It’s the forty-first anniversary. Mark Whittington took a few minutes off from fantasizing about the contents of legislation and the emotional states of others, and his imaginary Internet Rocketeer Club, to put together a long list of relevant links.
[Update a few minutes later]
Living on the moon — it’s the pits.
[Update a while later]
For those not aware, Evoloterra authors Bill Simon and I will be on The Space Show tonight from 7-8 Pacific (probably longer on the web).
[Update in the afternoon]
Speaking of Mark Whittington, his latest fantasy is that Constellation would have gotten us back to the moon in 2019. It’s hard to know how to deal with wilful delusions like this.
[Update a couple minutes later]
Bob Zimmerman displays a profound lack of faith in his country:
Sadly, it appears right now that the next manned lunar mission is probably not going to be an American mission. Though the exact outline of NASA’s future remains as yet unclear, President Obama has rejected the Moon as a future destination, and Congress appears willing to accept this decision.
Instead, either a Chinese, Indian, or Russian astronaut is likely going to be the next human to stroll onto Tranquility Base, taking pictures and souvenirs. All three nations have expressed a determination to get to the Moon. All three have also demonstrated in recent years the technological know-how for making it happen.
I will say no more than that I see no sign of either political will or capability of any of those countries to put a man on the moon. No one seems to be in any big hurry about it (e.g., China launches humans into space every three or four years). There is no indication that any of them are building the kind of infrastructure (either a heavy lifter or propellant depots) to enable it, and no demonstration of the ability to do vertical/vertical vehicles (not even at a Masten/Armadillo level).
My prediction is that the next human to trod the lunar surface will not be a government employee.
[Bumped]
So both the moon and mars may have a cave system ready and waiting for colonists (what’s that about Swiss cheese?)
…two meters under the surface of the moon, the temperature remains fairly constant … 20 to 40 degrees below zero…
Plenty of water, low gravity and game rooms (just needs a space heater, people from the Dakotas will feel right at home)… when do we start building the condos?
either a heavy lifter or propellant depots
Neither is strictly needed if all you want to do is flags and bootprints. And they’ve already said how they intend to do it I think. Storable lander, no propellant transfer, EOR with a cryogenic stage. Not going to happen any time soon. Not relevant even if it did.
Gee, I must be in great company to be the target of one of Rand Simberg’s savage attacks along with Bob Zimmerman. The fascinating things is that Zimmerman agrees with Simberg more than I, but one step outside of the party line and he gets Rand Simberg jumping down his throat.
By the way, much as I would like to see it, I’m pretty sure that the next person on the Moon will not be part of a private expedition. The next expedition will be paid for and likely operated by some government or another. The spectacle of commercial space demanding government subsidies just to get into LEO buttresses my point.
By the way, back handed reference to my links appreciated.
Hilarious, Mark.
I write:
…and here you trot along to make the point with: I must be in great company to be the target of one of Rand Simberg’s savage attacks along with Bob Zimmerman. The fascinating things is that Zimmerman agrees with Simberg more than I, but one step outside of the party line and he gets Rand Simberg jumping down his throat.
Emphasis mine.
Do you have no sense whatsoever of self awareness, or irony?
The spectacle of commercial space demanding government subsidies just to get into LEO buttresses my point.
I’m aware of no one “demanding” government subsidies. We simply point out that if the government wants to see faster, more cost-effective results for its stated goals, they’re a good idea. Commercial space started in the absence of “government subsidies,” and it will continue, and get on to the moon, with or without them. It’s only a matter of schedule. Either way, they’ll beat any government.
I think the Russians could do it with a couple of Proton launches and in orbit assembly. The Chinese should be able to do the same after Long March 5 starts service. The question is why do it? As of now there is no viable economic or even propaganda motive.
Another thing is, either of these launchers have worse payload than Delta IV Heavy, or the formerly planned Atlas V Heavy. So in fact the US could do the same if it really wanted to. There is no launcher gap.
At most you might say there is a manned space gap. Or a space toilet gap. But manned space is not being used for much of anything anyway.
To tread or to trot, not to trod, right?
I’m on record as predicting that the first Chinese to walk on the Moon will be a Chinese American, landed there by private enterprise. I offered to bet Twittington, but he refused to man up and take the bet. Apparently, he does not have as much faith in the superiority of Chinese Communism over private enterprise as he claims.
Maybe I can win some money off Bob Zimmerman instead. 🙂
Mark, are you honestly saying that you really do believe Constellation was executable? Or are you saying that with More Money Than NASA Has Ever Gotten it would have been executable? Hell, anyone can say that.. with magic unicorns NASA could get more girls interested in science and math too.
Wait.. what *are* you saying?
Rand,
[[[Commercial space started in the absence of “government subsidies,]]]
Actually NASA subsidized the launches of commercial satellites from the beginning of space commerce in 1962 while into the 1980’s. The foundation provided the foundation for today’s 200 billion plus space commerce industry.
Funny how even space advocates overlook that the vast majority of space spending today is commercial. And space commerce has been around for nearly 50 years. Maybe if more folks realized that, and talked about it more, commercial crew would seem like less of a change, just a natural evolution of capabilities of the aerospace industry. But comsats and remote sensing seem to be victims of their own success and so are invisible in terms of space policy debates.
Now if you are talking about the New Space definition of “commercial space” as being only HSF New Space related, then yes, most of the New Space firms started without subsidizes, but only those with deep pocket founders, or winners of government contracts, seem to be doing well.
Now if you are talking about the New Space definition of “commercial space”
It’d be really nice if people actually knew what New Space was about.
Rick Tumlinson is about the only person who bothers to define what he’s talking about when he uses the term and it’s telling. I’ll try to paraphrase:
A New Space company or organization is any that was founded with the specific goal of moving humanity out into space.
Or, in other words, founded by “space cadets” to achieve the dreams that are cherished by that community, rather than just profits or national security, or any of the other motivations that drive people to start space companies.
“Commercial” has very little to do with it. In fact, a non-commercial New Space organization is a perfectly reasonable thing to talk about.
Trent,
[[[A New Space company or organization is any that was founded with the specific goal of moving humanity out into space.]]]
So it is a “religion”, which explains a lot….
Is the Red Cross a “religion” by your standards, or Amnesty International, or Greenpeace or the NAACP?
Tom,
There are a lot of religious aspects to the space community. Other people — including some at The National Review — have noticed this.
I got involved in the late 1970s after O’Neill’s book The High Frontier. My involvement was moderate, though, as is my personality. At the time I was involved in a good bit of other stuff as well. Check out my blog posting Background of an L5 Society Activist.
When I eventually found out that L5 colonies were much further in the future than most space activists realized, I was disappointed, but still kept up some involvement, off and on, for years afterward. I drifted back into the movement after a really bad management experience at Goddard to see if I could help reform the industry in needed ways.
I don’t know where the human race will be in a thousand years. We could have colonies in space. Then again, we might be a fraction of our current size and confined to Earth. I obviously prefer the technologically optimistic future which I why I am active in the space community. It is worth some time and effort.
So it is a “religion”, which explains a lot….
No, Tom, religions are based on faith, prophets whose word must not be questioned, and ancient texts. Not mathematics.
Your belief that Apollo failed because it wasn’t expensive enough, for example, is religion.
The contrary belief — that Apollo was too expensive — is not religion. It can be proved by simple mathematics.
G. Harry Stine used to say that space cadets would get nowhere until they learned to calculate ROI as well as Isp.
Unfortunately, you never learned that lesson.
When humans return to the Moon to stay, it will be because of people who did the hard-headed financial calculations you eschew.
Edward,
[[[G. Harry Stine used to say that space cadets would get nowhere until they learned to calculate ROI as well as Isp. ]]]
So what is the ROI on Teachers in Space that make it better investment then existing STEM programs?
Or is it one of the faith based beliefs of the religion of New Space that teachers who fly into space are better then those who have not?
So what is the ROI on Teachers in Space…
It’s not always about the math. Sometimes it’s about the perspective. To answer, since we killed her, ROI would be nearly zero.
However, who knows what would be the result if she’d returned to earth with an experience to relate. I hear a butterfly can change the future.
Ken,
You are out of the loop. I am referring to the New Space program Ed is promoting to spend per $200,000 teacher to send a bunch of teachers on sub-orbital missions.
But that is OK, many of the terms New Space uses are intended to confuse folks, like calling the new NASA contractors commercial space as if the old space contractors were somehow not commercial firms, and calling the contracting model New Space is advocating as commercial crew even though its no more commercial then the old government contracting model for HSF.
But what I am basically asking Ed Wright is how spending $200,000 to send a teacher on a 6 minute suborbital flight will provide a higher ROI then using that money in other ways to promote science education. As usual he has no answer to it.