Sights are off the moon, and maybe put away for good.

[MotoH]

Obama aims to ax moon mission

NASA's plans to return astronauts to the moon are dead. So are the rockets being designed to take them there — that is, if President Barack Obama gets his way.

When the White House releases his budget proposal Monday, there will be no money for the Constellation program that was supposed to return humans to the moon by 2020. The troubled and expensive Ares I rocket that was to replace the space shuttle to ferry humans to space will be gone, along with money for its bigger brother, the Ares V cargo rocket that was to launch the fuel and supplies needed to take humans back to the moon.



More: http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/...,2770904.story


Comments?

 

[mgb_phys]

Couldn't he have just announced ambitious plans to visit the places but not funded them - then he is both a visionary and fiscally sound?

 

[Stratosphere]

There's another great move by our wonderful president.

 

[turbo]

Couldn't he have just announced ambitious plans to visit the places but not funded them - then he is both a visionary and fiscally sound?

Hmm... Sounds like a recent president who said that the US should fund trips to Mars, and promptly canceled the NASA Breakthrough Propulsion project that might possibly have made interplanetary human travel possible.

 

[waht]

http://img262.imageshack.us/img262/7638/1264769718wolfmoon.jpg

 

[Ivan Seeking]

We have had this discussion here many times before: Robotic exploration of the solar system by far makes the most sense. As for the moon, or Mars for that matter, what's the point in sending people? We can barely operate a low-orbit space station. Are we going to send people to live on the moon?

 

[DaveC426913]

We have had this discussion here many times before: Robotic exploration of the solar system by far makes the most sense. As for the moon, or Mars for that matter, what's the point in sending people? We can barely operate a low-orbit space station. Are we going to send people to live on the moon?

Let me turn your question on its head.

Are we going to spend the rest of our existence in the solar system doing nothing but testing soil samples?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Let me turn your question on its head.

Are we going to spend the rest of our existence in the solar system doing nothing but testing soil samples?

What would you like to do, and why? What can a person do that a robot can't?
http://robonaut.jsc.nasa.gov/

Why inhibit legitimate research by overspending on unnecessary human cargo?

 

[DaveC426913]

What would you like to do, and why? What can a person do that a robot can't?

Develop technology.
Experiment with habitation.

I'll generalize it: robots may be good for pure science research, but not so good for tech development and engineering.

 

[MotoH]

Sure you can send a robot anywhere. But what about that human element of being there. Besides rovers get stuck (just like the one that has been declared stuck for good on mars) Humans have the ingenuity to think on the spot and be able to analyze the situation.

Why shouldn't humans go to the moon and to mars? Why should we leave that experience to the robots. Wouldn't you like to go to the moon or Mars and stay for a month or two in a moon hotel? I for sure know I would.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Develop technology.

Why does this depend on a moon mission?

Experiment with habitation.

Same question.

I'll generalize it: robots may be good for pure science research, but not so good for tech development and engineering.

The robots relay information to scientists and engineers here on earth. Again, I don't see where this depends on putting people at extreme risk for an exotically expensive venture [esp Mars] that yields little to no practical benefits.

How we do justify taking money away from legitimate research? It's not like saying the space program has no value, it is a statement about what sort of space program has the greatest value.

Spinoff technologies: technology related to highly advanced robots. Low-cost propulsion systems, like the ion drive.

 

[MotoH]

How do you know a Human trip to Mars wouldn't have massive amounts of technology flowing into the civilian sector? What about the first manned mission to the moon, we sure as heck got a lot from that which we didn't expect. You will never know until you try.

 

[waht]

As for the moon, or Mars for that matter, what's the point in sending people? We can barely operate a low-orbit space station. Are we going to send people to live on the moon?

I agree. The benefit to cost ratio is way too small to justify any space exploration yet. I'd much prefer hundreds of billions more be channeled into R&D than having astronauts riding chemical propulsion rockets. We need cheaper ways to launch things into orbit, develop new propulsion drives like the VASIMIR, better energy storage, and some kind of nuclear reactor in space.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

How do you know a Human trip to Mars wouldn't have massive amounts of technology flowing into the civilian sector?

The same would be true of money spent on a massive energy program intended to end our reliance on imported oil. And not only would we get the spinoff technologies, we would also reduce our trade deficit by nearly half a trillion dollars a year.

What about the first manned mission to the moon, we sure as heck got a lot from that which we didn't expect. You will never know until you try.

The fallacy is that there is some kind of magic related to space exploration. If the government spends mass quantities of money on credible research of many kinds, we will reap the benefits. And again, we can always spend more on the development of engines that make interplanetary travel much cheaper, and practical. But we don't have to go to Mars in order to start - a classic problem of having cart but no good horse.

 

[DaveC426913]

Why does this depend on a moon mission?



Same question.

I'm not talking about rocket technology, I'm talking about developing Moon technology. i.e in prep for setting up a base - for mining, manufacturing, manned habitation, etc.

We've got to leave Earth some time.

The robots relay information to scientists and engineers here on earth. Again, I don't see where this depends on putting people at extreme risk for an exotically expensive venture [esp Mars] that yields little to no practical benefits.

How we do justify taking money away from legitimate research?[/QUOTE]
But you are thinking only in terms of research. You are not considering expanding humankind's turf.

 

[D H]

Yes, we've had this discussion many times before. Scientists can be dense.

 

[SystemTheory]

I've heard the main reason (financial) for the new moon missions is helium-3 mining or other high value exotic materials.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helium-3

Personally I think we've done a poor job stewarding the energy and resources of Earth so far. If we were my children and I was God/Creator, I would not allow us to inhabit a new planet until we learn to care for the one given to us as a gift! Translation: solve real problems on Earth before engaging the fantasy of fixing problems by populating the heavens.

 

[MotoH]

See this is the thing. Once we get to the moon and build a credible base there that is able to launch spacecraft , the amount of rocket fuel needed will go down drastically. You don't need to travel through an atmosphere and beat gravity on the moon. That is where all that rocket fuel goes. As soon as we get to the moon everything will become far easier because of that pesky thing known as atmosphere.

We can't stay on Earth forever, no matter how well we protect her. There will soon be overpopulation (there really already is) and the Earth just won't hold everyone. We can't just start killing people off, so we have to expand. Why not start now?

Why should space exploration cost money? Why should money even matter? Shouldn't we put everything into this and go for the gold?

 

[turbo]

See this is the thing. Once we get to the moon and build a credible base there that is able to launch spacecraft , the amount of rocket fuel needed will go down drastically. You don't need to travel through an atmosphere and beat gravity on the moon. That is where all that rocket fuel goes. As soon as we get to the moon everything will become far easier because of that pesky thing known as atmosphere.

We can't stay on Earth forever, no matter how well we protect her. There will soon be overpopulation (there really already is) and the Earth just won't hold everyone. We can't just start killing people off, so we have to expand. Why not start now?

Why should space exploration cost money? Why should money even matter? Shouldn't we put everything into this and go for the gold?

Once we get to the moon... What makes you think that if we put more more personnel on the moon, we would gain any advantage over the laws of physics?

Please catch a clue.

 

[DaveC426913]

Why should space exploration cost money? Why should money even matter? Shouldn't we put everything into this and go for the gold?

Well, the downside is that it is a purely altruistic goal. Not just for us, but for our children and grandchildren. No one who is born before the middle of the 21st century will be going off-planet for any length of time except as part of a research mission.

So, we do have to mete out how much money we put toward the future that has no benefit in the present.

 

[Phyisab****]

As for the moon, or Mars for that matter, what's the point in sending people?

It's freakin sweet.

 

[MotoH]

Once we get to the moon... What makes you think that if we put more more personnel on the moon, we would gain any advantage over the laws of physics?

Please catch a clue.

So you are saying that there is no difference between launching a spaceship from the moon, and one from earth? Seems like we would save a lot of fuel if we were to travel to phobos from the moon (the next logical step)

What does a shuttle have to overcome to leave earth? Gravity, the last time I checked the moon has a lot less gravity than earth. I am surely not an expert on this, but it makes sense.

 

[DaveC426913]

So you are saying that there is no difference between launching a spaceship from the moon, and one from earth? Seems like we would save a lot of fuel if we were to travel to phobos from the moon (the next logical step)

What does a shuttle have to overcome to leave earth? Gravity, the last time I checked the moon has a lot less gravity than earth. I am surely not an expert on this, but it makes sense.

OK, we've got to put some context around this.

It is WAY less energy-expensive to lift a shuttle from Earth than it is to first lift an entire moonbase to the Moon, man it, and then launch a shuttle from there. Remember, pretty much everything of interest (materials, personnel and supplies) all must come from Earth anyway).

Launching from the Moon will only become cost-effective when we need to be launching them all the time.

 

[russ_watters]

How do you know a Human trip to Mars wouldn't have massive amounts of technology flowing into the civilian sector? What about the first manned mission to the moon, we sure as heck got a lot from that which we didn't expect. You will never know until you try.

Oh, it absolutely would, just like Apollo and Star Wars did. But the cost-benefit ratio just isn't there. These programs are hugely expensive and can't be justified based soley on spin-off technologies. The goal of the program has to be free-standing.

Sure you can send a robot anywhere. But what about that human element of being there.

What human element?

Besides rovers get stuck (just like the one that has been declared stuck for good on mars) Humans have the ingenuity to think on the spot and be able to analyze the situation.

The rover getting stuck isn't a human inginuity problem, as the rovers are controlled from earth. In any case, you picked a really bad example as the Mars rovers were perhaps the most successful mission NASA has ever put together, in terms of what we learned for the cost.

For one thing, the rover (one of them...) got stuck three years into a three month mission, so what you are listing as a failure is actually just the end of a rediculously successful mission. But more to the point, you could send thousands of those rovers to Mars for the price of a single manned mission. Regardless of this nebulous "human ingenuity" factor, a person can't be in a thousand places at once.

Why shouldn't humans go to the moon and to mars?

Simple question, already answered: it is too expensive for too little benefit.

Why should we leave that experience to the robots.
Wouldn't you like to go to the moon or Mars and stay for a month or two in a moon hotel? I for sure know I would.

Hell yeah, I'd like to go!, but that's just a fantasy of mine. The government shouldn't be spending a trillion dollars to satisfy your or my or anyone else's fantasy.

...Or do you think the government should buy us all tickets on Branson's SpaceShipTwo?

[edit] The government should also buy me Megan Fox, but that's a different issue entirely.

 

[russ_watters]

I'm not talking about rocket technology, I'm talking about developing Moon technology. i.e in prep for setting up a base - for mining, manufacturing, manned habitation, etc.

We've got to leave Earth some time.

No we don't. I don't know exactly what you are thinking there - why you think we have to leave Earth (I've heard it before), but there is no reason for *you* or *me* or even our grandchildren to "got to leave earth".

But you are thinking only in terms of research. You are not considering expanding humankind's turf.

Like above: what is the actual benefit/need to/for "expanding humankind's turf"?

This is real life, Dave, not a Star Trek fantasy, boring as it may be.

 

[russ_watters]

See this is the thing. Once we get to the moon and build a credible base there that is able to launch spacecraft , the amount of rocket fuel needed will go down drastically. You don't need to travel through an atmosphere and beat gravity on the moon. That is where all that rocket fuel goes. As soon as we get to the moon everything will become far easier because of that pesky thing known as atmosphere.

Um... unless you are talking about a colony of people completely independent of Earth (they never visit and get no materials from earth), you still have to take off from Earth to get to the moon before taking off from the moon to get to...whereever.

We can't stay on Earth forever, no matter how well we protect her.

Fortunatly, all of our great-great-great-great-great grandchildren will be dead long before "forever". Meanwhile, I just got my January heating and electric bill...

Lets deal with real problems, not speculative fantasies about where we might need to be in 10,000 years.

There will soon be overpopulation (there really already is) and the Earth just won't hold everyone. We can't just start killing people off...

Fortunatly, we don't have to kill people off, they die on their own after 75 years or so. We only have to slow the rate of having offspring...which is already happening. Most western countries are actually shrinking already (the US is an exception largely due to immigration).

And in any case, I'm not sure what you think will happen if the population becomes 10x what it is today (unlikely in the next hundred or two years)...but whatever happens certainly won't be worth the quadrillions of dollars necessary to put major colonies on the moon and Mars. Better to spend that money on food!

...so we have to expand. Why not start now?

We don't have to expand now (and I don't think we will ever - certainly it can't be predicted with any reliability when it might happen), so we don't need to start now. Again, I just got my energy bills for January - this is a now problem and we have enough "now" problems we need to deal with now.

Why should space exploration cost money? Why should money even matter? Shouldn't we put everything into this and go for the gold?

Huh? Well that's just gibberish. I've been joking (only half joking really...) about Star Trek, but that sounds like something straight out of the Star Trek universe, where money doesn't exist (except where it does exist ). You do realize that Gene Roddenberry was a sci fi writer, not an economist, scientist or political philosopher, right? I have a copy of the Star Trek technical manual on my bookshelf. Great read, but in the preface, they define the word technobabble. It's basically technical sounding words or phrases that are actually just meaningless. That's what you've posted here.

 

[hamster143]

NASA's plans to return astronauts to the moon are dead. So are the rockets being designed to take them there — that is, if President Barack Obama gets his way.

When the White House releases his budget proposal Monday, there will be no money for the Constellation program that was supposed to return humans to the moon by 2020. The troubled and expensive Ares I rocket that was to replace the space shuttle to ferry humans to space will be gone, along with money for its bigger brother, the Ares V cargo rocket that was to launch the fuel and supplies needed to take humans back to the moon.

*IF* that's true, that change has a bigger scope than just "not going to the Moon by 2020". If the Constellation program and Ares I / Ares V are killed, that means that NASA won't have *ANY* proprietary means of getting stuff into orbit for the next 10+ years, and it will depend on third party systems (either SpaceX or Russian Soyuz/Proton rockets) to send anything, including the most trivial robotic spacecraft .

On the subject of the Moon and Mars, I'm inclined to agree that the strategy taken by NASA is a dead end. We have to shift the focus and the money from 1920s-style chemical rockets towards novel means of propulsion. If SpaceX can figure out a way to put stuff into LEO for $1000/kg through the magic of economies of scale, let them. If they need money to upgrade their technology to make it man-rated, give them that money. In the mean time, work on 21st century technology. The vision should be that of cheap third-party LEO lifts (initially, SpaceX, eventually the space elevator), and advanced technology that let's us go to the Moon and beyond. By advanced technology, I mean nuclear reactors in space, direct nuclear propulsion (hydrogen that's heated by passing through a nuclear reactor and then vented through a nozzle), ion drives powered either by nuclear reactors or by large solar batteries.

But, of course, that strategy change cannot be made unilaterally by the White House. If they are indeed planning to stop financing the Constellation program, there must have been an agreement between the White House and the top management of NASA, and maybe there will be money available to continue operating the Space Shuttle till 2012, if not longer (we'll need some way of getting to the ISS...)

 

[DaveC426913]

No we don't. I don't know exactly what you are thinking there - why you think we have to leave Earth (I've heard it before), but there is no reason for *you* or *me* or even our grandchildren to "got to leave earth".

This is precisely what I stated in post 20.

I get why it's a budget-thing as to why we would spend the money for our descendants.

 

[zomgwtf]

I can see why it makes more sense to send robots into space but I still feel disappointed that humans will not return to another 'world' lol .

I understand that technology might develop from more missions but I'm not exactly sure if it would be generally usefull technology. The thing that I thought would be the mots exciting would be as dave pointed out experimenting with habitation of these different worlds.

I wonder though how did NASA and USA government convince people that going to the moon in the first place was a good idea? Just because it hadn't been done before? They would have seemed to be in the same position we are in now because there was no way they would be able to foretell the technological developments that have occurred from the previous missions... just as we can't foresee them for potential future trips.

So why did NASA go to the moon ever?

 

[DavidSnider]

So why did NASA go to the moon ever?

It was an extension of the arms race.

 

[DaveC426913]

It was an extension of the arms race.

Yes. America sent a very strong message to Russia in getting a man on the Moon within 12 years of Russia's Sputnik coup.

And once they'd won that, the manned space program was pretty much shelved.

 

[zomgwtf]

Really?

[sarcasm]Well then it's good to know that when it comes to science and knowledge etc. that the governments of our world put the right foot forward![/sarcasm]

We should investigate the oceans more.

 

[Char. Limit]

In that case, convince Republicans that Saddam Hussein hid WMDs in the ocean. We'll find out a lot... but no WMDs. Sounds like quicksand... or a certain country that behaves like quicksand.

 

[mgb_phys]

What about the first manned mission to the moon, we sure as heck got a lot from that which we didn't expect.

Almost all of Nasa's 'spin-offs' were actually from military programs.
Teflon was developed in the 30s and first used industrially in the Manhattan project.
Miniaturized electronics and digital computers were developed for the Minuteman missile and used by Apollo.
Rockets were initially developed by the silver medalists in WWII and almost all the commercial launchers today from Delta to Ariane are based on ICBMs

So the obvious solution for a wide range of spin-offs is to start a war with Mars.

 

[MotoH]

Now doesn't the LRO feel let down? I mean, her main job was to find water on the moon by finding neutrons for possible use by humans in the future and now she just gets to tell us where the water is!