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Mangalyaan, India’s First Mars Mission

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Re: Mangalyaan, India’s First Mars Mission

#81

Post by InclinedPlane »

bolder88 wrote: post #30
pavs wrote: post #19

Every time India space programs discussion comes out a group of people will bring up India's poverty and other problem that should be fixed instead of investing on space program. I used to be one of those guys (I am from Bangladesh), then I looked at the actual cost of this space program and realized that its not a lot of money (~$70 Million) even by India's standard. For example, in india's domestic cricket tourname…

One of the bigger questions is international aid. "Since 2007 India has been the world's largest recipient of recorded remittances from abroad. In 2010 these inflows were worth $54bn (£35bn). UK foreign direct investment in India is considerable, reaching £1.8bn in the same year." You can't really on the one hand claim your country is terribly poor, and needs handouts from other nations, and on the other play at bein…

Can you guess which country is the 6th highest in remittances?

France.

Do you want to guess what number 8 is? Germany. Are these poor countries? Are remittances "international aid"? No, not necessarily. They're just an example of extended families spread out across different countries sending different parts of the family money. Should we begrudge France or Germany their remittances? Or their space programs?

Re: Mangalyaan, India’s First Mars Mission

#82

Post by amalag »

sateesh wrote: post #51
maaku wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regarding the peanuts (in case this was lost on others): it's a JPL tradition that mission control open and share a jar of nuts right before the launch / orbital insertion / landing, for good luck. The point, obviously, is that space programs everywhere have good luck superstitions, many of them making less sense than a religious ritual.

>> is that space programs everywhere have good luck superstitions, many of them making less sense than a religious ritual. Why so ? How does a religious ritual makes more sense than good luck superstitions ?

Religious rituals are meant to connect with the divine. The idea being they are not inventions of ordinary people. Some created superstition just gives some order in someone's life and is just a shadow of a proper ritual.

Re: Mangalyaan, India’s First Mars Mission

#83

Post by pagade »

DanBC wrote: post #80
anupshinde wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Generally, I would have simply agreed with what you said. (and what you said is true) But! Stop complaining at this one moment. And take a look at the achievements of this country's people. They don't have world's best food, world-class infrastructure and not enough money to hire world class talent either. Probably they have world-class corruption in the country. How many countries achieve this after having these man…

> How many countries achieve this after having these many "core" problems. It is a great feat! It's confusing to me how India can plan something like this, but cannot fix the problem of buying train tickets. I've heard that the queues can be quite long. But it is exciting to see India sending things into space.

If you meant buying online, the problem was solved long back.. https://www.irctc.co.in/

Believe me the website works and is used by millions..

Queues still remain long due to lack of computer literacy and reach of internet..

Re: Mangalyaan, India’s First Mars Mission

#84

Post by InclinedPlane »

pavs wrote: post #19

Every time India space programs discussion comes out a group of people will bring up India's poverty and other problem that should be fixed instead of investing on space program. I used to be one of those guys (I am from Bangladesh), then I looked at the actual cost of this space program and realized that its not a lot of money (~$70 Million) even by India's standard. For example, in india's domestic cricket tourname…

The irony of those complaints is that programs such as this one have a tremendous positive impact on industry and the economy. Think about what happens when you have a group of engineers and technicians who successfully build, launch, and operate a Mars orbiter. What sort of skills and experience do they acquire, what sort of impact do they have on the industrial base? What do they go on to do later in life?

And think about the proof of Indian engineering and manufacturing that this sort of mission provides. How much more likely are people to buy satellites or launch services from India? Or Indian made aircraft? Or even just consumer goods?

R&D spending often has a multi-fold positive impact on the economy, and I think that is likely to apply for this mission.

Re: Mangalyaan, India’s First Mars Mission

#85

Post by sateesh »

amalag wrote: post #82
sateesh wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> is that space programs everywhere have good luck superstitions, many of them making less sense than a religious ritual. Why so ? How does a religious ritual makes more sense than good luck superstitions ?

Religious rituals are meant to connect with the divine. The idea being they are not inventions of ordinary people. Some created superstition just gives some order in someone's life and is just a shadow of a proper ritual.

You seems to be reasoning that rituals are _not_ inventions of ordinary people where as superstitions are, hence one should give more credence/weight to rituals. My point is rituals are creations of ordinary people, just that they are ceremonious doesn't make them any higher truth.

Re: Mangalyaan, India’s First Mars Mission

#86

Post by anupshinde »

skrish wrote: post #35
kamaal wrote: post #26

Those people claiming ISRO does it at a shoe string budget, because they reuse yes they do. But we are talking of a factor of more 10 here. Let me put facts on ground. Go and visit any ISRO campus in India. See the kind of offices they work in, they kind of food canteens they eat lunch at, they kind of buses they travel in and take a look at how much they are paid. I assure you will be shocked. In fact shocked will b…

I used to stay in a paying guest accomodation during my first job. My roommate was a guy who had just joined ISRO - we graduated same year but from different colleges. And I also had a chance to interact closely with 2 other friends who were working with ISRO at that time (one was a senior in college). His payscale started at Rs.8000 per month (in 2001 that was less than $200usd). He was a production engineer. He wou…

As an organization, ISRO is political and bureaucratic. I have a good "set of friends and family" worked there or working there. There are good people and bad people (projects) there. You must be lucky to get into the right one. The pay scale is not competitive - But its not worse. The perks are really good. i.e Ultimately they get paid a little less than a private cos. The perks from the governments should not be discounted EVER. I work in a private co. which is much better than the Infosys/Wipro/etc s.w co's (also with a relatively much better pay). But I can tell you, ISRO job is better than mine. If I could opt today, I would go to ISRO.

With a little lesser pay, you also get peace of mind. This might not be important at 22s or 25s. But at 30, as a husband and a father, I can surely tell you ISRO gives much better lifestyle. i.e you can work for 2 hours or 16 hours if you enjoy that. Average employee productivity there sucks - literally. But at that non-competitive pay, government should not expect more.

You also have a "safe-job" and lesser work pressure. There are certain projects that are high-pressure jobs - but those are rare.

An important factor to keep you motivate might also be "working for your country". I have worked for large govt. projects for western countries and it give you ZERO sense of pride. It is "just another project". And I worked for a very small system for the transportation in my city. And just that feeling of watching that system being used in my country gives me a hell lot of sense of pride/achievement. I don't know if everybody feels the same way - but that is one of the biggest motivation factors for me (I don't work for ISRO / govt)

Re: Mangalyaan, India’s First Mars Mission

#88

Post by sibinpthomas »

golergka wrote: post #73
kamaal wrote: post #26

Those people claiming ISRO does it at a shoe string budget, because they reuse yes they do. But we are talking of a factor of more 10 here. Let me put facts on ground. Go and visit any ISRO campus in India. See the kind of offices they work in, they kind of food canteens they eat lunch at, they kind of buses they travel in and take a look at how much they are paid. I assure you will be shocked. In fact shocked will b…

Russian space program was in similar conditions for the past 20 years. I have a couple of former classmates who graduated from one of the best math high schools and math universities in Russia, got great grades, won programming competitions and now work as low-level embedded C hackers, writing firmware for space chips. (It seems like the two of them are making every career decision together — they even played wow wit…

I literally LoL reading the 'malloc' and 'calloc'. Those guys are all-caps NERDS...kudos to them.

Re: Mangalyaan, India’s First Mars Mission

#89

Post by discardorama »

vixen99 wrote: post #68
discardorama wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can't really on the one hand claim your country is terribly poor, and needs handouts from other nations, and on the other play at being spacemen. ... and you can't really post on HN without showing some basic common sense. FYI: "International remittances" is NOT foreign aid. It is money sent to India by Indians working abroad. Foreign direct investment is NOT foreign aid. It is non-Indians buying Indian stocks.…

"Thankfully the UK will stop sending foreign aid to India in 2015". You seem to have a problem with this simple wish but perhaps you can explain what it is? Do you think aid should continue (in spite of India's request) or that the UK should stop. BTW we can read negatives without capitalization. Many countries including Britain seem to me to get their priorities wrong. India certainly does when one sees the wretched…

> You seem to have a problem with this simple wish but perhaps you can explain what it is?

My problem is with the assumption that this miniscule amount of "aid" is somehow significant.

Do realize that when countries give "aid", it is often more for domestic reasons. This "aid" comes with all sorts of strings attached, and benefits the donor country more than the recipient.

Case in point: US military aid to Israel comes right back to the US in the form of weapons purchases from Lockheed, Grumman, Boeing, etc. In other countries, donor countries stipulate that the aid be used to purchase things from the donor country only; or expensive "consultants" are hired to manage the aid, depriving any benefit to the recipient.

Re: Mangalyaan, India’s First Mars Mission

#90

Post by gopalv »

skrish wrote: post #35
kamaal wrote: post #26

Those people claiming ISRO does it at a shoe string budget, because they reuse yes they do. But we are talking of a factor of more 10 here. Let me put facts on ground. Go and visit any ISRO campus in India. See the kind of offices they work in, they kind of food canteens they eat lunch at, they kind of buses they travel in and take a look at how much they are paid. I assure you will be shocked. In fact shocked will b…

I used to stay in a paying guest accomodation during my first job. My roommate was a guy who had just joined ISRO - we graduated same year but from different colleges. And I also had a chance to interact closely with 2 other friends who were working with ISRO at that time (one was a senior in college). His payscale started at Rs.8000 per month (in 2001 that was less than $200usd). He was a production engineer. He wou…

For a ridiculous comparison of how cheap/expensive Mangalyaan was

http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=%28425+x+10%5E7+INR%29+...

Not that it matters, but I pay more for my city commute per-km.

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