If Obama succeeds in killing the NASA Constellation project, what then?

The last scheduled Space Shuttle mission is STS-133, scheduled for September 16 of this year when the Discovery takes flight for the last time. After that, where do we go from here - aside from calling Russia?

I know there are commercial spacecraft entrepreneurs, including Bert Rutan of X-Prize fame, but do any of them have any working designs that can deliver supplies, modules, and crew to the ISS and back again? And is NASA working on a backup plan in case Constellation is truly killed off?

It's a terrible idea and we're gonna fight it.

Keith's space expert was saying this last night. That's the plan and he said it was a good one.

If they go that route, I don't see a future for NASA.

Which sucks.

That was the plan in the beginning... to create a commercial space program.

Let the private sector do it... that would keep workers employed and keep the government spending down.

and there is plenty of research being done by NASA that commercial firms will NEVER ever do because it costs too much, the risks are too great, and there's no clear path to a quarterly profit.

are all not "commercially worthwhile".

Generally it is govt who fills the role of stuff that is no "commercially worthwhile".

Just because it doesn't have immediate commercial value doesn't mean it doesn't benefit mankind.

The govt sponsors pure research in academic settings for the exact same reason. Some research is unpredictable and we never know how it will have commercial value.

Not every result the government produces has to be measured in dollars and cents. There is that little thing about "promoting the general welfare and securing the blessings of our liberty" to ourselves and those who come after us to keep in mind.

Seward bought Alaska. It's about "a vast future also" as Lincoln put it. You can't put great discovery and innovation on a corporate quarterly profits timetable because it just doesn't work that way.

There seems to be quite a few commercial oganizations working on the development of space technology. Guess they're all crazy, eh?

as in satellite launches, NOT doing basic research. Guess you need to read more carefully eh?

We have more immediate needs at the moment. Once we're back on track, I see the funding coming back as well. I do think that the research budget should be left alone for the most part... I can see the need to cut back on building expensive ships.

if there is a budget deficit that means we need to raise taxes to close the gap - not cut spending in a recession. WORST. IDEA. EVER.

But yes, there are more immediate needs.

Let the private sector take over, as was the plan anyway.

it's NASA AND homeless people... RAISE taxes on the rich. Cut spending on the Iraq War. There's NO NEED to screw with NASA.

Me and Obama pick the real science.

It doesn't.

"I'm an engineer" is an argument from authority. And on the internet no less.

Aristotle would be proud.

Except for ddeclues logical fallacies, those are invalid by default.

You have a Nobel laureate physicist saying (prior to this whole budget affair) that manned spaceflight is not producing useful results. He's not the only one. There authorities on all sides.

http://www.space.com/news/070918_weinberg_critique.html

We need under sea cities for when the asteroids come. There, hows that for something for engineers to do? :)

Pure fiction, just like the value of the ISS.

I don't think tossing credentials around (on the internet of all places) is much of an argument.

Sure, PRESIDENT Obama is not an engineer.

But he can snap his fingers and have a large team of top engineers assembled at a moments notice to give him their cutting edge consensus on how to proceed.

Can you?

As an astronomer, I'm not that excited about another moon landing. But I sure am looking forward to the James Webb Space Telescope.

Since it will be at the L2 Lagrange point, it is well beyond any manned repair missions using current vehicles.

L2 might start getting crowded in the future.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lagrangian_point#L2

From the actual budget overview at http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/420990main_FY_201_%20Budget_Overview_1_Feb_2010.pdf

I wish someone would "screw" me like that.

NASA has been cut back for years, so this doesn't begin to get it back to where it needs to be.

after which NASA will be shelved once people stop paying attention to launches that aren't happening anymore.

And, for a lot longer. What makes NASA more special than them?

At this rate NASA will be history. Obama, much as I like him, has burned the fleet.

At least for a while... we just don't have the money. It needs moved to the back burner, taxes need raised on the rich (aka Bush tax cuts end) and cut spending on the war(s). We are seriously fucked here, and it's going to take a lot of cut backs to get back on the right path.

. . . but there will always be more pressing needs. I think that the window for space exploration is narrow and if it gets closed for too long it'll stay closed and we'll just be stuck in a closed system that will be subject to increasing levels of entropy.

We need to cut spending, end the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy, and cut spending wherever we can for at least a few years. We are otherwise seriously doomed.

How did you ever choose the DMT molecule as your signature image? And have you seen these?



The people at Erowid got a glassblower to make glass models of various psychotropics. Very beautiful and very unique.

. . . I've worked a lot with Ayahuasca in South America and, well, DMT is pretty amazing.

I haven't seen those molecule sculptures. Very nice.

Self-delete

http://science.slashdot.org/story/10/02/02/1716211/The-Upside-of-the-NASA-Budget?art_pos=4

"There are a lot of articles circulating about the new changes to the NASA budget, but this one goes into some of the details. From what I'm seeing, it looks great — cutting off the big, expensive, over-budget stuff and allowing a whole bunch of important and revolutionary programs to get going: commercial space transportation; keeping the ISS going (now that we've finally got it up and running); working on orbital propellant storage (so someday we can go off to the far flung places); automated rendezvous and docking (allowing multiple, smaller launches, which then form into one large spacecraft in orbit). Quoting: 'NASA is out of the business of putting people into low-earth orbit, and doesn't see getting back in to it. The Agency now sees its role as doing interesting things with people once they get there, hence its emphasis on in-orbit construction, heavy lift capabilities, and resource harvesting hardware. Given budgetary constraints and the real issues with the Constellation program, none of that is necessarily unreasonable. '"

http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2010/02/nasa-reboots-focuses-on-cheaper-sustainable-exploration.ars

http://www.networkworld.com/news/2010/020110-layer8-nasa-commercial-space-contracts.html?hpg1=bn

:hi:

...when we were on the moon. Unless, of course, you are one of those moon-landing conspiracy theorists.

:tinfoilhat:

Now the Chinese and Indians are in space, as are the Europeans.

And, they're 40 years behind us.

Science that can't be replicated isn't science anymore, and you aren't replicating it.

With their money. They aren't ahead of us. I don't see the Chinese putting up a space station or sending rovers to Mars, or probes throughout our solar system, and I don't see their version of the Hubbell telescope. Yeah, it would be great if NASA got more money. It would be great if the National Park Service, USGS, NOAA and Fish and Wildlife had budgets the size of NASA's too. There's more than one kind of science, and only so much money out there. I don't want to see funds wasted on a project that even its manager admits is over budget and and too far behind schedule.

it's not my problem. The Chinese have people in space, India sent a lunar probe...Rome disappeared for the same reasons.

Exactly my point.

I don't know why people think 'money' goes into space. What goes up is plastic, wiring, metal, circuit boards, fiberglass etc.

The money stays here, in salaries for all the people at NASA, and in salaries to their contractors and sub-contractors.

And they go out and spend it on groceries and housing and furniture and cars, and all the other things that keeps the economy ticking over.

Cutting back at NASA or eliminating it means more homeless starving people in the end, while all the 'talent' will go to other countries with space programs.

Your a LIBERAL!

peace and low stress
:patriot:

:fistbump:

Not for stuff to send astronauts to ISS or to the moon.

not suck for the Wii system.

USA!USA!

It's pointless, no good science comes from it. Just think what 9 Billion for robots would get us? Look what Pioneer, Voyager, and the two Mars rovers Spirit/Opportunity have contributed? People in space? Not worth it.

Just because we can go jump in Lake Michigan in January doesn't make it a good idea.

The space station has been a money pit. All we got was something that WILL BE PUSHED OUT OF ORBIT IN 10 YEARS.

We've come up with whole new technologies from space, so it has great benefits.

No one is going to sit breathless in front of their TV sets, and cheer on robots. It's as exciting as watching paint dry. Funding will dry up altogether if that's what happens.

It wasn't my idea to put up a space station, we already had a perfectly good one called the moon.

However, we've learned a lot from the ISS as well...and btw there is no money on board.

But the IIS has been a waste of time and money. Over 20 years and we're going to deorbit it in less than 10. Crazy.

And this particular mission is a waste, not all science work out of NASA. If you had a choice between keeping the IIS alive until 2020 till we crash it into the atmosphere or launching DSCOVR, which would you pick? One will add pollution to the atmosphere, the other will answer some real science questions about the atmosphere. Yes?

NASA's use of Velcro helped popularize it in the United States.

:)

The same technology that allows NASA Engineers to improve picture quality is now regularly used by MDs to look inside your body without invasive surgery. Unless you enjoy the pain of unecessary surgery.

Like getting weather reports days in advance? How bout Satellite TV? Or your cell phone? None of these would be possible without Satellites that are circling the globe in geosynchronous orbit.

Like using your computer mouse? A proto-type of it is a product of the Engineers of NASA.

Lifeshears, used to tear away debris to rescue accident victims.

Virtual reality, human tissue stimulator, digital imaging breast biopsy system, laswer angioplasty, cool suits, programmable pacemakers, ocular screening, air purifiers that eliminate pathogens and preserve food, biological threat sensors.... literally thousands of things.

I repeat, it wasn't my idea to have a space station, we already have the moon available, but we have learned a great deal from it nonetheless.

No, not all science is done out of NASA....which is no reason to defund NASA.

How about keeping the space station alive until we are capable of reaching the moon?

That's my point. Have robots do it, keep the people on the ground, get some real science done.

We can't even explore our own oceans, why go to another planetary body?

Like I said, no one will sit breathless in front of their TVs cheering on robots...and funding will be cut again if that's the approach.

Real science requires real people. Robots are useful for a lot of things, but the human mind that built them is also required in space.

We are exploring our own oceans, humans can multi-task. Robots can only do what they are programmed to do.

Why ever do anything?

Why go outside the cave?

Why go over the next hill?

Why bother at all?

That's the neat thing about knowledge...it feeds on itself and grows exponentially.

In spite of your best efforts to keep us on the ground, Dr Woo.

Something you seem to oppose in general.

Maybe it would have helped to read the links.

Most of us on here don't get our science knowledge from Wikipedia.

Or corn syrup

You've still got the knee jerk disregard for wikipedia?

Wow.

Why don't you look at something worthwhile instead of sitting there grumping in your block of cement?

http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/hqlibrary/pathfinders/spinoff.htm

Oh, did you want Wiki?

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_are_the_benefits_of_space_exploration

The second link's another sales pitch, and unlike my wiki links, contains no discussion or references.

Enjoy your cement.

And that should concern you, but I see it doesn't.

This is a good move for the US. Long past due, actually.

Several Roman emperors said much the same.

Couple of Chinese ones too.

You never have any intention of discussing things, you just like to be argumentative.

The first commercially viable CT scanner was invented by Sir Godfrey Hounsfield in Hayes, United Kingdom at EMI Central Research Laboratories using X-rays. Hounsfield conceived his idea in 1967,<6> and it was publicly announced in 1972. Allan McLeod Cormack of Tufts University in Massachusetts independently invented a similar process, and both Hounsfield and Cormack shared the 1979 Nobel Prize in Medicine.<7>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-ray_computed_tomography

I don't believe that NASA developed the MRI either. You can check for yourself by downloading "The History, Development and Impact of Computed Imaging in Neurological Diagnosis and Neurosurgery: CT, MRI, and DTI" from http://precedings.nature.com/documents/3267/version/5

NASA, in order to secure funding, has a habit of making quite egregious claims of inventing or developing all sorts of things that it only had some tenuous relationship with.

If you imagine it, then it comes true. That's how real science works.

to start arguments?

Didn't Skinner make a request today that people try to be more civil on here?

After all those posts where you stick your fingers in your ears and call me names?

No fingers in ears, no names.

Woo-woo is what you do, and it's a favorite topic of yours.

I'm an integral part of the moon program.

Alan Sheppard did most of the eastern portion and Werner Von Braun did most of the central coast.

topics. You might as well just post a series of smilies so people don't waste time trying.

They actually preceded it with the Echo experiments and the first Telstar satellites. If anything, they absorbed technology transfers from the military intelligence satellite programs, rather than NASA.

Nor do I believe that NASA made any significant contribution to cellular telephony. The basic architecture of cellular telephony came out of Bell Labs and other civilian labs. The CDMA technology developed by Qualcomm came from military communications.

They are, however, part of the space program, and all of it works together. Many disciplines, one field.

The cumulative distance covered by the Spirit rover in six years worth of exploration could have been covered by a human being, on foot, in a single day. All of the combined science performed by the rover, in six years, could have been performed by a single human scientist in under a week. Even worse, the NASA rover operators have logged literally HUNDREDS of situations where they have spotted items that looked very interesting, but they were unable to access them because the terrain was too steep, the ground too soft, or because they were more than a few dozen yards from the rovers planned path. A detour to look at an interesting rock that a human could do in minutes requires DAYS of planning and maneuvering with the rovers.

Robots are a poor substitute for self-aware and curious scientists on the ground.

There's no need to bring oxygen. Or water. Or food. Or place to store waste. There's no risk of somebody getting hurt. No risk of somebody dying. No risk of setting the space program back many years and billions of dollars like the last two times NASA got people killed thanks to the wasteful and nearly scientifically useless manned space program.

I for one, don't want to live in a padded world where we aren't allowed to do anything "dangerous". If the astronauts know the risks and are willing to accept them, nobody should have a problem with it.

Second, you're thinking about this all wrong. There have already been proposals that would eliminate the need to bring oxygen or water to Mars. Only a small chemical reactor and some hydrogen catalyst are needed. Everything else can be manufactured on site from gasses already present in the Martian atmosphere. You should look up the Mars Direct plan to see just how little is actually needed to accomplish a transit to Mars.

Just the consequences of near certain failure on other people.

"Second, you're thinking about this all wrong. There have already been proposals that would eliminate the need to bring oxygen or water to Mars. Only a small chemical reactor and some hydrogen catalyst are needed. Everything else can be manufactured on site from gasses already present in the Martian atmosphere. You should look up the Mars Direct plan to see just how little is actually needed to accomplish a transit to Mars."

Well, yes. That or they'll take the transporter beam to Mars, live off of food made by replicators, and get around the place by riding on sand worms.

And cement.

Urdoinitrong.

Woo woo refers specifically to pseudoscience. Homeopathy, crystals, general scientific illiteracy, that sort of thing. You're calling me a woo woo, but I've not promoted pseudoscience once in this thread or any other. You seem to be suggesting that I'm woo woo because I'm "anti-science" because I'm in favor of this cut. In fact, this budget actually increases funding for science by billions of dollars, the pro-science crowd (not that I think you know) supports this. You, on the otherhand, have a kneejerk dismissal of this increase to science budgets, so if anybody here approximates woo woo, it'd by you, Boo. It's further interesting to note how you react to information you don't like. You claimed NASA's to thank for MRIs and cellphones and CT scans and computer mice, and what not. Then when confronted with solid explanations that such claims are false, you get all persnippity instead of addressing the issue. More wooishness.

And as for cement- I've got no idea what the hell you're talking about.

how many robots could we send instead? Seriously, one person or 50 robots? If you like a rock in a hard place, design a robot and send 10 of them to look at it. They don't need to come back, like if the operator confuses meters and feet during entry... :) :) :)

:hi:

even longer if you count the last scientifically valid mission which was Skylab. Science and space exploration did not cease during the Carter administration, far from it.

As long as we have plan to explore Mars by 2030 I will be happy. A robotic sample return mission could utilitize an existing launch vehicle and serve as a proof of concept for any future manned mission.

:eyes:

SpaceX has the Falcon 9: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_9
It's scheduled to be launched this year.

They're also developing a manned capsule to be launched on the Falcon 9 that will carry 7 astronauts to the station:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_Dragon

I doubt these things will be ready to go as quickly as Elon Musk says but they'll still be available MUCH sooner than the Ares I will have been. I believe they'll also be much safer as well since they're liquid fueled like the old Apollo rocket rather than solid fuel.

An interview with Elon Musk: http://www.livescience.com/common/media/video/player.php?section_id=8

Edit: Forgot to mention...Bigelow Aerospace has two "space stations" of their own in orbit right now. With the Falcon 9 or another design, people will be able to travel to private space stations without the involvement of NASA.

If that's accurate (big if) we're talking a third of the shuttle's payload at 1/30 the price. And that's just for the medium rocket.

The Saturn V had it's share of bugs and oddities, and liquid fueled rockets have always had an unhealthy habit of exploding.

I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just wondering what the basis for that statement is. As it is, the logic (as I see it) behind the Ares-I 1st stage and Ares V boosters being solid is, you can reuse them, and you don't have to build a rather complicated, expensive liquid-fueled rocket engine just to throw it away after one use.

Just repeating what I've heard from other space enthusiasts who actually have knowledge of the design of liquid fueled and solid fueled rockets.

If you say that there's are reasons that SRBs aren't inferior to liquid-fueled rocket engines, then maybe you're right. I can't really argue the point. The only other liquid fueled rockets I've read about are Apollo and the V-2, the latter of which did have a propensity towards explosion. :)

It's time to look at a completely new paradigm for space travel using robotics and new technology. NASA is still basing everything on yesterday. This is the perfect place to stop and reengineer the space program into the 21st century and beyond.

Who wants to throw good money into old technology these days? Not me.

I know that some believe that killing manned flight will make it easier for congress to slash the funding. I'm not so sure that is inevitable and that should be the battle. I'm a huge believer in the need to eventually build manned bases on the moon and to visit Mars and beyond. I do think that the strategy of getting funding through the human drama of manned flights has been a hinderance. We need to develop methods and infrastructure in space that makes those more ambitious programs possible. Robots can and should be working on the moon today, stockpiling fuel at the very least, possibly building the foundations for a human base.

NASA should be about science, and maybe even about the big explorations. There is potential for space to be cost effective for the private market, and it should be NASA's mission to unlock that potential and raze the barriers that exist.

ending manned flights is the smart thing to do; it's zero sum funding;

See, the ONLY reason we haven't ended hunger, homelessness, psoriasis, etc. is because of the few cents NASA gets.

And obviously, ANY money spent on science or space exploration must be a giant fucking waste, see, that's why the media sees fit to attach a price tag every time they tell you that someone at NASA farted.

Wouldn't it be funny if ...other things... were treated similarly by the media?

"Today, a non-violent pothead was sent to prison, at a cost of $80,000 a year"

"The Military fired four cruise missiles, at $6 Million Dollars each, which succeeded in taking out a mobile falafel stand"

Once we stop "wasting" all this money on goofy shit like exploring the universe, obviously all our problems here on Earth will be solved. Shit, we've cut NASA's budget countless times, cancelled all manner of projects, since 1970... and that's why we've solved so many problems down here in the last 40 years, don'tchaknow?

Why, by now, with all the space projects that have been canned, we ought to be living in Paradise!

including Space Shuttle (all except Enterprise) ; I could see where Constellation might be suitable for cancellation ... It has had serious design issues from the start ...

Everybody seems to forget about Elon Musk, Space X and the Falcon/Dragon ....

Space X is the closest any commercial outfit has come to providing 'private' station resupply and crew transfer ....

Dragon is being designed for both manned and unmanned transfer tasks ... They have been slow and steady towards that goal ....

Even though the bastards refused to hire me (As an 'experienced space vehicle technician', I make 'too much money')

Even though they refused to hire me, they do have a robust design, a decent track record, and a committed workforce ...

Constellation has had it's problems, and I could see why some would want it to get deep sixed ....