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From: Richard Maine on 15 May 2010 20:45 AES <siegman(a)stanford.edu> wrote: > Even if Obama (or George Bush, or any other president) went 10 terms, a > manned Mars trip is not going to happen. 10 terms - 40 years is implausible? I thought Mac users were alleged to be on the imaginative/creative side. > The Moon, by contrast, is obviously a rather easily do-able trip. Mars is easily doable. A bit costly and risky. Lowering the risk raises the cost as well. But there is nothing inherently particularly difficult about it. The moon was a *MUCH* harder goal, given the state of technology when the moon commitment was made. We did not have the needed technology then; we do have the technology to do Mars today. And the moon trip was done in well less than 10 years, much less 40. Yes, I am an engineer. I even worked for NASA (though not much on the space side of the house) until my retirement about 3 years ago. > [How can anybody on a _computer_ group, for God's sake, even think that > at this point a manned excursion to the Moon it's worth wasting funds > on.) I decline to enter into such debates on this newsgroup. I'll just say that the assumption that computer people would somehow all agree with what is apparently your position shows lack of imagination - and is demonstrably wrong (since I know plenty of computer people who think it is worth it - starting with myself). I won't debate the underlying point; I just note that there are "computer people" on multiple sides of it. (I use "multiple" intentionally, as there are far more than 2 sides involved.) -- Richard Maine | Good judgment comes from experience; email: last name at domain . net | experience comes from bad judgment. domain: summertriangle | -- Mark Twain
From: AES on 15 May 2010 21:35 In article <w9zzl01q8qj.fsf(a)zipcon.net>, Patrick Scheible <kkt(a)zipcon.net> wrote: > AES <siegman(a)stanford.edu> writes: > > > > Even if Obama goes 2 terms, a manned Mars trip is not going to happen. > > > > Even if Obama (or George Bush, or any other president) went 10 terms, a > > manned Mars trip is not going to happen. > > > > Even if Obama (or George Bush, or any other president) went 10 terms, > > even an _attempt at_ a manned Mars trip is not worth wasting _any_ funds > > on. > > In 1929, who would have predicted a moon landing 40 years later? > > I would say no Mars landing for the next 10 years for sure. But if it > became a funding priority on the level of the Apollo Project it might > be possible as soon as 20 years from now. > > However, it's difficult to get that level of funding for a project > that won't bear fruit for 20 years. Unfortunately, it's not always so difficult. Take the shuttle, for example, which has never borne any fruit. Or the Concorde. Or the Star Wars missile defense proposal using lasers. Obviously, I'm a dyspeptic on this subject. But I'd go along with the following approach: * Identify the fundamental laws of physics and fundamental properties of the physical world which will have to be fundamentally altered for any manned trip to Mars to be remotely realistic -- much less useful -- at present * Sponsor research on those fundamental laws of physics and properties of nature, at some rational, sensible, modest level of funding. * When -- or rather, _if_ -- some fundamental, totally unexpected breakthrough in the laws of nature comes along that would seem to make Mars travel possible, start thinking about it again.
From: AES on 15 May 2010 21:36 In article <hsmsep$ppc$4(a)news.eternal-september.org>, Peter Flass <Peter_Flass(a)Yahoo.com> wrote: > AES wrote: > > > > > > > [How can anybody on a _computer_ group, for God's sake, even think that > > at this point a manned excursion to the Moon it's worth wasting funds > > on.) > > What are we going to do, stay on this god-forsaken dirtball until the > sun turns into a red dwarf? Or should we just wait until someone > invents FTL drive? If we're not expanding, we're dying. More like, if we're endlessly expanding (in population, that is) we're killing ourselves, along with our world.
From: AES on 15 May 2010 21:38 In article <0cp3c7-02a.ln1(a)laptop.reistad.name>, Morten Reistad <first(a)last.name> wrote: > > We are on a decent track with unmanned missions. We just need to > scale that up a thousandfold. > And since unmanned missions are at least a thousand times less expensive (or more productive) than manned missions . . .
From: Mensanator on 16 May 2010 00:51
On May 15, 7:33 pm, des...(a)verizon.net wrote: > Peter Flass <Peter_Fl...(a)Yahoo.com> writes: > > AES wrote: > > >> [How can anybody on a _computer_ group, for God's sake, even think > >> that at this point a manned excursion to the Moon it's worth wasting > >> funds on.) > > > What are we going to do, stay on this god-forsaken dirtball until the > > sun turns into a red dwarf? Or should we just wait until someone > > invents FTL drive? If we're not expanding, we're dying. > > When the sun starts expanding, When will that happen? 5 billion years from now? Think anyone will still be around? > Mars may warm up for a while. How long is a "while"? > Only then would sending a few people to Mars make any sense. The expansion of the Sun will be wider than the orbit of Mars. This must be a new usage of "sense" with which I am unfamiliar. > > Even then, it can only be done for a short term extension of human > life, moving any significant part of the population is out of the > question. After Mars warms up, it will then be bathed in radiation > and after that get colder than it is now. No inner planets will > remain. Doesn't "inner planets" include Mars? > > Expansion into the Solar System makes no sense. So why bother sending anyone to Mars? > > To expand beyond the Solar System: > > 1. Find habital planets. Either with telescopes, or robotic missions > or a combination of both. This may take thousands of years. > > 2. If there is no life on a potential habital planet, we'd need to > "seed" that planet with life forms we are compatible with. This may > take tens of thousands of years and is still robotic missions. > > 3. Once the target planet is ready, we can figure out whether to > send a live crew on a thousand year voyage or whether we just want > to send eggs or DNA to be raised by robots. > > The future of space flight is clearly robotic. > Man is too fragile for the trip. That will never happen. |