Let's Go, Already!
Aug. 5th, 2005 04:43 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
redaxeI have several times, in several places, noted that there is a need for a specific mission, in terms of manned space exploration, for the venture to succeed. Here is someone who notes both the successes and failures of the Shuttle program, criticizing it as being too vague and undefined a venture:
Note, you critics, that the author does not advocate shutting down the program in all events: "some purpose beyond trying to keep its participants alive." That's what I've suggested, and again suggest. When you define a goal in your daily life, the difference between the current state and the desired end state provide guidance and insight into the specific issues and steps that are necessary to move from point A to point B. This concept is infinitely scalable. It works on your smallest problems, it works on your largest problems, it works on the problems of your neighborhood, your school board, your town or city, your state or province or barony or fiefdom, your country, and your species.
It has already worked with regard to the manned space program It was called Apollo, which followed Gemini, which followed Mercury, during which then-President John F. Kennedy announced a clear intention of placing a man on the moon within ten years. During that time, step by step, incrementally and in both evolutionary and revolutionary jumps, science and technology were developed with the goal in mind. Safety was paramount -- and there was an awareness that this would be, of necessity, a dangerous venture however much advancement was made. There always is, pioneering.
Lives were lost. The program moved ahead toward its goal.
Unfortunately, no concrete goal was defined or declared after that one was achieved.
The Shuttle, as shown in the linked article, was a good but unworkable idea, reaching for more than could be achieved at the time. That happens a lot. IBM tried to make computer peripherals Plug-n-Play (though not in those words :-) with the Micro Channel Architecture it introduced in the PS/2. The technology wasn't up to it -- but that doesn't mean either that it was a bad idea, nor unworkable. It was just that the tech needed to be better, and, in fact, provides the key for the later, successful, design.
However he got to the idea (and we can explore the rights, wrongs, ins, outs, and power-grabs elsewhen; please let's leave them out of comments here), George W. Bush has suggested getting a permanent manned presence in space (either orbit or on Luna), or else trying to reach Mars in 30 years. Personally, I'd start with getting back to the Moon, and colonizing it. (Sure, L4 and L5 are closer. But Luna has several advantages, including both some gravity and local materials to build with, assuming you can work them.) One step at a time, and we have a giant leap to make. Again.
NASA dismisses such helpful suggetions [as grounding the Shuttle and doing unmanned science only] as unworthy of its mission of 'exploration', likening critics of manned space flight to those Europeans in the 1500's who would have cancelled the great voyages of discovery rather than face the loss of one more ship.
Of course, the great explorers of the 1500's did not sail endlessly back and forth a hundred miles off the coast of Portugal, nor did they construct a massive artificial island they could repair to if their boat sprang a leak.
...
The goal cannot be to have a safe space program - rocket science is going to remain difficult and risky. But we have the right to demand that the space program have some purpose beyond trying to keep its participants alive. NASA needs to take a lesson in courage from its astronauts, and demand either a proper, funded mandate for manned exploration, or close down the program. By NASA's own arguments, the commercial, technological and intellectual allure of manned space exploration are so great that it will not be a hard case to make. But even if the worst happens and the Shuttles are mothballed, with the the ISS left abandoned, the loss to science will have been negligible. That is the great tragedy of the current 'return to flight', and the sooner we force the agency to confront its failure, the greater our chances of salvaging a space program worth keeping out of the current mess.
Note, you critics, that the author does not advocate shutting down the program in all events: "some purpose beyond trying to keep its participants alive." That's what I've suggested, and again suggest. When you define a goal in your daily life, the difference between the current state and the desired end state provide guidance and insight into the specific issues and steps that are necessary to move from point A to point B. This concept is infinitely scalable. It works on your smallest problems, it works on your largest problems, it works on the problems of your neighborhood, your school board, your town or city, your state or province or barony or fiefdom, your country, and your species.
It has already worked with regard to the manned space program It was called Apollo, which followed Gemini, which followed Mercury, during which then-President John F. Kennedy announced a clear intention of placing a man on the moon within ten years. During that time, step by step, incrementally and in both evolutionary and revolutionary jumps, science and technology were developed with the goal in mind. Safety was paramount -- and there was an awareness that this would be, of necessity, a dangerous venture however much advancement was made. There always is, pioneering.
Lives were lost. The program moved ahead toward its goal.
Unfortunately, no concrete goal was defined or declared after that one was achieved.
The Shuttle, as shown in the linked article, was a good but unworkable idea, reaching for more than could be achieved at the time. That happens a lot. IBM tried to make computer peripherals Plug-n-Play (though not in those words :-) with the Micro Channel Architecture it introduced in the PS/2. The technology wasn't up to it -- but that doesn't mean either that it was a bad idea, nor unworkable. It was just that the tech needed to be better, and, in fact, provides the key for the later, successful, design.
However he got to the idea (and we can explore the rights, wrongs, ins, outs, and power-grabs elsewhen; please let's leave them out of comments here), George W. Bush has suggested getting a permanent manned presence in space (either orbit or on Luna), or else trying to reach Mars in 30 years. Personally, I'd start with getting back to the Moon, and colonizing it. (Sure, L4 and L5 are closer. But Luna has several advantages, including both some gravity and local materials to build with, assuming you can work them.) One step at a time, and we have a giant leap to make. Again.
