Sigh, I am really starting to hate Obama now

[Fear No Evil]

Originally posted by: umbrella39

Originally posted by: ayabe

Originally posted by: umbrella39

Originally posted by: Fear No Evil

Originally posted by: brandonbull

Originally posted by: ironwing
OP: I think you might be under the impression that NASA is an agency primarily concerned with science and engineering. It isn't. NASA's function is to transfer billions of tax dollars per year to politically connected contractors. What we get in return is largely irrelevant in the equation. Putting on a show for the public once in a while is good marketing but that's about all it it. Ares in/out, Atlas in/out is a political decision based on who greased whom more.

At least some one invented something useful for those billions. What have we gotten from the billions transferred to the contractors to support Iraq besides thousands of dead and wounded troops?

This is where I disagree with the 'wasted money' in Iraq argument.

War isn't always wasted money, it creates a ton of jobs and the war in Iraq I think arguably could be credited with saving TONS of defense jobs. Our troops are getting combat pay, tons of contractors are getting work over there. Companies are selling power and water equipment over there.. etc. Its not just going into a black hole.

Says the guy posting from the comfort and safety of his home.

Wow nice...that's the absolute worst Iraq invasion justification I've yet seen on P&N, kudos to that fucking guy.

No shit. So what he is saying is that if the economy is fucked up over here, it is perfectly OK to bomb some country so that the troops have something to do and that our rich corporations can profit even more from the rebuilding. I still wonder WHWBHWB. I don't remember any chicken hawk that used to post here ever being quite this stupid.

Sigh.. I never said anything about the justification of the war. I simply said arguing against it based on money isn't as cut and dry as you would like to believe. War is not a black hole.. people DO profit from them.

 

[Hajpoj]

I was a Physics major until I discovered how our mathematics are fundamentally flawed. Sure it can be used from a practical standpoint, but no intrinsic truth can dicovered with it.

Our math is based on our logic, which is determined by our senses. Since our senses determine our logic, everything based on our logic is temporal and eternally flawed since nothing can be done to change how interpret data in the first place.

 

[silverpig]

Originally posted by: Hajpoj
I was a Physics major until I discovered how our mathematics are fundamentally flawed. Sure it can be used from a practical standpoint, but no intrinsic truth can dicovered with it.

Our math is based on our logic, which is determined by our senses. Since our senses determine our logic, everything based on our logic is temporal and eternally flawed since nothing can be done to change how interpret data in the first place.

...so you became a philosophy major and will flip burgers while contemplating your uselessness in the universe?

 

[Jeff7]

Originally posted by: Stiganator
NASA has contributed immensely, but on the verge of recession I don't know that it is necessary to fund it like crazy. The only probable thing the moon will net us is resources. Beyond that, I don't think it is going to net too many advances. Same to be said about pretty much every other planet in the solar system. I think we'll need to go to a different star system to find another planet that will net any 'useful' things i.e. Earth 2. Computers were the last huge advance in technology. I don't foresee anything that big anytime soon, but maybe I'll be surprised.

Oh, there'll be advances. Room temperature quantum or optical computers would potentially be as revolutionary as the computer itself. Same story for room temperature superconductors. Imagine if you could do this at room temperature. Yeah that looks silly, but that right there could put ball bearing manufacturers out of business. It could allow new styles of electric generators to be built. Power transmission lines could be made smaller, and losses due to resistance heating would be gone - which amounts to more than 10% of the total electric production in the country, just turned into heat in the lines before it ever gets used. Total efficiency right now is somewhere around 25-35% going from fuel to power in your house. Huge losses.
Traces on circuit boards could be made smaller, heat production would be reduced. And I don't know what else. That's just stuff I could think of off the top of my head.

Maybe the LHC will find something we can use or manipulate, something revolutionary like the discovery of the electron.

Originally posted by: Hajpoj
I was a Physics major until I discovered how our mathematics are fundamentally flawed. Sure it can be used from a practical standpoint, but no intrinsic truth can dicovered with it.

Our math is based on our logic, which is determined by our senses. Since our senses determine our logic, everything based on our logic is temporal and eternally flawed since nothing can be done to change how interpret data in the first place.

Our mathematical language seems to have done a damn fine job thus far.

Our senses determine our reality; if our math can describe that reality, then it's done its job. I don't know what you want to obtain by "intrinsic truth," or what that's really supposed to mean. Are we going to go ask spacetime itself, "Hey, is this accurate?"
I don't think it's going to answer.



On topic: Manned space exploration is dandy and all, but we're kind of expensive things to send into space, especially on long trips like to the Moon, or worse, to Mars. Robots don't care if they're folded up and stashed in a small titanium or aluminum can for a few months. They don't eat, they don't excrete, they don't need coffee breaks, they don't care if they're worked to death, and they don't have any desire to return home. Sure it's an amazing experience to walk on a world other than Earth - for a few people. Everyone else on Earth gets exactly what they'd get from a robot: Pictures. (And scientists get lots of data from various other instruments, it's not all just pretty pictures.)

An awful lot of what we do is just going to Low Earth Orbit anyway, and the shuttle was an interesting concept, but perhaps was not ideal. It needed a lot of rework after each launch; it wasn't so much "reusable" as it was "refurbishable." Plus, given the extra mass of the entire orbiter itself, that's a lot of mass to be hoisted into orbit, not even counting any possible cargo.
One of the other design goals of the shuttle was to be able to retrieve satellites from orbit and bring them back down. I don't know if they ever even did that. Once or twice maybe?

There are alternative ways of getting people and cargo to LEO; the Russians do it just fine with their Soyuz spacecraft.


Something else to consider though: NASA's entire yearly budget is well below $20 billion a year. That's a fly spitting into the wind compared to the national budget. And NASA's total spending since its inception more than 50 years ago is around what has been spent on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

 

[eits]

have you seen the economy lately? he needs to make cuts. space exploration is a luxury and we need to get rid of some of the luxuries for a bit.

 

[dmcowen674]

Originally posted by: freshgeardude

Topic Title: Sigh, I am really starting to hate Obama now

It really ticks me off knowing how much of a politician he really is.

He promised more money to nasa in florida and texas but then goes to another state and said he wants to cut from these programs.

that is pretty bad, but not the main reason I am angry....

he wants to completely scrap the ENTIRE ares program! how are we suppose to get to space now after 2010....

Oh look another anonymous hater coward before the guy even takes office, color me surprised :roll:

You should be thrilled since you don't believe in science anyway and it will save money.

What will you do once it angers you so much you can't stand it?

 

[Pneumothorax]

Originally posted by: Young Grasshopper
Welfare Queens/Food Stamps = waste of money

CORRECTED

 

[Mani]

I am not thrilled about this either, but cuts need to be made, and if there is a non-critical need, it's space travel.

 

[jonks]

Economic crisis > visiting mars

 

[evident]

Originally posted by: jonks
Economic crisis > visiting mars

this

 

[BeauJangles]

Originally posted by: Mani
I am not thrilled about this either, but cuts need to be made, and if there is a non-critical need, it's space travel.

Do you really think Obama, a guy who is very interested in bringing science education and the US scientific community up to par, is thrilled about these cuts either?

Obama's inheriting a terrible situation and he's going to have to cut budgets of programs he supports.

 

[DrPizza]

Originally posted by: Viditor

Originally posted by: Young Grasshopper
Space exploration = waste of money

That post = waste of space

Seriously, the Space program is FAR more important than we ever thought it was going to be. It's saved more lives and improved conditions in more places than any other endeavor in history...and certainly nobody expected that when it began.

It's also evident to any student of social behavior that eventually we will need to expand off of this planet in order to survive.
Now many people will argue that this will not need to be done for a very long time. Sadly these are the same people that created years as a 2 digit number for computers, thus causing the Millenium bug scare...and the same people who insisted that Hubbard was a fool and that we will have plenty of oil for any foreseeable future.

Edit: BTW, the Space Program is the only government program I can think of that has produced a net profit (and a big one).

That's a ridiculous argument. Sadly, the people who fear doom and gloom are the same people who built bomb shelters in the 70's... See, two can play this game.

The "we've gotta get off of earth to save ourselves" is absolutely irrational and illogical. You're saying that we have a better chance of terraforming another planet or building some sort of shelter on another planet - a planet that inhospitable to life, because we're not going to be able to keep our live-sustaining planet working? "What if someone genetically creates a virus that will kill all humans on earth, how will our species ever survive?!" If that's the argument, then you've been watching too much television - I believe there was a James Bond episode with just that scenario, except the bad guys were on a space station. Thank God for the space shuttles in that episode, because they shot down all the viruses in the sky with laser weapons. Quite simply, if someone wanted to kill all the humans & was smart enough to do so, don't you think they'd be smart enough to send it to some colony in space, too? There are no compelling reasons for us to leave this rock over the next 1000's of years, other than, for lack of better words, evolution into a higher intelligent civilization. Any other doom type scenarios are science fiction fantasy.

As far as the inventions spawned by the space program, many of those simply arose there first as a result of them needing such devices first. Does anyone really think that without a space program, we'd never have had cordless tools? That's rather naive.

I'm all for science & more spending on science. But simply, there's no need at the present time to send humans into space. And, does anyone really think that reinventing the wheel - sending man back to the moon - is going to spawn incredible inventions? Do some of you people really think "thank God for NASA! If it weren't for NASA, my glasses would scratch too easily" Or maybe, just maybe do you think that without NASA, someone might have said to themselves, "you know what? This really sucks. This is the 3rd set of lenses I've scratched this year. I think I'm going to work on materials to make these lenses more scratch resistant."

Space exploration by robots? :thumbsup: Space exploration by humans, that costs an order of magnitude more money to accomplish the exact same amount of exploration & increases our knowledge the same amount? :thumbdown; How much do we know about all the outer planets? How much have we learned about Mars? All those missions at a fraction of the expense of just one manned mission. And, may I point out, several of those missions resulted in the loss or spacecraft. Robots are much more efficient and far more cost effective. They don't need breaks. They don't need a narrow range of environmental factors to survive. And, they don't need a return trip to the earth.

Also, as far as getting any significant number of people off the surface of this rock, I think some people need to be reminded about how much fuel it takes to launch the space shuttle. Now realize, that's only a small fraction of the fuel it takes to get out of earth's gravitational tug. The space shuttle's orbit really isn't that high. It's no where near the altitude of a geostationary orbit.

 

[Fox5]

I'm all for science & more spending on science. But simply, there's no need at the present time to send humans into space. And, does anyone really think that reinventing the wheel - sending man back to the moon - is going to spawn incredible inventions? Do some of you people really think "thank God for NASA! If it weren't for NASA, my glasses would scratch too easily" Or maybe, just maybe do you think that without NASA, someone might have said to themselves, "you know what? This really sucks. This is the 3rd set of lenses I've scratched this year. I think I'm going to work on materials to make these lenses more scratch resistant."

A lot of those things probably had no market before NASA, and thus were prohibitively expensive. The amount of money wasted on failures by NASA probably outweighs the money spent on the successes, but those successes may never have gotten off the ground without government subsidy. After all, how much did scratch resistant lenses cost in R&D? Was it worth it to reduce the number of sales by making lenses that last longer? Was it a given that it could be done cheap enough?
I actually think that will be the eventual outcome btw. That research is going to have to be government subsidized. Information is basically free nowadays thanks to the 'net, and government funded health care* resists paying the medicine companies more than it has to. With the way things are going, it'll become too dangerous for companies to invest in expensive R&D. Within the next 50 years, look for a return of the government R&D tax (what Bell Labs used to get before being broken up) and the death of capitalism in many high tech markets. It wasn't all that long ago that's what the telecom industry was, and a great many useful inventions, including the Internet, were a result of that.

*Yes, the US doesn't have federalized health care yet, but it'll happen. By being one of the few countries willing to pay for better healthcare, the US gets raked over the coals in medical costs, almost exclusively funding advanced medical R&D. That's a big burden on the US, and once health care is federalized the US won't pay it. Health care will either stagnate, or countries will have to put taxes in place to fund research.

 

[Mani]

Originally posted by: BeauJangles

Originally posted by: Mani
I am not thrilled about this either, but cuts need to be made, and if there is a non-critical need, it's space travel.

Do you really think Obama, a guy who is very interested in bringing science education and the US scientific community up to par, is thrilled about these cuts either?

Obama's inheriting a terrible situation and he's going to have to cut budgets of programs he supports.

Relax dude, I'm agreeing with you.

 

[MovingTarget]

Originally posted by: Pneumothorax

Originally posted by: Young Grasshopper
Welfare Queens/Food Stamps = waste of money

CORRECTED

Fail. This argument has been debunked many times. The stereotypical welfare queen is a myth. Would you really want to get rid of these benefits in a recession, when people need them most? Have you ever been on public assistance during hard times due to layoffs? I think not.

 

[Colt45]

If Russia can get people to space in a 50 year old design that runs on fucking kerosene, I'm pretty sure NASA should be able to come up with a budget rocket... but they won't. NASA has the whole $500 toilet seat thing in common with the military, hell they probably have $5000 toilet seats.

 

[libs0n]

The entire premise of this thread is flawed.

1. Obama is not seeking to gut NASA, but rather is performing due diligence ahead of assuming power.
2. Ares is not the moon program, or NASA's manned spaceflight program, but an *implementation* to achieve those objectives.
3. The looking into alternative implementations, like the Atlas 5 or Delta 4 rockets, is to see if there is benefit in pursuing those implementations rather than the Ares.

In short, Obama's transition team is looking to see if there is a better way to achieve the objective of both going to the moon and shortening the gap from when the Shuttle is retired and a suitable crew transport is operational. He is in fact barking up the right tree, as using the EELVs will be faster, safer, and cheaper than the Ares rocket. The only reason the EELVs were not picked in the first place is because the Ares program is in fact mainly pork for the established Shuttle contractors. If you truly believe that NASA's exploration of space and the moon are worthwhile goals, then you would support the canceling of the Ares series of rockets in favour of the alternatives, as the Ares rockets are a hideously expensive diversion from the true objective.

Originally posted by: freshgeardude
Here

The transition team is demanding deep cuts from the agency, and is investigating whether old military rockets such as the Delta IV and Atlas V could be used in place of Ares.

oh please, those rockets are so obsolete.. im sure they will cost way to much money now to dig back into those projects and try and make them usable.

You are factually incorrect here. The rockets in question are modern day operational rockets, not the Atlas' and Delta's of the past. They are in fact relativeley recent vehicles, as they were commissioned by the Air Force only in the past decade. They've had 21 flights since then, and are pretty much near term usable to launch a crewed capsule; all they need is the addition of a health monitoring system to alert the capsule's abort motor to fire in the event of failure. To better acquaint yourself with them, google the Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle program, or the rockets themselves.

Text

is pretty clear that

Obama may be considering ending the Ares rocket program, intended to be the replacement for the space shuttle.

and this also means

This could mean potentially for the first time in over 40 years the agency may have no method to send astronauts into space.

The growing gap between the Shuttle retirement and the operation of a new vehicle is the direct consequence of the Ares being selected as the next system. It is an entirely new vehicle of questionable design, and has been pushing its operational date years into the future as problems have arisen in its development. As largely operational rockets with only minor modifications needed to carry a capsule, the EELVs will in fact shorten the gap before the next system is brought online. They will also be safer as they have a reliable operational record compared with the completely untested Ares 1. If you truly want to see that gap shortend, then you would applaud the switch to the EELVs.

***

To reiterate, there have been no cuts to NASA. Anyone who says otherwise is misinformed. Even if the Ares rockets were canceled in favour of the EELVs, that would be the right thing to do as they are a serious boondoggle that will set back your space program for decades.

edit: Also, NASA's money is peanuts when it's taken in perspective with other expenditures. NASA's yearly budget is around 17 billion. Compare that with a 600 billion+ dollar military, 700 billion dollar bank bailout, a trillion dollar stimulus package, the yearly trillion plus discretionary budget and a multi-trillion dollar federal budget. Even if you cut it, it's not gonna make but a hill of beans difference in your bottom line.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Originally posted by: freshgeardude

Originally posted by: sunzt
NASA Spin Offs

Link shows 2008 issue of Spin Off where it lists most important NASA spin offs from health and medicine, transportation, public safety, Consumer; home; recreation; environmental and agricultural, computer tech, and industrial productivity.

READ IT AND APPRECIATE NASA.

217 pages of in your face to the people who think NASA is a waste of tax dollars.

:thumbsup:

 

[miketheidiot]

Originally posted by: Genx87
Hehe well we are in a recession on the verge of a depression. Cuts are expected. However I will enjoy watching people who blasted Bush for not supporting NASA as much as he could praise Obama for this move.

i don't thin you will get that pleasure.


:thumbsdown: to this move.

 

[umbrella39]

Originally posted by: Pneumothorax

Originally posted by: Young Grasshopper
Welfare Queens/Food Stamps = waste of money

CORRECTED

Yeah because exploring space is much more important in these economic times than giving food stamps to the millions that have found themselves unemployed. I don't want to see a dime taken away from NASA either but if there has to be cuts, then let them get the cuts, not the people who need to eat.

Fail.

 

[miketheidiot]

Originally posted by: Vic
It's only big govt socialism when it's spent on something useful.

If space is so great, why doesn't private industry invest more?

you could make a market failure argument here pretty easily, and in quite a few ways.

 

[miketheidiot]

Originally posted by: Fear No Evil


This is where I disagree with the 'wasted money' in Iraq argument. SOMEBODY has to make all these bullets, bombs, helicopters, planes, tanks, humvees, body armor suits, etc. And most of the time those companies are in the United States. War isn't always wasted money, it creates a ton of jobs and the war in Iraq I think arguably could be credited with saving TONS of defense jobs. Our troops are getting combat pay, tons of contractors are getting work over there. Companies are selling power and water equipment over there.. etc. Its not just going into a black hole.

you apparently don't get economics.