and be happy. Won't need novelty in their lives in the future. Perhaps. I have mine; I just hope my great, great grandkids have their too.
I see "manned space exploration" or "get along on less" as a false dichotomy. Most of the "novelty" in your life didn't come from manned space travel, it came from human ingenuity and creative expression. I don't see any reason to expect that will whither unless we shoot people into the sky.

cgallaga

20th July 2008, 07:53 AM

I got an idear, lets call it a draw and just let women do it. ;)

bokonon

20th July 2008, 08:09 AM

Barring some radical new transport technology, this planet will remain the home of the bulk of mankind, probably for ever.
Absolutely true. We know there is no other habitable planet in our solar system, so the only real prospect for a viable colony on another planet would be on a planet circling another star.

Voyager 1 is the fastest probe we've ever launched with rocket technology, because of gravity boosts it's received en route. Launched in 1977, it is now (more than 30 years later) only 14 light HOURS from earth. Less than one light day. The nearest star is four light YEARS away, and there's no guarantee that it has any more habitable planets.

Except there is no forever. Sooner or later, some planetary disaster will occur, manmade or not.
Having some eggs in at least one more basket is a reasonable strategy. Mars and the Moon are the obvious targets.
Earth orbit is a more obvious target, if you're looking for insurance from "planetary disaster." Dozens of underground "biospheres" would also be more cost-effective (and more feasible) than extraterrestrial settlements.

What we need NOW is the ability to get humans to Mars and the Moon and to let them establish permanent settlements. That is not beyond us, but it may be in 50 years if we have another 10billion mouths to feed and no oil to make fertiliser. Now may be the only time we have.If it's "beyond us" in 50 years (and it won't be), those colonies will die on the vine anyway. There is no reasonable prospect for them to generate products (including He3) which they can use to trade economically (as "New World" colonies did), so they will have to be subsidized. Medicine, replacements for aging technology, food, water, clothing, and more will need to be supplied to extraterrestrial colonies. Children born into such colonies will need the option of returning to earth. I expect most of them would choose to relocate to earth, rather than live out a life that's grimmer and less satisfying than life in the most stifling small town on earth.

At some point, there may be infrastructure in place that will make the possibility of travel to the moon less daunting. A three-day trip, and the fact that the moon shares our location in the "Goldilocks zone" might make a commuter settlement feasible. I don't think it's something we need to rush into, and I don't expect to see it happen in the next 50 years.

Soapy Sam

20th July 2008, 09:03 AM

Absolutely true. We know there is no other habitable planet in our solar system, so the only real prospect for a viable colony on another planet would be on a planet circling another star.

Voyager 1 is the fastest probe we've ever launched with rocket technology, because of gravity boosts it's received en route. Launched in 1977, it is now (more than 30 years later) only 14 light HOURS from earth. Less than one light day. The nearest star is four light YEARS away, and there's no guarantee that it has any more habitable planets.

Earth orbit is a more obvious target, if you're looking for insurance from "planetary disaster." Dozens of underground "biospheres" would also be more cost-effective (and more feasible) than extraterrestrial settlements.

If it's "beyond us" in 50 years (and it won't be), those colonies will die on the vine anyway. There is no reasonable prospect for them to generate products (including He3) which they can use to trade economically (as "New World" colonies did), so they will have to be subsidized. Medicine, replacements for aging technology, food, water, clothing, and more will need to be supplied to extraterrestrial colonies. Children born into such colonies will need the option of returning to earth. I expect most of them would choose to relocate to earth, rather than live out a life that's grimmer and less satisfying than life in the most stifling small town on earth.

At some point, there may be infrastructure in place that will make the possibility of travel to the moon less daunting. A three-day trip, and the fact that the moon shares our location in the "Goldilocks zone" might make a commuter settlement feasible. I don't think it's something we need to rush into, and I don't expect to see it happen in the next 50 years.

Might be fifty, might be two hundred. The point is that there may be a finite window of opportunity and we should assume there is.
A Martian colony would have to be a globally funded project- which may be the best justification for attempting it. As for bringing people home- maybe a better model would be Botany Bay, rather than Virginia?
Yes, spacehabs have the advantage of position (nearness to markets etc), but the numbers will always be small. If we can accidentally pull a greenhouse effect on Earth, we can do it deliberately on Mars. I don't say next week.

But the "Why send humans" argument can be extended:- Why send robots? Why bother at all? We can learn all we need to know about Mars from our horoscope.

Mind you- people who are content at home rarely make colonists. Who knows what life on Earth may be like in 100 years? Maybe Mars will look pretty attractive to some people.

Roboramma

20th July 2008, 09:57 AM

I think manned space-flight will eventually be a reality. The way I see it, life expectancy will continue to go up, and people will still want children. At some point, we'll have to limit that. Giving people the option of leaving, going somewhere else, if they want to have children seems viable to me. Of course it's a very limited option, but at least its' something.

As to other places and habitability - mars is fine. So's the moon. Sure, we'll have to bring some things with us, and sure, for a while it won't be self-sufficient. Does it ever need to be?

But as to just going there for the fun of it? I'd rather we looked at exploiting space, with humans or robotics, first, rather than just sending people around the solar system. One of the first things to look at is producing rocket fuel somewhere outside of our gravity well, rather than having to use rocket fuel to get it there.

I'd also rather see a probe sent to alpha centauri at extremely high speeds than a major manned space program. We could get something there in 50 years, (plus say ten-fifteen to figure out how to do so) if we really put our minds to it. And it could send back pictures and other data in 5.
That would be real exploration, and it would be truely astounding and inspiring.

If not that, build some big telescopes, say on the far side of the moon. I think we have a future in space, and I think that humans will be a part of it, to some extent. But I think they should be part of it only when they add to it.
And I don't think that putting people on mars would be the same as putting people on the moon was. Unless they're doing something in a way that is really expanding our presence in the solar system, other than just walking around, it will get old, pretty fast.
When we first went to the moon people thought it meant that we'd be living there soon, and then moving on. It was the first time we'd left our planet. Another moon mission, or a mars mission, would be very different.

Roboramma

20th July 2008, 10:10 AM

Might be fifty, might be two hundred. The point is that there may be a finite window of opportunity and we should assume there is.
I think this is a good point. We should be looking at ways to make use of the resources up there (and really doing them, even if they aren't cheaper) while resources down here are plentiful enough to make that viable.

Roboramma

20th July 2008, 10:23 AM

Barring some radical new transport technology, this planet will remain the home of the bulk of mankind, probably for ever.
I don't think that's true. Certainly there won't be an exodus of the bulk of mankind, but it's possible that people will reproduce faster "up there" than "down here". If we can someday make self-sustainable colonies somewhere, well, start with fifty people and after a while you've got billions, without needing to send anyone else up there.
And they don't even need to be self-sustainable in the "don't need anything from earth" sense. Just in the economic sense of being able to trade for whatever they need.

Except there is no forever. Sooner or later, some planetary disaster will occur, manmade or not. some of those we can protect ourselves against with our robotic spacecraft - asteroid or cometary collisions for instance. But your right - one day the sun will go gas giant on us, for instance.
There's also gamma ray bursters - one of them in our nieghborhood basically sterilizes the solar system.

And as you said there are still manmade problems, pretty hard to avoid when we're all crammed on the same little rock.

Having some eggs in at least one more basket is a reasonable strategy. Mars and the Moon are the obvious targets. I agree, though I think we've got plenty of time before we need to worry about sending people to actually live there. I'm interested mostly in making use of the resources of the solar system, once we've learned to do that efficiently, colonizing other planets will be easy.

Adapting our genes to space, or other worlds strikes me as a dead end road.
We adapt the planet to our needs, not the other way around. I think we'll likely do some combination of the two.

All this is wildly speculative though.
What we need NOW is the ability to get humans to Mars and the Moon and to let them establish permanent settlements. That is not beyond us, but it may be in 50 years if we have another 10billion mouths to feed and no oil to make fertiliser. Now may be the only time we have.
I disagree only slightly - I think the important first step is learning to make use of the resources up there, to make exploiting them cheaper by getting a lot of practice doing so. If that means humans are a part of that, so be it, but I think robots will likely be more efficient for most purposes, especially in the long run.

shadron

20th July 2008, 10:44 AM

Even nicer than it is today, unless people get the idea that it's okay to trash the place because we can always go somewhere else.

Bokonon, that's a pretty bleak assessment of humans. 300 years ago we (as a civilization) didn't worry about anything much beyond territory. 60 years ago it was geopolitics. Today it's global warming. I contend that in this race were improving our aim and our abilities; I don't think we'll trash our environment in the long run as long as we keep improving (thanks largely to science, of course) our abilities and our mental health. The other danger is that we won't improve these fast enough, and some of our old, dark side will swamp the new refinements. The global warming deniers (one example) seem to represent this visceral side of our minds (and this is not a us/them thing; we all have these tendencies within us). One way we have kept that at bay in the past is to give it new worlds to conquer or surrogates; something for the macho side of us to chew on. Can we now do without that? If we can, we may wind up with your utopian view, and I'd say, more power to us. I just don't think its going to be that simple.

bokonon

20th July 2008, 12:29 PM

If we can accidentally pull a greenhouse effect on Earth, we can do it deliberately on Mars. I don't say next week.
On earth, a century of billions of people burning fossil fuels (and other fuels) has slightly raised CO2 levels, which may cause an increase of a few degrees in temperature in a few decades. I don't see how that example in any way demonstrates that we could do it deliberately on Mars, where no fossil fuels exist. Even if we could warm it up enough to be livable, the idea that this would make Mars habitable is absurd. There is no breathable atmosphere, no magnetic field protecting organisms from solar wind or radiation. Lower gravity means bones will deteriorate over time (a bigger problem on the moon, I admit, but still a problem on Mars).

The fact is, no matter how bad things get on earth, transforming that "bad" environment into something livable will be a walk in the park compared to making colonies on the moon or Mars livable. If you need challenges, make the continental shelf habitable, or the Sahara desert. The technology developed there may be useful on the moon or Mars, if the transportation problem is ever solved.

Roboramma

20th July 2008, 12:37 PM

On earth, a century of billions of people burning fossil fuels (and other fuels) has slightly raised CO2 levels, which may cause an increase of a few degrees in temperature in a few decades. I don't see how that example in any way demonstrates that we could do it deliberately on Mars, where no fossil fuels exist. Even if we could warm it up enough to be livable, the idea that this would make Mars habitable is absurd. There is no breathable atmosphere, no magnetic field protecting organisms from solar wind or radiation. Lower gravity means bones will deteriorate over time (a bigger problem on the moon, I admit, but still a problem on Mars). The idea that we could live on the moon or mars is different from the idea that we could live as well there as we do here.

The fact is, no matter how bad things get on earth, transforming that "bad" environment into something livable will be a walk in the park compared to making colonies on the moon or Mars livable. If you need challenges, make the continental shelf habitable, or the Sahara desert. The technology developed there may be useful on the moon or Mars, if the transportation problem is ever solved.
I agree that this is a good first step in understanding those sorts of problems. The thing is, though, that if you're interested in building a habitat on mars, the best way to do that is look at what you would need to build a habitat on mars - living on the bottom of the ocean may solve challenges, some of which would be the same, but not most of them.

shadron

20th July 2008, 02:25 PM

The fact is, no matter how bad things get on earth, transforming that "bad" environment into something livable will be a walk in the park compared to making colonies on the moon or Mars livable. If you need challenges, make the continental shelf habitable, or the Sahara desert. The technology developed there may be useful on the moon or Mars, if the transportation problem is ever solved.

Technically, yes. The challenges are there, but solvable. What makes the problem here on earth bad isn't the technical problem but rather the sociological one. Getting a solution agreed upon when many do not even agree there is a problem, or that it deserves even minor attention dragged away from pursuit of profits and standard of living - that's the problem.

Roboramma

21st July 2008, 02:25 PM

I saw this video today - what do you guys think:
Bn6Gel7yEs

BenBurch

21st July 2008, 03:19 PM

I saw this video today - what do you guys think:
Bn6Gel7yEs

You must have lost a character somewhere in that YT number. It does not load.

rwguinn

21st July 2008, 04:31 PM

I see "manned space exploration" or "get along on less" as a false dichotomy. Most of the "novelty" in your life didn't come from manned space travel, it came from human ingenuity and creative expression. I don't see any reason to expect that will whither unless we shoot people into the sky.
I beg your pardon?
Perhaps all the electronics, diagnostics, and other "toys" would have been developed anyway, but manned space programs gave them one hell of a kick in the butt!

SezMe

21st July 2008, 06:01 PM

Compared to the military, I would guess that the NASA kick in the butt was more like friendly pat.

rwguinn

21st July 2008, 08:03 PM

Compared to the military, I would guess that the NASA kick in the butt was more like friendly pat.

To quote my (former) boss:
"you're entitled to your opinion. It's wrong, but you're entitled to it."

Military technology takes many years to reach civilian use. Something about National Security...
NASA technology is almost immediately available--NASTRAN, Composites--the supercritical wing--among other things.
How long after the military had them did it take to get "Starlite vision" type binoculars to the commercial market?

shadron

21st July 2008, 09:11 PM

Heh - I've been reading some thing on cryptography lately. One of the great inventions in cryptography was the asymmetric public key encipherment, which solved the problem of how to send deciphering keys through an "out-of-channel", usually very expensive manner in order to use cryptography (public key). It also allows people to digitally sign their work in an unmistakable, uncopyable manner. These methods were developed by Whitfield Diffie (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitfield_Diffie) and Martin Hellman (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Hellman), and expanded upon by Rivest (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ron_Rivest), Shamir (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adi_Shamir) and Adleman (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Adleman) of RSA (their initials) fame.

It turns out that NSA and its British counterpart GCHQ (not exactly the military, but the same idea, close enough for this argument) had people who developed the same ideas at least three years before. Diffie-Hellman was originated by James H. Ellis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_H._Ellis), Clifford Cocks (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clifford_Cocks), and Malcolm Williamson (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malcolm_J._Williamson)of GCHQ, and RSA's algorithm was invented for he first time at the NSA. These facts were not publicly disclosed until 1997.

The algorithms for drawing spline curves (the name spline is East Anglian and refers to the rubber ruler that was originally used to draw them), aka Bezier curves, were originally developed as pencil-and-paper methods simultaneously by de Castlejau with Citroen in France, Pierre Bezier at Renault and Birkhoff (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garrett_Birkhoff), Garabedian (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Garabedian&action=edit&redlink=1), and de Boor (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_R._de_Boor) at General Motors in the late 1950s. None knew of the others work for over 20 years because of compulsive secrecy within he auto industry (again not military, but indicative of the proprietary mindset).

NASA publishes its science outright, as it is developed; the violation of that state of affairs is a large piece of why the Hansen controversy was emphasized as it was. There is not another scientific organization of its size and like in the world, I don't think. It has worked or provided experienced assistance in every scientific field from paleontology to meteorology, geology to cosmology, and everything in between.

If it's a weapon, then the military probably developed it. The rest of science and technology hails NASA as a friend, partner and developer.

bokonon

21st July 2008, 09:55 PM

I beg your pardon?
Perhaps all the electronics, diagnostics, and other "toys" would have been developed anyway, but manned space programs gave them one hell of a kick in the butt!
Nonsense. Rubik's cube wasn't developed for the space program, MP3 wasn't developed for the space program, widescreen TV wasn't developed for the space program, the iPhone wasn't developed for the space program, the Walkman wasn't developed for the space program, MIDI wasn't developed for the space program, laptop computers weren't developed for the space program, most of the books written in the past 60 years weren't written because of the space program, most of the movies made in the last 60 years weren't made for the space program, the Jerry Springer show wasn't created for the space program, blow dryers weren't built for the space program, genetic engineering wasn't developed for the space program, the human genome wasn't sequenced for the space program, the World Wide Web wasn't written for the space program...

We got fuel cells and Tang and Depends and solar panels and a few other things. Integrated circuit research got that "kick in the butt" you mentioned, so we got calculators and personal computers earlier than we otherwise would have, but more R&D dollars have been spent to satisfy consumer needs than the needs of the space program. Most of the innovations in your life and mine are the result of creative people developing products for the general public, not developing products for the manned space program.

SezMe

21st July 2008, 10:28 PM

To quote my (former) boss:
"you're entitled to your opinion. It's wrong, but you're entitled to it."
Since you're so smart on the subject, I am sure you can provide some evidence to back up your surety. And citing a couple of anecdotes doesn't cut it.

Roboramma

22nd July 2008, 12:14 AM

You must have lost a character somewhere in that YT number. It does not load.

Oh, shoot, and I didn't even mention Bill Stone's name, so no one would have a clue what I'm talking about! Thanks for noticing, here's the correct video (hopefully):

-Bn6Gel7yEs

The whole europa thing has always inspired me, as well as the idea of actually making some economic use of space. Anyone have any opinion on whether his idea (regarding the moon) is feasible? Apparently (http://www.ted.com/index.php/speakers/bill_stone.html) he's trying to get together 15 billion dollars to do it.

He’s also hoping to singlehandedly jump-start commercial human space exploration by offering spacefarers affordable fuels and consumables extracted from the moon. His new Shackleton Energy Company, or SEC, intends to raise $15 billion (as he points out, this is about the cost of a North Sea oil production platform complex) to mine ice thought to be trapped on the moon's southern pole at Shackleton Crater, and to sell derived products (including propellants and other consumables) on the moon and in low earth orbit (LEO) to international consumers. If all goes well, SEC will be open for business as early as 2015 as an international energy company.

bokonon

22nd July 2008, 07:52 AM

I'm not familiar with the use of water as a propellant, so I don't know how many miles per gallon per kilo it will give you. Using his own numbers, he's hoping to drop the cost of a bottle of Evian in orbit from $10,000 to about $700. It doesn't look to me like that's going to be the solution to $5/gallon gas, so you're still going to need a compelling reason to burn the fuel. Sending robots will give you more "bang for the buck" than sending men, for many reasons: no fuel necessary for the return trip, no fuel necessary for life support, no fuel necessary for people in the first place.

ETA: Assuming his bottled water is the 20-ounce size, he's still talking about providing "commercial" water costing over $4000/gallon.

SeanDamnit

22nd July 2008, 09:21 AM

The idea behind manned space missions is to ultimately make living on another body practical someday. At least in my mind. Lets talk a little bit about the practicallity of establishing a permanent settlement on another planet/moon.

Unless our understanding of things like light speed are wrong, it is very very unlikely that humans will ever leave the solar system. Even if there happens to be an inhabitable planet on a nearby star - that's still much more than a lifetime for anyone not travelling at light speed...and we will never travel at light speed.

The only options that leaves is living on the Moon or Mars. I don't believe Mercury or Venus will ever be viable for human living.

It will take 2 years minimum round trip to mars and back using our current technology. And that's 2 years if you leave at the best possible time. I just don't think humans are capable of not going nuts and compromising the mission if they have to be cramped in a tin can unable to escape for that amount of time. I also don't think it's possible for something critical to not go wrong at some point, and help will always be way too far away. The time it takes to get to Mars and back looks like a deal breaker to me right now - unless we are capable of creating another means of propulsion that is signifigantly faster...maybe someone could fill me in if something is both faster and actually practical (no anti-matter stuff - lets be honest, it's not going to happen) but not developed yet.

The moon looks like the only option to me. It's only 3 days away, which is much better for sanity and in case of emergencies. But then, what really does the moon have to offer us right now that would make human settlement worth it?

Roboramma

22nd July 2008, 10:02 AM

bokonon

22nd July 2008, 11:18 AM

what really does the moon have to offer us right now that would make human settlement worth it?
"Tourist destination for rich people" seems to be about it. I don't mind if private enterprise decides that's a niche worth developing and creates the infrastructure to make it happen, but it doesn't seem like the sort of thing the governments of the world should be coming together to facilitate.

Robot probes could create a VLBI network for radio astronomy on the far side of the moon with no human presence required, and I'll reserve judgment on the "industrial quantities of fuel for orbiting fuel stations" until I've heard more details.

NoisyAstronomer

22nd July 2008, 12:36 PM

"A manned space program that is only used when it is needed (Experiments on Mars etc)"

I have to say, working with instruments at remote locations, you can roboticize all you want, but things get done more efficiently when a human can go over a kick it every once in a while. Seriously, there are certain problems in field research that only a human has the creativity to explore. The Mars rovers are super-awesome, but remote control is difficult and time consuming and has no comparison to an actual geologist walking about on the surface.

patnray

22nd July 2008, 01:39 PM

Except that you can send 100 robotic probes for the cost of one manned mission. And what's your hurry? We have plenty of time to explore Mars...

Agno

22nd July 2008, 01:52 PM

I think that right now, the cost and the risk are not worth it for manned space travel, other than low Earth orbit. Robots can do a good job for a much cheaper price and with no danger. However I do think that it's the destiny of the human race to go into space. When the technology is better and cheaper and safer. Estimates I've seen talk about nearly a trillion dollars to send a manned mission to Mars. And as yet, we don't even have the technology to protect astronauts against the hard radiation of space beyond low Earth orbit.

I see manned missions more as "gee whiz" and macho show-offs of technology. For the price of a manned mission to the Moon, we could send several robotic probes to the planets. We would get much more bang for the buck, scientifically speaking.

When it's cheaper and safer, then yes, let's do it. But right now, robots are better.

We've been there and done that. The Apollo program was great at first. But they just kept bringing back rocks...rocks and more rocks. No little green men, no Moon babes, no cure for cancer...just rocks. The public got tired of funding rock hunts and the program was cancelled. It would be the same with Mars, a trillion dollars for a few rocks. No thanks. True, it would be exciting and cool and all that, but for a trillion dollars and the high risk, I don't think it's worth it to send a few cowboys to Mars.

Now private enterprise, I think they should be able to do whatever they want as long as there are some safety standards.

patnray

22nd July 2008, 03:04 PM

Astronauts landing on Mars will be able to explore more of the surface in just a few hours than all of the probes and rovers already sent to Mars combined. And we need to send people into space for more reasons than just exploration. We need to push the limits of our technology. Solving significant problems, such as how to avoid damage from extended exposure to cosmic rays, will produce technology that will have direct applications here on earth.

Also, it's not an "either-or" question between manned or robotic missions. Eliminating manned missions will not free money for robotic missions. It's likely, that more money would be spent on robotic missions to Mars in support of a manned mission than would be spent on robotic missions if there were no manned missions planned.

I fear that the gap between the Space Shuttle and the first flights of Ares (especially if lengthened as proposed by some politicians) will cause NASA to lose most of the engineers, technicians, and scientists that work for them. It will cause less interest in space and science and will result in less qualified minds to replace the lost talent over the years.

-- Roger

Fleets of robots landing on Mars will be able to explore far more of the surface far sooner and for far less cost than any manned probe. And we need to send robots into space for more reasons than just exploration. We need to push the limits of our technology. Solving significant problems, such as how to make controlled landings at precise locations, will produce technology that will have direct applications here on earth and are essential pre-requisites to any manned exploration.

Mars is so much further than the moon that the challenges are orders of magnitude greater. We can’t just put a few people in a capsule and send them on their way. Even on a fast trajectory a round trip would take a year or more (and there’s no turning back once they leave Earth’s orbit). Any reasonable manned program will require an extensive infrastructure in advance: habitats, power plants, fuel and oxygen generators, etc, as well as extensive robotic surface surveys to locate the best site for a manned base.

Back in the 60s, the idea was to assemble one huge spacecraft in orbit that would carry everything needed for the entire mission. But these days a far simpler and robust method is to launch the supplies and equipment in multiple robotic vehicles on a slow trajectory (2 or 3 years to get there). The crew craft could then be much lighter and travel on a faster trajectory (6 to 9 months). This eliminates the need for expensive, dangerous, and unproven technology to assemble complex spacecraft in orbit. It allows for more spacious habitats and extensively equipped laboratories. It allows for some redundancy to recover from disasters like Apollo 13 (crew craft could be launched in pairs, for example).

But all of that would require advances in robotic technology. So our primary effort for now should be on developing the systems and infrastructures that will be needed. We can do a great deal of preliminary exploration while developing the technology for a robust human program later. There is no need to rush into a human mission. And a human mission will be far more productive if we prepare properly. That’s not to say we shouldn’t begin mapping out the requirements now, but we will gain far more if we take our time rather than rushing to get man there as soon as possible.

For now, for anything outside low earth orbit, robots rule! But you are right that an eventual manned mission will spur development of the required infrastructure.

Tanstaafl

22nd July 2008, 04:17 PM

Space robots don't drive 900 miles to kidnap the girlfriends of fellow space robots. Space robots also don't need diapers.

Do I detect the seed of a new plot line?

BenBurch

22nd July 2008, 08:36 PM

Corsair 115

22nd July 2008, 08:50 PM

We will get to Mars with humans the very moment we can build a fusion rocket and keep up .1 G there and back.Well, I guess we can write off a manned voyage to Mars within the next forty years or so.

If Mars is out, can we perhaps look at developing a reliable and reasonably economical SSTO vehicle to open up local space development?

neutrino_cannon

23rd July 2008, 01:01 AM

I've always like DeGrasse Tyson's reply to those who do not approve of manned space travel, which is this: 'We don't name highschools after space robots'.

A pithy quote proves nothing about the overall utility of a thing. We don't name high schools after the local water purification plant, plastics or oral contraceptives (at least I hope not); but what matters more to the lives of the teaming millions, those things or some politician? Just 'cause it ain't sexy...

If Mars is out, can we perhaps look at developing a reliable and reasonably economical SSTO vehicle to open up local space development?

Could someone explain to me why SSTO is a good idea? Seriously; how are the problems of cost and safety in existing launch vehicles improved by dragging along lots of structural dead weight along for the ride?

Sure, it's aesthetically unappealing to have to ride big disintegrating totem poles into space, but to get the delta-v where it has to be, that's the only sensible approach. Just 'cause it ain't sexy...

The Mars rovers are super-awesome, but remote control is difficult and time consuming and has no comparison to an actual geologist walking about on the surface.

Being that nobody has actually put foot on Mars yet, how confident are you in that assertion? If you have the technology to shield a person from the radiation during the multi-month trip through interplanetary transfer orbit, mitigate the health problems of weightlessness, land on Mars, withstand the local conditions for as much time as needed, keeping one or more humans alive and well all the while, AND haul all that junk into orbit

who's to say that you can't make a rover that would be far better adapted to the persistently hostile demands of such a mission? Just 'cause it ain't sexy...

I see manned missions more as "gee whiz" and macho show-offs of technology. For the price of a manned mission to the Moon, we could send several robotic probes to the planets. We would get much more bang for the buck, scientifically speaking.

DINGDINGDINGDING!!!

We have a winner.

The only reason to indulge in manned space travel at this point is because it's sexy. People are certainly willing to pay for sexy; it's good entertainment. But please, there is no need to delude oneself about why it's being done.

BenBurch

23rd July 2008, 03:39 AM

Well, I guess we can write off a manned voyage to Mars within the next forty years or so.

If Mars is out, can we perhaps look at developing a reliable and reasonably economical SSTO vehicle to open up local space development?

Burt Rutan and his ilk will see to that, I think.

Correa Neto

23rd July 2008, 07:42 AM

I think that for most purposes, robots are the way to go nowadays and in the foreseeable future (say, 50 years or so). However, sooner or later, manned flights will be needed (or demanded, if you will).

Most of the exploration work on the Moon, for example, can be made by RC machines; the time delay (1sec?) is not that high. Someone can controll a rover and robotic hands from an office. Even if the rover enters a lava tube, leaving outside the cave an antenna connected by a cable to the rover will allow (limited) exploration. Communcation sattelite relays can do the trick on the lunar hemisphere wich is not turned towards us.

But Mars and beyond (or Venus and towards the Sun)... This will require the development of more autonomous and "intelligent" AI than we have nowadays. Impossible? I guess not.

I think the best approach for distant missions such as Mars or Venus is a combined man+AI+RC machines. Stay in orbit while controlling rovers, planes, etc. Easy? No. But again, sooner or later, manned flights will be needed (or demanded, if you will). Even if we manage to clean the mess we made at our own homeworld, even if human population reaches a stable sustainable level. We will go even if just because we want to.

There's another aspect (may be seen either as long term or very looooooooooooong term)- There are space hazzards and Earth will not last forever. Yes, the odds of some catastrophe such as an unavoidable asteroid hit are small, but its consequences are so dire that its something worthy of consideration.

jadebox

23rd July 2008, 07:45 AM

Mars is so much further than the moon that the challenges are orders of magnitude greater. We can’t just put a few people in a capsule and send them on their way. Even on a fast trajectory a round trip would take a year or more (and there’s no turning back once they leave Earth’s orbit). Any reasonable manned program will require an extensive infrastructure in advance: habitats, power plants, fuel and oxygen generators, etc, as well as extensive robotic surface surveys to locate the best site for a manned base.

Exactly. "We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard ...."

There is no need to rush into a human mission. And a human mission will be far more productive if we prepare properly. That’s not to say we shouldn’t begin mapping out the requirements now, but we will gain far more if we take our time rather than rushing to get man there as soon as possible.

For now, for anything outside low earth orbit, robots rule! But you are right that an eventual manned mission will spur development of the required infrastructure.

What you described is the current plan. But, without the push for a manned mission, there won't be a push to develop the robots and infrastructure.

-- Roger

Agno

23rd July 2008, 08:28 AM

I would expect that in the not too far future, you could use virtual reality technology to control a robot on the moon. It could do just about anything a person could do.

As I said before, I think it's the destiny of the human race to go into space. We WILL go into space, if we don't destroy ourselves first. But in my mind, it's a question of when. And that depends on a lot of factors. I don't see it as feasable nor desireable to go now or at anytime in the near future. The technolgy isn't good enough. Some people argue things like "what if Columbus had wanted to wait for better technology?" Well, Columbus didn't attempt to cross the ocean in a leaky row-boat, which comparitively, is about the state of our spacecraft technology at the present time.

As yet, no plausable solution has been forthcoming to address the danger of hard radiation in space. You would need several inches of lead or equivalent material to protect people from it. Not feasable. But besides that, it's just too expensive and the rewards don't outweigh the risks. Now if they find life on Mars or on some other body in the Solar System, then that would change the playing field considerably. But just to go so we can say we did it and bring back a few rocks....sorry, I don't think so.

But it's a moot point. Congress will never fund an agressive manned space program.

Again, humans will go into space and in large numbers at some time in the future. But what's the rush? Why spend trillions of dollars and risk human life for a gee-whiz, macho showoff, just so we can say we did it? That's really all it boils down to.

Also, it would appear that there is no life on any other body in the Solar System. Isn't that what the space program is ultimately about? Finding out if we're alone? At least that's a big part of it.

If trillions of dollars are to be spent on the space program, let's spend it on projects that look for life. How about a combination solar sail, nuclear engine, gravity assist, ion engine, etc etc. program to get to another star? It might take decades but the scientific return would be much greater than a manned mission to Mars.

Or put humongous telescopes in orbit around the Earth to look for Earth like planets with an atmosphere containing oxygen.

I just can't see any justification in a gee-whiz manned mission beyond the Earth. Let the robots do the exploring until our technology has gone further than leaky row-boats.

Roboramma

23rd July 2008, 08:50 AM

If trillions of dollars are to be spent on the space program, let's spend it on projects that look for life. How about a combination solar sail, nuclear engine, gravity assist, ion engine, etc etc. program to get to another star? It might take decades but the scientific return would be much greater than a manned mission to Mars.

Or put humongous telescopes in orbit around the Earth to look for Earth like planets with an atmosphere containing oxygen.

I just can't see any justification in a gee-whiz manned mission beyond the Earth. Let the robots do the exploring until our technology has gone further than leaky row-boats.

I agree - a manned space program may be somewhat inspiring for a little while - until people realise that we're not actually doing anything: that it's all just a stunt. But a real, dedicated, big search for life elsewhere? One that will bring back a powerful understanding of our local neighborhood regardless of what it finds?
That's inspiring.

Jimbo07

23rd July 2008, 09:29 AM

Some people argue things like "what if Columbus had wanted to wait for better technology?" Well, Columbus didn't attempt to cross the ocean in a leaky row-boat, which comparitively, is about the state of our spacecraft technology at the present time.

[pained consideration of difficult analogy]

nneearrrrearrrreearrgh... ugh

[/pained consideration of difficult analogy]

Of course, Columbus did not set off on even a steamship, either. He set off on a voyage doomed to almost certain failure, were it not for his happenstance stumbling upon certain masses of land in the western hemisphere (islands, to boot!).

They had bodily hardships that we well understand. It will be comparably easy to provide vitamin supplements and hygiene to astronauts. We can maintain daily communication with the home base. We KNOW where we are going and can calculate precisely how long it will take to get there. On the other hand, they didn't have to contend with a micro-gravity, hard radiation environment.

The biggest problem is speed, not structural integrity, and that is a problem of energy. There will be other non-material factors, such as boredom.

As yet, no plausable solution has been forthcoming to address the danger of hard radiation in space. You would need several inches of lead or equivalent material to protect people from it. Not feasable.

I thought the idea was to provide a smaller, water-enclosed, safe harbour on the craft?

patnray

23rd July 2008, 09:31 AM

What you described is the current plan. But, without the push for a manned mission, there won't be a push to develop the robots and infrastructure.

-- Roger
In my opinion the current plans are not nearly robust enough. Too few crew members, not enough advance infrastructure, insufficient redundancy (such as sending crew carrying craft in pairs). We are in too much of a hurry to get there with the minimal resouces. We'll get much more science and adventure if we go beyond the minimum requirements.

The astounding success of robotic missions in recent years means there is plenty of effort to develop more missions to explore the solar system. Many worthy projects that would extend our knowledge and capabilities have to compete for limited budgets because most of our space budget is wasted on human space flight. But you are right: only a long range plan for eventual manned missions would spur the development of the technology needed to create the required infrastructure to support a human visit to Mars.

I believe that a manned Mars mission is an acceptable long range goal (40 or 50 years), but most of our effort right now should be on robotic exploration, not manned flight.

Furthermore, it would be unethical to send humans on such an extended mission without first developing methods and procedures to mitigate the risks (radiation, weightlessness, Apollo 13 like disasters, etc.) All of these could be overcome with proper preparation, planning, and technology. But not in the next 10 or 20 years, in my opinion.

uruk

23rd July 2008, 09:55 AM

I was watching Dawkin's latest video conversation with Stephen Weinberg, and was dissappointed with what he had to say on manned space travel. He declared that he regarded a Manned Mars Mission or another Moon mission as pointless, seeing hundreds of robots as the future.

I've always like DeGrasse Tyson's reply to those who do not approve of manned space travel, which is this: 'We don't name highschools after space robots'.

How do you feel about manned space exploration?

I'm surprised hearing that from Dawkin. Being a huge proponent of evolution he should know that organizims have a tendency to expand into what ever environment they can survive in. We just happen to be slightly more crafty than our fellow passengers on this planet.

I'm all for manned space exploration by any country. I think it is important to the future of mankind. Not so much for space exploration but for manned space exploitation.

Robotic exploration will never be replaced by manned exploration but niether should manned exploration be replaced by robotic exploration.

I would hate to think that our only presence or legacy in the solar system would be our robots

BenBurch

23rd July 2008, 10:03 AM

uruk: Ultimately, we will BE those machines.

uruk

23rd July 2008, 10:09 AM

Or not. All things considered, it might have been nice if Columbia had been a robot mission.

Are you kidding? the natives would have turned the robot probe into knives and jewelery. History showed that manned missions was the most efficient way of displacing a culture.

Robots indeed!

uruk

23rd July 2008, 10:23 AM

uruk: Ultimately, we will BE those machines.

Are you refering to the eventual merging of our biology into our technology?

Would we still be whining about the cost and dangers of manned space prescence even then?

We complain about the risks and dangers of manned space travel but we think nothing about shelling out, as a society, billions of dollars on something as relatively meaningless as block buster motion picture entertainment where stuntmen risk thier lives so that Keanu Reeves looks cool for the two hours in which we try to evade boredom and hope our date falls for the "hole in the popcorn tub" trick.

Speaking of Keanu Reeves, anybody else concerned about the Day the Earth Stood Still remake?

bokonon

23rd July 2008, 10:34 AM

Exactly. "We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard ...."
Lots of things are hard. Many of them aren't worth the effort. Spending tens of billions (or hundreds of billions) so geologists can swing a pick on Mars is something hard that just isn't worth the effort right now.

Weaning ourselves off of petroleum without returning to an 18th-century lifestyle will be plenty hard. Unlike a manned Mars mission, it will also be worthwhile.

Curing the diseases that kill us will be hard, and also worthwhile.

There is no shortage of challenges to lift the human spirit for the foreseeable future. We don't have to manufacture meaningless goals.

Roboramma

23rd July 2008, 10:35 AM

uruk

23rd July 2008, 10:42 AM

http://www.bobpark.org/ for this week, apparently there is not a permanent link yet

Well I can tell you one thing that humans can do better than any robot will ever do for quite some time to come. Think.

Two things if you include improvising

bokonon

23rd July 2008, 10:45 AM

Whistle?

uruk

23rd July 2008, 11:18 AM

I think the question is poorly framed, really. The question isn't "manned or robotic", the question is "what are we trying to do?", followed by, "what's the most efficient way to do it."

Will sending men to mars and bringing back a few rocks really help us to expand a human presence in the solar system? Maybe to some extent, in so much as we'll learn how to travel across those distances, which is necessary for that goal. On the other hand, learning to use the resources that are present elsewhere is, in my opinion, even more important for that long term goal, and could potentially drive everything else.

In the short term those resources will be more expensive to get at than just harvesting them from the earth, but if we fund the sort of missions that learn to get at them, the price of such missions will go down, and eventually it could fund itself.
Whether manned or robotic is more efficient for doing so isn't so important as finding the right goals.
And harvesting resources in space, in a way that clearly shows that we're not interested in just doing stunts anymore, is more inspiring to me than putting a few men on mars and letting them walk around a bit.

A mars mission would be cool, mind, but there are much more inspirational, useful, exciting things that we could do with that money. Let's send a robot to the seas of europa, build a telescope on the moon, try to harvest rocket fuel, etc.

I agree with alot of what you are saying. I am not for one big political or publicity stunt. I am for the long term steady push for permanent human presence in space.
Having said that. I am not for the total scrapping of manned flight for an exclusively robotic exploration.

Robotic and human space exploration are two different things. They have two different goals. Robotic missions adds to our scientific knowledge of the solar system whereas manned space exploration teaches us how to live in another, much more vast, environment and thus adds to our knowldege of "us".

To say one is more important than the other is being short sighted. Both add to our knowledge and experiance and gives so much in a practical sense.

What I would like to see from NASA is a more practical approach and work more to develop permanent human presence in Earth orbit and on the Moon. What we learn from that will make the eventual human visit to Mars safer and cheaper.

uruk

23rd July 2008, 11:43 AM

Lots and lots of manned space missions.

There are a lot of people I want to get rid of.

Actually, I voted for limited manned space missions, using robots instead whenever possible.

I don't think the government should be involved in space exploration, period, but that's just the nasty libertarian in me speaking.

Private exploration of space? Hell, yes!
I agree the private sector needs to take over. Someone mentioned space porno. We need space porno!

Well I think the government does have a purpose in space exploration. The government was pretty handy in establishing infrastructure like highways and traffic lights as well as establishing and enforcing saftey regulations,..etc

Space exploration started out as private experimentation. Tsilokovski, Robert Goddard, Werner Vaugn Braun, all started out as personal exploration and rocketry clubs. But Von Braun never could have built the Saturn V on his salary alone. And I seriously doubt he could have garnered corporate funding with going to the moon as a goal.

Unfortunately, the government has dominated space exploration and have used alot of it for military purposes. But if it wasn't for the government showing that space exploration is possible or that it can have a feduciary return, private corporations would never have gotten involved.

All that space technology is designed and build by private corporations.

uruk

23rd July 2008, 11:49 AM

Better uses of such resources would be to figure out how to live sustainably here at home on Earth....starting with an effective world-wide population reduction plan.

I believe these plans are called "wars".

uruk

23rd July 2008, 12:03 PM

Even nicer than it is today, unless people get the idea that it's okay to trash the place because we can always go somewhere else. The idea is not to trash another place. But there are many other reason to expanmd our presence. What were the reason for Europeans to leave the old world for the new?

Why would it? There is an infinite number of outlets for the human spirit which don't require flinging ourselves away from the earth. Then why exclude spacefaring? Becuse it's expensive? it's dangerous? When have we ever let that stop us from doing other expensive and dangerous things? Human history is pushed by doing expensive and dangerous things.

There are so many more creative ways to occupy one's time than "getting away from other people" that I don't think this is an issue. In addition, I can get away from other people any time I want, by going into an empty room and closing the door behind me. Everyone's life is a unique experience, and the future will only provide more variety. In 1000 years, there will be another thousand years of good books to read, good films to watch, good music to listen to, new cuisine to try, new areas of research to investigate... the idea that coasting into emptiness is the only way to expand the human spirit is a non-starter with me.
Again, why exclude space exploration from the list of things that can "expand the human experiance"?

Corsair 115

23rd July 2008, 12:07 PM

Could someone explain to me why SSTO is a good idea? Seriously; how are the problems of cost and safety in existing launch vehicles improved by dragging along lots of structural dead weight along for the ride?Because, from an economical point of view, anytime you have to throw away material after each flight you're wasting the resources and effort which went into constructing that material in the first place.

It'd be like a factory using a truck to ship goods to the retailer, and then the truck is scrapped after it gets there. Building a truck every time you want to ship something is not terribly economical in the long run.

Burt Rutan and his ilk will see to that, I think.I don't know, it seems to me they've got a long way to go. What they've got now is barely a suborbital vehicle.

I wonder what might have come out of the DC-X/Delta Clipper rocket program of the early 1990s had it not been cancelled. It looked like it had a lot of promise...

uruk

23rd July 2008, 12:16 PM

What makes any of you guys think we will ever explore space again in OUR LIFETIME? Humankind is unable to solve it's earth based problems. Space travel 30-40 years ago was a byproduct of a system that is gone and won't come back. If we come out of the mess we are in, we might make it, but I say that will be closer to the year 2100....

What do you mean? We've never stoped exploring space. It's just been robot heavy exploration.

Human presence is just starting up again. Well actually, U.S. manned space flight that is. The Russians were still sending people up long after skylab took a dump in the Indian ocean.

uruk

23rd July 2008, 12:32 PM

At some point, there may be infrastructure in place that will make the possibility of travel to the moon less daunting. A three-day trip, and the fact that the moon shares our location in the "Goldilocks zone" might make a commuter settlement feasible. I don't think it's something we need to rush into, and I don't expect to see it happen in the next 50 years.
That infrastructure isn't going to get there on it's own. And things put off for tomorrow has a habit of never getting done at all.

There needs to be a slow steady push for these things. And there's no time like the present to start.

But I agree, I don't see the infrastructor for a permanent presence on the moon (spacestation or research station style) for another 50 years.

Though I'm sure we'll put men back on the moon well within my life time. (We did it before after all)

uruk

23rd July 2008, 12:51 PM

Compared to the military, I would guess that the NASA kick in the butt was more like friendly pat.

I have to differ with you greatly here. The reason you have a PC on your desk is directly the result of the Apollo space program. The Apollo program dumped huge amount of money to miniturize a computer and the electronics needed to build it. If you look up the Apollo navigation computer you will see an errie familiarity to the way PC's and CPUs operate.

NASA was and still is a huge influence in the development of technology. NASA is not only about space exploration, it also does aeronautics and aircraft safety, weather and environmental research, bio-sciences, education and technology.

Go to a technical university or a well stocked library and look for a publication called "NASA Tech Briefs". The publication document all the technological development and research that NASA develops and funds.

neutrino_cannon

23rd July 2008, 01:00 PM

As yet, no plausable solution has been forthcoming to address the danger of hard radiation in space. You would need several inches of lead or equivalent material to protect people from it.

ARGGHHH! Why does this myth yet live?

Lead is one of the worst possible things to shield against radiation in space with! Particle radiation incident upon metal produces secondary radiation, usually in the neighborhood of x-rays. Water and plastics work far better in that regard. Lead, and other dense materials are only needed to protect against gamma radiation, which is less of a concern.

Zarathustra

23rd July 2008, 01:24 PM

I'm in favor of mandatory manned space mansions.

That, or a mandatory breeding limit protocol.

uruk

23rd July 2008, 01:25 PM

Nonsense. Rubik's cube wasn't developed for the space program, MP3 wasn't developed for the space program, widescreen TV wasn't developed for the space program, the iPhone wasn't developed for the space program, the Walkman wasn't developed for the space program, MIDI wasn't developed for the space program, laptop computers weren't developed for the space program, most of the books written in the past 60 years weren't written because of the space program, most of the movies made in the last 60 years weren't made for the space program, the Jerry Springer show wasn't created for the space program, blow dryers weren't built for the space program, genetic engineering wasn't developed for the space program, the human genome wasn't sequenced for the space program, the World Wide Web wasn't written for the space program...

We got fuel cells and Tang and Depends and solar panels and a few other things. Integrated circuit research got that "kick in the butt" you mentioned, so we got calculators and personal computers earlier than we otherwise would have, but more R&D dollars have been spent to satisfy consumer needs than the needs of the space program. Most of the innovations in your life and mine are the result of creative people developing products for the general public, not developing products for the manned space program.

Well let's see. things we would not have if it wasn't for the space program. Weather and communication satellites, GPS navigation, development in integrated circuit design and manuacturing, ( which brought about the digital revolution and electronic miniturization) minicomputers, (up until that point scientists, the military and corporation were happy with the huge mainframes) development in aerodynamics and air safety, CCD chips used in digital cameras, So on and so on.

Here is a website that shows some of what NASA gets involved in.
http://www.thespaceplace.com/nasa/spinoffs.html

I'd say it is money well spent. Especially considerin gthat most of the most goes to U.S. companies and employees.

uruk

23rd July 2008, 01:30 PM

ARGGHHH! Why does this myth yet live?

Lead is one of the worst possible things to shield against radiation in space with! Particle radiation incident upon metal produces secondary radiation, usually in the neighborhood of x-rays. Water and plastics work far better in that regard. Lead, and other dense materials are only needed to protect against gamma radiation, which is less of a concern.
Moon hoaxers perpetuate the myth. The nickle foil and mylar insulation on the Lunar module did a good job of stopping a good deal of the radiation.

uruk

23rd July 2008, 02:05 PM

Except that you can send 100 robotic probes for the cost of one manned mission. And what's your hurry? We have plenty of time to explore Mars...

And it takes a hundred different types of probes to do what one manned mission can do at ten times the amount of time. And they still can't think or improvise.

uruk

23rd July 2008, 02:39 PM

Fleets of robots landing on Mars will be able to explore far more of the surface far sooner and for far less cost than any manned probe. And we need to send robots into space for more reasons than just exploration. We need to push the limits of our technology. Solving significant problems, such as how to make controlled landings at precise locations, will produce technology that will have direct applications here on earth and are essential pre-requisites to any manned exploration. We already are sending fleets of robots to Mars. We already are working on making controlled precise landings. The Moon landings were precise and controled (relativly) landings performed by both astronauts and the on board computer. You don't seriouslt think the apollo astronauts just ploped down where ever willy-nilly do you?

Are you saying that manned spaceflight does not push technology?

Mars is so much further than the moon that the challenges are orders of magnitude greater. We can’t just put a few people in a capsule and send them on their way. Even on a fast trajectory a round trip would take a year or more (and there’s no turning back once they leave Earth’s orbit). Any reasonable manned program will require an extensive infrastructure in advance: habitats, power plants, fuel and oxygen generators, etc, as well as extensive robotic surface surveys to locate the best site for a manned base. One of the reason for the orbital Mars observers is to select possible landing sites for a manned mission. Part of the manned space program is to develop that infrastucture. It's not just about putting crews on the spacestation.

One of the functions of the spacestation is to solve the problems of effects on the body of extended periods in space.

Back in the 60s, the idea was to assemble one huge spacecraft in orbit that would carry everything needed for the entire mission. But these days a far simpler and robust method is to launch the supplies and equipment in multiple robotic vehicles on a slow trajectory (2 or 3 years to get there). The crew craft could then be much lighter and travel on a faster trajectory (6 to 9 months). This eliminates the need for expensive, dangerous, and unproven technology to assemble complex spacecraft in orbit. It allows for more spacious habitats and extensively equipped laboratories. It allows for some redundancy to recover from disasters like Apollo 13 (crew craft could be launched in pairs, for example). That is one of the methods they are considering for the mission to Mars. The Apollo method was never seriously considered.

But all of that would require advances in robotic technology. So our primary effort for now should be on developing the systems and infrastructures that will be needed. We can do a great deal of preliminary exploration while developing the technology for a robust human program later. There is no need to rush into a human mission. And a human mission will be far more productive if we prepare properly. That’s not to say we shouldn’t begin mapping out the requirements now, but we will gain far more if we take our time rather than rushing to get man there as soon as possible. That is going on right now. Robotic technology is being advanced and devloped. That has never stopped. What did stop was the human side of the equation after the Apollo program ended and skylab crashed. There is a need to continue manned spaceflight.

I don't think anyone really considers that we will ready for a manned Mars mission for another 75 to 100 years. we need to work on getting back to the moon and establishing a permanent human presence in our own backyard first. setting up a permanent moon research base would be excellent practice and opportunity to develop the infrastructure for a manned Mars mission.

For now, for anything outside low earth orbit, robots rule! But you are right that an eventual manned mission will spur development of the required infrastructure.I believe that anything beyond the moon is still the domain of robots.

bokonon

23rd July 2008, 04:13 PM

Well let's see. things we would not have if it wasn't for the space program. Weather and communication satellites, GPS navigation, development in integrated circuit design and manuacturing, ( which brought about the digital revolution and electronic miniturization) minicomputers, (up until that point scientists, the military and corporation were happy with the huge mainframes) development in aerodynamics and air safety, CCD chips used in digital cameras, So on and so on.

Here is a website that shows some of what NASA gets involved in.
http://www.thespaceplace.com/nasa/spinoffs.html

I'd say it is money well spent. Especially considering that most of the most goes to U.S. companies and employees.
Weather and communications satellites, check.

GPS navigation, check.

Integrated circuit design and manufacture, not really. While it's true that the manufacturing process became efficient much sooner because of demand from the space program, this is development that would have happened anyway.

Minicomputers, not really, these (and PCs) were a logical application for integrated circuits, which would have been developed eventually anyway.

Development in aerodynamics and air safety, I doubt it (commercial and private aviation probably did more), but since I don't know what specific equipment or practices you're referring to here, I'll give it a check.

CCD chips used in digital cameras, no. They were invented at Bell Labs, but not part of any research for the space program. Sony did most of the work to make them commercial, and that was done for consumer products, not the space program.

The space program has been responsible for the development of some essential technology, and has accelerated the development of more. The case for the manned space program is much weaker. Communications satellites, weather satellites, GPS navigation, and (except for the repair mission) Hubble, are all the result of putting equipment in space that works without men in space. Most of the additional research and development done for manned space flight is to keep people alive in places where most people will never go. If we can get most of the scientific benefit for a fraction of the cost by sending machines instead of men, I think that's where we should be focusing our efforts for now.

shadron

23rd July 2008, 10:47 PM

We will get to Mars with humans the very moment we can build a fusion rocket and keep up .1 G there and back. Then it won't be a whole lot longer than a trip to the moon, and we can pre-position everything at Mars including a spare return craft and make it all tolerably safe.

Actually, I think you should rather say that we will get to Mars when the Chinese set a schedule that the more nationalistic part of the country won't be able to abide.

neutrino_cannon

24th July 2008, 12:45 PM

Because, from an economical point of view, anytime you have to throw away material after each flight you're wasting the resources and effort which went into constructing that material in the first place.

It'd be like a factory using a truck to ship goods to the retailer, and then the truck is scrapped after it gets there. Building a truck every time you want to ship something is not terribly economical in the long run.

If structural material costs where a substantial chuck of the costs involved in space flight, SSTO would be a good approach. They aren't, so it's not.

Roboramma

24th July 2008, 05:08 PM

Actually, I think you should rather say that we will get to Mars when the Chinese set a schedule that the more nationalistic part of the country won't be able to abide.

Personally I think you don't take this far enough - I think they're likely to get there first. They'll have the means, and the will, to do it. It'll be their way to show that they are the new super-power.

Not yet, but soon.

It'll also just be a stunt - a way to show off their emerging economic, military, and scientific powers. If not mars, certainly the moon. But the US did that already, it's not enough of a statement - though they'll almost certainly go there first. They will both want and need something bigger, and mars offers that.

I predict that they'll do it within the next thirty years. After all, there are some things that they can do much easier than the US, because I think they're likely to worry much less about astronaut safety (especially long-term health) than the US would. Mind you, they still won't want any deaths or major disasters up there. But if an astronaut's mental health suffers, or gets cancer a few years after he gets home, well, that's a story that can be buried or spun.
Plus, chinese astronauts can be smaller :p

dudalb

24th July 2008, 05:22 PM

To send a manned expedition to Mars would be extremly expensive, but ironically it might be easier to get the money for that then an extensive robotic exploration program though the robots cost less.
We are talking government funding for a Mars expedition,since there is not enough of a profit to be made to interests private companies in doing so (but near earth exploration is another story completly) and in the end that means selling the public on a Mars expedition, and it's probably easier to get them willing to fund a manned expeditio, even though vastly more expensive , then a robotic expedition. Illogical, but a fact.
As the line from "The Right Stuff" goes, "No Buck Rogers, No Bucks".

uruk

24th July 2008, 05:34 PM

Weather and communications satellites, check.

GPS navigation, check.

Integrated circuit design and manufacture, not really. While it's true that the manufacturing process became efficient much sooner because of demand from the space program, this is development that would have happened anyway. Necessity is the mother of invention. If there is no need there is no reason to persue that area. While it is true that the development may come about eventualy it is a moot point. We have it now because of NASA.

The space propgram provided a huge influx of money into electronics development that it never would have had otherwise. As a matter of fact NASA still funds research into electronics. Look at NASA tech briefs.

Minicomputers, not really, these (and PCs) were a logical application for integrated circuits, which would have been developed eventually anyway. Inventions build upon another. And again it is a moot point. If NASA had not pushed for the develpment of a minicomputer we might not have them today. There has to reasons for someone to invent or develop something. If that drive is not there, there is no reason to develop it.

Development in aerodynamics and air safety, I doubt it (commercial and private aviation probably did more), but since I don't know what specific equipment or practices you're referring to here, I'll give it a check. The first "A" in NASA stands for "aeronautics". It is in NASA's mandate to do research in aeronautics.

Here, this will give you a start: http://www.aeronautics.nasa.gov/

CCD chips used in digital cameras, no. They were invented at Bell Labs, but not part of any research for the space program. Sony did most of the work to make them commercial, and that was done for consumer products, not the space program. Nope. NASA needed a miniturized imaging device small enough to fit on satellites and probes that could withstand space environment and not suck down as much wattage as videotron tubes did.
Check it out here: http://ranier.hq.nasa.gov/Sensors_page/DD/HST&GLL_CCD.html

Specificaly "Charge coupled device technology was first demonstrated in 1969 at the Bell Laboratories. In 1974, under the sponsorship of the NASA Instrument and Sensing Technology program, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory began a program to increase the size of CCD arrays (then less than 100-by-100 picture elements, or pixels) and to lower their readout noise levels. Shortly thereafter, the Office of Space Science (OSS) added funding, and by 1978 CCD arrays of 500-by-500 pixels had been produced, achieving noise levels of 10 electrons rms (root mean square). After this, OSS continued the development of the 800-by-800 arrays that are currently being used by Galileo (1989 launch) and the Hubble Space Telescope (1990 launch)."

The space program has been responsible for the development of some essential technology, and has accelerated the development of more. The case for the manned space program is much weaker. Communications satellites, weather satellites, GPS navigation, and (except for the repair mission) Hubble, are all the result of putting equipment in space that works without men in space. Most of the additional research and development done for manned space flight is to keep people alive in places where most people will never go. If we can get most of the scientific benefit for a fraction of the cost by sending machines instead of men, I think that's where we should be focusing our efforts for now.

Robotic and manned space exploration have two different goals. It is short sighted and disingenuous to say one is more important than the other in regards to the scientific knowledge they further.

That is saying that geological chemistry is more important that biological chemistry. They both further our understanding in the fields they pertain to.