NASA's Space Launch System

[arch4non]

NASA just announced they're moving forward with their space launch system. They've picked out a new design with deep space exploration beyond Earth's orbit in mind. Manned missions to Mars might become a reality in the next decade or two.

-Full Story

[Shinneh]

While I like space travel and the idea of colonising the moon, and polluting mars until it has an atmosphere so we can colonise it as well, I'd really rather this money was spent ending poverty or aids, in the words of paramore it's my humble opinion, but it's one I believe in, we should end the major problems of this world before we start flying off into space.


But it's being done, so I can't wait for whatever they find it

I believe there was a theory a few years back after a certain metorite was unearthed, that we were "seeded" by mars, so who knows, going there could very well answer a lot of questions as to why life on this planet developed.

[Master Gunner]

I don't want to get in a debate of NASA vs Military spending, but just to put that is perspective, Iraq alone costs the US $12 billion/month (according to a Huffington Post article I found in 30 seconds, so no clue on accuracy). Next to that, $30 billion over 10 years (or even $50 billion assuming massive cost overruns) isn't that much. Also, if we ever develop the capability to, say, mine an asteroid (which China is looking to do), the program will be able to pay for itself.

[arch4non]

While I like space travel and the idea of colonising the moon, and polluting mars until it has an atmosphere so we can colonise it as well, I'd really rather this money was spent ending poverty or aids, in the words of paramore it's my humble opinion, but it's one I believe in, we should end the major problems of this world before we start flying off into space.

I don't think this sort of backwards way of thinking is very healthy. I mean, why are you even paying for internet when you could be donating that money towards AIDS research? Despite having a tiny budget compared to everything else, NASA is responsible for many innovations we use every day without even realizing it.

[Shinneh]

Yeah but then countries like china and america dominate the resources gained and people still starve. Though I may just be thinking this because I recently finished watching planetes....

I do see your point though, there is a lot to be gained from space.

[Dutch guy]

And once again NASA proves to be missing the point. AGAIN they are going for a cryogenic fuel system, while SpaceX and other countries have proven that room temperature fuels are cheaper to operate and just as reliable. This is no different from the constellation program, and even though I really would like to see NASA get back in the game, I see a future program cancellation due to cost overrun on the horizon.

[DancingFox]

I'm glad they're just still going, with the space shuttle program just having finished, and the hubble space telescope no longer having repair missions. I'm glad we're still progressing in this field in some manner, even if a very small budget is being put into it.

Also, Mars is great and all, but I believe not actually viable for terraforming: too small to hold an atmosphere of sufficient pressure / oxygen content for us to survive. Venus is actually a far better choice.

[Master Gunner]

I too am a proponent of colonizing Venus, but mainly because it will inevitably involve massive airships.

[Lord Chrusher]

NASA should be doing two things right now. First they should be doing astrophysics and planetary science. They should be building space telescopes and space probes. Although it would be nice to have a trained geologist with a rock hammer wandering around on Mars would be nice, no one is going to spend the hundreds of billions of dollars required any time soon. In the mean time there is a lot of interesting, valuable science to be done with missions with price tags between a few tens of million to a couple billion. Second they should be developing novel technology to make space flight cheaper and safer. Rebuilding the Saturn V is not the way to go about this. It is not clear having an ultra heavy lift rocket is much use. It is quite possible that it would be cheaper to lift bits of a manned interplanetary mission into orbit using several smaller rockets then assemble them in orbit.

Sending crew and supplies to the International Space Station should be contracted out. For the science accomplished, space stations are extremely expensive.

[empath]

While I like space travel and the idea of colonising the moon, and polluting mars until it has an atmosphere so we can colonise it as well, I'd really rather this money was spent ending poverty or aids, in the words of paramore it's my humble opinion, but it's one I believe in, we should end the major problems of this world before we start flying off into space.

I suggest you take a close look at The Science of Discworld by Terry Pratchett, Ian Stewart and Jack Cohen.

The underlying point behind the science side of the book really builds off of Tsiolkovsky's statement "Earth is the cradle of humanity, but one cannot live in a cradle forever."

[Lord Chrusher]

Permanent human occupation of another planet is a trillion dollar project. While I think it should be done it is very much a long term project. What we should be doing now is making space travel cheaper.

[Geoff_B]

I saw a comic a while back. It went something like this:

1960s: Computers filled up rooms. We launched rockets at the moon.

2010s: Computers fit in our hand. We launch birds at buildings.

[Lord Chrusher]

Part of that is there is a bigger market for computers than for going to the moon.

[Geoff_B]

There is also a bigger market for multicoloured ball-shaped fowl

[Shinneh]

"The underlying point behind the science side of the book really builds off of Tsiolkovsky's statement "Earth is the cradle of humanity, but one cannot live in a cradle forever.""

I don't really agree with that sentiment though, if man is going to leave earth it should do so as mankind, not america, or china, but the world as a whole. Planetes actually did a really good job of making that argument.

But I shall check this book out, because it sounds quite interesting.

[Lyinginbedmon]

The phrase "woo" does not even begin to describe my joy.

[Shinneh]

The phrase "woo" does not even begin to describe my joy.

Does this help? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKWpGJ4Xhw8

[theDreamer]

Current problems with Earth:

Over population -> not enough food production, poor living quality for many

Solutions: Kill the poor. Get more living space.

I unno about YOU, but I think space travel and eventual colonization IS a solution to ending poverty, and other underlying issues.

[Lyinginbedmon]

The phrase "woo" does not even begin to describe my joy.

Does this help? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKWpGJ4Xhw8

It needs to be about 20% cooler, but it will suffice.

If nothing else, maybe human civilisation will finally get some perspective when we can all take a trip into orbit or beyond and actually see that what we're fighting over is very insignificant in the scheme of things and is not, as is commonly believed, covered in dotted lines.

[Exachix]

I have to say I disagree with you dreamer, I only believe it'll displace issues elsewhere. The fact our resources are limited will only be altered if we go to the stars (There's only a limit on how much we can mine our solar system). Poverty will only be displaced onto other areas of our empire, so on and so forth. Overpopulation will be a localized problem always in certain places, or in general. I'm not to make predictions.
(Not that I wholly disagreed with you, I only disagreed on a few points, not on your sentiment as a whole.)

I believe the way to travel into space is threefold. They need to bring scientific knowledge back to the human race, so we will survive outside of the inevitable destruction that will be brought about by the supernova and maybe transcend beyond our state. I realize that is very science-fictiony, but really, we need a goal as a race of what we want to obtain in the very long run - ultimately what is science's purpose. Travelling to the stars should ultimately complete that knowledge - or at lease make our knowledge of the universe more complete

Secondly, it needs to bring resources to the human race. We won't ever, in my opinion, find limitless energy (actually, I'm sure we won't due to thermodynamics. FU entropy!), but we can, for example, use the resources of Mars and other planets. I believe if we colonise the moon it should be used not just for science but to develop resources for earth-based culture and production.

Finally, we should transit to other planets because they are there. People travelled across seas to see what was on the other side, and 'discovered' America. People travelled down and found that the sea has a bottom, and we're not floating on a vast disk. People travelled to the moon because they saw it and went 'hey, we can totally do that'. Because we can is often the answer we give to people as to why we do the things we do. If we don't do it, we don't know what we're missing.

That, in my opinion and now when I think about it, why the ISS won't wholly work - it is only a scientific outpost, whereas it needs some way to 'work' - say by providing energy to earth or such. I could be wrong - this is only partially speculation - but if the ISS did other things it would be seen in better light. (I may have heard some people saying that some of NASA's projects were bad ideas - I may not have but that is the reason for this paragraph).

Unfortunately in the current world climate it would have to be profitable, that is it would have to result in a benefit for mankind. Another problem is that our world is very rich in resources, we have so many of them. (compare to Mars or the Moon - they by comparison have alot of rocks, whereas we have oil, coal, iron, aluminium, oxygen, nitrogen, uranium... we have a whole host of elements and resources, whereas other nearby terrestrial planets have few. They have some types of rocks - moon in particular has some compounds that are found on earth, I cannot speak for Mars.) As such we may not find what we need to use in the terrestrial planets or asteroids in our solar system.

Ultimately, any mission into space has to take into account all the various variables. The new launch mechanism by NASA has, most likely, been analysed by many many people, and as such it is not my place to say if it's a good idea, if it's the most cost effective idea, or if it's even going to work. They have decided on this, and I'm sure they know what they're doing. My opinions are detailed above as to why we should enter space, and I'm sure they're working to achieve that goal, but my views are not everyone's, and as such may not be correct.

Space is where we need to go next, but we need to do it carefully and correctly. It may help if the nations on earth were not embroiled in personal matters.

Also oops this post became a bit longer than I thought it should have, sorry.

[Metcarfre]

I'm with Chrusher on this one. There's good science to be done for much cheaper. And we should focus on fixing the planet we have before we think about screwing up a new one.

[Lyinginbedmon]

Exachix, what you describe is one of the bigger issues behind the series Planetes, which regards a team that cleans up orbiting space trash to prevent Kessler syndrome, and there's actually a terrorist group that things mankind should stay on Earth until they figure out how to live together responsibly. It also had the backdrop that space travel had become heavily invested in the private sector, with people going on holidays to the moon and taking high-altitude flights between places on Earth.

In the end, I really like how the whole resource issue was addressed. A political agreement was made that the resources harvested from space would be given to Earth nations based on their population, not their actual economic contribution to space exploration and such. It wasn't a full-blown stop to the debate, but it was an excellent foundation for resolving it.

I think once more of Earth gets moving into space, either by developing the technology independently or by piggy-backing onto NASA or some other manner, humankind is going to start realising there's not much separation between them, either in the cold darkness of space, or on the warm homeland of Earth.

[Metcarfre]

Kesler syndrome?

AHAHAHAHAHAHHAAHA!!!

[Lyinginbedmon]

More like this

Imagine trying to fly a spacecraft through that, and that was from 3 years ago.

Satellites collide, creating debris. Objects in Earth's orbit break apart, creating debris. Astronauts take a dump on the ISS, creating debris. Eventually, the debris itself will start colliding, creating exponentially more debris.

The end result will be a sort of shield around Earth made of shrapnel, effectively cutting Earth off from space and shutting down space travel for centuries.

[Metcarfre]

Yes, I know. Wasn't there a Bond film about that? Satellites with frickin' lasers to burn up debris that were instead used to take the moon hostage or some such?