Read Kevin Parkin's excellent account of yesterday's town hall meeting at JPL (in the comments section of Jeff Foust's post announcing it), and weep:

From memory (expect lots of errors):

Estimated average audience age - 55 years
Estimated audience size - 250
Aprox. % of JPLers - 80%
Estimated people there my age (27) or younger - 10 (including the camera man, myself, and Derek Shannon (see earlier comment))

Sen. Brownback gave a 5 min intro to set the stage for the town hall meeting, making it clear that he was highly interested in innovative suggestions for how to structure the legislative architecture of the exploration initiative. Rep. Rohrabacher said a few words and was congratulated by JPL President Charles Elachi on having triplets this month. Also in attendance was Buzz Aldrin and Gen. Pete Worden.

- The first audience speaker spoke eloquently and extolled the virtues of prizes and industry collaboration. Sen. Brownback asked people who did/didn't support prizes to raise their hands. Sen. Brownback asked the audience speaker how much the prize award should be. This seems to be a point of particular interest, since Sen. Brownback asked precisely the same question of Elon Musk at the launcher hearing a couple of weeks ago. Back then, Elon Musk said something like it should be 10% of the amount the government would otherwise spend on developing that capability. This time, the answer was "as much as possible" to which there was laughter and Sen. Brownback rephrased the question, how little can we spend on prizes? Nothing as good as Elon's answer was put forward.

- The gentleman sitting on my left believed that the focus of NASA should not be on exploring Mars but rather on studying the dynamics of Earth, global warming, etc. Knowing of Rep. Rohrabacher’s views on this subject I watched the expression on his face as this was said. Rep. Rohrabacher patiently waited and then said that he couldn't disagree more with said gentleman. So began a period of booing and a sequence of rebuttals from various members of the audience throughout the remainder of the evening.

- Someone else suggested that looking at computer images was just as good as listening to an astronaut give a first-person account of their experiences of exploration/other planets. Most people in the room disagreed in a reserved way.

- One lady declared that we should spend billions of dollars on space, so that unbelievers in Jesus could all be sent to the moon. This was arguably the highlight of the meeting, and I briefly imagined churches passing around collection plates for money to send me to the moon, and then happily recalled the episode of South Park where the church sent missionaries to convert aliens on the planet Marklar and so held a TV funding drive for a spaceship, photon torpedoes etc.

- One elderly lady spoke at length, beginning by mentioning her two congressional science medals, moving on to discredit herself by saying something like the settlement of the moon would be impossible because the lack of magnetic field on the moon, and therefore the radiation would kill everyone. She finished up by saying that NASA wouldn't spend $100K to maintain the only laser capable of ranging the moon (to the accuracy of ~1 cm) and that she had spent the last 20 years of her life fighting for that small slice of funding. Sen. Brownback listened with a concerned expression.

- Sen. Brownback at some point took a show of hands who thought we would be on the moon in 30 years, then 20 years. Very few thought 20 years.

- One gentleman referred to the human exploration program as not generating any useful science (except on how humans degrade in space) and referred to the space station as a useless tin can. He was against the exploration initiative because science had so far been much better conducted by robotic craft than humans (*).

- One gentleman in front of me said that these JPL scientists understandably viewed the exploration initiative as a purely scientific endeavor, when in fact there were other less tangible motivations too, such as exploration itself. He did not mention reversing the decline of the science base or the military justifications, but nevertheless he was about the only person who had taken on board the essence of this new initiative. He is the NASA employee I would keep.

- Sen. Brownback asked how people might feel if someone else were to colonize the moon and then there was some discussion of international cooperation, particularly with Russia. Sen. Brownback seemed unaware of the pitfalls of international collaboration in making projects _very_ expensive, but did make a good point that ISS would be in a very bad position right now if we had not partnered with Russia.

- Sen. Brownback wrapped up by again thanking JPL for their excellent success with the Mars Rovers, which makes his job of justifying space expenditure on Capitol Hill much easier. Rep. Rohrabacher had earlier expressed the same sentiment, and my own view these expressions were absolutely sincere. Retired congressman Robert Walker said a similar thing to NSS Exec Director George Whitesides at the Aldridge Commission hearing in New York. He basically said that legislators realize the value of space exploration but that without the public continually asking questions about space exploration and a general impression of broad-based popular support, that it was very easy to vote money to veteran's affairs rather than NASA (they compete in the same budget category). Shortly thereafter the Space Exploration Alliance was announced, of which NSS is a member.

(*) On a personal note, this was the viewpoint I had expected from JPL and which I feel is small-minded linear thinking. If we are still conducting robotic science and human operations the same way we do now in 10-15 years, once the exploration initiative gets going, then I may as well go into the finance sector right now and forget my dreams --because they will never happen with the status quo.

I don't have time to comment much on this right now, but I think that it speaks for itself. I will say that in response to the notion that "...ISS would be in a very bad position right now if we had not partnered with Russia," the ISS program would have died a decade ago if we hadn't partnered with Russia. It's not clear to me that that would have been a worse position for it than the present one...

[Update in the afternoon]

Here's a report from a Pasadena reporter.

Rand,

I have to agree with your post. While it may be possible that the president's space initiative may actually be beneficial overall to the development of space (and it is one of the only things to come out of this administration that I even partially agree with), it's comments like these above that really make me wonder. I'm amazed these guys are so closed-minded. It's sad to see that so many otherwise intellegent people still don't even come anywhere near close to "getting it".

I still think that the next person to walk on the
Moon will be an American, but things like this make me think that he's more likely to be a privately funded individual than a government employee.

~Jon

I have to agree with your post.

I hope it wasn't too painful, Jon. ;-)

I hope it wasn't too painful, Jon. ;-)

Not too bad at all actually. I usually do agree with your space and technology related posts. It's just your political posts that I usually disagree with. I'm sure there's a statistical chance I'll eventually agree with your political/warmongering posts, but it hasn't happened yet to my knowledge.

I'll let you know if it happens. ;-)

The "Disbelievers to the moon" bit was just too funny.

One of the lessons about using the Shuttle with the ISS is that it is dangerous to have only one type of manned spacecraft. If we had at least two (or better, a number of commercial craft) it wouldn't have been an issue. You'd think that would have been obvious after Challenger.

ISS is another example of something that should have been very useful. They should be doing heavy research on board. But that is a bit hard when you can barely send people there.

"Sen. Brownback asked the audience speaker how much the prize award should be. This seems to be a point of particular interest, since Sen. Brownback asked precisely the same question of Elon Musk at the launcher hearing a couple of weeks ago. Back then, Elon Musk said something like it should be 10% of the amount the government would otherwise spend on developing that capability. This time, the answer was "as much as possible" to which there was laughter and Sen. Brownback rephrased the question, how little can we spend on prizes? Nothing as good as Elon's answer was put forward."

I think I provide a better answer. The amount of the prize should be tied to its expected value, not its expected cost. If the amount of the prize is its expected value, it encourages innovations with the highest cost/benefit ratio. If the amount of the prize is tied to its expected cost, it simply encourages innovations that reduce costs below what NASA would expect to pay, which is a less relevant measure of success.

Another factor is that there should smaller prizes for coming second-- this would encourage groups that are near completion when the main prize is won to not just give up completely. Also, the methods used by the prize winners aren't necessarily the best methods, and this might help avoid a future with a spaceflight version of GatesOS.

As for JPL and robotics-- I'd be amazed if they had any ohter attitude than being against manned flight, considering where their interests lie.

Jonathan Goff
I still think that the next person to walk on the
Moon will be an American, but things like this make me think that he's more likely to be a privately funded individual than a government employee.

Not that there is anything wrong with that . . .