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SpaceshipTwo crashes shortly after Mojave test flight

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Re: SpaceshipTwo crashes shortly after Mojave test flight

#291

Post by JabavuAdams »

jedmeyers wrote: post #174
7952 wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair space flight has some significant advantages from an environmental perspective. Earth observation satellites are essential for understanding how the atmosphere works and how the planet is changing. Also, the unique constraints of space have lead to the development of sustainable technology such as solar panels, fuel cells, and better water purification.

Who cares? Let's feed the poor first and worry about bigger stuff later. Reminds me of a story about a letter written by Sister Mary Jucunda from Zambia to Dr. Ernst Stuhlinger, then-associate director of science at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center. ( http://www.meaus.com/whyExplore.html )

There are so many structural / societal problems in the way of feeding the poor that it's not a very interesting problem. You would have to re-engineer our society and power-structures.

Better to make incremental progress on poverty, without constraining the innovators to work on problems that don't interest them, or that seem even more intractable than e.g. space travel or AI.

Re: SpaceshipTwo crashes shortly after Mojave test flight

#292

Post by JabavuAdams »

atlantic wrote: post #120
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no reason for everybody to stay home and do housekeeping, then there's a big beautiful universe out there. Dare to dream big!

If we can't even save our own home world, there is every reason to believe that we will do damage elsewhere. That being the case, best to stay home until we grow up a bit.

What is damage? Life is change. Life modifies the environment. The Earth does seem to be the most interesting body in this region of space, but I don't view it as some sacred jewel that should be protected against all change.

Re: SpaceshipTwo crashes shortly after Mojave test flight

#293

Post by JabavuAdams »

atlantic wrote: post #194
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The rest of our solar system is rocks. Hard to do much damage there. Anything we do has to be for the better (oxygen, water, life).

Are you sure? I get the impression we're not very good at recognizing other life forms, or alternative forms of intelligence.

So we kill them. It wouldn't be the first time, and it won't be the last. This is life. Hopefully we'll learn something, except to be paralyzed by fear of doing damage.

Re: SpaceshipTwo crashes shortly after Mojave test flight

#294

Post by JabavuAdams »

Turing_Machine wrote: post #73
mikeash wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instead of living through the greatest mass extinction event in the last few million years, we'd be living in harmony with nature, dying of now-curable injuries, starving to death when times are lean, seeing our mothers and wives and daughters die in childbirth, and living in profound ignorance of the nature of the universe. At least with the mass extinction there are prospects for fixing the problem.

There have been at least five mass extinction events that wiped out over 50% of the species on the planet. Possibly as many as twenty. The Permian-Triassic event supposedly took out 90-96%(!) of all living species.

And yet, here we are. I'm totally okay with causing mass extinction as long as something human-descended comes out the other side.

Re: SpaceshipTwo crashes shortly after Mojave test flight

#295

Post by JabavuAdams »

pessimizer wrote: post #90
atlantic wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is commendable, and is what drives the human race forward. Without these fearless men we wouldn't have gone to the moon. We wouldn't have explored the depths of the ocean. We wouldn't have flown the skies. That's one way of looking at the matter. Another is that without this untrammelled technological evolution (I hesitate to use the word "progress") we wouldn't be living through the greatest mass extinction e…

You're forgetting how cool it would be for rich people to burn a couple hundred thousand to fly in space for two and a half hours. It's clearly the highest expression of the human spirit, and you're a hopeless hater cynic. I wonder what the carbon footprint of space tourism is, and will be if it becomes cheaper and more popular? I feel guilty flying on a plane.

Live a little! It's okay to be human-supremacist. Sheesh. Have neo-cortex, will dominate.

Re: SpaceshipTwo crashes shortly after Mojave test flight

#299

Post by icebraining »

sliverstorm wrote: post #116
x0054 wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a really grate way to sell tickets: "We now know just how careless we can be to limit in flight explosions to just one per year!" You can't use the same attitude that's now common in software startups with space vehicles, or any vehicles for that matter. "Ship now and fix problems later" does not work with real world products, and to be honest, should be avoided in software as well.

That's one of the big ways the private sector cuts costs! Where do you imagine the "fat" that the private sector trims (relative to gov't) comes from? The private sector isn't somehow just better at stuff . It has different motives and different priorities, and makes different compromises.

That's one of the big ways the private sector cuts costs!

Is it? Is there evidence that the private sector is consistently more accident prone that public entities when doing similar activities?

Re: SpaceshipTwo crashes shortly after Mojave test flight

#300

Post by icebraining »

melling wrote: post #175
seanflyon wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you suggesting we send several generations of robots to Mars first? That's a great idea and exactly what we have been doing for decades.

Yeah, didn't we land something there a decade ago? And the decade before that?

And four decades ago: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viking_program
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