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America Needs a New Moon Mission

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Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#21

Post by flogic »

sperling75 wrote: post #2

Agree completely that our space program needs a new significant mission to stay relevant. However, I don't think going to space matters as much as it did last century. During JFK's reign catching up in space with the soviets was more than about going to space, it was about being able to defend the country. Today I think our new Moon Mission should be about solving climate change. That's an issue the country and world…

I agree that we need to solve climate change. It's the single most important issue facing humanity at the moment. Where I don't agree though is the general idea that it's mutually exclusive with space exploration. A common theme is that space research often pays of in advancements down here.

If we actually have a stable outpost on the moon or Mars. We'll likely advance the state of solar systems and energy storage. We'll also likely need research into maintaining a stable biome on said station. And then there is the next generation of scientists that will be inspired. So in a roundabout way, space exploration could help save our butts down here.

Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#22

Post by nine_k »

greglindahl wrote: post #12

Some of the justifications in the article are running against modern rocketry: Who really thinks we can mine water on the moon more cheaply than launching it from Earth on a reusable rocket? Remember that it's not just SpaceX aiming at much lower launch costs, it's also Blue Origin.

There are significant chunks of water ice on Moon. Evaporating and re-condensation of that water on Moon surface can be a cheaper and a more dependable source than shipping from Earth.

Ideally, a Moon base should be able to produce key things, like energy, water, bulk building materials from local sources, and only depend on Earth for lighter-weight, high-tech supplies and machines.

Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#23

Post by greglindahl »

nine_k wrote: post #22
greglindahl wrote: post #12

Some of the justifications in the article are running against modern rocketry: Who really thinks we can mine water on the moon more cheaply than launching it from Earth on a reusable rocket? Remember that it's not just SpaceX aiming at much lower launch costs, it's also Blue Origin.

There are significant chunks of water ice on Moon. Evaporating and re-condensation of that water on Moon surface can be a cheaper and a more dependable source than shipping from Earth. Ideally, a Moon base should be able to produce key things, like energy, water, bulk building materials from local sources, and only depend on Earth for lighter-weight, high-tech supplies and machines.

Less ideally, a Moon base could be an uneconomic way of doing all of these things, eating all of NASA's human spaceflight budget. So after getting ourselves stuck with the cost of the Shuttle and the cost of ISS, now we'll get ourselves stuck in the cost of a Moon base that's less reliable and more expensive than reusable launchers.

The reusable launch thing will be proven out in 5-10 years, long before we could set up production on the moon.

Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#25

Post by nnq »

madaxe_again wrote: post #3
sperling75 wrote: post #2

Agree completely that our space program needs a new significant mission to stay relevant. However, I don't think going to space matters as much as it did last century. During JFK's reign catching up in space with the soviets was more than about going to space, it was about being able to defend the country. Today I think our new Moon Mission should be about solving climate change. That's an issue the country and world…

You're going to need to look beyond NASA for earth sciences for the time being - there's about to be a certain change in the US that has already said earth science research is to be scrapped. The new moon mission will likely literally be a moon mission, as the incoming change has alluded to. Honestly, not sure what the future is for NASA, other than perhaps the past, and a return to primarily propaganda rather than s…

As a non-american I still think that climate change is the wrong problem for the US to focus on, and space exploration and colonization goals are better targets.

The US has a huge concentration of wealth and brainpower. Neither of those are what's need to solve climate change. You'd need an army of Mahatma Gandhis and the new breed of "social entrepreneurs", not of Einsteins and Oppenheimers.

And you know, that concentration of wealth and brainpower is actually one of the problems that would have to be solved to solve climate change: India and China and soon Africa and all the other poorer countries will keep not giving a fuck about climate change and polution if it helps them pull up their living standards. Those CO2 and methane taxes: they'd rather fight a nuclear/chem/bio war than pay them! Only thing that would incite a more global cooperation towards reducing climate change would be a massive global redistribution of wealth.

And that would mean the end of US as an economic superpower among many other things.

So imho, US should shoot for the stars while you still can and raise the standard of the international space race at all cost! ...cause after the next either world war or "global redistribution of wealth" there might not be enough concentration of brainpower and wealth left to do these things, and the human race needs some kind of plan B!

Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#26

Post by danblick »

sperling75 wrote: post #2

Agree completely that our space program needs a new significant mission to stay relevant. However, I don't think going to space matters as much as it did last century. During JFK's reign catching up in space with the soviets was more than about going to space, it was about being able to defend the country. Today I think our new Moon Mission should be about solving climate change. That's an issue the country and world…

Gerard Degroot argues in "The Dark Side of the Moon" [1] that going to the moon was mostly about (1) allowing Democrats (LBJ and JFK) to score political points by criticising the Eisenhower administration and (2) cashing in on American cultural enthusiasm for space (Buck Rogers, Orson Welles, etc.). Space exploration didn't actually make much sense in terms of defense policy, international relations, or scientific research.

Eisenhower hated the idea of throwing money away on expensive programs that offered poor return on investment and were primarily funded for political reasons (his famous comments about the military industrial complex were made in a speech at the very end of his presidency). He funded development of American ICBM and space reconnaissance programs in the late 50s, but did so separately from space exploration programs. By the time of the Mercury missions we already had mature ICBM and satellite programs and it didn't have much to do with real defense needs.

Even in the late 50s the US was never really behind the USSR in terms of space technology, but for strategic reasons it was sometimes unclear how far ahead the US was (for example, we had extensive photographs from satellites showing Russian nuclear missile launch sites; these indicated that we had far more missiles than the Russians, but at the time the satellites used to collect these photos were still secret, and so the intelligence they revealed was not widely known, even though most Americans believed at the time that America lagged behind the Russians).

Sputnik may have been the first satellite in space, but Eisenhower had intentionally stopped von Braun from launching a satellite even though we were very close to having that capability. Eisenhower was mostly concerned with establishing a precedent that would allow satellites to fly over foreign countries, and didn't mind if the Russians were the first to space if this meant that one of their satellites would establish this precedent instead of one of ours.

(1) https://www.amazon.com/dp/0814719953

Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#27

Post by Tuna-Fish »

nnq wrote: post #25
madaxe_again wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're going to need to look beyond NASA for earth sciences for the time being - there's about to be a certain change in the US that has already said earth science research is to be scrapped. The new moon mission will likely literally be a moon mission, as the incoming change has alluded to. Honestly, not sure what the future is for NASA, other than perhaps the past, and a return to primarily propaganda rather than s…

As a non-american I still think that climate change is the wrong problem for the US to focus on, and space exploration and colonization goals are better targets. The US has a huge concentration of wealth and brainpower. Neither of those are what's need to solve climate change. You'd need an army of Mahatma Gandhis and the new breed of "social entrepreneurs", not of Einsteins and Oppenheimers. And you know, that conce…

I couldn't disagree with you more.

New Einsteins and Oppenheimers are precisely what's needed to fight climate change. "Social enterpreneurs" will do jack squat, other than make people feel better. The only way to actually beat climate change is to improve the relevant technology to the point where the route to high standard of living is cheaper to do with clean tech. Constantly reducing the cost of solar power, and better batteries mean that we are halfway there.

The job of carbon taxes is not to be the cause of reducing global emissions in the long term. It's to make development of cleaner energy production more economically viable in the short term, to drive investment that way, so that the cost can eventually be driven below fossil fuels.

It's not necessary for some to be pulled down for others to climb up. The rest of the world catching up (and they will) will do nothing to the capability of the the USA.

Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#29

Post by kazagistar »

ethbro wrote: post #20
sperling75 wrote: post #2

Agree completely that our space program needs a new significant mission to stay relevant. However, I don't think going to space matters as much as it did last century. During JFK's reign catching up in space with the soviets was more than about going to space, it was about being able to defend the country. Today I think our new Moon Mission should be about solving climate change. That's an issue the country and world…

Earth always has been, and in all likelihood will forever be, screwed up. Climate change will never be solved until (to paraphrase a quip from memory) global inequity has been evened out to a level a Pakistani brickmaker would consider prosperity. I don't see countries with higher standards of living making those sacrifices for the greater good of our planet. I'd sleep much better betting our species on space expansi…

If peak global output is barely enough to colonize, then there is no way any of the colonies will ever reach that level of output, and then whats the point? It should be done sustainably, or it doesn't really matter at all.

Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#30

Post by mitchtbaum »

This comment shows what enormous damage belief in manned, extra-orbital space visits does to us (us = humans, life on Earth).

Of course I'm going to take downvotes for saying this, so I'll ask gullible readers one question: what ^^evidence^^ have you seen that proved such extraordinary events took place anywhere other than on your screens?

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