He gets a letter from an astronaut in response to his anti-manned-space piece. Of course, it should be noted that it was anti-NASA manned space, not anti-manned space in general.
He remains unrepentant:
I would give everything I have, ten times over, to have been where Greg has been and see what he has seen. I don’t see any reason why U.S. taxpayers should fund my enthusiasm, though.
Neither do I.
He is obviously not opposed to human space flight. I think that he might think differently had the taxpayers’ money done more (and a lot more) to allow him to go. And, to forestall the usual trolls, that doesn’t mean paying for his trip. It just means doing the kinds of things that made aviation successful.
[Wednesday afternoon update]
Mark Whittington imagines that I am “misreading” Derb’s attitude:
He is obviously not opposed to human space flight. I think that he might think differently had the taxpayers’ money done more (and a lot more) to allow him to go.
Actually Derbyshire makes it clear that he is opposed to all government funded pace exploration, such as Apollo.
So sayeth the Derb today (though not in response to Mark’s own misreading — I’m quite confident that he never reads Mark’s scribblings):
…even if I grant your argument, the role of government remains to be decided. Stuck as I am with the rooted conviction that government does everything badly and in a spirit of financial irresponsibility, I’d keep government involvement to a mimimum, with just perhaps a modest subsidy here or there to encourage entrepreneurs. Shuttle missions at half a billion dollars per, though? No thanks. Not unless I’m on board!
I’m a little more principled than Derb — I’d object to billion-dollar shuttle flights (just as I object to billion-and-a half-dollar Ares I flights) as a national policy even if I were on board.
I’m sure that Mark will continue to misread it, though. It’s what he does.
[Bumped]
Derbyshire’s harangue was much more than a plea for private enterprise human spaceflight. He asserted: 1) that Apollo was meaningless in a historical sense; and 2) the robotic space program has been much more productive scientifically than the human one. Neither assertion is supported by the facts.
In the case of Apollo, winning the race to the Moon gave the US an aura of technological invincibility. This made the subsequent threat of SDI during the Reagan administration technically credible to the Soviets and hastened the end of the Cold War in our favor.
For science, virtually everything we think we know about the early history and evolution of the Earth and other terrestrial planets comes from study of the Apollo lunar samples and data. There is simply no comparison between our understanding of the Moon’s early processes and history and those of Mars — our knowledge of martian history is fragmentary and conjectural whereas we know a great deal about the history of the Moon and by inference, the other planets (e.g., early heavy bombardment). That this comes solely from returned samples (which, it is claimed, a robot could accomplish) is incorrect — the lunar knowledge comes from collection of geologically controlled samples, which was a result of human judgment and selection in real time. If all it took were samples of rocks, our knowledge of Mars should equal that of the Moon because we have the SNC meteorites (which come from Mars). It doesn’t. Why? Because we have no idea of WHERE the martian meteorites come from. They have no geological context. Hence, their scientific value is greatly diminished.
So Derbyshire is wrong on both counts. Apollo was wildly successful in its original Cold War objectives of intimidating and ultimately defeating the USSR. And it remains the single most successful scientific endeavor in human history. His Luddite opinions do not advance the cause of private sector space, a cause for which I have much enthusiasm. Every piece of his about space that I have ever seen displays this ignorance and arrogance.
Derbyshire captures my thoughts about human space flight perfectly. Greg Harbaugh only strengthens his point. All the classified work I know of, done with shuttle, could have been done just as well unmanned. Like Derbyshire I’m not against manned private space flight, I just think that it’s a waste of time and money. Come on, when do I get to see the rocket racing league? How far has that schedule been pushed back? How about the 50th tourist flight? I say 50th because several people will die way before that and the whole business will dissolve in a bunch of lawsuits if it doesn’t die for lack of paying customers way before that. I hear the space nuts talk the talk, when do they walk the walk?
If everything Greg Harbaugh says is true, why aren’t DoD and a host of other customers lining-up outside NASA HQ every day and throwing money at NASA to support Shuttle continuation, expand ISS, accelerate Cx to help ensure no gap in US human space access, and build lunar science and manufacturing bases?
In the case of Apollo, winning the race to the Moon gave the US an aura of technological invincibility. This made the subsequent threat of SDI during the Reagan administration technically credible… Apollo was wildly successful in its original Cold War objectives of intimidating and ultimately defeating the USSR.
An interesting interpretation but not supported by facts.
Eisenhower created NASA specifically to take manned spaceflight away from the military. Wernher Von Braun was vehemently and actively opposed to the “militarization of space.” He recruited Carol Rosin, who remained one of the most outspoken opponents of military space (including SDI) long after his death.
If Apollo was somehow leading to SDI, Von Braun certainly didn’t realize it, or intend it, and achieving a goal that he opposed could hardly be considered a “success.”
The United States government was not trying to “defeat the USSR” during the 1960’s. The official US policy during that period was to seek stalemate (“containment”), maintain the “balance of power,” and achieve “detente.” Ronald Reagan was the first US President to reject containment and advocate victory over Communism, long after the Apollo era.
While the Apollo program was going on, the US was shutting down the development of ballistic missile defenses, development of x-planes, and other technologies they considered “destabilizing” because they might give the US a military advantage. Barry Goldwater commented on that fact when he said that ballistic missile defense was “far, far more meaningful than a Moonshot.”
If not for Apollo, we might have had SDI twenty years earlier, as well as reusable launch vehicles and routine access to space, instead of a few dead-end missions.
it remains the single most successful scientific endeavor in human history.
Most scientists disagree with you, but even if that’s true, there’s a limit to how much society ought to spend just to find about “the Moon’s early processes.”
Especially when we could have found out much more about those processes, for less money, if we had continued down the road of X-15/DynaSoar/Reusable Atlas instead of Von Braun’s folly. Furthermore, we would have the means to economically exploit our knowledge of the Moon for commercial purposes, rather than remaining an abstract scientific venture.
His Luddite opinions do not advance the cause of private sector space, a cause for which I have much enthusiasm.
It’s a pity you didn’t show that enthusiasm when the Aldridge Commission declared human spaceflight would “remain the province of government” — just days after SpaceShip One. I’m still waiting to see a minority report on that.
Its interesting that John Derbyshire compares NASA human spaceflight to the Zheng He fleet of the Ming Dynasty. The Ming Dynasty is considered the high point of Chinese history and the era that the Zheng He fleet occurred in is considered by many the high point of the early Ming Dynasty. Like NASA however more pressing concerns, specifically a war with Vietnam and the need to spend on defenses against the Monguls in the north resulted in a cut back on exploration preventing the follow-up establishment of trading colonies to build on the early gains. Just as the Vietnam War made following up Apollo with a lunar base “impractical” from the viewpoint of Nixon Administration. As a result both became a symbol of a great stand alone accomplishments rather then merely the first step to greater things. It will be interesting to see if space historians will view the X-Prize in the same way as a failed model in 30 years as Rand views Apollo if Virgin Galactic fails to make it financially.
However what John Derbyshire is missing in his piece the consequence of the abandonment of exploration by the Chinese after discontinuing to follow up on the Zheng He fleet. An excellent book by Kenneth Pomeranz titled “The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy” discusses this in detail. In this book Pomeranz shows that by every measure of economics and technology progress China and Western Europe were equal in the mid-1400’s. Yet the West went on to rule the world literally while China declined until it was a defacto colony of the West. Why? The answer Pomeranz came to was that in the mid-1400’s China started looking inward. It started to emphases self-sufficiency and to discourage trade by heavy taxes on merchants instead of encouraging it (Carbon credits anyone?)
The resulting centuries long decline of China has only been reversed in the last couple of generations that it has started back on the road to being a economic power equal to the West. By contrast the exploration by Europe resulted in it looking outward and generated an explosion of trade, wealth and technical innovation. This centuries long boom lead to a western dominance of the world that is only now starting to wane.
It will be interesting to see if future historians link the retreat from human spaceflight as symbol of the decline of the United States and the abandonment of the exploration fleet is to the decline of the global influence of the Chinese. Perhaps the calls for ending NASA’s human space missions to focus on more practical and worthy endeavors are distance echoes of the “wise” Chinese advisors who started the decline of China by providing similar advice to the emperor.
There is not much I can add to Paul’s and Tom’s comments, which were masterful and too the point, devestating Derbyshre’s little screed into incoherence. I find that his spitting on one of the greatest technological feats and voyages of exploration (as well as the greatest missed opportunities) in history was sad and wholely inappropriate.
Just as the Vietnam War made following up Apollo with a lunar base “impractical” from the viewpoint of Nixon Administration.
When all else fails, blame Nixon. 🙂
Tom, if you read Kennedy’s speeches, you’ll find that his goal was to land *one* man on the Moon and return him safely to the Earth. Full stop.
The idea that Kennedy planned to go on to Mars, build vast lunar bases, etc. was invented by his admirers after his death. Much like the claim that Kennedy planned to end the Vietnam War, it is pure wish fulfillment with no historical evidence to support it.
It was Lyndon Johnson, not Nixon, who began to reduce funding for Project Apollo. The goal of a successful Moon landing was already in sight and funding was reduced accordingly.
Nixon was probably more of a space nut than Johnson was, and definitely more than Kennedy. He authorized NASA to continue Moon landings after Apollo 11 when most Americans saw no point in it and longer than JFK and LBJ would likely have authorized.
The fact that you guys worship Kennedy and make Nixon your whipping boy shows how disconnected from political reality you are. Even liberal Democrats were not willing to spend enough to fund your fantasies.
I marvel at the fact that a business professor is unable to understand why it’s impossible to build a mining colony by launching three or four astronauts in a tin can at a couple billion dollars a pop.
It will be interesting to see if space historians will view the X-Prize in the same way as a failed model in 30 years as Rand views Apollo if Virgin Galactic fails to make it financially.
Perhaps, if space historians are too ignorant to know that Virgin Galactic is not the only company working on human spaceflight. I wouldn’t count on that.
At least Virgin Galactic isn’t asking for hundreds of billions in government handouts then lashing out when they don’t get them.
Apollo worshippers got hundreds of billions, and you’re still lashing out at some of your strongest political supporters (like Nixon) for not giving you enough money? That might be easier than admitting your plan might be flawed, but do you really think it’s productive?
I’ll bet Obama breaks your heart, too, Tom. Who will you blame then?
It will be interesting to see if space historians will view the X-Prize in the same way as a failed model in 30 years as Rand views Apollo if Virgin Galactic fails to make it financially.
The success or failure of Virgin Galactic will be irrelevant. X-Prize will prove to be a failed model only if space tourism in general doesn’t succeed.
Perhaps the calls for ending NASA’s human space missions to focus on more practical and worthy endeavors are distance echoes of the “wise” Chinese advisors who started the decline of China by providing similar advice to the emperor.
Perhaps so. But I think we’re ignoring a crucial part of the story if we interpret that as meaning Chinese exploration failed due to obstruction by naysayers. The explorers had roughly thirty years to prove their value. I suspect it was something like Apollo in the end: a huge bill and not much tangible to show for the effort. At least with the European efforts, they were seeing trade benefits right away. I gather the Portuguese found new spots for trading right away once they figured out how to sail around the Arabic nations of North Africa.
I suspect it was something like Apollo in the end: a huge bill and not much tangible to show for the effort.
Exactly
I find that his spitting on one of the greatest technological feats and voyages of exploration (as well as the greatest missed opportunities) in history was sad and wholely inappropriate.
I don’t. It is wholly appropriate to question the return on Apollo since the project was publicly funded. In my view, discontinuing Apollo doesn’t even register as a mistake. As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, I see five great mistakes made by NASA. One is the decision to go with the Ares program. The other four have to do with the Shuttle and the International Space Station (too many capabilities on the Shuttle when it was first designed, continuing the Shuttle past 1990, making the ISS dependent on the Shuttle, and continuing the Shuttle past 2003). Apollo simply could not continue given the funding environment of the time.
Great powers always expand, in one form or another, and that combined with our frontier, pioneer, city-on-a-hill national character means that we’re always going to be sticking our nose in other people’s business.
A different take from Mark Krikorian. Me kind-of likey.
I completely disagree with Spudis’s assessment of the scientific value of manned vs. unmanned spaceflight. Spudis ignores the fact that the unmanned space program has had large impact on areas of study where the manned space program has produced nothing — areas arguably much more scientifically important than the formation and history of the moon.
Moreover, we would have discovered a great deal about the moon even with an unmanned program. The fact that the moon is evolved, not primitive, was established by Surveyor. The crucial oxygen isotope, volatile abundance, and europium anomaly results would have been produced by sample return missions, even ones returning much less mass than Apollo returned. The evidence for the currrent consensus model of the formation of the Moon (the giant impact model) could have been obtained without anyone setting foot on the moon.
But let’s assume unmanned programs could have done none of that. Would Apollo have been worthwhile? I assert it would not have been. The moon, however interesting you may personally find it, is not so scientifically important that spending on it should have dwarfed spending on more important fields of science here on Earth.
At least with the European efforts, they were seeing trade benefits right away. I gather the Portuguese found new spots for trading right away once they figured out how to sail around the Arabic nations of North Africa.
The Portuguese were turning a profit from trade — including slavery — rather quickly. The western hemisphere efforts became profitable in less time than the “Space Age” has existed.
These are reasons why the analogy of space exploration to the Age of Exploration is not well founded.
>> Spudis ignores the fact that the unmanned space program has had large impact on areas of study where the manned space program has produced nothing — areas arguably much more scientifically important than the formation and history of the moon. <<
You completely misunderstood my point about the scientific return of Apollo. It was not that robotic exploration has no value — as an active participant in robotic missions past and present, I do not subscribe that viewpoint. The scientific return from Apollo influenced ALL planetary science, not just that of the Moon itself. Our fundamental understanding of impact as a geological process comes from Apollo and its supporting studies. Collision of solid objects is the basic process that put the planets together. Moreover, impact fundamentally shaped and re-arranged the configuration of the crusts of all the planets. Our current guesses about the ages of planetary features relies entirely upon the lunar cratering record deciphered by Apollo data and samples.
Not impressive enough? How about the idea that mass extinctions can be caused by impact (the KT extinction, for example)? That understanding was possible because Apollo taught us to recognize the tell-tale signs of hypervelocity impact. Because we went to the Moon, we obtained a completely new and revolutionary view of how life evolves on Earth.
All the robotic missions do is collect data. Sometimes that data is relevant, sometimes it isn’t. A robot can pick up and return a rock, but it cannot necessarily return the correct sample. Sure we got a lot of data from our series of robotic precursor missions to the Moon. But the goal of scientific exploration is UNDERSTANDING, not data.
This argument is completely separate from the other benefit of Apollo, which was its principal original motivation — our geopolitical competition with the old USSR.
The question I keep asking is how much our investment in the manned space flight program has trickled out into a broader investment in science and technology R&D. It’s typically said, for example, that the cold war spurred increased government investment in basic scientific research and well as applied technology development. Would that have happened in the absence of the Apollo program, which acted as a focus for our efforts? On a subject closer to home, Derb says that it would have been much cheaper to build many more Hubble’s rather than servicing the one we had. This is true in terms of pure cost comparisons but in the real world, those scores of HST clones would not have been built. We still have HST because it has garnered sufficient public support to allow us to spend the big bucks to keep it competitive.
Would that have happened in the absence of the Apollo program, which acted as a focus for our efforts?
Yes. Apollo is given far too much credit for a lot of the advances of the sixties, which were being driven almost as much by the missile industry.
Yes. Apollo is given far too much credit for a lot of the advances of the sixties, which were being driven almost as much by the missile industry.
Or were entirely from the non-government side of the economy, and (after being used for Apollo) were associated with NASA for marketing reasons. Tang and velcro are examples.
History repeats itself. While money continues to flow into Apollo II, the White House just killed the Kinetic Energy Interceptor, just months before its first booster test.
I’m sure that won’t stop some people from claiming NASA is protecting our national security.
How about the idea that mass extinctions can be caused by impact (the KT extinction, for example)? That understanding was possible because Apollo taught us to recognize the tell-tale signs of hypervelocity impact.
Recognizing extinction events is of little value if we can’t *prevent* mass extinction events.
Planetary defense is one of the reasons why we need to develop the ability to work in space *affordably.* Six months after the asteroid hits, no one will care how many papers APL published in the Journal of Lunar Science. Not even you, Paul.
Rand, I’m not sure that Derbyshire reads me or not and neither do you. But I am always pleased to count you as one of my biggest fans (g).
“Yes. Apollo is given far too much credit for a lot of the advances of the sixties, which were being driven almost as much by the missile industry.
Or were entirely from the non-government side of the economy, and (after being used for Apollo) were associated with NASA for marketing reasons. Tang and velcro are examples.”
This is technological advance. What about funding for basic science research? When I sit on review panels or talk to senior scientists, I am struck by the differences in outlook between the older set, who feel that any decent scientist has a faculty job (because they were abundant in their day) and that money should just appear in their grant accounts, and younger scientists who are painfully aware that even good scientists may not get permanent jobs or get their projects funded. NSF funding has been flat against inflation for what, a decade or more now, and while we astronomers have lucked out with NASA SMD funding, that gravy train is drying up as well.
How much should government invest in basic research? Do we go back to the state of affairs over most of human history, where science was the hobby of the independently wealthy? Do we go back to the golden age of the Cold War? Or somewhere in the middle? I don’t think private industry is the answer here.
“The Portuguese were turning a profit from trade — including slavery — rather quickly. The western hemisphere efforts became profitable in less time than the “Space Age” has existed.”
The African slave trade was on a small scale and may not have been partularly profitable until the sugar plantations were established in the West Indies.
More typical was the long lead time between Prince Henry the Navigator’s efforts to find a way to circumnavigate Africa and Da Gamma’s doing it to get to the spice markets in the East Indies. It demonstrates, if nothing else, the value of persistance.
Once again, Mark is bashing someone for expressing a conservative view of space policy. As he did with the Republican Study Committee and New Gingrich.
But don’t call Mark a liberal! 🙂
Oh, Mark, there was no “Da Gamma.” Perhaps you’re thinking of Vasco da Gama?
Edward,
Yep, President Kennedy’s specific words were to land a man on the Moon. Given that Apollo sent 12 it looks like it paid 12 times the rate of return he would have expected 🙂
What you miss is that the objective of Apollo was simply to prove that it was possible to send humans to the Moon, have them do useful work there, and then return them safely to Earth. That is all.
That may not seem like much today, but in 1961 when no one had even taken a spacewalk or spent more then a few hours in orbit it was a big thing. When orbital docking and landing on a airless world had not been done outside of science fiction it was a huge leap of faith, the kind that moves society forward.
And contrary to the historical revisionists it was exactly the type of national mission that did inspire kids to study science and for investments in basic technology to be made. Perhaps the kid that Apollo inspired didn’t end up going into aerospace, but they also didn’t end up working on an auto assembly line or as truck driver because of the inspiration. If you recall October sky on one of the four boys made it to NASA, but all four made it out of the coal mines and had successful technical careers. Don’t discount the intangibles like inspiration, those are the real drivers of human progress and of society. And why policy analysts are a poor substitute for political leaders with visions
As for robots, just compare the impact of the various robotic pictures of Earth done in the 1960’s and the single picture from Apollo 8 that triggered the environmental movement and made it sink in just how fragile the Earth is. And the progress in green technology as a result.
The key point often forgotten is that Spaceflight is about human progress and expanding horizons, not about science. Science is just the tail that unfortunately is now wagging the dog. Yes, expanding human knowledge is important, but its just trivia pursuit if it does nothing to increase human wealth, national security or simply the chances that human race will survive. All the knowledge of the Solar System is nothing but dead facts in a textbook if humans don’t expand and incorporate it into the econsphere of the human race.
China could have ruled the world in the 15th Century, but made the choice to turn inward because the rewards didn’t come fast enough. The next 500 years marked their decline. Hopefully American won’t make the same decision.
Rand,
I use Virgin Galactic as the marker for the success of the X Prize because its the sole survivor of the competition, except for perhaps Rocket plane whatever their current status is. The rest of the teams are gone with the wind…
Neither Xcor or Blue Origins were part of the X-Prize hoopla and both represent a more conservative and sustainable route to space tourism in my opinion. If the future industry emerges from their efforts, and Virgin Galactic doesn’t close its business model, then it would be very hard to argue the X-Prize was a sustainable strategy for moving space tourism forward.
“Once again, Mark is bashing someone for expressing a conservative view of space policy. As he did with the Republican Study Committee and New Gingrich. But don’t call Mark a liberal!”
Edward, clearly you don’t understand conservatives. Conservatives argue with one another all the time. I respect Newt, but I think his prize uber alles approach to space exploration is unworkable. That contrasts to liberals who demand total conformity.
If the future industry emerges from their efforts, and Virgin Galactic doesn’t close its business model, then it would be very hard to argue the X-Prize was a sustainable strategy for moving space tourism forward.
Not for me. I could easily argue it. Not that it really matters whether you believe it or not.
If you recall October sky on one of the four boys made it to NASA, but all four made it out of the coal mines and had successful technical careers.
As I recall from October Sky, Apollo still lay in the future, so it’s hard to understand how they were inspired by it, unless they had a hell of a prescience.
If you recall October sky on one of the four boys made it to NASA, but all four made it out of the coal mines and had successful technical careers.
As I recall from October Sky, Apollo still lay in the future, so it’s hard to understand how they were inspired by it, unless they had a hell of a prescience
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It’s worse than that Rand, they were inspired by Sputnik.
What you miss is that the objective of Apollo was simply to prove that it was possible to send humans to the Moon, have them do useful work there
No, “doing useful work” was not part of the job description. Look it up.
What work do you think Apollo astronauts did that was worth over $100 billion (inflation-adjusted dollars)? Digging a few trenches? Collecting a few rocks?
That may not seem like much today, but in 1961 when no one had even taken a spacewalk or spent more then a few hours in orbit it was a big thing. When orbital docking and landing on a airless world had not been done outside of science fiction it was a huge leap of faith, the kind that moves society forward.
The Air Force had plans to do all those things. There were even proposals to do lunar DynaSoar missions. What makes you believe they couldn’t have succeeded if they’d been given a chance?
And contrary to the historical revisionists it was exactly the type of national mission that did inspire kids to study science and for investments in basic technology to be made
Do you think they would have been less inspired if the Air Force had been doing it? Why is that?
If you recall October sky on one of the four boys made it to NASA, but all four made it out of the coal mines and had successful technical careers.
Go to any Air Force, and you’ll find lots of boys that come from towns like that. They may not become celebrity authors, but so what?
As for robots, just compare the impact of the various robotic pictures of Earth done in the 1960’s and the single picture from Apollo 8 that triggered the environmental movement
Tom, aren’t you the guy who keeps telling me how Ayn Rand said the engineers on Project Apollo were rationalists opposed to New Age hippy environmentalists? 🙂
Yes, the Apollo 8 pictures made great propaganda for environmentalism, disarmament, world government, and other leftwing causes. That doesn’t change the fact that Apollo did nothing for the things I care about — and it certainly did not lead to the “lunar base” you say you want.
I don’t discount the possibility that Orion might take some great pictures that Obama could use to promote global warming or national health care or something else. Just as Air Force One could be used to take photos over New York City. I simply don’t care about those things.
Do you want to promote space development or simply “green technology”?
Edward, clearly you don’t understand conservatives.
Funny, when I had dinner with Ronald Reagan, I thought I understood him.
Conservatives argue with one another all the time.
Conservatives argue with socialists all the time, too, Mark. The fact that you argue with conservatives does not automatically make you a conservative.
Conservatives are not just people who call themselves conservatives. They are people who believe in conservative principles, like limited government and fiscal responsibility.
Ronald Reagan said, “libertarianism is the heart and soul of conservatism.” You, on the other hand, use “libertarian” as a curse word for those who disagree with you. What “conservative” principles do you believe in?
I respect Newt, but I think his prize uber alles approach to space exploration is unworkable. That contrasts to liberals who demand total conformity.
Gingrich never called for “prizes uber alles.” Either you don’t understand his views or you’re deliberately mistating them. He supports a wide range of government space programs including Military Space Plane.
“Total conformity” seems a good description of what you’re demanding from Derbyshire, Gingrich, the Repulican Study Committee, etc. How is your insisting that space policy conform only to the expensive, government-only, civilian-only vision of John F. Kennedy and never consider any alternatives “conservative”?
I would have loved to see Dyna-soar and other ’60s tech funded and kept going, and it surely would have made a difference through to today. Ed is correct that our government dropped funding, and did not fund, many things that would have made the present a safer and more prosperous world precisely because they were considered “destabilizing”; this has continued to shut the research doors to RLVs, among other things.
However, when I look at our moon and consider that men have set foot there, I marvel and deeply appreciate the Apollo missions. That we have not returned since 1972 is the policy of the politicians and officials who value stability uber alles. Never mind the prosperity and the ability to deflect incoming rocks and the other advantages of a true spacefaring society-it would upset the current order of things. Status Quo, don’t rock the boat, don’t touch the pork-barrels, and don’t let the U.S.A. have too much success in reaching the free energy and resources of space; we must limit ourselves and our posterity in the name of holy stability.
That we were allowed to reach the moon was an accident of history, a triumph of aspiration over that stability our ‘leaders’ crave. I have to celebrate Apollo for that, even as I weep for the opportunities thrown away by our short-sighted elite.
Thanks, Rand, for the chance to rant. I dreamed of retiring to garden in 1/6 gee. If I can’t go to a Lunar retirement home, I’d like for my niece and nephew to have that chance; the next few years will tell if our government will allow private companies to succeed in opening the frontier.
Rand,
What happened in terms of the U.S. response to Sputnik as shown in October Sky happened even more with Apollo. It inspired a generation to study science and engineering.
What happened in terms of the U.S. response to Sputnik as shown in October Sky happened even more with Apollo. It inspired a generation to study science and engineering.
Tom, no one disputes that. The question is, did it lead to the large-scale lunar bases you desire?
If not, what makes you believe a second Apollo program will?
Or are you saying the US should spend $100 billion just to inspire a generation to study science and engineering, even if it doesn’t lead to any lasting space development?
Or are you saying the US should spend $100 billion just to inspire a generation to study science and engineering, even if it doesn’t lead to any lasting space development?
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Edward,
What leads you to believe that this program would inspire a new generation?
It inspired a generation to study science and engineering.
And then it shattered their dreams. We don’t get fooled again.
And then it shattered their dreams. We don’t get fooled again.
This. The reaction to space extravaganzas now will not be the same as it was then. The public has been inoculated against this particular strain of BS.
Anyway, with national debt where it is, the focus has to be on things that we can make to sell abroad to pay the creditors. Exercises in national vanity and future historical narcissism are no longer acceptable, if they ever were.
What leads you to believe that this program would inspire a new generation?
The Society for Creative Anachronism inspires thousands of people to learn the arts and sciences of the Middle Ages. By concentrating on historical reenactments, NASA can inspire an entire generation to study 60’s technology, science, history, and fashion. Young people all across the country can attend weekly meetings wearing leisure suits, bell bottoms, ridiculous wide ties, and other authentic costumes of the Apollo era. What could be more inspiring than that? If you attend a Renaissance Faire, you’ll see that many of the participants are already wearing tie-dye and beads, so clearly Tom is on to something here.
Rand and Ed,
I have said and before and I will say it again. The biggest barrier to opening the space frontier and expanding the human econsphere to Cislunar space is not Congress nor Wall Street.
Its the cynicism of space advocates who over the years built strawmen out of Projects like Apollo and Shuttle by trying to depict them as something they were not and never intended to be and then using it to ridicule any efforts to apply the lessons learned to develop better programs for moving humans out of LEO that are the real blocks to space progress, not the Derbyshires of the world who just use the space advocate own arguments against them.
The basic problem with Apollo, as with the Shuttle is that instead of using the hard won knowledge to move forward, in terms of a lunar base as an Apollo follow-on and a Shuttle II as a Shuttle follow-on space policy makers instead threw everything out and started off in a radical new direction.
The P-59 was a lousy jet fighter. It was an illustration of how not to build a jet fighter. But the USAF didn’t give up. And the second USAF attempt, the P-80, was a classic that served the USAF and USN well in many variants (including the T-33) for decades.
The B-9 and B-15 were also poor attempts at a practical long range bomber, but the B-17 and B-29 that Boeing built using the lessons learned were classics. There are lessons there for space advocates if they wish to learn them about persistence.
The Shuttle should be followed up with a Shuttle II, just as the P-59 was followed up with the P-80. It should be a straight forward program. No “experimental” procurement models as with X-33/X-34, just a straight procurement of simple TSTO craft for crew and a little cargo. The USAF didn’t change their procurement with the P-80, they just leveraged the lessons learned to do it right the second time.
And yes Ed, the Apollo landings should have been followed with an Apollo II in the form of a lunar base. Building a lunar base today (Apollo II as you call it) is just doing something that NASA should have done 40 years ago. It picking up where space policy left off to prematurely to chase the dream of cheap access to space in the 1970’s.
But both are non-starters in the space advocate community with its group think mentality that because the first attempt failed its time to give up completely and go in some radical new direction.
That is the reason I don’t waste much time with space advocates anymore. Its just the same old people with the same decades old mindset attending the same old conferences. Most haven’t changed their mindset in over 20 years. They are so stuck in their group think loop that it’s a waste to discuss space policy with them. Space advocate have so convinced themselves that projects like Apollo, Shuttle and ISS were “failures” that they refuse to see what they accomplished and how to build on those accomplishments for the next step. Instead they talk about the need for a radical “new space” approach that will save the day although when its actually implemented “new space” looks no different then “old space” except for the contractor names. But as with all cases of paradigm blindness arguing is a waste of time as any facts will be twisted to fit their static world view.
It wouldn’t be so bad if they at least were aware of modern economics and economic principles. Instead their ideas are still rooted in 19th Century economic though completely ignoring the advances in the field of complexity economics and the increased understanding of the role of institutions in the evolution of industries. Its like a modern astronomer trying to explain orbital dynamics to someone that still believes in the Ptolemaic model of the solar system. Its also why I see little hope for either the Augustine Commission or NASA’s future. When you are basing policy on outdated models and ideas the results are not likely to be any better.
The biggest barrier to opening the space frontier and expanding the human econsphere to Cislunar space is not Congress nor Wall Street. Its the cynicism of space advocates
Poor, Tom. You win the “Liberal Victim of the Year” award. 🙂
The United States government has spent close to a trillion dollars on space and rocket technology, but you haven’t come close to “expanding the human econsphere to Cislunar space.” So, who do you blame?
Not your own policies, naturally. NASA can do no wrong! It must be the nasty X-Prize, Virgin Galactic, Burt Rutan, space activists, etc. who stopped you from being successful!
LOL. 🙂
The basic problem with Apollo, as with the Shuttle is that instead of using the hard won knowledge to move forward,
No, the problem is that they were stupid ideas in the first place, as anyone who’s bothered to do a simple cost-benefit analysis could tell you.
Once again, Tom, it’s amazing that a business professor does NOT bother to use such simple, basic business tools. You claim to be the only person who understands modern economics, yet I have never seen you use even the most basic economics.
Do you tell your non-space clients to ignore the costs and returns of projects they invest in? Or do you just think we should ignore basic business principles when it comes to space?
And the second USAF attempt, the P-80, was a classic that served the USAF and USN well in many variants (including the T-33) for decades.
Actually, the P-80 was obsolete the minute the MiG-15 appeared. That’s why the Air Force and Navy developed the F-86 and FJ Fury.
Also, the USAF and USN were *military* organizations, and the P-80 was a *military* aircraft. Don’t you see anything odd in the fact that your analogies glorify military aircraft of the past, while your current “vision of space exploration” excludes both private enterprise *and* the military?
Where would we be today if the US followed your vision in the 1930’s? If the US government had stopped development of military aircraft and put aviation entirely in the hands of the NACA, abandoned the development of heavier-than-air craft, and concentrated on hot-air balloons and establishing a six-man “base” for NACA employees in Tahiti, do you think the rest of the world would have bowed down to our “accomplishment”? Hitler and Tojo, in particular?
The Shuttle should be followed up with a Shuttle II,
(Eyeballs rolling.) It was, Tom, but NASA failed to build Shuttle II. Go read some history books, please.
It was also followed by a National Space Plane, a Second Generation RLV, an Orbital Space Plane, and a dozen other vehicles. All of which NASA failed to build.
And yes Ed, the Apollo landings should have been followed with an Apollo II in the form of a lunar base. Building a lunar base today (Apollo II as you call it) is just doing something that NASA should have done 40 years ago.
Actually, I have to correct myself. I forgot that NASA did build a lunar base. The Apollo 11 landing site was officially the first lunar base — “Tranquility Base.” It’s very tranquil, because there’s no one there. 🙂
You still haven’t explained why the taxpayers should give you $100 billion to build another Tranquility Base, especially when you’ll tell us that big bad Burt Rutan or mean old Virgin Galactic prevented you from building it.
Personally, I’d rather give the money to the Air Force to work on Military Space Plane. They’re much less likely to make excuses if they fail, and they’re trying to do something important. You’re not.
Thanks Ed, you just proved my point that arguing with space advocates is like trying to explain orbital dynamics to someone who still believes in the Ptolemaic model of the solar system.
You are so lost in the old zero-sum game paradigm you just don’t get it.
Its about institutions and process, not programs or hardware. They come later. As long as space advocates focus on the latter and neglect the former the wheels of space policy in Washington will just keep spinning deeper into the mud. Thanks for the illustration of the key point of my argument.
In other words, you have no logical arguments to support your opinions, eh, Tom?
Thought so. 🙂
Its about institutions and process, not programs or hardware.
Unless the institutions are private businesses and the process is basic economics, you do not have a leg to stand on, Thomas. Otherwise, it’s just discretionary spending to be manipulated at whim and threatened every time a blowhard posts on the internet.
Karl,
The institutions are mission focused public/private partnerships, a hybrid that combines the best of pure private enterprises and government agencies without the drawback of either. Its how the Panama Canal was built, American hydroelectric generating system, the communication satellite system, even the Internet prior to the dot.com boom.
For example in the case of lunar development, contrary to Ed’s rant, I wouldn’t give NASA a dime. I would create a Lunar Economic Development Corporation (LEDC) and place it under the Dept. of Commerce. Initial capitalization would be around $5 billion, not the $100 billion Ed claims is needed for returning to the Moon.
The LEDC would also have authority to issue 30 year zero coupon bonds federally guaranteed to use to invest in joint ventures with private firms for lunar economic development.
The process would be normal corporate purchase behavior as was the case with the other Public/Private partnerships discussed. The Act creating it would exempt if from normal government procurement practices to reduce costs. It would start with LEDC contracting with private vendors for a series of low cost lunar missions to map and quantify lunar resources. Then additional missions to demonstrate ISRU capabilities. This would retire the technical risk for those ventures to the point that it would be possible to develop rational business models for their development. The LEDC could then use its bonding authority to invest in private firms involved in their development. Firms that partner with the LEDC would also be given a tax holiday on the join venture.
Note, no hardware programs. Hardware is determined the vendors and joint venture partners.
Note no drive to send humans, but humans will enter the mix when the economics requires their presence.
Note no science mission, although science will be a potential market and basic science will be critical to analyzing and developing lunar resources, just as the USGS in its many firms did basic geological research in the U.S. to develop its mineral resources. And learned a lot about how the western U.S. was created geologically as a side benefit.
Also a note on the cost of lunar missions. A few years ago I was working with a commercial venture looking at buying a lunar mission. I found out, via direct talks, that missions in the price range of $40-100 million are feasible even for the aerospace majors. The difference between those missions and the NASA missions are the cost of government procurement and the needs of doing cutting edge science using one-off experiments that very expensive to develop and validate. That is the advantage of the LEDC, no having to worry about satisfying any science goals.
In addition to the LEDC I also favor the creation of similar focused public/private partnerships for space energy, orbital infrastructure, orbital access (read RLV development). All start with some seed money and bonding authority. Then lets them focus on what they were created to do. Do you see the advantages over a mega agency that is trying to do everything and make everyone happy – and satisfying no one in the process…
And in regards to NASA, I would just forget about it. Its focus since Apollo has been on science and general and Mars in particular. I would let it go on that path and not worrying about it anymore. Nor try to turn it into something its not, a space commercialization agency as is being done with COTS, etc. Its not NASA’s culture nor does NASA have the organization to encourage the commercial development of space as the last 30 some years should prove. Its also why the Congressional staffers that created NASA didn’t give it the mission of Weather Satellites or Comsats. For Comsats they create the Comsat Corporation in 1962. For Weather Satellites they gave the Weather Bureau the lead. NASA just provided support while focusing on the Moon. They understood NASA limitations well.
There are lots of great people working for NASA. And they do a lot of great science and engineering. But NASA has neither the culture, budget nor organizational ability to develop commercial. Forcing NASA to stimulate the commercial development of space is like trying to make a pig fly like an eagle. You may be able to do it with a lot of Rube Goldberg contraptions but its still not a eagle. All that it will result in is a new generation of NASA contractors while the U.S. is still stuck in LEO. That is why I have zero interest in the Augustine Commission. Its nothing but another study on how to get those pigs flying 🙂
As for the idea that private industry will be able to do it alone on markets economics that is the core of new space. Well if it could do it on markets alone it would have decades ago and if that is the case there is no need for space advocates. The business models will emerge on their own without needing market substitutes (like prizes) normally associated with socialist economic systems. The best prize mechanism in a market base economy is profits and using market substitutes like prizes only distorts the market process in unpredictable ways.
And one final note for those still advocating the Ptolemaic (NASA centered) model of space development. The Act that creates the Lunar Economic Development Corporation will not be a carbon copy of the Acts for the Panama Canal, Comsat, TVA, BPA, etc. So don’t waste time arguing that the LEDC will fail if it follows those specific models. Each public/private partnership is a unique beast with the provisions in the act crafted to get the job done. You look to the older models for ideas and lessons learned, but you also develop new ones as needed. And that is also part of the process, bring the key players together to craft the LEDC Act to provide the framework needed to accomplish its mission of bringing the moon into the econsphere of humanity.
Remember the key point about public/private partnerships is that they work to prime the pump to get an industry started and a region developed. Then like all good starter motors they disengage once the engine is running. That is the key to crafting public/private partnerships to expand the human econsphere to the Cislunar space and beyond. Not Constellation, Ares I, or even NASA. That is old school thinking based on old models of technology and economics.
TVA is a good example of this lesson. It was a great model for the first 20 years of its existence. It transformed the Tennessee Valley region from a dirt poor rural area to an industrial powerhouse that played a key role in winning World War II and is a major contributor to America’s economic competitiveness. But after jump starting the regions economy it should have been spun off as a private Utility in the 1950’s. It wasn’t and it degraded to where you see it today. That is an example of the lessons that could be learned from history and applied to crafting the LEDC.
THAT Karl is how you use Modern economics to move space policy forward instead of continuing the same old cycle of presidential commissions, NASA missions, space advocate pressure on NASA, new presidential commissions, etc. that has been going on since Apollo. That is old style thinking. Based on old economic thought. That is what I am talking about when I advocate moving beyond NASA and for space advocate to overcome their obsession with it.
BTW I will be offering a graduate course on space commerce this fall at the California International Business University. I plan to live stream it free. You might want to check on it if you want to learn about 21st Century economics and space development 🙂
Well, this does sound more interesting since I agree it would be a better use of public funds than the current approach (define something to do, throw some cost plus contractors at it, cancel the project when they go over budget). But I’m not excited by the models you wish to emulate. There are plenty of examples of such projects that didn’t work or no longer work. In addition to TVA, we have Sematech in the US and the Fifth Generation project in Japan.
The bypassing of federal procurement is enticing. Being able to plan more than a few years in advance without substantial reshuffling every year would be helpful.
But here’s the problem. There’s no shortage of capital in the US. I don’t see a partnership that provides capital as automatically solving a problem. I see a need for tested business plans. But I don’t see a way for a partnership to help there without becoming a money sink. Issuing bonds doesn’t seem a good idea in that light. Where’s the cash flow that’s going to pay these bonds off?
Moving on, I think it’s a great idea to separate this from space science. For all the talk of needing one-off vehicles and such, the space science crowd simply doesn’t strike me as being economically knowledgeable. The two main reasons for not exploiting economies of scale seem to be the common belief that Congress will ax the project after the first unit gets built and a belief that there’s some sort of line for science projects. Building more units would be unfair to other projects that can’t get developed as a result.
Karl,
There is capital but the amount needed to jump start a lunar economy is too big for the Angels and too risky for those with the deep pockets. You need a bridge which is what the LEDC would provide.
As for the bonds, they are for the next stage, after the risks for ISRU has been reduced and the moon resources have been cataloged and you have the data needed to develop business models.
They would provide the LEDC the money needed to invest in a portfolio of joint ventures with private lunar ventures. A tool to bring some of the private capital to bear but in a way that is within the risk tolerance of investors as business models are proven. Revenues bonds of this type are pretty common in economic development. Again its a bridge mechanism to get the economy rolling.