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America Needs a New Moon Mission

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Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#71

Post by ethbro »

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #35
ethbro wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

"Earth always has been, and in all likelihood will forever be, screwed up." Agreed. Not only screwed up, but screwed up in multiple ways. Throwing more money at the dozens of money sinks here does nothing to significantly help ensure our long-term survival. It might be the right thing to do, and over time continuing to do things like this may mean that mankind enters into some new wondrous universe free from pain and…

To be accurate, we did go to the moon and do the other things.

The other things at the time happened to be ensuring people weren't lynched for the color of their skin and ensuring Vietnam didn't fall to communism on the current administration's watch.

Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#72

Post by ethbro »

streuselpie wrote: post #44
ethbro wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 you can't sustain a a huge, rich, self-repairing ecosystem, what are your chances of getting one of the ground where there is none, and then sutaining it? Are we really sure this isn't just a bunch of rationalization because really, we ought to confront the people who carve up resources and people? Going to the moon, even colonizing the whole Milky Way is completely uninspiring compared to something like bringing…

> Going to the moon, even colonizing the whole Milky Way is completely uninspiring compared to something like bringing war criminals to justice

I'm all for creating as much justice and sustainability as we can with an efficient amount of effort, but still for stopping short of perfection. In a thousand years, which of your options is going to matter more to our future descendants?

Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#73

Post by EarthIsReal »

coldtea wrote: post #68
EarthIsReal wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Soooooo beautiful!!!!!!!..... http://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&gws_rd=cr&q=night+sky+... You'd think that with our history so closely connected with the stars (before urbanization limited your camera's view), someone would have made sure to take a couple of photos, even bringing additional lenses, for such a potentially interesting point of view.. Alas none

> You'd think that with our history so closely connected with the stars (before urbanization limited your camera's view), someone would have made sure to take a couple of photos, even bringing additional lenses, for such a potentially interesting point of view.. Alas none If by "none" you mean "some", them yes. E.g: http://eoimages.gsfc.nasa.gov/images/imagerecords/51000/5148... Anything else? (Even if nobody had bot…

>"some"

Where?? That image looks unrelated to any men on the Moon.

>somehow they would not know how to add stars with Photoshop to said images is beyond inane

That level of detail would take huge computational power and software. It takes a lot more than putting bright spots on a fake picture to exactly align said dots and their intensity with our Universe, especially from multiple angles.

Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#74

Post by coldtea »

EarthIsReal wrote: post #73
coldtea wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You'd think that with our history so closely connected with the stars (before urbanization limited your camera's view), someone would have made sure to take a couple of photos, even bringing additional lenses, for such a potentially interesting point of view.. Alas none If by "none" you mean "some", them yes. E.g: http://eoimages.gsfc.nasa.gov/images/imagerecords/51000/5148... Anything else? (Even if nobody had bot…

> "some" Where?? That image looks unrelated to any men on the Moon. > somehow they would not know how to add stars with Photoshop to said images is beyond inane That level of detail would take huge computational power and software. It takes a lot more than putting bright spots on a fake picture to exactly align said dots and their intensity with our Universe, especially from multiple angles.

>Where??? That image looks unrelated to any men on the Moon.

You didn't ask specifically for star photos from the moon. I sent one from space. Not enough? Or do you think that it's OK, we can get to space, but somehow the moon is out of bounds?

The few missions of men on the moon had limited time and better things to do than try to take multiple exposures (especially with the camera gear of the time) just to make pretty pictures.

>That level of detail would take huge computational power. It takes a lot more than putting bright spots on a fake picture to exactly align said dots and their intensity with our Universe, especially from multiple angles.

Actually, it's really trivial to do so in 3D space, doesn't take much of cpu, and tons of programs offer such "planetarium" functionality, where you can align everything, even moving around in time as you wish.

Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#75

Post by kesselvon »

perseusprime11 wrote: post #16

Instead of putting Men and Women on Moon or Mars or Jupiter's Moon, how about the new mission be "create environment for 100 spaceX like companies to thrive" I reject the premise that government should be creating these missions or setting these big audacious goals

Those free markets exist after the government already spent all the R&D money needed to make it a reality. Market-based plans can only happen after the research is done, since companies are really bad at long-term R&D with no clear exit.

Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#76

Post by euyyn »

EarthIsReal wrote: post #73
coldtea wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You'd think that with our history so closely connected with the stars (before urbanization limited your camera's view), someone would have made sure to take a couple of photos, even bringing additional lenses, for such a potentially interesting point of view.. Alas none If by "none" you mean "some", them yes. E.g: http://eoimages.gsfc.nasa.gov/images/imagerecords/51000/5148... Anything else? (Even if nobody had bot…

> "some" Where?? That image looks unrelated to any men on the Moon. > somehow they would not know how to add stars with Photoshop to said images is beyond inane That level of detail would take huge computational power and software. It takes a lot more than putting bright spots on a fake picture to exactly align said dots and their intensity with our Universe, especially from multiple angles.

> Long-exposure photos were taken with a special far ultraviolet camera, the Far Ultraviolet Camera/Spectrograph, by Apollo 16 astronauts from the surface of the Moon, and operated in the shadow of the Apollo Lunar Module (LM)

One such picture: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Apollo_16_UV_photo_of_Ear... and here with stars labelled: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Apollo16EarthID.png

It took literally one google search and clicking on the first result.

Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#77

Post by nine_k »

greglindahl wrote: post #23
nine_k wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

I don't see a contradiction here. Reusable launchers bring stuff in from Earth. They are just relieved from doing water tanker missions. But, if there's need, they can definitely bring in some water, too.

A partly self-replenishing Moon base is going to be cheaper to run than the ISS that depends on constant resupply from Earth.

Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#78

Post by drzaiusapelord »

euyyn wrote: post #60
danblick wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 re…

Just from the look of it, without having read the book nor Degroot's critics, looks like a pretty unbalanced viewpoint: "In the things the we seemed to be behind, we actually were ahead but it was a secret. In the things we irrefutably were behind, it's because we were just waiting for them to set the precedent". When an argument has such an onanistic appeal to patriots, it's suspect.

That book is fairly critical and a far cry from a patriotic tome. If anything, its anti-patriotic and is overly critical of NASA and US space policy while being fairly mum on the Soviet program and not having too much criticism of the costs of the Soviet programs. That book is the anti-Apollo and dismissive of US accomplishments. Sadly, we live in an age where ahistoric claptrap gets popular because internet forum bubbles encourage "alternative" thinking for the sake of being contrarian.

It is also full of dishonestly. The son of one of the engineers claims a interview in the book never happened:

https://www.amazon.com/Dark-Side-Moon-Magnificent-American/p...

Also this quote is completely out of context:

"But the final word goes to Eisenhower, who once vetoed Apollo. He reminded Americans that "every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed".

This was in reference to the war machine, not our civilian space program and its disingenuous to apply it to NASA.

Lastly, yes the US could have beat sputnik. Recent declassified memos which seem to be authentic have revealed this possibility. Von Braun had a 4-stage Jupiter-C in 1956. It had the capabilities to launch a satellite into orbit. Apparantly, the 4th stage was left ignored due to political concerns of setting off a arms race, or even a war, with the USSR if a US satellite flew over its country every 90 minutes or so.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/gerald-bracey/beating-the-russ...

Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#79

Post by coldtea »

euyyn wrote: post #76
EarthIsReal wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "some" Where?? That image looks unrelated to any men on the Moon. > somehow they would not know how to add stars with Photoshop to said images is beyond inane That level of detail would take huge computational power and software. It takes a lot more than putting bright spots on a fake picture to exactly align said dots and their intensity with our Universe, especially from multiple angles.

> Long-exposure photos were taken with a special far ultraviolet camera, the Far Ultraviolet Camera/Spectrograph, by Apollo 16 astronauts from the surface of the Moon, and operated in the shadow of the Apollo Lunar Module (LM) One such picture: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Apollo_16_UV_photo_of_Ear... and here with stars labelled: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Apollo16EarthID.png It took literally one goog…

>It took literally one google search

Is this observation addressed to me or to you?

Because it that's the kind of photo you wanted, it would have literally took one google search to find it when you asked for one. If anything, it seems like you cheer for finding evidence that speaks the contrary of your argument yourself.

I was referring to having the crew to take several long exposure captures so that you can see both earth and the stars properly exposed in the same photo, despite the limited dynamic range of film. Which this is not. If you don't accept the other stuff, why would'd accept some light dots near another light dot is a real picture of the Earth?

Re: America Needs a New Moon Mission

#80

Post by ben_w »

EarthIsReal wrote: post #73
coldtea wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You'd think that with our history so closely connected with the stars (before urbanization limited your camera's view), someone would have made sure to take a couple of photos, even bringing additional lenses, for such a potentially interesting point of view.. Alas none If by "none" you mean "some", them yes. E.g: http://eoimages.gsfc.nasa.gov/images/imagerecords/51000/5148... Anything else? (Even if nobody had bot…

> "some" Where?? That image looks unrelated to any men on the Moon. > somehow they would not know how to add stars with Photoshop to said images is beyond inane That level of detail would take huge computational power and software. It takes a lot more than putting bright spots on a fake picture to exactly align said dots and their intensity with our Universe, especially from multiple angles.

> That level of detail would take huge computational power and software.

It takes zero computational power and zero software. We've been able to fake stars since 1650.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planetarium

It would have been utterly trivial in the 60s and 70s, even without a massive planetarium, just using multiple exposures. 'cause that had been known about since the "fairies at the bottom of the garden" photos of the victorian era.

Stars in the background of the Apollo footage tells you nothing, at all.

The photos of the footprints, from an orbiting lunar reconnaissance probe, says more.

https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/images/584398main_M...

Edit to correct spelling, fottage->footage

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